Walmart Closing Portland Stores

[RiverDog]

Yeah, I know, the Washington Examiner is a conservative rag that promotes almost exclusively conservative takes. But this editorial is spot on:

Residents in Portland, Oregon, have continued to learn the hard way that the soft-on-crime approach they permitted their leaders to institute has consequences as businesses continue to depart the city.

Walmart is closing its last two locations in Portland just months after CEO Doug McMillon warned that rampant thefts would lead the company to raise prices or close stores in some locations. Residents in the neighborhoods of those two locations will have to shop elsewhere, and 580 employees will also be affected by the closures.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opin ... e-policies

To be fair, Walmart's official statement regarding the store closures did not mention crime as being one of the reasons, but it's almost certainly one of if not the major factor as it directly impacts their profit. And they're not the only business in the Rose City that has thrown up their hands and closed. Additionally, city leaders appear to have gotten the message as they're finally cracking down on at least some of the crime that's been causing businesses to leave:

Portland police are now finally taking this seriously. Officers are conducting anti-shoplifting “blitzes,” arresting 64 people in a December operation that led to 10 stolen vehicles being recovered alongside three firearms and almost $9,000 in stolen merchandise. A February operation led to another 40 arrests, with officers recovering $2,000 in merchandise and handing out 32 felony charges and 28 misdemeanors. Another of these operations was carried out on Sunday.

But the damage done by years of enabling criminals to do what they like can’t be erased so easily. Walmart is leaving, joining over 2,500 downtown businesses that moved out since 2019. The city has burned the trust of business owners and must now begin the long process of rebuilding that trust. Portland is now associated with riots, homelessness, and rampant thefts, and it will be for years to come. With fewer options for both shopping and employment, Portland residents will (quite literally) be paying the price.

Closing the barn door after the horses got out is an appropriate analogy. Businesses pay taxes, and fewer businesses means less revenue for the city and fewer resources for police and projects designed to address the homeless problem.

And Portland isn't the only city suffering from rampant crime and homelessness. Chicago's once popular mayor recently got soundly beaten in a recent election, primarily due to the state of crime and homelessness within their city.

Is it fair to blame liberal Democrats for the state of the big cities they manage? I certainly don't hear anyone talking about defunding the police anymore.

[mykc14]

Yeah, I know, the Washington Examiner is a conservative rag that promotes almost exclusively conservative takes. But this editorial is spot on:

Residents in Portland, Oregon, have continued to learn the hard way that the soft-on-crime approach they permitted their leaders to institute has consequences as businesses continue to depart the city.

Walmart is closing its last two locations in Portland just months after CEO Doug McMillon warned that rampant thefts would lead the company to raise prices or close stores in some locations. Residents in the neighborhoods of those two locations will have to shop elsewhere, and 580 employees will also be affected by the closures.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opin ... e-policies

To be fair, Walmart's official statement regarding the store closures did not mention crime as being one of the reasons, but it's almost certainly one of if not the major factor as it directly impacts their profit. And they're not the only business in the Rose City that has thrown up their hands and closed. Additionally, city leaders appear to have gotten the message as they're finally cracking down on at least some of the crime that's been causing businesses to leave:

Portland police are now finally taking this seriously. Officers are conducting anti-shoplifting “blitzes,” arresting 64 people in a December operation that led to 10 stolen vehicles being recovered alongside three firearms and almost $9,000 in stolen merchandise. A February operation led to another 40 arrests, with officers recovering $2,000 in merchandise and handing out 32 felony charges and 28 misdemeanors. Another of these operations was carried out on Sunday.

But the damage done by years of enabling criminals to do what they like can’t be erased so easily. Walmart is leaving, joining over 2,500 downtown businesses that moved out since 2019. The city has burned the trust of business owners and must now begin the long process of rebuilding that trust. Portland is now associated with riots, homelessness, and rampant thefts, and it will be for years to come. With fewer options for both shopping and employment, Portland residents will (quite literally) be paying the price.

Closing the barn door after the horses got out is an appropriate analogy. Businesses pay taxes, and fewer businesses means less revenue for the city and fewer resources for police and projects designed to address the homeless problem.

And Portland isn't the only city suffering from rampant crime and homelessness. Chicago's once popular mayor recently got soundly beaten in a recent election, primarily due to the state of crime and homelessness within their city.

Is it fair to blame liberal Democrats for the state of the big cities they manage? I certainly don't hear anyone talking about defunding the police anymore.

Yeah it is fair to blame liberal democrats. Defunding the police and the whole BLM movement and CRT are actually taking us backwards in our steps towards equality/equity. Liberal ran cities are crumbling with Portland, San Fran, and Seattle among the worst. The rate at which these once beautiful cities have fallen apart is extremely alarming. Hopefully they wake up and look at real, lasting solutions to the drug, homelessness, and crime issues that are driving businesses and tax paying residents away.

[RiverDog]

Yeah it is fair to blame liberal democrats. Defunding the police and the whole BLM movement and CRT are actually taking us backwards in our steps towards equality/equity. Liberal ran cities are crumbling with Portland, San Fran, and Seattle among the worst. The rate at which these once beautiful cities have fallen apart is extremely alarming. Hopefully they wake up and look at real, lasting solutions to the drug, homelessness, and crime issues that are driving businesses and tax paying residents away.

I'm not sure that I can blame the homeless problem on the Dems, at least not in its entirety. Spokane has a homeless problem. So does the Tri Cities and Walla Walla. It seems to have penetrated cities big and small no matter which party is in control. Some are more successful at dealing with than others, but I get the sense that all the successful ones are doing is chasing them from one place that won't tolerate them to another that will. They're not necessarily solving it.

But other types of crime they absolutely are to blame. Seattle is still dealing with the aftermath of their Defund the Police initiatives:

The department is still losing more officers than it can hire. So far in 2023, 16 employees have left SPD for a variety of reasons. Only 10 have been hired to fill those vacancies. The goal for this year is to hire 125 total officers.

Even if that happens, staffing levels will still be far lower than where (Chief of Police) Diaz wants them to be to adequately patrol the streets of Seattle.

In 2020, Seattle's pack of baboons city council passed a resolution to cut their PD budget by 50%. Although they never got to that extreme, they still cut it by 17% at a time when crime was on the rise, so it's no wonder that they've seen such an increase. The open hostility towards the police shown by the city council was directly responsible for over 400 officers quitting SPD, and given the current labor shortage in all industries, they'll be playing catch up for years to come.

[Aseahawkfan]

The way Democrats are allowing these homeless drug addict camps to grow in Washington State is criminal in my opinion. Watching Seattle and Everett with these heavy drug addicted zombies wandering about is terrible when you have lived here long enough to know that were not there when you were young.

Where I live Everett is a mess as are parts of Seattle. It's seeping into the suburbs where I live where there have been some pretty nasty murders having to do with drug dealing in some of the local parks.

The Democrats answer to make it look like crime statistics are lower is decriminalize low value property crime and drug use, then claim the have decreased crime which is like getting rid of speed laws and claiming there is no speeding. Democrats are manipulating crime statistics to make themselves look better like we're all stupid. You can't designate certain crimes as no longer felonies or jailable offenses, then act like you reduced crime when the type of crime is still clearly occurring.

This is why when I look at the government, you can't trust them or those that follow them blindly. They don't care about regular citizens because if they call the police, they immediately come or provide assistance. Whereas regular citizens have to walk amongst the drug zombies hoping they don't get targeted by them.

The Democratic answer is decriminalize and force regular folks to deal with their presence whether robbing folks or acting in an insane manner. It's very sad.

[RiverDog]

The way Democrats are allowing these homeless drug addict camps to grow in Washington State is criminal in my opinion. Watching Seattle and Everett with these heavy drug addicted zombies wandering about is terrible when you have lived here long enough to know that were not there when you were young.

Where I live Everett is a mess as are parts of Seattle. It's seeping into the suburbs where I live where there have been some pretty nasty murders having to do with drug dealing in some of the local parks.

There's a homeless problem everywhere. In Spokane, far from being a hotbed of liberalism, their homeless population doubled in just one year. I can't blame it solely on the Democrats.

There's always been homeless, it's just more visible nowadays. They used to ride in railroad boxcars, but since the railroads started using more containers, hopper cars, and padlocking what box cars are left, they've run them away from the RR tracks and yards into the city streets. Obviously, the problem has gotten worse, and our more tolerant approach to illegal drug use may be one of the drivers.

The Democrats answer to make it look like crime statistics are lower is decriminalize low value property crime and drug use, then claim the have decreased crime which is like getting rid of speed laws and claiming there is no speeding. Democrats are manipulating crime statistics to make themselves look better like we're all stupid. You can't designate certain crimes as no longer felonies or jailable offenses, then act like you reduced crime when the type of crime is still clearly occurring.

This is why when I look at the government, you can't trust them or those that follow them blindly. They don't care about regular citizens because if they call the police, they immediately come or provide assistance. Whereas regular citizens have to walk amongst the drug zombies hoping they don't get targeted by them.

The Democratic answer is decriminalize and force regular folks to deal with their presence whether robbing folks or acting in an insane manner. It's very sad.

