When New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced a few days ago that she would be deploying 1000 members of the National Guard and State police to perform bag checks throughout the New York City subway system, people were perplexed. The theory goes if the Democrats really wanted to make people safer, they would arrest people who commit crimes and put them in jail, and not for five minutes. What a concept!
But, no. The Democrats aren’t serious about stopping crime, but they are experts at gaslighting and distractions. Immediately, critics saw this for what it is – Security Theatre during an election year. Hochul herself confirmed this during an interview on MSNBC saying, “I’m going to demonstrate that Democrats fight crime as well. This narrative that Republicans have said and hijacked the story that we’re soft on crime, that we defund the police — no.”
Talk about the compulsion to confess! There she is on national television, crowing about how this is a partisan demonstration to restore belief in a false Democrat narrative that everything is just fine, and they haven’t decimated police departments in blue cities, especially New York. But if that’s the case, why is she deploying armed troops into the subway?
The situation itself is absurd—a state play-acting that they’re tough on crime by sending the National Guard into the transportation system with no real power to do anything at all. People can decline to have their bag searched and if so, Hochul says they can’t ride the subway. Really? And exactly how will that be enforced? Does she mean for the presence of the National Guard to simply be a deterrent? Possibly. But that’s a dangerous game for a city where a mob of illegal aliens felt free to attack New York City police officers in Times Square.
There are more rational things the state and city could do—like have the transit cops actually ride on the trains, ticket, and arrest bad people who do bad things. Or end the “no bail” rules that allow, and ergo encourage, criminals to keep on victimizing people and society itself.
But adding more transit cops would cost money; money needed for a super-important new NYPD team with which the city cannot live without– the new NYPD Dance Squad. With priorities like this, people can stop wondering why everything is in such disarray.
One could get caught up in the Orwellian nature of the abject malignant stupidity exhibited by our betters, but there’s something very important revealed by this the deployment of the military to re-establish law and order. In 2020, you might recall an opinion piece published by the New York Times by Senator Tom Cotton titled, “Send in the Troops,” wherein he rationally advocated for the use of the military to quell the “orgy of violence,” including the shooting of police officers, murder, arson, and looting, among other heinous acts of violence unfolding in blue cities throughout that summer of 2020.
Mara Gay, an editorial board member of the paper, tweeted at the time, “Running this puts black people in danger. And other Americans standing for our humanity and democracy, too. @nytimes.” Other staffers joined her condemnation, and the paper surrendered whining that the piece “fell short of our standard and should not have been published.” Two well-respected members of the opinion section were then pushed out of their jobs.
Then lo and behold, fast forward to this week of March 2024, when the same Mara Gay and the same New York Times issued an editorial piece embracing Hochul’s mandate of sending the National Guard into the New York subway ostensibly to stop crime.
This week Gay heaped approval on Hochul’s plan to use the military to deal with urban crime. She wrote, “New York City cannot function without a thriving subway…ensuring that the system not only is safe but feels safe is paramount,” noting that Hochul’s decision was “the right one.” In her genuflection to the genius of using the National Guard in this fashion she noted that if this, “can provide even some psychological comfort, nudging additional riders back to the subways, it could help the system become safer.”
From condemning the use of the military to intervene when civilians and police officers were being murdered, businesses destroyed, and the social fabric was being shredded is now okay with deploying the military in a domestic role when it might get “riders back to the subway.” This should tell you everything you need to know about the left and their loudest evangelists.
It’s funny what an election year does to the left when poll numbers offer up the stark reality that Americans are sick and tired of the left’s putrid scheme to pit us against each other while drowning us in a sea of chronic fear. The astonishing poll numbers are so bad, that even the Democrats can’t ignore the fact that their strategy has backfired. Spectacularly.
The only silver lining for us is Joe Biden and his team of marionettists actually did unite Americans as we all watched in disbelief and repulsion as we reject what they are doing to our nation.
Despite the left’s little gaslighting dance, remember their commitment to chronic fear and division remains. There is something quite ghoulish about having facilitated a collapse of law and order through direct policy decisions, knee-capping law enforcement, while essentially ending criminal incarceration and punishment, only to declare that you are going to save the day by sending in the military…as window dressing.
While it seems like a general schizophrenic episode displayed by politicians and the media, the fact is there is a method to this madness. It reveals the fact that they understand what they’ve done, they know it has made our lives worse, that Americans don’t like it, and they need to pretend that they’re doing something about it. But it also provides a glimpse into the decayed mentality that remains committed to a policy of creating and maintaining fear and social chaos simply for the sake of it, and for the power they imagine it will guarantee them.
Normally, November is just a lovely Fall month. But for our country, we now recognize November 2024 provides a unique opportunity for the decent to say enough is enough.
Tammy Bruce, an Independent Conservative, has traversed a unique political journey that reflects her commitment to principles rather than party affiliations. She joined Fox News in 2005 as a Political Contributor, hosting her show “Get Tammy Bruce” on Fox Nation and providing insightful commentary on various issues for the Association for Mature Americans (AMAC).
The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.