Blue City State Schadenfreude - Elections have Consequences

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member

Portland's Predictable Doom Loop



At one time not so long ago, Portland leaders turned the sleepy town into a progressive hub for the creative class, spending billions on 19th-century light rail Choo Choo trains to convey bus riders to their planned utopia. The more the plans failed, the more the planners planned, as Ronald Reagan once said. Because of the hard hand of the planner class, a corrupt system of regulatory capture, and the certitude of those who know better than we do how to run our lives, Portland leaders never really stopped to consider if anyone wanted what they were selling. They went on blithely singing kumbaya and giddily handed the match to the activist left, which lit the Molotov cocktail that sparked the city’s self-immolation.

Now these leaders have regulated, locked down, and scared away a third of the downtown office buildings. When San Francisco hit this marker it was called a “doom loop.”

“Referred to as ‘death lists’ among real estate professionals, the documents outline properties that are economically unsustainable,” according to The Real Deal. These buildings are troubled assets that are in danger of defaulting on loans and handing them over to the bank.

Willamette Week, the city’s lefty weekly, which did the digging to find out how bad this problem is, concludes that Portland is worse off than other Democrat cities on the doom loop roller coaster because of its Antifa and BLM riots.

The question—and it’s a contentious one—is whether Portland is worse than any place else because of blight. Plywood that went up during the 2020 protests still obscures some downtown storefronts. Homeless camps that took root during the pandemic are only now being removed. On some downtown blocks, you’re just as likely to see someone smoking fentanyl as sipping a Frappuccino.
 

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member

Crime-ridden liberal cities have a new favorite scapegoat: Automakers



Other cities have already filed lawsuits against Kia and Hyundai over a rise in vehicle thefts, including New York City, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Cleveland, Baltimore, Seattle, San Diego and St. Louis, as well as Columbus, Ohio, and Memphis, Tenn.

A federal judge earlier this month declined to approve a $200 million class-action lawsuit settlement from the automobile manufacturers to cover about 9 million vehicles with model years ranging from 2011-2022, according to The Associated Press.

The vehicles produced during that time period do not feature push-button ignitions and anti-theft devices, which allows thieves to easily steal the cars with just a screwdriver and a USB cord. Some major automobile insurers have even refused to issue policies in some areas for owners of Hyundai and Kia models that they deem too easy to steal.

When rejecting the $200 million settlement, U.S. District Judge James Selna said the deal failed to provide "fair and adequate" relief to automobile owners. The settlement’s rejection came after the attorneys general of six states and the District of Columbia urged the judge to require the automobile manufacturers to install anti-theft technology in all theft-prone vehicles, possibly in combination with a buyback program.
 

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member
🔥 Next, some news from the controlled demolition of San Fransisco, in two recent New York Post headlines.

First, from August 25th (last Friday):

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Guess how many of the people who looted the San Fransisco Nordstrom location have been arrested? I’ll give you a hint: fewer people than were arrested for San Fransisco mask violations. Actually, it was zero. Zero arrests.

Next, four days later, yesterday’s headline (Monday):

image 8.png

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A sad day indeed. And not just because the San Fransisco store was considered Nordstrom’s “flagship” store and had been operating for 35 years.

Why don’t they just rip off the band aid and go ahead and make shoplifting legal in California?

The good news is Nordstrom’s departure will depress real estate prices even more, allowing oligarchs a chance to buy the insanely-valuable downtown properties up for pennies on the dollar, after which the City can suddenly begin prosecuting its brownshirts, I mean criminals, again. It’s like Lahaina, except slower.

But wait! There’s a ready solution to all this crime that’s destroying our once-grand cities! Smart cities. Or Fifteen-minute cities, or whatever you call it. Where everything you need is located right where you live, right in your own high-rise prison, I mean skyscraper.

Who wants to bet we’ll be hearing about turning San Fransisco into a smart city soon?



 

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member

16-Year-Old Girl Stabbed To Death Fighting Over McDonald’s Sauce



At 2:00 a.m. ET Sunday morning, the teenager reportedly got into an argument with another 16-year-old girl outside of a McDonald’s near the popular U Street area of the nation’s capital. The victim allegedly began attacking the suspect before walking away. Then, according to security camera footage, the suspect allegedly lunged at the now-deceased girl and stabbed her to death. It’s unclear what exactly started the argument, but a D.C. detective testified in court that it began over sweet-and-sour sauce, The Washington Post reported.

“At the end of the day, someone is dead over a dispute over sauce,” D.C. Superior Court Judge Sherri Beatty-Arthur said in court Monday.

The suspect was charged with second-degree murder while armed and pleaded “not involved” on Monday. Per the Post, the prosecutor in the case said that the suspect is the only individual “who brought a knife to a fistfight.”