It's hard to legislate this problem away. Providing them more shelter isn't a solution. Neither is more affordable housing because they don't have an income anyway and won't because most are not employable. Neither is treatment as many of them have no intention of sobering up or kicking their drug habit. The best we can do is keep them from interfering with the rest of society and provide those that want to fix their problem an opportunity for a way out.

[mykc14]

I'm not sure that I can blame the homeless problem on the Dems, at least not in its entirety. Spokane has a homeless problem. So does the Tri Cities and Walla Walla. It seems to have penetrated cities big and small no matter which party is in control. Some are more successful at dealing with than others, but I get the sense that all the successful ones are doing is chasing them from one place that won't tolerate them to another that will. They're not necessarily solving it.

But other types of crime they absolutely are to blame. Seattle is still dealing with the aftermath of their Defund the Police initiatives:

The department is still losing more officers than it can hire. So far in 2023, 16 employees have left SPD for a variety of reasons. Only 10 have been hired to fill those vacancies. The goal for this year is to hire 125 total officers.

Even if that happens, staffing levels will still be far lower than where (Chief of Police) Diaz wants them to be to adequately patrol the streets of Seattle.

In 2020, Seattle's pack of baboons city council passed a resolution to cut their PD budget by 50%. Although they never got to that extreme, they still cut it by 17% at a time when crime was on the rise, so it's no wonder that they've seen such an increase. The open hostility towards the police shown by the city council was directly responsible for over 400 officers quitting SPD, and given the current labor shortage in all industries, they'll be playing catch up for years to come.

You are still in a blue state and homelessness is on the rise in most blue states. In fact, since 2012, Red states have seen a distinct drop in their homelessness while Blue states have seen a steady rise. The homelessness issue is very much interwoven with the drug/mental health issues that are not criminalized or treated in the more liberal states. There is a definite connection between the two and although Spokane isn't a liberal hotbed it is certainly being affected by liberal policies. The same is true in my county, Lewis county. We have seen way more homelessness in the past 3-5 years than in my lifetime here. As far as the defund the police stuff it certainly is accelerating the downfall of those cities, but they were also on the decline before.

[mykc14]

The way Democrats are allowing these homeless drug addict camps to grow in Washington State is criminal in my opinion. Watching Seattle and Everett with these heavy drug addicted zombies wandering about is terrible when you have lived here long enough to know that were not there when you were young.

Where I live Everett is a mess as are parts of Seattle. It's seeping into the suburbs where I live where there have been some pretty nasty murders having to do with drug dealing in some of the local parks.

The Democrats answer to make it look like crime statistics are lower is decriminalize low value property crime and drug use, then claim the have decreased crime which is like getting rid of speed laws and claiming there is no speeding. Democrats are manipulating crime statistics to make themselves look better like we're all stupid. You can't designate certain crimes as no longer felonies or jailable offenses, then act like you reduced crime when the type of crime is still clearly occurring.

This is why when I look at the government, you can't trust them or those that follow them blindly. They don't care about regular citizens because if they call the police, they immediately come or provide assistance. Whereas regular citizens have to walk amongst the drug zombies hoping they don't get targeted by them.

The Democratic answer is decriminalize and force regular folks to deal with their presence whether robbing folks or acting in an insane manner. It's very sad.

They certainly are manipulating crime rates by decriminalizing lots of things but Seattle can't really hide the fact that they have reached a 15 year high in violent crime and the rate that it is increasing is scary. After the "defund the police" movement violent crime shot up 40%, but it was already on the rise. What we are witnessing first hand in San Fran, Portland, and Seattle is how to destroy a city in 10 years. If city leaders don't take some ownership and clean stuff up what will these cities look like by 2030?

[RiverDog]

They certainly are manipulating crime rates by decriminalizing lots of things but Seattle can't really hide the fact that they have reached a 15 year high in violent crime and the rate that it is increasing is scary. After the "defund the police" movement violent crime shot up 40%, but it was already on the rise. What we are witnessing first hand in San Fran, Portland, and Seattle is how to destroy a city in 10 years. If city leaders don't take some ownership and clean stuff up what will these cities look like by 2030?

Did you ever see the movie "Escape From New York" with Kurt Russell? That's where they're heading.

Seattle used to be a fantastic city, especially downtown. Back in the 80's and 90's, when it was hotter than hell in eastern Washington and Seattle was nice and comfy, I'd get together with a bunch of my college buddies and we would meet in Seattle for a Mariners game on a Saturday night then go bar hopping in the Pioneer Square district, work our way through downtown, then stumble back to our hotel somewhere in downtown. With no cell phones, I had to rely on the rhyme that my aunt had told me in order to navigate the downtown area back to our hotel: Jesus Christ Made Seattle Under Protest. The east/west streets, from north to south, are James and Jefferson ('Jesus'), Cherry and Columbia ('Christ'), Marion and Madison ('Made'), Seneca and Spring ('Seattle'), Union and University ('Under'), and Pike and Pine ('Protest'), and of course, the north/south streets are 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and so on. It tells you the condition we were in trying to find our hotel at 2am. But man, did we have a blast!

Those days are gone forever. Seattle is an open cess pool of filth, and there's no way that I'd risk walking at night through that area.

[mykc14]

Here's a breakdown of the 10 States with the highest percent of homeless per capita vs. the 10 states with the lowest homelessness per capita and how these states voted in the last presidential election.

10 Highest homelessness per capita:
1- California- Dem
2- Vermont- Dem
3- Oregon- Dem
4- Hawaii- Dem
5- New York- Dem
6- Washington- Dem
7- Maine- Dem
8- Alaska- Rep
9- Nevada- Dem
10- Delaware- Dem

10 Lowest:
1- Mississippi- Rep
2- South Carolina- Rep
3- Illinois- Dem
4- Alabama- Rep
5- Virginia- Dem
6- Iowa- Rep
7- West Virginia- Rep
8- North Dakota- Rep
9- Indiana- Rep
10- Conn- Dem

There is a clear connection between Dem States and Homelessness issues.

[RiverDog]

Here's a breakdown of the 10 States with the highest percent of homeless per capita vs. the 10 states with the lowest homelessness per capita and how these states voted in the last presidential election.

10 Highest homelessness per capita:
1- California- Dem
2- Vermont- Dem
3- Oregon- Dem
4- Hawaii- Dem
5- New York- Dem
6- Washington- Dem
7- Maine- Dem
8- Alaska- Rep
9- Nevada- Dem
10- Delaware- Dem

10 Lowest:
1- Mississippi- Rep
2- South Carolina- Rep
3- Illinois- Dem
4- Alabama- Rep
5- Virginia- Dem
6- Iowa- Rep
7- West Virginia- Rep
8- North Dakota- Rep
9- Indiana- Rep
10- Conn- Dem

There is a clear connection between Dem States and Homelessness issues.

Kudos for doing some homework to illustrate your point. But simply using how a state voted in a POTUS election does not necessarily represent which party controls the state. Virginia, for example, has a Republican governor and one chamber of the Legislature is controlled by the Republicans yet it voted Democratic in the last election. Nevada and Vermont both have a Republican governors despite the fact that they fell to Biden.

One of the problems with trying to use the data you presented to draw the conclusions you're trying to make is that there are no reliable estimates on the homeless populations. From the op ed section of the New York Times:

We don’t know exactly how many people are homeless in America. We don’t even have a particularly good guess. But the federal estimate relies on local one-night-only head counts of the homeless population, conducted at the end of January, that seem almost designed to produce an undercount. A federal audit recently described the method as unreliable, which means that the government’s ignorance is impeding efforts to provide necessary aid to people in desperate need.

In 2017, for example, the government put the total homeless population at 550,996. That same year, school districts across the country, using a broader definition, reported 1.35 million homeless students, according to the most recent data from the National Center for Education Statistics. That number, it bears emphasizing, is just a count of homeless students — not their parents or other family members, and not the rest of the homeless population.

Cities generally rely on volunteers, and larger cities often sample rather than attempt a comprehensive count. New York, for example, divides the city into 7,000 zones, and then actually tries to count the number of homeless people in 1,500 of those zones.

It’s not uncommon — and, under the circumstances, hardly surprising — for jurisdictions to report annual swings of as much as 50 percent in the number of people reportedly living without shelter. These swings are almost certainly incorrect.

The government knows all this. A report issued by the Government Accountability Office in July 2020 concluded the counts “did not provide a reliably precise estimate of the homeless population.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/28/opin ... -data.html

So do we know that the rankings you presented were based on data that was using the same definition of homelessness, was done at the same time of the year, and using the same methodology? And even of the answer is yes, there's enough differences between those states to make an apples-to-apples comparison next to impossible. If the Federal government counts heads in January, would you honestly expect to get accurate numbers of the homeless in Alaska and North Dakota vs. Hawaii and Nevada?

[Aseahawkfan]

Riverdog,

You've already watched attempts by the right to deal with these problems derailed by courts with activist judges looking to halt this and stop that and let this politician get sued for trying.

You've seen the playbook RD:

1. Want anything done a the border no matter how reasonable, you're anti-immigrant.

2. Want harder sentences for drug crime or crime in general, you're a racist.

3. Mob riots at the capitol in D.C., Democrats are screaming insurrection and wanting them jailed because they are right wing. Mob riots in Seattle and takes over six city blocks driving out cops from the East Precinct and threating to attack police where we have multiple police chiefs including a female of African descent and a Latin man, it's the "Summer of Love" to out Democratic mayor until someone got killed and now the city is paying out a few million for a wrongful death lawsuit. All so the Dems can make it seem like none of this is a big deal because it's their voters rioting.

