Posted on 03/16/2021 6:55:38 PM PDT by george76
Last June, the city of Portland, Oregon, hopped on the “defund the police” bandwagon. Now, it is flooded with gun violence, and the mayor is already backtracking from his support for the cuts.
Mayor Ted Wheeler has requested $2 million in emergency funding for the police department, pointing directly to the surge in gun violence. At this point last year, Portland had seen just one homicide. This year, that number is 20, with 208 shootings in the city so far.
Wheeler backed the Portland City Council’s decision to cut $15 million from the police budget last June, which included disbanding police units that investigate gun violence. Predictably, that move backfired in a city that saw 100 consecutive days of violent rioting last year.
Riots are back once again in the city, thanks to Wheeler’s spinelessness. Rioters have once again targeted a federal courthouse in the city, a reprise of the violent storming of the courthouse last July. In June, it was reported that the city lost around $24 million due to the riots. Damage to federal buildings totals roughly $2.3 million.
Portland, like Minneapolis, doesn’t have and never did have an overpolicing problem. The city has an underpolicing problem, compounded by cowardly city leaders who pander to anti-police activists. Portland city leaders, just like their Minneapolis counterparts, humored these leftist ideologues while turning a blind eye to riots. Now, they reap the whirlwind in the form of a surge in violent crime.
And this is Portland, so there is no Republican to blame for this issue. Wheeler is a Democrat. So are the city council members, with one independent who was endorsed by the council’s Democratic members. Gov. Kate Brown, who said that former President Donald Trump was “provoking confrontation for political purposes” by protecting the courthouse, is a Democrat. So is President Biden, who currently has federal agents trying to protect the courthouse.
Nor is there any plausible way to blame the availability of guns in Oregon or in neighboring states. Guns are exactly as available today as they were before this 2,000% surge in murders.
This is what happens when people who are tasked with actually running a city embrace ridiculous ideologies to please activists. I would say that Portland residents deserve better, but this is the leadership they chose for their city. Given the failures of Wheeler and the city council to this point, the voters are the only ones who can change course.
If the 2020 election is any indication, it won’t be happening any time soon.
No worries, Democrat Portland voters.
Just hold hands and sing Kumbaya.
They got what they wanted. No more mean tweets from the bad orange man. Now F off and enjoy the consequences, though I am sure the dems will shower them with our taxdollars
Just as long as the dumb azz liberals stay there...who really cares?
Imagine that.
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
H. L. Mencken
Still more room to cut, still more people to kill.
The Left is not done creating utopia yet.
I wonder how much the cowardly city leaders of Portland, Seattle, etc, got paid for their Soros compliance?
An increase from 1 to 20 is a 1900% increase, not 2000%.
No sympathy here. They only have themselves to blame. Defund the police, suffer the consequences.
Don't give it to him, stupid should hurt, extreme stupid should hurt extremely. Might be a "teachable moment" as those dip$#!+s say.
Have to love liberals.
Stupid people elect stupid people.
This is a very common error made by news personalities of all types.
Time for a Somali Peacekeeping Force or maybe more social workers. I have no sympathy for the people of Portland. The problem is that these fools are now running the U.S.
Why can’t it go up higher, so the world is spared of Portland’s stupidity?
” a 2,000% surge in murders “
And how much of a surge in unsolved murders?
If the “justice system” will not do it’s job- it’s one job- then it will not be respected.
“Math is not their strong suit apparently.”
They came up with millions who “magically” appeared to have voted for Dementia Joe, so fantasy math is really strong on the left s/
Ahhh, the land of rich old sodomites hooking up with little boys on crystal meth and drive-by sexual assault by NBA billionaire owners. Literally the land of ‘Rape and ‘Honey’... also the whitest metropolis in this country.
There is one brave journalist out there, Pulitzer Prize Winner Nigel Jaquiss. Not a conservative by any means but he has really brought attention to things otherwise we’re not gonna see covered like Mark Cuban digit/finger rape/sexual assault of a girl against her will after a Portland trailblazer game when she had just asked for a photograph with him and her boyfriend:
His coverage of former OR governor Neil Goldscmidt (was in Carter’s cabinet afterword until this controversy derailed his ambitions) continued rape of a 14 year old neighbor is incredibly illuminating in terms of the damage done. On the macabre level, an easy 9.5. I’ve never read anything more depressing in my life.
https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/nigel-jaquiss
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