Rampant crime. Our economy – all our livelihoods – on the brink.
Like so many of you, these are my top concerns.
Care to guess who I’m backing?
It takes a lot to lose the female vote in our post-Roe era, but here we are. And the Dems have no one to blame but themselves.
I don’t normally vote red. But I’m hardly alone in my apostasy this election cycle.
In fact, I suspect this election will resemble the shock of Trump in 2016 — at least in New York, where I live. I think many people who usually vote Democrat are likely not telling pollsters, or friends or family, that for the first time they feel no other option than to vote Republican.
There’s a sense of desperation, chaos and a palpable desire for change.
But Democrats don’t seem to be listening.
Normalcy and rationalism, those longed-for conditions that Joe Biden promised to restore to us post-Trump, remain missing in action
‘I don’t know why that’s so important to you.’ The minute Kathy Hochul said that, in response to challenger Lee Zeldin’s concerns about crime — during the lone debate she deigned to grant — her willful obtuseness, her sheer out-of-touch-liberal-elitism, became irrefutable, insufferable and intolerable.
Dems and their cohorts in the mainstream media have elevated woke orthodoxy and so-called criminal justice reform to the top of their agenda.
Meanwhile the average working American — once the heart of the party — worries about violent crime, soaring inflation, undocumented migrants, the infiltration of critical race theory and all manner of sexual and gender ideologies on kindergarteners and, here in New York City, the elimination of gifted and talented programs and merit-based acceptances to elite high schools, in a misguided pursuit of equity.
Rampant crime. Our economy – all our livelihoods – on the brink. Like so many of you, these are my top concerns. Care to guess who I’m backing?
Normalcy and rationalism, those longed-for conditions that Joe Biden promised to restore to us post-Trump, remain missing in action.
And for every Democrat who insists that this is the most consequential election ever — well, we’ve all heard that before. Seriously: how many times can we be told the sky is falling?
Now the Dems are sounding an even greater alarm: If we don’t vote for them, our democracy probably won’t survive. That’s right — according to them, this will be our last free and fair election ever.
Does this not sound like a stick-up? Vote for us or America gets it right between the eyes!
This is a garbage threat. Aside from true believers on the far left, no one’s falling for this Jedi-mind trick — coercing votes by threatening the end of voting.
Hey, progressive fabulists — the average American will never get to say how insulting they find this to your face. But that’s what the voting booth is for.
This election is a call to action.
There’s a sense of desperation, chaos and a palpable desire for change. But Democrats don’t seem to be listening
Voters gaslit by a party that insists the economy’s going gangbusters, that COVID is still an emergency, that the cops are the bad guys, and that all that crime they fear is in their heads – they are about to send a very clear message.
They’re sick of hearing that if they’re voting Republican, they’re too stupid to understand the issues. (See Hillary Clinton last week on Joy Reid’s MSNBC show… the women of The View… any given op-ed in The New York Times.)
Here in New York, with one day to go before the election, Hochul said that Zeldin was ‘fear-mongering,’ on crime, ‘hyperventilating, trying to scare people for months, and all New Yorkers are on to it.’
No, Kathy: All New Yorkers are on to you. Hours before she made that brazen dismissal, a man was stabbed on the subway while trying to protect a female rider from being harassed.
And hours before Hochul held a ‘New York Women Vote’ rally at Barnard College with Hillary and Kamala Harris last week, a woman was attacked in Hudson River Park, raped in broad daylight so brutally that several bones in her neck were broken.
This is an ostensibly safe, clean park in one of the city’s wealthiest neighborhoods. The alleged attacker has 25 priors, including two other sexual assaults.
As a ‘New York Woman’ who votes, that attack solidified my decision.
Voters gaslit by a party that insists the economy’s going gangbusters, that COVID is still an emergency, that the cops are the bad guys, and that all that crime they fear is in their heads – they are about to send a very clear message
Criminals here have never been so brazen. They plunder and pillage and terrorize like they own this city, because they do.
Why? New York’s feckless, ultra-woke district attorney, Alvin Bragg, refuses to prosecute offenders or seek bail. Felonies aren’t felonies anymore; they’re misdemeanors.
We’re meant to pity the criminals, not the victims.
No case better exemplified this upside-down approach than Bragg’s decision to charge a hardworking bodega owner with murder for defending himself from an ex-convict — who did time for assaulting a police officer — attacking him over a bag of potato chips.
There was surveillance video and images. New Yorkers saw this. And we were outraged — for the bodega owner. It was only after a group effort from New York’s fellow bodega owners and a drumbeat of media criticism that Bragg reversed his decision.
But not before that man, Jose Alba, 61 years old, spent five days at Rikers, held on bail he couldn’t possibly afford: $250,000.
That says it all.
It’s but one example of New York City’s delicate, simpering approach to our most violent repeat offenders: So sorry to have bothered you — please accept our apologies and enjoy the rest of your day!
If Democrats had shown a modicum of humility — if the party had said yes, we got it wrong, we over-corrected and we get it, we hear you, you’re right, we feel your pain — maybe they would have had a chance
Not since Bill de Blasio have New Yorkers wanted to see the backs of two people more: Bragg and Hochul. But our governor, much like our erstwhile mayor, is incapable of reading the room.
Here was Hochul on MSNBC the other day, after host Stephanie Ruhle broke ranks and told the governor that New Yorkers don’t feel safe: Hochul pivoted to her quick action in addressing an uptick in catalytic converter thefts.
I kid you not.
She questioned why anyone would blame Alvin Bragg for the state of this once-great city.
‘I’m not sure how firing one district attorney in one borough in New York is going to deal with the crime issue,’ she said.
Zeldin has pledged to declare a state of emergency on Day One and to fire Alvin Bragg.
This isn’t just New York. Major cities under Democratic leadership are seeing a surge in homelessness, the mentally ill, filth and decay, and violent crime. Just look at L.A., bastion of West Coast celebrity liberalism: Everyone from Kim Kardashian to Gwyneth Paltrow to Chris Pratt to Snoop Dogg to no less a liberal scion than Maria Shriver are publicly backing GOP mayoral candidate Rick Caruso.
‘Los Angeles needs someone totally focused on its present & its future,’ Shriver tweeted in April. ‘Someone who knows how to bring people from all professions and walks of life together to build a thriving, affordable, safe city.’
That’s all people want. It’s not a big ask.
If Democrats had shown a modicum of humility — if the party had said yes, we got it wrong, we over-corrected and we get it, we hear you, you’re right, we feel your pain — maybe they would have had a chance.
But that chance is gone. A grown-up learning experience is in order.
Ignore the voters — the people who hire and fire — at your peril.