It's pretty obvious the left wing hypocristy in Washington State and D.C. Even on this board you rarely see any left winger post how wrong it was for the local government to allow six city blocks to be taken over by "protesters' who drove the police out and ordered business owners not to charge for their goods and services. Not a peep out of them how wrong this was, but piles of posts in threads about how the D.C. Mob launched a coup.

Democrats and leftists will not acknowledge their tolerance for drug crime and the terrible way it afflicts local communities or do much about it. They want to pay for some shelter that the drug addicts will ruin while funneling money to feed them free drugs telling us all it's a better way to handle drug crime by giving in to their poisonous addiction.

It's a terrible way to run a nation. If it were me, I'd Duterte them myself. I'm starting to see why the Filipinos voted in Duterte to handle this crap before they became infested with drug addicts and dealers too powerful to get rid of.

[mykc14]

Kudos for doing some homework to illustrate your point. But simply using how a state voted in a POTUS election does not necessarily represent which party controls the state. Virginia, for example, has a Republican governor and one chamber of the Legislature is controlled by the Republicans yet it voted Democratic in the last election. Nevada and Vermont both have a Republican governors despite the fact that they fell to Biden.

One of the problems with trying to use the data you presented to draw the conclusions you're trying to make is that there are no reliable estimates on the homeless populations. From the op ed section of the New York Times:

We don’t know exactly how many people are homeless in America. We don’t even have a particularly good guess. But the federal estimate relies on local one-night-only head counts of the homeless population, conducted at the end of January, that seem almost designed to produce an undercount. A federal audit recently described the method as unreliable, which means that the government’s ignorance is impeding efforts to provide necessary aid to people in desperate need.

In 2017, for example, the government put the total homeless population at 550,996. That same year, school districts across the country, using a broader definition, reported 1.35 million homeless students, according to the most recent data from the National Center for Education Statistics. That number, it bears emphasizing, is just a count of homeless students — not their parents or other family members, and not the rest of the homeless population.

Cities generally rely on volunteers, and larger cities often sample rather than attempt a comprehensive count. New York, for example, divides the city into 7,000 zones, and then actually tries to count the number of homeless people in 1,500 of those zones.

It’s not uncommon — and, under the circumstances, hardly surprising — for jurisdictions to report annual swings of as much as 50 percent in the number of people reportedly living without shelter. These swings are almost certainly incorrect.

The government knows all this. A report issued by the Government Accountability Office in July 2020 concluded the counts “did not provide a reliably precise estimate of the homeless population.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/28/opin ... -data.html

So do we know that the rankings you presented were based on data that was using the same definition of homelessness, was done at the same time of the year, and using the same methodology? And even of the answer is yes, there's enough differences between those states to make an apples-to-apples comparison next to impossible. If the Federal government counts heads in January, would you honestly expect to get accurate numbers of the homeless in Alaska and North Dakota vs. Hawaii and Nevada?

I don't want to derail the focus of your thread but I don't think what you presented changes much- the evidence clearly points to liberal states having a higher homeless population per capita than conservative states. 7 of the 10 are liberal, not just Democrat leaning, but the most liberal states in the county. Some are cold weather, some are warm weather. I agree the estimates are probably off but there's no real reason to believe that they aren't equally off in most states. What's more likely? Liberal politics decriminalizing drug usage, not enforcing vagrancy laws, not enforcing petty theft or shoplifting, etc leading to migrant homelessness or just randomly those states have more homeless, or just unreliable numbers? At the end of the day it doesn't matter what numbers you use liberal states are going to be amongst the highest in homeless numbers, especially when adjusted per capita and if the only argument is that the numbers are unreliable then why wouldn't they be unreliable everywhere? The real question is if liberal states are the states most likely to give out social services, raise minimum wage to a "living wage" and spend ridiculous amounts of money on the homeless then why do they have the largest homeless populations? Either those programs don't work and have led to more homelessness in their own communities or those programs/political policies are leading to migrate homeless populations moving in. At any rate whatever they are doing is leading towards disaster.

[mykc14]

Also using school numbers to count homeless population is completely unreliable. They have very loose definitions of homeless and often inflate those numbers to get federal grants.

[Aseahawkfan]

Also using school numbers to count homeless population is completely unreliable. They have very loose definitions of homeless and often inflate those numbers to get federal grants.

Not to mention a lot of cities even in red states are governed by Democrats.

We all know Democrats generally get votes in cities. It's the suburbs and rural areas where the big divide happens. Cities invite severe wealth gaps that require social programs so the wealthy will have workers able to work their businesses and in their homes to barely survive living in some overly small apartment in the city. Seattle is especially this way. You're either enormously wealthy buying a million dollar plus condo or home, living in rent controlled places, or paying a few thousand for a small apartment. Then there is the parking. It has always been amusing to me that the Democrats keep supporting these rich leftists who look at higher taxes as noblesse oblige rather than voting for people that would create real market conditions for regular folk to live.

I guess when your options are rich tech Democrats who at least throw you some scraps and rich Republicans who want to pay as little taxes as possible and don't care if folks live in cardboard boxes, you toss in with the group that's at least going to give you 150 square foot apartments with a shared bathroom.

There ain't no middle class party any more. Just a party of super rich and the rich with different ideas of how the servants should be treated.

[RiverDog]

Let's assume that you guys are correct, that the Democrats are responsible for the homeless problem. What, specifically, have they done to cause it? Higher taxes? More liberal drug laws? Soft on crime? And if mykc's ranking is anywhere near accurate, WTF is Alaska doing near the top of it? Why would Illinois be one of the top states in dealing with the homeless problem? Didn't they have a well-publicized issue with homeless at O'Hare International? Why would it have been a campaign issue in the recent mayoral election in Chicago?

My take is that yes, there does seem to be a worse homeless problem in large cities that happen to be run by Democrats. And Democrats have proven themselves to be wholly incapable of solving the problem. But are Republicans any better? If so, what solutions have they had? Or is their success due to the fact that they are tasked with a less dense area to police, a more educated population that is less likely to turn to drugs, and in areas that that are cheaper to live in? Are they simply chasing their homeless to areas with a larger population of all types? And lastly, what would you do to solve it?

I can blame the Democrats for a lot of things, but they are not the root cause of the homeless problem. IMO it's society in general that has caused it.

[Aseahawkfan]

Let's assume that you guys are correct, that the Democrats are responsible for the homeless problem. What, specifically, have they done to cause it? Higher taxes? More liberal drug laws? Soft on crime? And if mykc's ranking is anywhere near accurate, WTF is Alaska doing near the top of it? Why would Illinois be one of the top states in dealing with the homeless problem? Didn't they have a well-publicized issue with homeless at O'Hare International? Why would it have been a campaign issue in the recent mayoral election in Chicago?

My take is that yes, there does seem to be a worse homeless problem in large cities that happen to be run by Democrats. And Democrats have proven themselves to be wholly incapable of solving the problem. But are Republicans any better? If so, what solutions have they had? Or is their success due to the fact that they are tasked with a less dense area to police, a more educated population that is less likely to turn to drugs, and in areas that that are cheaper to live in? Are they simply chasing their homeless to areas with a larger population of all types? And lastly, what would you do to solve it?

I can blame the Democrats for a lot of things, but they are not the root cause of the homeless problem. IMO it's society in general that has caused it.

Democrats have allowed the drug problem with heroin to reach a point of no return that it is no longer controllable. Between prescription drugs, heroin, fentanyl, meth, and several other drugs we can barely name and then toss in alcohol and real insanity, they have allowed the drug problem in America to reach a percentage that we can't sufficiently deal with growing crime and homeless it causes. They refuse to take the hard approach on drug addicts and the Democrats believe hiding it will somehow make it controllable or go away. It's not just Democrats, but leftists period such as Canada decriminalizing drug usage.

Then you have wealthy Democrats and Republicans living housing communities with security and better policing pushing all the homeless drug addicts to prey on the suburban middle to lower middle class in their quest for money or items to trade for drugs. Rich liberals lower crime thresh holds so you can't jail the homeless drug addicts robbing stores like Walmart and Target to pay for their drug habit when they move the felony level to 1000 plus dollars stolen and then tell cops in Everett not to interdict low level heroin usage.

Do you live under a rock, RD? The documents showing Democrats doing this are all over the place.

https://www.criminaldefenselawyer.com/resources/criminal-defense/crime-penalties/petty-theft-washington-penalties-defense

These small legal adjustments are all over the place, RD. Done by Democrats and other city officials because it allows them to appear to have reduce crime when they have redesignated it. The primary drivers of this type of property crime are drug use, addicts who can't obtain regular jobs robbing stores and selling or trading the items for drugs.

Y'ou've seen the discussions of the Democrat end game: decriminalize drugs, use tax payer dollars to supply drug addicts, then push them all into zones they can do the drugs, force the regular population to have to deal with these folks by either getting robbed or paying tax monies to supply their drugs hoping to reduce property crime.

The lock them up Republicans are being called racist and the like because they want more prison funding, more police, and harder sentences on drug addicts and the associated drug problems.