 

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member
Naima Liggon, of Waldorf, Maryland, was allegedly killed by another 16-year-old girl outside the fast food chain in a popular nightlife section of the city around 2 a.m., the Metropolitan Police said.

The deadly knife attack stemmed from an argument over the nugget dipping sauce between the teens and a third girl, Detective Brendan Jasper testified in court Monday, according to the Washington Post.

The verbal dispute turned physical as Liggon and the third girl hit the teenage suspect, who did not initially fight back, outside the restaurant near U Street NW, Jasper told the court, citing security footage.

The 16-year-old instead “lunged” at Liggon and the third teen as they tried to get into a vehicle, the detective testified.

The suspect allegedly stabbed Liggon in the chest and abdomen with a 7-and-a-half-inch pocketknife, he said. The girl was rushed to the hospital by private means but could not be saved.


 

Kyle

Beloved Misanthrope
PREMO Member
WTF? Killed over Chicken Nugget sauce?


Chick Fil-A sauce, I can maybe understand.... Even Burger Kings Zesty, but Mickey-Ds? :ohwell:
 

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member

Pandemic-era migration cost D.C. more than $1 billion

https://www.axios.com/local/washington-dc/authors/cdil

Migration during the pandemic resulted in Washington, D.C., losing $1.6 billion in taxable income between 2020 and 2021, a 7.6% drop — in line with other big cities that lost residents to cheaper locales during the same time period.

Why it matters: A new analysis of tax data by the D.C.-based Economic Innovation Group quantifies the reasons some of America's biggest cities are struggling to rebuild their economies post-pandemic, writes Axios' Neil Irwin.

Zoom in: In some cities — including Washington, D.C. — income taxes are a major source of municipal revenue

The big picture: When millions of Americans rethought their living situations during the pandemic, their moves changed the geography of where money is made in the United States.

  • The data shows a surge in income arrived in many rural and exurban places and in popular vacation destinations.
  • Not only did residents leave the biggest cities, but those who left disproportionately had high incomes, meaning the hit to those local economies was larger than migration numbers alone would imply.
By the numbers: The flight occurred across the Washington region. In Arlington County, out-migration caused an 8.2% drop in adjusted gross income from 2020 to 2021. That totaled $845.4 million.

  • Affluent Fairfax County had a smaller proportional drop of 2.3%, but the loss amounted to $1.2 billion.
  • Montgomery County saw a 1.6% drop equaling $705 million, and Prince George's County had a 2.6% drop that added up to $527 million.
 

Hijinx

Well-Known Member
16 years old on U st. in NW Washington DC at 2 AM in the morning.

We wonder what is wrong with these kids?
What is wrong is parents who have no idea where the heck their children are at 2AM.
 

Clem72

Well-Known Member
Naima Liggon, of Waldorf, Maryland, was allegedly killed by another 16-year-old girl outside the fast food chain in a popular nightlife section of the city around 2 a.m., the Metropolitan Police said.

The deadly knife attack stemmed from an argument over the nugget dipping sauce between the teens and a third girl, Detective Brendan Jasper testified in court Monday, according to the Washington Post.

The verbal dispute turned physical as Liggon and the third girl hit the teenage suspect, who did not initially fight back, outside the restaurant near U Street NW, Jasper told the court, citing security footage.

The 16-year-old instead “lunged” at Liggon and the third teen as they tried to get into a vehicle, the detective testified.

The suspect allegedly stabbed Liggon in the chest and abdomen with a 7-and-a-half-inch pocketknife, he said. The girl was rushed to the hospital by private means but could not be saved.


Senseless. Imagine going to jail for life because of nugget sauce.

I mean maybe if it was szechuan, but not sweet and sour.
 

Clem72

Well-Known Member
If I was a tv reporter, I would be asking the dead 16 yr olds Waldorf parents the question.
Why was your 16 yr old in DC at 2am?
I was going to say, isn't it obvious. The Waldorf McDonald's closes at 11pm. Except Google tells me they have 3 Micky D's and one is 24 hours while another stays open until 4am.
 

black dog

Free America
I was going to say, isn't it obvious. The Waldorf McDonald's closes at 11pm. Except Google tells me they have 3 Micky D's and one is 24 hours while another stays open until 4am.
Why would it be obvious? I don't know this family.
All of the McD's out here along the highways are 24-7-365
If they can get business, they will be open.
 

Clem72

Well-Known Member
Why would it be obvious?
It was a joke, let me set it up.

Child dies far away from home at 2am fighting over mcnugget dipping sauce.

Reasonable question is asked, "why were they in DC at 2am"

Perfect joke, "Obviously, because the Waldorf McDonald's closes at 11pm".
-----

It's funny, because obviously that was not the intent of the question (why are your kids running around unsupervised late at night).
 
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