It's not often that Progressive Democrats openly admit their failures.
But the Newark, NJ city council has given up on its police force, and their city. Today they enacted an ordinance mandating that eateries open after 9 PM must hire armed security guards.
Why?
Because last month an off-duty cop was shot and killed in a hail of bullets while waiting for his take-out order to be ready.
The new ordinance, sponsored by South Ward Councilman Ras Baraka, comes roughly a month after South Ward resident and police officer William Johnson was shot and killed while waiting to buy a slice of pizza at Texas Fried Chicken and Pizza.
Aside from the obvious inability of the city government to get a handle on the murder rate, the idiocy of this policy can't be beat. The only people who are legally allowed to own guns in Newark, ie the talent pool from which said armed guards would be drawn, are off-duty cops.
By all accounts Officer Johnson was a credit to his department. He was trained to spot trouble and react to it. In fact he was already moonlighting as a security guard at a nearby high-rise. But he was still gunned down in a senseless drive-by shooting.
The reality is the police in Newark can't protect themselves, let alone the average citizen. And the gun control nuts who are in charge in New Jersey won't dream of letting us protect ourselves.
Newark is lost. All the silly ordinances and armed guards in the world won't change that fact. But what does Councilman Baraka do? He blames the victims:
According to Baraka, the chicken shacks and pizza joints that stay open late do little to serve the community and encourage crime.
How's that for a kick in the ass? A guy who's trying to earn a living and maybe provide a service to his community, he's encouraging crime. Because an open chicken joint is a magnet for drive-by shootings and not a place for hungry people to grab a bite to eat.
Yeah, Newark is a goner. Forty some odd years of Democratic Party rule coupled with bazillions of dollars in social programs has produced a city which takes all the fun out of dysfunctional. The message is clear — hunker down, board up, hide inside your homes because the people you elected to protect you have given up on keeping you safe.
But come the next election Ras Baraka and the rest of his fellow councilmembers will be returned to office in a landslide. Because the citizens of Newark are genetically hardwired to vote Democratic. Even if it kills them.
Newark doesn't need armed guards. It needs a moat. And a fellow named Lot to take one last look around before he pulls up the drawbridge.
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