An Idaho City Wrestles With a Woke Approach to Crime

The Magic Valley’s 14 liberals won’t like it, but the people recently arrested in connection with a string of shootings in Twin Falls aren’t named Smith or Jones.  Arrest reports are factual.  And while Anglos still commit the majority of crimes, it’s a fair question to ask if some of the gunplay is related to Latin gangs.  You can bury your head in the sand and take a woke approach, but a lot of your neighbors are asking some questions and looking for answers.

As Britain’s Conservative Party learned, you can only gaslight people for so long.  When they find circumstances that directly impact their daily lives, they’re going to be angry.  In Britain, the government pledged to reduce migration.  When it increased exponentially, the people who complained were villainized as racist.

Our situation is different, only in the sense we’re a much smaller population sample.  For the past couple of years, the city government has avoided suggestions buses were dropping off hordes of newcomers on our streets.  The public wants to know what’s going on, and a lot of people in government look uncomfortable when you bring up the subject.  But if you’re ducking bullets when you’re buying a sandwich at Chick-fil-A, you aren’t interested in elected officeholders spouting politically correct claptrap.

I can probably survive being labeled a bigot.  Bullets?  I’m not so sure.

I’m told city police are developing new plans to combat loitering on some streets, but the cops can’t be everywhere.  I guess that some of you have some ideas on how to restore some calm.  I gather your members of the city council are seeking public input.

Britain’s Conservative Party may never recover.  The party of Disraeli, Churchill, and Thatcher was destroyed because it neglected its voters for too long.  There’s a lesson in that story for all governments, great and small.

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