Then there is heavy amounts of drugs coming across the border which gets lumped together with the anti-immigrant rhetoric which the Dems conveniently sell as a group of racist anti-immigrant Republicans like Trump even though there is legitimate problems with drug cartels and gangs in Central and South America with us being their number one customers. Do you think poor Latins are paying expensive prices for fentanyl, coke, and meth?

There's a reason Republicans and Democrats keep handing power back to each other. They are both caught in ideological BS that is absolutely terrible for this nation. Both sides are so busy garnering votes from villainizing the other side nothing gets done to really solve these very real issues.

I don't want immigration control at the Southern Border because I hate immigrants, I want control because of what comes out of that area including the insane drug cartels and gangs which are documented problems in the nations they come from.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ju%C3%A1rez_Cartel#:~:text=The%20Ju%C3%A1rez%20Cartel%20(Spanish%3A%20C%C3%A1rtel,border%20from%20El%20Paso%2C%20Texas.

It's not being hateful towards immigrants to want the Southern American border cleaned up and the unchecked crossings with drug mules and cartel and gang members stopped. Even they are 1% of the immigrants crossing, that is a lot of crime and drugs coming over. It doesn't take a large percentage of criminals and drugs to cause a lot of issues.

This is a lot of stuff that feeds the entire probem that is not being dealt with due to constant gridlock and constant villanization of political parties where many party members are asking for reasonable limitations on this type of behavior.

[RiverDog]

Democrats have allowed the drug problem with heroin to reach a point of no return that it is no longer controllable. Between prescription drugs, heroin, fentanyl, meth, and several other drugs we can barely name and then toss in alcohol and real insanity, they have allowed the drug problem in America to reach a percentage that we can't sufficiently deal with growing crime and homeless it causes.

The drug problem in America has been on a relentless upswing no matter which party has been in charge. From 1981 to 1993, the Republicans controlled the White House for 12 straight years with a staunch, anti-crime conservative as our POTUS for 8 of them along with a functional majority in Congress and the problem only got worse. George W. Bush was in charge for 8 straight years and the problem got worse. It's a societal problem, not a political one.

The lock them up Republicans are being called racist and the like because they want more prison funding, more police, and harder sentences on drug addicts and the associated drug problems.

Then there is heavy amounts of drugs coming across the border which gets lumped together with the anti-immigrant rhetoric which the Dems conveniently sell as a group of racist anti-immigrant Republicans like Trump even though there is legitimate problems with drug cartels and gangs in Central and South America with us being their number one customers. Do you think poor Latins are paying expensive prices for fentanyl, coke, and meth?

There's a reason Republicans and Democrats keep handing power back to each other. They are both caught in ideological BS that is absolutely terrible for this nation. Both sides are so busy garnering votes from villainizing the other side nothing gets done to really solve these very real issues.

I don't want immigration control at the Southern Border because I hate immigrants, I want control because of what comes out of that area including the insane drug cartels and gangs which are documented problems in the nations they come from.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ju%C3%A1rez_Cartel#:~:text=The%20Ju%C3%A1rez%20Cartel%20(Spanish%3A%20C%C3%A1rtel,border%20from%20El%20Paso%2C%20Texas.

It's not being hateful towards immigrants to want the Southern American border cleaned up and the unchecked crossings with drug mules and cartel and gang members stopped. Even they are 1% of the immigrants crossing, that is a lot of crime and drugs coming over. It doesn't take a large percentage of criminals and drugs to cause a lot of issues.

This is a lot of stuff that feeds the entire probem that is not being dealt with due to constant gridlock and constant villanization of political parties where many party members are asking for reasonable limitations on this type of behavior.

I agree completely about the southern border and alluded to it in the massage parlor thread. We need to be less concerned with the illegal immigrants that are otherwise law abiding and crack down on the human trafficking and drug smuggling operations. One of the problems at the southern border is that we don't have enough capacity to process immigrants, the vast majority of which are law abiding and not attempting to smuggle drugs, forcing them to resort to attempting to cross illegally, making it easier for the bad guys to mix in with the good. We need to separate the wheat from the chaff.

But as long as there's a demand, there's always going to be a motivation for smugglers to exploit this ripe market that we've given them, and we'll always be playing this cat-and-mouse game between them and LE. You said yourself that the war on drugs has been a complete failure, and part of that failure is that we've focused too much of our efforts on interdiction and not enough on education and other means to reduce demand.

At this point, I don't see any solution to the homeless problem. The best we can hope to do is to isolate them from the rest of the population and give those that want to cure themselves ample opportunity to do so. Round them up then dump them in an open field somewhere and let the churches and social workers feed and shelter them. I was serious when I said that we're approaching the "Escape from New York" scenario.

[mykc14]

Let's assume that you guys are correct, that the Democrats are responsible for the homeless problem. What, specifically, have they done to cause it? Higher taxes? More liberal drug laws? Soft on crime? And if mykc's ranking is anywhere near accurate, WTF is Alaska doing near the top of it? Why would Illinois be one of the top states in dealing with the homeless problem? Didn't they have a well-publicized issue with homeless at O'Hare International? Why would it have been a campaign issue in the recent mayoral election in Chicago?

My take is that yes, there does seem to be a worse homeless problem in large cities that happen to be run by Democrats. And Democrats have proven themselves to be wholly incapable of solving the problem. But are Republicans any better? If so, what solutions have they had? Or is their success due to the fact that they are tasked with a less dense area to police, a more educated population that is less likely to turn to drugs, and in areas that that are cheaper to live in? Are they simply chasing their homeless to areas with a larger population of all types? And lastly, what would you do to solve it?

I can blame the Democrats for a lot of things, but they are not the root cause of the homeless problem. IMO it's society in general that has caused it.

I'm not saying the Democrats are causing the homeless problem. It is clearly multifaceted and is caused by both Republicans and Democrats and has deep roots in the drug epidemic and mental health. What the Democrats are doing is passing policies that lead to more drug use and make it really hard for people to get mental health help if they don't personally want the help- even if they aren't really capable of making that decision. The policies being passed by liberal democrats are extremely conducive to worsening these issues.

[RiverDog]

Let's assume that you guys are correct, that the Democrats are responsible for the homeless problem. What, specifically, have they done to cause it? Higher taxes? More liberal drug laws? Soft on crime? And if mykc's ranking is anywhere near accurate, WTF is Alaska doing near the top of it? Why would Illinois be one of the top states in dealing with the homeless problem? Didn't they have a well-publicized issue with homeless at O'Hare International? Why would it have been a campaign issue in the recent mayoral election in Chicago?

My take is that yes, there does seem to be a worse homeless problem in large cities that happen to be run by Democrats. And Democrats have proven themselves to be wholly incapable of solving the problem. But are Republicans any better? If so, what solutions have they had? Or is their success due to the fact that they are tasked with a less dense area to police, a more educated population that is less likely to turn to drugs, and in areas that that are cheaper to live in? Are they simply chasing their homeless to areas with a larger population of all types? And lastly, what would you do to solve it?

I can blame the Democrats for a lot of things, but they are not the root cause of the homeless problem. IMO it's society in general that has caused it.

I'm not saying the Democrats are causing the homeless problem. It is clearly multifaceted and is caused by both Republicans and Democrats and has deep roots in the drug epidemic and mental health. What the Democrats are doing is passing policies that lead to more drug use and make it really hard for people to get mental health help if they don't personally want the help- even if they aren't really capable of making that decision. The policies being passed by liberal democrats are extremely conducive to worsening these issues.

I'll agree with most of that. The Dems have horribly mismanaged their cities, especially Seattle and Portland, and their attitude towards law enforcement is a big driver of a range of problems that have gotten much worse, including homelessness, drug usage, and crime in general. But the way you worded your first comments, claiming that there is a clear connection between blue states and homelessness by using a rather hodge podge ranking of states by Presidental voting trends and percent of homelessness, indicated to me that you felt they were the cause and/or that the Republicans had a better grasp of the situation. Although there are exceptions, most of the homeless problems tend to be concentrated in urban areas, and that just happens to be where Democrats rule. Republicans are lucky because their task is much less complicated as there's significant demographical differences between urban areas where Democrats govern and suburban/rural populations that the R's manage.

One thing that I don't agree with is your statement that "people to get mental health help if they don't personally want the help'. It's a waste of resources trying to rehabilitate someone that doesn't want help. I'm not sure what the rate of recidivism for drug addicts is, but for those imprisoned for substance related problems and subsequently released, it's about 85%.

Homelessness has become an alternate lifestyle for many. I'm almost to the point where I think we should just start tossing them into concentration camps and tell them that the only way out is to accept treatment and prove that they're drug free and can safely re-enter society, give them a motivation to clean up. Sounds awful, doesn't it?

[Aseahawkfan]

The Dems and Republicans competing agendas block any useful progress on drugs.

I know if I were dealing with the drug problem, I'd do the following:

1. Make the punishment fit he crime with forced rehabilitation.

2. Severely punish dealing and sale up to and including the death penalty or life imprisonment. Deaths associated with drug use would be murder charges attributed to dealers.

3. Start a military campaign against the cartels in South and Central America declaring them terrorists selling poison in America in an attempt to destabilize and harm America. I'd rip them apart. I'd Tombstone them as in when Wyatt Earp said, "I see a red sash, I kill the man wearing it." If there is a cartel or gang member around, I kill the man associated. The only way to take care of these types of people is harshly same as when the English defeated the Thuggee cult in India or how we've had to deal with terrorists: burn them down, accept the collateral damage, and end the problem.

