As former Barack Obama aide Rahm Emmanuel infamously said, never let a crisis go to waste. Politicians have often used emergencies, real or perceived, and the public clamor for them to “do something”, as opportunities to expand State power. From banking panics leading to the creation of the Federal Reserve, to the 911 attacks leading to the misnamed “Patriot Act”, history has seen similar episodes happen again and again. Now the tragic and government-created epidemic of homelessness along with drug abuse or accidental overdosing on fentanyl, may be playing out the same way.
SF mayor London Breed, she of Covid lockdown policies and ex-girlfriend of “city family” corruption poster boy Mohammed Nuru, is ready and willing to use the coercive power that too many are eager to give her. “'Force is going to have to be a part of it, whether people like it or not,’ Breed said https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/sf-mayor-breed-drug-crisis-arrest-drug-users-18114523.php during a Board of Supervisors meeting last month."
As the SF Chronicle points out in a recent editorial, “The idea is a familiar one: Civil liberties are holding back commonsense solutions, prioritizing human rights over the seemingly more urgent approach of force.”
The article linked above discusses how politicians are pushing conservatorship laws and crackdowns to force people into drug treatment programs and such, even though these programs already cannot accommodate demand. Sadly, I suspect the kind of people who are willing to use State coercion don’t really care what happens to those swept up by such enforcement afterwards, but only about getting them off the streets, out of sight and out of mind.
Love & Liberty,
((( starchild )))