Desperate Dems distancing after San Francisco debacle 

The news itself was huge: Last week, voters in the uber-progressive city of San Francisco ousted from office three school-board members who had consistently prioritized the radical left’s woke agenda over students’ education.

But as the dust has settled after this political bombshell, the reaction — especially from some Democrats — has been quite interesting as well. It’s worth a closer look.

Here’s how San Francisco’s Democrat mayor, London Breed, responded to the news:

“In this particular case, the board neglected their primary responsibility to focus on other things, other things that are important, but not as significant as what they were there to do and that is to educate children. ... We failed our children. Parents were upset. The city as a whole was upset, and the decision to recall school board members was a result of that.”

You’ll forgive us if we’re not impressed.

While there’s nothing necessarily objectionable about Breed’s statement per se, its timing — like its source — raises an eyebrow. We’re all for calling out the school-board members and their fellow travelers on the left for their reprehensible dereliction of duty. But nobody should miss what’s behind Breed’s condemnation.

Breed, like other Democrats across the country, had every opportunity to forcefully oppose the hard left’s educational agenda when it first began to seep into our schools — and certainly long before it had become as entrenched as it is today. At best, they remained silent; at worst, they encouraged it.

What should be obvious to everyone is that the sudden repudiation is purely political. Democrats know that if adherence to woke radicalism is a political liability in San Francisco, it’s a liability everywhere. And so Breed and others are now in a panic-stricken rush to the exit door to get off this particular crazy train.

What’s likely to unfold from here is a bit of a fissure among Democrats. While some will continue to unapologetically champion the hard-left approach, the more strategic among them will no doubt try to follow Breed’s lead. One who already has is Michael Bloomberg, the erstwhile presidential candidate, who slammed the fact that, “Instead of reopening schools, [the school-board members] spent their time renaming them, stripping off the names of historic figures like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln before a public outcry forced them to reverse course."

But Bloomberg also betrayed the real reason for his worries, adding: "I am deeply concerned that, absent an immediate course correction, the party is headed for a wipeout in November, up and down the ballot. The political earthquake that just occurred in San Francisco should be a dire warning to the national Democratic Party."

Between now and November, you’re going to continue to hear from plenty of Democrats — especially the politically vulnerable ones — about how horrified they are by the failures of our education system and the dangerous road that the radicals in their midst have taken us down.

But it’ll all be a ruse. The time to speak up was when the leftist agenda first started doing damage to our nation’s kids, not when it began causing political headaches for Democrats. As such, the party as a whole bears responsibility for the mess we’re in today. They’re just counting on voters having short memories and forgetting that fact in time to vote this fall.

Don’t be fooled.

Morning morsels ...

THE ECONOMY

Las Vegas is in a housing bubble (Victor Joecks, Las Vegas Review-Journal): The last time Las Vegas had a major housing bubble, things didn’t end well. Here’s hoping it ends differently this time. It’s not fun to think about, but there are many signs that current Las Vegas housing prices aren’t sustainable. Last year, prices soared 26 percent. Read more >

Reno homeless population on street nearly doubles in a year (Associated Press): The number of homeless people living on Reno-area streets has almost doubled over the past year as home prices continue to soar to record levels and the lack of affordable housing intensifies. County data shows the number of “unsheltered/unknown” homeless individuals jumped from 342 in January 2021 to 656 last month, the Reno Gazette Journal reported. Read more >

Joe Biden is making the housing crisis worse (Joel Kotkin, UnHerd): As inflation continues to soar in America, few things have become more precious than hard assets like property. And with the stock market as unsteady as our political leadership, big dollars from Wall Street are pouring into real estate, snapping up both multi-family and single-family homes. Read more >

FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL

Three Douglas primary races shaping up with filing less than two weeks out (Kurt Hildebrand, The Record-Courier): By this time next month, the stage will be set for the 2022 election. ... Most of Douglas County’s partisan offices will be settled in the June 7 Republican Primary. As of this week, The Record-Courier has received announcements that portend at least three Republican primary races, including both seats in the Nevada Legislature and the County Commissioners District 2 seat. Read more >

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Biden’s Woke Appeasers Trash U.S. Military Readiness (Jed Babbin, The American Spectator): It was only a few weeks ago that President Joe Biden announced that we were committed to maintaining Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. Now Russian President Vladimir Putin is recognizing two parts of Ukraine — Donetsk and Luhansk — as independent states. His team of woke appeasers won’t even be able to muster significant sanctions against this Russian aggression. Read more >
 

NOTABLE QUOTE

“The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.” ― Abraham Lincoln