4. Legalize marijuana federally to get that out of the way so we're not wasting law enforcement resources on a drug about the same level as alcohol.

5. Allow lawyers to use Tort Law to sue anyone making money selling drugs to citizens outside of a doctor's prescription and even doctor's who overprescribe pain medication.

I know none of this will happen due to political gridlock and the Democrats wanting to play the "spoiled child" soft game with Americans using drugs selling all of us they're just victims we must help.

My feeling is and always has been at certain points in time a problem reaches such bad proportions you have to burn it out the hard way. I have no such considerations for human beings that I have any trouble wiping a bunch of them out to save the ones that are worth saving while cutting away the cancerous humans that give us nothing.

It's like when I watch Norwegians euthanize a walrus that has claimed territory near a human settlement and then leave Mark Brevik in jail after he murdered 70 children. It's the logic of the left and makes no sense whatsoever. You kill a walrus doing what is natural to it while pretending the life of a scumbag like Mark Brevik is worth preserving because they are human? Sorry, I'd rather spend the money to move the walrus and spend a few bucks on a bullet in Brevik's head.

But that's the left wing for you: always wanting to consider everyone special snowflakes and no harsh treatment of humanity. I just don't share that attitude. If I could take over for a short while supervillain style, I'd clean some things up and crush the opposition for a while including all the stupid ass lawyers manipulating the system to protect these scummy drug dealers. I think society could use a bit of harsh justice right now.

[RiverDog]

The Dems and Republicans competing agendas block any useful progress on drugs.

I know if I were dealing with the drug problem, I'd do the following:

1. Make the punishment fit he crime with forced rehabilitation.

2. Severely punish dealing and sale up to and including the death penalty or life imprisonment. Deaths associated with drug use would be murder charges attributed to dealers.

3. Start a military campaign against the cartels in South and Central America declaring them terrorists selling poison in America in an attempt to destabilize and harm America. I'd rip them apart. I'd Tombstone them as in when Wyatt Earp said, "I see a red sash, I kill the man wearing it." If there is a cartel or gang member around, I kill the man associated. The only way to take care of these types of people is harshly same as when the English defeated the Thuggee cult in India or how we've had to deal with terrorists: burn them down, accept the collateral damage, and end the problem.

4. Legalize marijuana federally to get that out of the way so we're not wasting law enforcement resources on a drug about the same level as alcohol.

5. Allow lawyers to use Tort Law to sue anyone making money selling drugs to citizens outside of a doctor's prescription and even doctor's who overprescribe pain medication.

I know none of this will happen due to political gridlock and the Democrats wanting to play the "spoiled child" soft game with Americans using drugs selling all of us they're just victims we must help.

My feeling is and always has been at certain points in time a problem reaches such bad proportions you have to burn it out the hard way. I have no such considerations for human beings that I have any trouble wiping a bunch of them out to save the ones that are worth saving while cutting away the cancerous humans that give us nothing.

It's like when I watch Norwegians euthanize a walrus that has claimed territory near a human settlement and then leave Mark Brevik in jail after he murdered 70 children. It's the logic of the left and makes no sense whatsoever. You kill a walrus doing what is natural to it while pretending the life of a scumbag like Mark Brevik is worth preserving because they are human? Sorry, I'd rather spend the money to move the walrus and spend a few bucks on a bullet in Brevik's head.

But that's the left wing for you: always wanting to consider everyone special snowflakes and no harsh treatment of humanity. I just don't share that attitude. If I could take over for a short while supervillain style, I'd clean some things up and crush the opposition for a while including all the stupid ass lawyers manipulating the system to protect these scummy drug dealers. I think society could use a bit of harsh justice right now.

Forced rehab likely won't work for the majority of individuals, but it might cause some to make a personal commitment. I'm more inclined to give them whatever they want but keep them in some sort of prison camp and away from society. Except for those that accept that they have a problem and want to address it, I'm not concerned with rehabbing them. Just keep them from interacting with the rest of society.

I'm completely opposed to your second suggestion. If we could get countries like Columbia, Peru, Nicaragua, et al, to allow us to prosecute a war against drug cartels, then I'm good with it. But we can't act unilaterally as I think you're suggesting.

Your third suggestion is a moot point. I don't think there's any law enforcement agency that's pursuing marijuana law violations except as it is related to more serious crimes.

Most doctors are already extremely cautious about over prescribing drugs. And I'm not sure how much of the current drug crisis is related to MD's over prescribing meds.

But, you gave it a shot. I do agree that the problem is so large that something radical is going to have to be embarked on if we are to be successful.

[mykc14]

I can blame the Democrats for a lot of things, but they are not the root cause of the homeless problem. IMO it's society in general that has caused it.



I'll agree with most of that. The Dems have horribly mismanaged their cities, especially Seattle and Portland, and their attitude towards law enforcement is a big driver of a range of problems that have gotten much worse, including homelessness, drug usage, and crime in general. But the way you worded your first comments, claiming that there is a clear connection between blue states and homelessness by using a rather hodge podge ranking of states by Presidental voting trends and percent of homelessness, indicated to me that you felt they were the cause and/or that the Republicans had a better grasp of the situation. Although there are exceptions, most of the homeless problems tend to be concentrated in urban areas, and that just happens to be where Democrats rule. Republicans are lucky because their task is much less complicated as there's significant demographical differences between urban areas where Democrats govern and suburban/rural populations that the R's manage.

One thing that I don't agree with is your statement that "people to get mental health help if they don't personally want the help'. It's a waste of resources trying to rehabilitate someone that doesn't want help. I'm not sure what the rate of recidivism for drug addicts is, but for those imprisoned for substance related problems and subsequently released, it's about 85%.

Homelessness has become an alternate lifestyle for many. I'm almost to the point where I think we should just start tossing them into concentration camps and tell them that the only way out is to accept treatment and prove that they're drug free and can safely re-enter society, give them a motivation to clean up. Sounds awful, doesn't it?

What I was saying is that Liberal states are creating a situation in which either more of their citizens are becoming homeless or drawing migrant homeless populations from other states. This situation is caused by the issues that we have mentioned multiple times earlier. This can be seen by multiple data sets, including the one that I mentioned earlier that you call "Hodge Podge." How accurate the data is can be argued, but it is still decent data given the difficulties of tracking homelessness. The data that I presented clearly shows that liberal states have more homeless people per capita.

Here's another way to look at it. Based on a 2018 Gallop Poll these are the 10 most liberal states in our country:
1- Massachusetts
2- Maine
3- Vermont
4- Washington
5- New Hampshire
6- New York
7- California
8- Hawaii
9- Maryland
10- Oregon

7 of these 10 are also on the list of the top 10 cities with the highest homelessness per capita: California, Vermont, Oregon, Hawaii, New York, Washington, Maine. How many of those 10 are in the bottom 10 of homelessness per capita? 0.

Here's another list of the top states based on homelessness per capita:

1- DC
2- NY
3- Hawaii
4- Oregon
5- California
6- Washington
7- Mass
8- Alaska
9- Nevada
10- Vermont

Here's the 10 highest homeless cities per capita in the US:

1- Eugene, OR
2- Las Angeles, CA
3- New York, NY
4- San Jose, CA
5- Seattle, WA
6- Anchorage, AK
7- Las Vegas, NV
8- San Francisco, CA
9- Savannah, GA
10- San Diego, CA

I know these might be more "hodge podge" lists but the fact remains that all of these list and data sets point to the same thing- homelessness is a larger problem per capita in liberal states. We can go back and forth about how reliable the numbers are or how liberal a state might be, but until you show me data that shows something different it's really hard to argue that there isn't a connection between homelessness and liberal states, whether they create it at a higher rate or bring them in from other states.

As far as the success of forced treatment we've discussed it before and probably aren't going to agree. The success of forced methodone typically varies from 60-80% and is a much better solution than what most liberal politicians are doing- which is essentially nothing other than trying to keep them out of jail and give them safe places to do their drugs (which certainly could help explain why they have so many homeless people per capita).

[RiverDog]

Sorry, I'm not buying your argument. It's pointless to try to find reliable information on the number of homeless, link it with a particular political party, then produce a credible ranking. As you said, conducting accurate surveys on the number of homeless is next to impossible. Some rely on federal government statistics that are taken once a year at a specific time, ie January, that's certain to produce an undercount. Others might use advocacy groups that are motivated to over count so as to make the problem look worse than it is so they may obtain more funding. The same goes on the other end of the spectrum. Red states might want to intentionally undercount so as to make the problem not look as bad. There's also other factors that may dictate the extent of the homeless problem in one area vs. another besides which political party is in control.

As far as forced rehabilitation goes, I'm looking at it in a very cold hearted, businesslike way: How much bang can we get for the buck? Is it worth it to spend thousands of dollars on each successful rehab while other associated demands, like food, housing, and other services, are forced to go without? Liberals don't like hearing the term "cost-benefit analysis" as it sounds like we're treating people like business assets, but it has to be performed. There are other expenses associated with dealing with the homeless problem besides rehab, and we have to make sure that the limited funds they have available is being spent wisely.

