Editors at the Washington Examiner lament the negative impact of progressive policy choices.
See if you can figure out what these three news stories have in common.
First, high-profile political efforts to defund and demoralize entire police forces are giving rise to an unlikely anarcho-capitalist trend. Police are retiring or leaving the profession in droves, and their former departments are failing to recruit new officers in many major cities, thanks mostly to the profound antipathy shown toward the police by elected officials. Meanwhile, wealthy people are increasingly hiring their own pricey private security to protect themselves, their possessions, and their businesses. As a result, private security officers now outnumber police by more than 50%.
Second, new cars have become unaffordable for ordinary people, with the national average sales price hitting $48,000. Part of the problem has been a recent chip shortage that made cheaper vehicles less profitable to produce. But even as that problem recedes, high prices are sticking thanks to government policies. …
… Third, green energy policies are making the nation’s electrical grid less reliable, prompting the wealthy to splurge on backup sources of power. The New York Times coverage feebly links generator-hoarding to “extreme weather linked to climate change.” But its own piece unavoidably admitted that “blackouts will hurt more people as Americans buy electric heat pumps and battery-powered cars to replace furnaces and vehicles that burn fossil fuels — a shift essential to limiting climate change.” In other words, the problem is climate change policy, such as electric vehicle mandates and grid-unfriendly alternatives to fossil fuels. …
… If you haven’t figured out the common theme between these three stories, it is that they all demonstrate ways that Democratic policies make the American dream unattainable for an ever-larger number of people. Left-liberals are excluding vast swathes of the population from basic comforts that people have long taken for granted — in these particular cases, personal safety, transportation, and access to reliable, cheap energy.
