America is being gaslighted.
We’re being told that we should live in fear.
Are you ready to accept that?
I’m not.
My home is a short drive from the center of Washington D.C. and not a day goes by that I do not worry about rising crime. Our young daughter goes to a playgroup in a city park that I may stop attending because of an alarming rise in carjackings.
It’s my worst nightmare that a thug steals my SUV with my toddler helplessly strapped to her car seat inside.
Last week, my hairstylist was carjacked in broad daylight right outside of her salon. As she was unloading her trunk, a group of men pulled up, one jumped into the front seat of her vehicle and took off.
When she called the police at 10am, she was told her incident was the fourth carjacking that morning.
My mother-in-law is a Washington Nationals baseball season ticket owner and for the first time off-duty D.C. police officers may be hired to patrol local sports venues. I now worry about her every time she goes to a game.
Is this the new normal?
Apparently, yes, according to Democrats running the nation’s cities. What a sorry state of the country.
However well-justified my fears are, they pale in comparison to what millions of other Americans, with far few options than I, face every single day.
For a moment, put yourself in the shoes of 20-year-old Ashley and 22-year-old DJ. They’re an out-of-town couple, who were shopping in downtown Chicago this past Saturday night.
After stepping out of Nordstrom, they were looking for a place to eat. It was a perfectly ordinary evening. Then everything spiraled wildly out of control.
They were surrounded by a mob of up to 100 teenagers.
‘They said they were going to kill us,’ remembered Ashley (above, right). ‘They turned around and started fighting. I got pushed down to the ground and the whole group went to DJ and not to me.’
‘They said they were going to kill us,’ remembered Ashley. ‘They turned around and started fighting. I got pushed down to the ground and the whole group went to DJ and not to me.’
By now you may have seen the video of the attack. It’s terrifying. Ashley shrieks as the crowd swallows her up. Her head dips below the bodies. Her attackers jostle with each other, frantic to get in their punch.
It’s one of many stories. Over the weekend, it was absolute mayhem in Chicago.
Hundreds of young people flooded the city’s iconic shopping district. Stores were looted and vandalized. Windows were smashed. Traffic was blocked. Tourists were terrified.
Two teen boys were shot. One man was reportedly beaten as he sat in the driver’s seat of his car after his windshield was smashed in.
At this point in the decline of America’s cities, I don’t expect city leaders to be appalled.
Those days are long gone.
Mob violence is a regular occurrence in this once great city. And predictably, there were few demands for arrests and accountability for those literally destroying their own community.
America is being gaslight. We’re being told that we should live in fear. Are you ready to accept that? I’m not. (Pictured: Car torched in downtown Chicago on April 15)
Chaotic scenes unfold in Downton Chicago as a mob runs wild
In America today, violence, destruction, and nihilism is accepted. It’s the new normal.
‘Here’s the thing,’ outgoing Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot told reporters on Monday, long after the full picture of the chaos was clear. ‘The vast majority of the young people that came downtown came downtown because it was great weather and an opportunity to enjoy the city… I’m not going to use your language, which I think is wrong, to say that it was mayhem.’
Nothing to see her, folks. Just move along.
Even worse — the response of Illinois State Senator Robert Peters. He didn’t only ignore the vandalism, beatings and shootings – he outright justified it.
‘I would look at the behavior of young people as a political act and statement,’ Peters tweeted Sunday. ‘It’s a mass protest against poverty and segregation.’
Arguably, the most troubling reaction of all came from Chicago Mayor-Elect Brandon Johnson. He makes clear that nothing is going to change in the Windy City.
‘In no way do I condone the destructive activity we saw in the Loop and lakefront this weekend. It is unacceptable and has no place in our city,’ he hedged – a reliable signal that what comes next is going to be bad.
‘However,’ he wrote, ‘it is not constructive to demonize youth who have otherwise been starved of opportunities in their own communities.’
Let’s be clear, no one is demonizing law-abiding teens. They are pleading for basic safety. But in Chicago and across America – that’s too much to ask.
Frankly, if you’re shocked by these reactions – you haven’t been paying attention.
The summer of 2020 was my red pill event. It was the moment that I recognized a paradigm shift in our country. As mobs and criminals exploited justified outrage over the murder of George Floyd to loot and riot – the left defended them.
I watched and listening to all of this and felt helpless. I was disgusted when the neighborhoods of innocent Americans were destroyed. But anyone who objected to this outpouring of anger was labeled a racist.
Recall Congresswoman Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez in July 2020 blaming spiking New York City crime on economic desperation.
‘They need to feed their child and they don’t have money, so they feel like they either need to shoplift some bread or go hungry,’ she said in a virtual town hall.
Of course, shoplifting doesn’t explain a reported 130% spike in shootings year over year. But that didn’t matter to AOC.
‘Do we think this has to do with the fact that there’s record unemployment in the United States right now?’ she said.
Arguably, the most troubling reaction of all came from Chicago Mayor-Elect Brandon Johnson. He makes clear that nothing is going to change in the Windy City.
‘Here’s the thing,’ outgoing Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (pictured) told reporters on Monday, long after the full picture of the chaos was clear. ‘The vast majority of the young people that came downtown came downtown because it was great weather and an opportunity to enjoy the city… I’m not going to use your language, which I think is wrong, to say that it was mayhem.’
Well, Alexandra, how do you rationalize crime today? Unemployment is at its lowest rates in American history. I’m sure she’ll find another excuse, because these far-left lunatics capitalize on the destruction.
To them, crime is not the result of lawlessness. It’s the result of social ills. When they blame shootings on unemployment they skirt the blame, they let themselves off the hook.
The irony is lost on no one that Chicago has been ruled by Democrats for decades, yet it only continues to circle the drain. Maybe they’re to blame?
Now, nearly three years after the BLM Summer of 2020, our society has deteriorated even further. Maybe most sickeningly of all, the people that Lori Lightfoot, Brandon Johnson and AOC claim to represent are bearing the brunt of it.
Sadly, it’s not just Chicago. It’s Los Angeles, it’s New York City, it’s Washington D.C., it’s Detroit, it’s St. Louis, it’s Baltimore… When will these thoughtless politicians and the voters who put them in office learn? At this rate, maybe never.
And while I will hold on to city living for as long as I can, I will not put my family at risk. If Washington, D.C. continues getting worse – the McCain’s will leave.
We will be ok. But where will that leave our fellow Washingtonians? Some can’t flee the chaos.
As people like me escape, the decline of cities will only accelerate.
So, will I accept living in fear?
The answer is ‘no’.
But I’m one of the lucky ones.