Without looking at the financial details, my sense is that forced rehab would not be worth the number of resources we'd have to expend and that we should be more focused on preventative measures and making sure that those that want to cure themselves are able to do so. The reality is that we don't have an unlimited budget that would allow us to treat every single homeless person. If curing one out of every five-ten persons treated through forced rehab doesn't take resources away from those that are there by means other than that of their own devices, then I'm good with it.

The other thing is the moral aspect. If someone wants to f their lives up, then let them. Who am I, or more specifically, who is the government to tell an individual how to live their lives? I don't want to take a dime away from treating a person that wants to be treated in order to treat one that doesn't.

I'm skeptical of your 60-80% estimated success rate. It's been a long time ago, but I once had an employee that we sent to an inpatient drug rehab as a condition of his continued employment. He invited me to have lunch with him one day, and afterwards, I spoke alone with his counselor, and I asked him what the chances were of him successfully breaking his habit. He looked at me with a glum, straight face and said "not good" and went on to explain that unless they came to them voluntarily, the majority weren't going to make it. Sure enough, when he got out of rehab, it wasn't a month before I had to call him at home when he didn't show up for work, told him on the way in to stop by the clinic and take a drug test, and he showed up at work to clean out his locker and told me he was quitting because he knew he was going to test positive. IMO the success rate of a forced rehab is closer to 10-20%

[RiverDog]

Here's an article that speaks to the success rate of alcohol rehabilitation:

National surveys suggest that of those with alcohol use disorder (AUD), a medical condition defined by the uncontrollable use of alcohol despite negative consequences, only about one-third attempt to quit drinking each year. Of those, only about 25% are successful at reducing their alcohol intake for more than a year.

https://americanaddictioncenters.org/re ... statistics

So if out of 100 people, only 33 of them attempt to quit and out of those 33, only 25% are successful, the overall success rate is less than 10% (8.25% to be exact).

That coincides with what I've always been told about drug and alcohol rehabilitation, that the first step is acceptance of the fact that you have a problem and that without a willingness to address it, there's not a very good chance of success. At $14k-$27k per patient for a 30-day inpatient treatment session, I sure as hell don't want to be throwing it away on people that don't even want to be rehabbed.

https://rehabs.com/addiction/how-much-does-rehab-cost/

[mykc14]

Sorry, I'm not buying your argument. It's pointless to try to find reliable information on the number of homeless, link it with a particular political party, then produce a credible ranking. As you said, conducting accurate surveys on the number of homeless is next to impossible. Some rely on federal government statistics that are taken once a year at a specific time, ie January, that's certain to produce an undercount. Others might use advocacy groups that are motivated to over count so as to make the problem look worse than it is so they may obtain more funding. The same goes on the other end of the spectrum. Red states might want to intentionally undercount so as to make the problem not look as bad. There's also other factors that may dictate the extent of the homeless problem in one area vs. another besides which political party is in control.

So every source of data points to homelessness being more of a problem in Democrat controlled states and instead of maybe admitting that there is a possible connection between liberal policies and homelessness is that it's hard to find data and that Red States are intentionally undercounting to make the problem look better? So Republican states under report (except Alaska) and Democrat states post accurate numbers? That seems much more far fetched to me than the simple idea that decriminalizing drugs, not enforcing vagrancy laws, and not prosecuting property crimes/petty theft leads to an increase in homelessness in an area. It seems logical that those thing would be connected AND the numbers back that up. Why totally dismiss the data because the numbers are unreliable. Wouldn't they be unreliable everywhere? What other factors would explain this? Cold weather vs. warm weather? Minority population? Socioeconomic position of states? It doesn't matter the cross section the numbers till connect the homelessness and liberal policies.

[Aseahawkfan]

Forced rehab likely won't work for the majority of individuals, but it might cause some to make a personal commitment. I'm more inclined to give them whatever they want but keep them in some sort of prison camp and away from society. Except for those that accept that they have a problem and want to address it, I'm not concerned with rehabbing them. Just keep them from interacting with the rest of society.

I'm completely opposed to your second suggestion. If we could get countries like Columbia, Peru, Nicaragua, et al, to allow us to prosecute a war against drug cartels, then I'm good with it. But we can't act unilaterally as I think you're suggesting.

Your third suggestion is a moot point. I don't think there's any law enforcement agency that's pursuing marijuana law violations except as it is related to more serious crimes.

Most doctors are already extremely cautious about over prescribing drugs. And I'm not sure how much of the current drug crisis is related to MD's over prescribing meds.

But, you gave it a shot. I do agree that the problem is so large that something radical is going to have to be embarked on if we are to be successful.

I would act unilaterally. I think we need a tyrant like Rome used to vote in for short periods to take care of problems before returning to a Republic. Someone to bypass the legal game players and the whining citizens and all the problems that Democracies create that destroy them from within while the people halting problems from being solved destroy their own nation due to a lack of action.

I've listened to you for a while. Your understanding of heroin addiction and the harder drugs is very lacking. Heroin and opiates are destructive poison. You don't waste time coming up with friendly ways to deal with heroin and similar drug addiction. You don't worry about the addicts you can't recover, you just burn them down and be done with them.

If the Central and South American nations are producing these drugs and violating our laws in shipping it into the nation, that is what I consider an act of war against us. They can no more handle their cartel problem than the Middle East could handle their terrorist problem. It has spilled over into our land for too long now and needs to be harshly dealt with.

It's another one of those things you don't read much about like when they had vote in an 18 year old young woman as sheriff in Juarez only to have her ask for political asylum because the drug cartels threatened her life almost immediately.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marisol_Valles_Garc%C3%ADa

They have lost control in Central and South America of their drug cartels. America sitting by and allowing this when they pose a threat to our stability with the drugs and problems they cause in our neighboring nations is willful neglect that will as it has done with the likes of Osama and Saddam cause a more severe problem down the line. These things should get taken care of before they get off the ground, but they don't. So now we should go in and clean it up because the Central and South American nations are not capable and are in fact allowing their governments, military, and police forces to be infested with cartel personnel.

This is nothing more than a dream on my part that won't happen while I'm alive. I'd support a leader that would do this myself. I get tired of listening to Republicans classify marijuana in the same category as heroin, meth, and other more dangerous drugs. Wasting law enforcement resources on MJ is wasteful and pointless. But I would welcome harsh treatment of heroin addicts and the harder drugs. Heroin and opiates and the like create drug zombies. People so addicted to the drug they would debase themselves and hurt their children just to get that heroin high. The heroin, fentanyl, and the like needs to be dealt with like the very real and dangerous problem that it is with very little sympathy or legal meandering we see in the political system to save future generations from this vile addictive poison.

[RiverDog]

I would act unilaterally. I think we need a tyrant like Rome used to vote in for short periods to take care of problems before returning to a Republic. Someone to bypass the legal game players and the whining citizens and all the problems that Democracies create that destroy them from within while the people halting problems from being solved destroy their own nation due to a lack of action.

I've listened to you for a while. Your understanding of heroin addiction and the harder drugs is very lacking. Heroin and opiates are destructive poison. You don't waste time coming up with friendly ways to deal with heroin and similar drug addiction. You don't worry about the addicts you can't recover, you just burn them down and be done with them.

You're right, I don't have a deep understanding of heroin or other hard core drug addiction. I've never messed with that chit nor have any of my close friends. Everywhere I've worked has had a strict drug testing policy so with just a few exceptions as the one I mentioned in my previous comments, I haven't been exposed to it during my employment.

But I'm not sure what it was that I wrote that would make you think that I'd waste time trying to "treat them in a friendly way". I just got through making a cold-hearted fiscal argument saying that I don't even want to attempt a forced rehab unless they're willing and would rather just isolate them from the rest of society, turn them out into some compound, and let them do to themselves what they wanted as its a waste of money to do otherwise. How is that wanting to "treat them in a friendly way"? I was expecting someone to accuse me of being inhumane and barbaric, not of being some sort of bleeding heart sympathizer.

If the Central and South American nations are producing these drugs and violating our laws in shipping it into the nation, that is what I consider an act of war against us. They can no more handle their cartel problem than the Middle East could handle their terrorist problem. It has spilled over into our land for too long now and needs to be harshly dealt with.

It's another one of those things you don't read much about like when they had vote in an 18 year old young woman as sheriff in Juarez only to have her ask for political asylum because the drug cartels threatened her life almost immediately.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marisol_Valles_Garc%C3%ADa

They have lost control in Central and South America of their drug cartels. America sitting by and allowing this when they pose a threat to our stability with the drugs and problems they cause in our neighboring nations is willful neglect that will as it has done with the likes of Osama and Saddam cause a more severe problem down the line. These things should get taken care of before they get off the ground, but they don't. So now we should go in and clean it up because the Central and South American nations are not capable and are in fact allowing their governments, military, and police forces to be infested with cartel personnel.

This is nothing more than a dream on my part that won't happen while I'm alive. I'd support a leader that would do this myself. I get tired of listening to Republicans classify marijuana in the same category as heroin, meth, and other more dangerous drugs. Wasting law enforcement resources on MJ is wasteful and pointless. But I would welcome harsh treatment of heroin addicts and the harder drugs. Heroin and opiates and the like create drug zombies. People so addicted to the drug they would debase themselves and hurt their children just to get that heroin high. The heroin, fentanyl, and the like needs to be dealt with like the very real and dangerous problem that it is with very little sympathy or legal meandering we see in the political system to save future generations from this vile addictive poison.

