The Poor-hosed

You know what’s unfair?  If you’re poor, you’re getting hosed and a lot of it is due to the people in government, sworn to protect you.

This past week, Target announced it was closing nine stores in four states because of the crushing cost of thievery.  Stores will be shuttered in New York, California, Washington State and Oregon.

One of the stores that is closing is in Manhattan, in East Harlem.  Target opened in 2010, and it was a big deal when the well known and successful big box store put down roots in a low-income community. 

A politician who repped that area when the store opened summed it up, saying, “Closing is a problem.  Target was a staple in the neighborhood for many years.  That’s a lot of jobs.  Target provided products that were at a price point important to the community.”

Yup, a big problem.

You know why?  The people in the neighborhoods that need those stores the most are getting a royal screwing.  It was one of the few places in East Harlem where shoppers could go and not overpay.  It was a godsend for the folks in the area to be able to buy quality clothing for their kids at good prices.  They could shop for a wide variety of fresh food, healthy food, instead of bodega bananas and potato chips.  

Target gave people in neighborhood jobs and benefits.  It provided the community with a measure of stability.

As one Target employee told a local news reporter, “Now there’s not gonna be no more Target.  Now what they’re [the thieves} gonna do?”

The progressive legislators and district attorneys have colluded with the thieves and have robbed from the people of East Harlem.  They’ve sacrificed the poor at the alter of their no-bail laws, their Raise the Age laws and their laws that permit perps to swipe whatever they can get their hands on.  

The socialist-progressive politicians and their policies are not helping the poor, they are poisoning the poor.

Target’s CEO Brian Cornell cut to the heart of the matter.  After announcing the closings, he said, “We know that our stores served an important role in their communities, but we can only be successful if the working and shopping environment is safe for all.”

Here’s the cold hard fact.  By taking punishment out of the thieves’ calculations, they were handed a clear shot to grab and go, go, go.

In New York City, the police say 300 people are responsible for 30% of the robberies.  4000 arrests between them and 70% aren’t in jail.  Stealing is the way they make their living.

And now, we’re seeing the outcome.  Stores are losing billions of dollars to shrinkage, the euphemism for theft.  So, they’re closing down and getting out.  Their customers aren’t safe.  Their employees aren’t safe.  

The poorer neighborhoods that needed them the most are left holding the empty shopping bag, and that’s a crying shame.

Let me tell you about another tsunami created by our politicians that’s drowning the low income citizens of our largest cities.  

Devoid of any coherent immigration policy by either party, the asylum seekers keep coming and coming across the southern border. 

As hundreds of thousands of migrants flood New York and other cities, important and vital social services are under enormous economic pressure.  New York’s Mayor Eric Adams estimates the cost to the taxpayers for housing, feeding and caring for the migrants will be $12 billion over three years.  

He’s ordered his already understaffed agencies to prepare to cut spending by an initial 5 percent with more to come if the state and the feds don’t pony up. 

You know what that means.  Programs that support essential workers, social workers, housing, health care will be slashed.

Repairs in public housing will be pushed off.  Scarce affordable housing will become more scarce.  Homelessness will increase.

Public schools, already struggling to provide a plausible education, will be further burdened with immigrant kids that need special attention and pedagogical supplementation to get them up to speed.

The competition for jobs for unskilled workers will intensify.  

The Biden Administration has been a no-show when it comes to helping out the Democrat-run sanctuary cities that are being inundated with immigrants.  No money and no work permits for the newly arrived.

Heck, the president wouldn’t even meet with Mayor Adams when he was in New York last week at the UN.  He could have seen first hand what his border policy has wrought by visiting the venerable Roosevelt Hotel, dubbed the new Ellis Island, that has been converted into an immigrant processing center by the city.  

The urban poor are being squeezed in a vice created by the elected representatives who were supposed to be their allies.  

On the one hand, the centrists have been silenced and the fringe fanatics have pushed us to the precipice by enacting their phoney philosophies.  On the other hand, the pernicious political partisans have put the brakes on the desperate need for a legitimate and productive national debate on immigration reform.

The poorest among us are suffering the most for all this malign behavior.  

We need to reestablish our cities, states and nation to where lawlessness isn’t legalized and where immigration isn’t injuring citizens struggling to survive. 

I think that’s fair, don’t you?