NY Times Kristof (3/3): Liberal state policies hurting Blacks more

By Taxpayers Association of Oregon
OregonWatchdog.com

New York Times columnist, Pulitzer Prize winner, and former 2022 Oregon Democrat Governor candidate, Nick Kristoff, wrote a scathing article on Oregon and California’s (West Coast states) failures.

Nick Kristoff, wrote,

“Consider a volunteer group called the Portland Freedom Fund that was set up to pay bail for people of color. The organization raised money from well-intentioned liberal donors, and the underlying problems were real: Bail requirements hit poor people hard. In 2022, the Portland Freedom Fund helped a Black man named Mohamed Adan who had been arrested after allegedly strangling his former girlfriend, holding a gun to her head and then — in violation of a restraining order — cutting off his G.P.S. monitor and entering her building. “He told me that he would kill me,” the former girlfriend, Rachael Abraham, warned. The Freedom Fund paid Adan’s bail, and he walked out of jail. A week later, Adan allegedly removed his G.P.S. monitor again and entered Abraham’s home. The police found Abraham’s body drenched in blood with a large knife nearby; three children were also in the house. Adan was charged with murder — no bail this time — and the incident prompted soul-searching in Portland. But perhaps not enough. A well-meaning effort to help people of color may have cost the life of a woman of color.”

” One of the passions of the left, drawing partly on Ibram X. Kendi’s book “How to Be an Antiracist,” has been that if a policy leads to racial inequity, then it’s racist even if it wasn’t meant to be. But by that standard, West Coast progressivism abounds in racism.We in the West impeded home construction in ways that made cities unaffordable, especially for people of color. We let increasing numbers of people struggle with homelessness, particularly Black and brown people. Black people in Portland are also murdered at higher rates than in cities more notorious for violence, and Seattle and Portland have some of the greatest racial disparities in arrests in the country.”

OUR COMMENT: Liberal leaders said defund Portland police to HELP minorities in 2020 and they did. It caused the nation’s greatest increase in homicide at that time and those most killed were minorities.   Liberals raise taxes to help minorities and end up crushing small business that employs minorities and is run by minorities.

OUR COMMENT:Here is example of how then-Governor Brown early released a twice-felon who went on to be charged as a serial killer:

OUR COMMENT:This criminal was released early and began raiding stores within months of being released.

OUR COMMENT: This is a different example on how laws passed to help minorities end up hurting them as Oregon has both some of the lowest graduation rates and test scores with minorities leading the decline.

Kristof further said,

“I don’t actually agree with Kendi. I think intentions and framing can matter, but it’s absolutely true that good intentions are not enough. What matters is improving opportunities and quality of life, and the best path to do that is a relentless empiricism — which clashes with the West Coast’s indifference to the laws of economics. ..Public sector efforts to build housing are often ruinously expensive, with “affordable housing” sometimes costing more than $1 million per unit, so the private sector is critical. Yet one element of progressive purity is suspicion of the private sector, and this hobbles efforts to make businesses part of the solution. Business owners who earn an income from their company are effectively barred from serving on the Portland City Council.”

OUR COMMENT: So true, liberals demonize businesses and their concerns.  We once did this meme:

NOTE: Kristof would explain in his article that the issue is West Coast liberalism as opposed to liberal practiced in other states, and say that Republican states fare must worse on average.  We encourage you to read his full article and support journalists via subscribership if you find that you like their writings and wish to hear from their more.

NY Times Kristof (1/3): All gone wrong when we’re in charge

NY Times Kristof (2/3): Top liberal donors feared for their catalytic converters