You're talking about 3rd world countries. Their governments are not very effective, and in many cases corrupt. Their citizens are poor and as such, they do not have the resources that highly industrialized nations like the United States has. They have small militaries that don't even qualify as a decent police force. For the most part, they aren't willing participants in the drug trade, rather they don't have the ability to police themselves.

If we were able to obtain the permission/cooperation of their governments, then yes, I'd support some sort of armed incursion, and I think that we have conducted clandestine military operations in the past and would support doing something covert. But I'd never support a conventional invasion without the full consent of their governments.

[Hawktawk]

This is personal. Both my older 2 have struggled with opiate addiction. My son is doing OK now and not sure about sarah as we dont speak much right now.

She went from a beautiful young woman capable of anything to living on the streets of Portland, dancing in strip clubs and even selling herself on the streets, Shes been in rehab 3 times. At one point she and her pos dealer boyfriend were breaking into vacant houses to stay warm in the winter.Sarah was the victim of molestation at the hands of one of my ex wifes BFs to be fair, its been a life sentence. Its hell as a parent , a gut ache that never goes away .

Portland is the heroin capitol of the world. It was when it was illegal and it is when its decriminalized. So its up close and personal. I have no idea the answer. Stiffer enforcement ? Fine .
your taxes will go way up to pay the extra law enforcement and feed and house them.
Same for government assistance. Dont help those scummy bums with my tax dollars. The same party screaming the loudest telling women what to do with their bodies have absolutely no plan for after they are born. Just a foil for class warfare.

[mykc14]

This is personal. Both my older 2 have struggled with opiate addiction. My son is doing OK now and not sure about sarah as we dont speak much right now.

She went from a beautiful young woman capable of anything to living on the streets of Portland, dancing in strip clubs and even selling herself on the streets, Shes been in rehab 3 times. At one point she and her pos dealer boyfriend were breaking into vacant houses to stay warm in the winter.Sarah was the victim of molestation at the hands of one of my ex wifes BFs to be fair, its been a life sentence. Its hell as a parent , a gut ache that never goes away .

Portland is the heroin capitol of the world. It was when it was illegal and it is when its decriminalized. So its up close and personal. I have no idea the answer. Stiffer enforcement ? Fine .
your taxes will go way up to pay the extra law enforcement and feed and house them.
Same for government assistance. Dont help those scummy bums with my tax dollars. The same party screaming the loudest telling women what to do with their bodies have absolutely no plan for after they are born. Just a foil for class warfare.

I am so sorry that your children have struggled with addiction and that your daughter has lived on the streets. As far as what your tax dollars are being used for they are definitely going to be used for the homeless. Inslee is trying to get 4 billion dollars approved for homelessness. 4 BILLION! It's crazy especially considering Washington "only" has 25,000 homeless people living in our state(although it can be argued that is a low number). If we already have to spend money on the homeless issue I would spend it on putting drug abuses and pushers in jail with harsh sentences with the only way to shorten these sentences being going through state sponsored rehab- which would last years (maybe even the rest of their lives). I would increase sentences for repeat offenders and enforce burglary, vagrancy, and petty theft laws. Even if forced rehabilitation is as low as 25% success (which I would argue it is higher) that would help. It's got to be about getting drug abusers/pushers off of the street. Legalizing this crap isn't helping.

Honest question Hawktalk which one of these three option would you want for your daughter (and if that is too personal I completely understand and apologize?-

Would you rather your daughter be allowed to pursue her drug addiction on the streets, being able to basically live anywhere she wants, steal whatever she wants, and have easy access to drugs with no threat of being arrested. Although she's safe from arrest she's not safe from life on the street.

Have a state paid for safe place to live where she can do drugs without any fear of being arrested, but also you would know that she is probably warm and has a bed to sleep in. Safe from being arrested and relatively safe from harm- although obviously not completely safe because she is doing drugs and surrounded by drug users.

Get arrested multiple times and harshly prosecuted with a long jail sentence and the only way to shorten that sentence is to take Methadone and go through a state sponsored rehab process which continues for years (maybe even the rest of her life) after she gets out.

[RiverDog]

This is personal. Both my older 2 have struggled with opiate addiction. My son is doing OK now and not sure about sarah as we dont speak much right now.

She went from a beautiful young woman capable of anything to living on the streets of Portland, dancing in strip clubs and even selling herself on the streets, Shes been in rehab 3 times. At one point she and her pos dealer boyfriend were breaking into vacant houses to stay warm in the winter.Sarah was the victim of molestation at the hands of one of my ex wifes BFs to be fair, its been a life sentence. Its hell as a parent , a gut ache that never goes away .

Portland is the heroin capitol of the world. It was when it was illegal and it is when its decriminalized. So its up close and personal. I have no idea the answer. Stiffer enforcement ? Fine .
your taxes will go way up to pay the extra law enforcement and feed and house them.
Same for government assistance. Dont help those scummy bums with my tax dollars. The same party screaming the loudest telling women what to do with their bodies have absolutely no plan for after they are born. Just a foil for class warfare.

Yes, that is very sad, and my heart goes out to you and your family.

But like you, I don't have a solution. My best answer is for the government to provide resources for those that want to get out of that vicious circle that you speak of. Without accepting the fact that they have a problem and a determination to do something about it, there's not much anyone can do to break them of their vices, get a job, and re-enter mainstream society.

[Hawktawk]

All I want for my kids is to be ok . My daughter is a victim of a sexual assault coupled with hereditary mental issues . But she’s not blameless and between family she has had lots of resources over the years . But heroin put her in strip clubs , walking the streets . She lost her son to CPS , got clean , got him back . Relapsed and lost him again . Kidnapped him and now has no parental rights at all. Point being when a normally loving mother will throw away her only child for a high it tells you what kind of grip opiates have on you . I hear all the proposals for incarceration , forced sobriety , forced methadone use . There will be a high failure rate imo . But do we buy them properties to sit and get high on with a high fence ? Not a junkyard. A junkie yard . Not sure .

I agree with prosecution of drug kingpins . Maybe death . Common sense for small time guys moving enough weight to get their fix . I don’t think people should be allowed to use illegal class 2 narcotics in public . Arrest those people . But remember arresting someone makes them less employable which is the only real hope for a normal life for them

I have compassion . Some people can’t just get up and fix themselves and be ok . What’s america going to do ? It may be more prevalent in democratic states but it’s everywhere and last I checked were the UNITED states. We need to stop treating this like a god damn political football like everything else .

[Aseahawkfan]

Hawktawks story is an example of what I'm talking about because most American's are not getting it about opiates. There are no half measures. There is no curing it with a government paid place and decriminalization. There is no winning with standard drug enforcement. You need to go absolutely nuclear on opiate addiction. Kill the dealers with no mercy shown and the addicts need forced rehab. You need to treat it like someone is selling poison to your children.

I liken it to watching movies about drugs that show the difference between the levels of problematic addiction. With MJ you get movies like Cheech and Chong or Harold and Kumar go to White Castle or Pineapple Express. With coke you might get a Bright Lights, Big City or some coked up party movie. With heroin you get Requiem for a Dream, Trainspotting, and Less than Zero. Heroin movies aren't funny forays hanging out with your buddies. Or even coked up business people at some party talking fast and not able to sleep. Heroin is a descent into self-destruction and depravity on a level no one that hasn't seen it or done it can imagine.

I originally thought all these heroin movies were exaggerations until I had a friend dot that stuff. I've been around drugs my life which I why I don't touch them. Seen coke use, lots of MJ, LSD, some meth, crank, alcohol, and the other crap. That stuff can be bad. But nothing is close to heroin addiction. When my buddy got into heroin, he fell into a pit. Sold off most of his stuff to pay for it. Had addicts sleeping in his living room if they gave him a fix. His home went from mildly cluttered to looking like he lived in an abandoned building with whinoes with shopping carts in his living room they used for daily thievery to pay for their heroin addiction. His dealer used to pay girls he lived with in heroin sex or having them turning tricks in his house to pay for their heroin. Heroin and other opiates are addictive poison on a level I've never seen.

I think continuing with these half-measures is a mistake. They need to burn down the dealers and treat heroin selling on our streets like an act of war on our society. Enslaving people to a drug as addictive as heroin is vile act and should be treated as such.

The heroin trade should be burnt down. I wish I could take control for a while because I would burn the heroin trade to the ground and start offing the dealers to dry up the supply treating them like some kind of terrorist trying to kill people with their drug. Not sure how long we have to continue to watch heroin do its evil whether it's killing people or turning them into drug slaves before we do what is necessary to destroy the industry. Heroin isn't coke or MJ or acid or any of the softer drugs. It's a drug on a whole other level and needs to be treated as such and absolutely wiped out.

[Aseahawkfan]

This is personal. Both my older 2 have struggled with opiate addiction. My son is doing OK now and not sure about sarah as we dont speak much right now.

She went from a beautiful young woman capable of anything to living on the streets of Portland, dancing in strip clubs and even selling herself on the streets, Shes been in rehab 3 times. At one point she and her pos dealer boyfriend were breaking into vacant houses to stay warm in the winter.Sarah was the victim of molestation at the hands of one of my ex wifes BFs to be fair, its been a life sentence. Its hell as a parent , a gut ache that never goes away .

Portland is the heroin capitol of the world. It was when it was illegal and it is when its decriminalized. So its up close and personal. I have no idea the answer. Stiffer enforcement ? Fine .
your taxes will go way up to pay the extra law enforcement and feed and house them.
Same for government assistance. Dont help those scummy bums with my tax dollars. The same party screaming the loudest telling women what to do with their bodies have absolutely no plan for after they are born. Just a foil for class warfare.

I understand your story.

My buddy fell into a pit he was able to climb out of it, but it was deeper than any he had been in before.

My nephew disappeared on the streets because of heroin addiction. He hadn't been heard from in years. Family tried to help him, but once the heroin had him he became lost.

Another guy I know pimped out his wife to get heroin fixes. Lost multiple jobs and even to this day fights the addiction and the health problems from years of addiction to heroin.

A lady I knew at work lost both her sons to Oxy addiction.

Opiates are terrible. Worst drugs in existence. Now I'm reading reports of Fentanyl offing people including kids with minimal contact. And yet we're still treating marijuana the same as opiates on a Federal level. We are such a dumb country sometimes.

[MackStrongIsMyHero]

Hawktawks story is an example of what I'm talking about because most American's are not getting it about opiates. There are no half measures. There is no curing it with a government paid place and decriminalization. There is no winning with standard drug enforcement. You need to go absolutely nuclear on opiate addiction. Kill the dealers with no mercy shown and the addicts need forced rehab. You need to treat it like someone is selling poison to your children.

I liken it to watching movies about drugs that show the difference between the levels of problematic addiction. With MJ you get movies like Cheech and Chong or Harold and Kumar go to White Castle or Pineapple Express. With coke you might get a Bright Lights, Big City or some coked up party movie. With heroin you get Requiem for a Dream, Trainspotting, and Less than Zero. Heroin movies aren't funny forays hanging out with your buddies. Or even coked up business people at some party talking fast and not able to sleep. Heroin is a descent into self-destruction and depravity on a level no one that hasn't seen it or done it can imagine.

I originally thought all these heroin movies were exaggerations until I had a friend dot that stuff. I've been around drugs my life which I why I don't touch them. Seen coke use, lots of MJ, LSD, some meth, crank, alcohol, and the other crap. That stuff can be bad. But nothing is close to heroin addiction. When my buddy got into heroin, he fell into a pit. Sold off most of his stuff to pay for it. Had addicts sleeping in his living room if they gave him a fix. His home went from mildly cluttered to looking like he lived in an abandoned building with whinoes with shopping carts in his living room they used for daily thievery to pay for their heroin addiction. His dealer used to pay girls he lived with in heroin sex or having them turning tricks in his house to pay for their heroin. Heroin and other opiates are addictive poison on a level I've never seen.

I think continuing with these half-measures is a mistake. They need to burn down the dealers and treat heroin selling on our streets like an act of war on our society. Enslaving people to a drug as addictive as heroin is vile act and should be treated as such.

The heroin trade should be burnt down. I wish I could take control for a while because I would burn the heroin trade to the ground and start offing the dealers to dry up the supply treating them like some kind of terrorist trying to kill people with their drug. Not sure how long we have to continue to watch heroin do its evil whether it's killing people or turning them into drug slaves before we do what is necessary to destroy the industry. Heroin isn't coke or MJ or acid or any of the softer drugs. It's a drug on a whole other level and needs to be treated as such and absolutely wiped out.

Half measures are definitely not working. I wish we had the resolve as a nation to do what you say. Down here in Baton Rouge, fentanyl has reached near epidemic proportions. Lots of ODs are happening because they are cutting softer drugs with this stuff. Small children have also been ODing when they find their parent's fentanyl stash. To the local LE's credit, they've made a concerted effort to track it down and arrest people; they busted three houses in relative quite neighborhoods (my neighbor was one of them). These places had lots of fentanyl along with several semi-automatic firearms. Not even sure if that's going to stem the tide.

[RiverDog]

Half measures are definitely not working. I wish we had the resolve as a nation to do what you say. Down here in Baton Rouge, fentanyl has reached near epidemic proportions. Lots of ODs are happening because they are cutting softer drugs with this stuff. Small children have also been ODing when they find their parent's fentanyl stash. To the local LE's credit, they've made a concerted effort to track it down and arrest people; they busted three houses in relative quite neighborhoods (my neighbor was one of them). These places had lots of fentanyl along with several semi-automatic firearms. Not even sure if that's going to stem the tide.

I don't disagree with anything that has been said in these past few comments, and I agree that it's going to take some sort of drastic action to solve the issues of drug abuse and homelessness. But at the same time, we have to be practical in what we can expect out of our government and society in general. Especially as politically divided as we are, I don't see any decisive action on a whole range of issues. The best we can hope for is to mitigate the problem as much as we can and keep it from getting worse while protecting those of us in the rest of our society from those individuals that have screwed up their lives with their poor choices.

Back to the OP. I see where Cracker Barrell is closing all of its stores in the Portland area due to the failure of the understaffed and demoralized police department to effectively respond to rampant shoplifting. The liberals in that city that are responsible for the demonization of the police following the BLM riots, an activity that they might as well given their blessing to, are being left to simmer in their own broth.

This article is from Aug. of 2022 when Cracker Barrel closed one of their Portland stores, but it highlights the issues that companies are having with theft, drugs, and the homeless problem:

The statement (from Cracker Barrel's management) didn't mention any specific evaluation criteria, but employees who spoke to KGW said the restaurant's management called an emergency meeting Monday to announce the closure, and they told staff that it was due to security issues.

That's something the neighbors said they're quite familiar with. "There's a lot of theft," Goodwin said. "People on drugs." A quick look around the area Tuesday turned up drug paraphernalia, discarded clothes tags and abandoned shopping carts.

While the abrupt closure of a business like Cracker Barrel may be surprising to some, there have been some other recent closures in the Portland area under similar circumstances.

Coffee giant Starbucks announced last month that it would close two Portland locations — one downtown and one at Gateway — along with more than a dozen other stores across the country, due to safety concerns for staff and customers. A third Portland location in Hollywood has also been shuttered.

https://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/ ... 67d8b47723

[MackStrongIsMyHero]

It's just going to have to bottom out. A real shame, but they made their bed.

[RiverDog]

It's just going to have to bottom out. A real shame, but they made their bed.

Yeah, Portland and Seattle are in the first half of the 21st century like Detroit was in the last half of the 20th. Lots of plywooded windows and graffiti resulting from businesses leaving, in Detroit's case, caused by the demise of the Big 3 auto makers. It's really sad as both Seattle and Portland were so vibrant and fun to visit. I used to take my daughter to Seattle, to the aquarium on the waterfront, Seattle Center, baseball games, boat tours on the bay. Now, they're open cesspools of human feces, blue tarps, and shopping carts filled with criminals, drug addicts, and an understaffed and demoralized police department that's been taught to worry about covering their asses first and protecting the community second.

I'm not going to blame the Dems/libs for all of Seattle and Portland's homeless/drug problems, but they damn sure didn't do anything effective to address it (anyone remember the $80k toilets for the homeless?) And I blame them for about 90% of the problems associated with their police departments, which is the really frustrating thing regarding this subject as so many of us could see that one coming.

[mykc14]

Yeah, Portland and Seattle are in the first half of the 21st century like Detroit was in the last half of the 20th. Lots of plywooded windows and graffiti resulting from businesses leaving, in Detroit's case, caused by the demise of the Big 3 auto makers. It's really sad as both Seattle and Portland were so vibrant and fun to visit. I used to take my daughter to Seattle, to the aquarium on the waterfront, Seattle Center, baseball games, boat tours on the bay. Now, they're open cesspools of human feces, blue tarps, and shopping carts filled with criminals, drug addicts, and an understaffed and demoralized police department that's been taught to worry about covering their asses first and protecting the community second.

I'm not going to blame the Dems/libs for all of Seattle and Portland's homeless/drug problems, but they damn sure didn't do anything effective to address it (anyone remember the $80k toilets for the homeless?) And I blame them for about 90% of the problems associated with their police departments, which is the really frustrating thing regarding this subject as so many of us could see that one coming.

You don't blame the Dems for leagilizing hard core drug possession (an issues which is clearly connected to homelessness)? 90% of us could see that would lead to more people selling drugs (I mean they can essentially have a months worth of drugs on them without consequence), drug abusers moving in, and crime in general (also clearly connected with homelessness). Combine that with the 90% of the issues surrounding police departments (defunding movements) and not prosecuting criminals or enforcing vagrancy laws and I would say you have about 90% of the reason Seattle and Portland are falling apart. Liberal Democrat policies have ruined Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, etc... Those cities were beautiful for decades- being ran by Democrats. I don't have a problem with Dem's, its the extreme liberal policies that are to blame and they certainly are increasing homeless numbers in Seattle and Portland.

[c_hawkbob]

Decriminalized not legalized. Big difference.

[mykc14]

Decriminalized not legalized. Big difference.

Not in Seattle. They do not arrest anybody with a gram or less of any drug on them. Potato vs. potato. I will grant that those drugs are not technically legal but in practice they are and drug users know it. The same is true in other liberal US cities who have 'decriminalized' drug use.