By Greg Maresca
A picture is worth a thousand words that transcends generations. That photograph of armed New York National Guard troops standing at the entrance of a Queens-bound 7-train was another iconic photo that captured the Big Apple devolving into the Big Banana—as in republic.
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In another sign of societal and political surrender, Gov. Kathy Hochul ordered the state’s National Guard to patrol New York City’s subways. In the raw days of the 1970s and 1980s, when no subway car went unscathed courtesy of an army of graffiti bombers, the National Guard stayed home.
Armed troops are for Bosnia, not Brooklyn.
George Soros-financed prosecutors have effectively politicized the law with mob rule by decriminalizing crime, foregoing bail and incarceration that undermines law-abiding citizens while criminals walk. The city’s courts are like a catch-and-release fishing derby. It is more chaos, hypocrisy, and the deconstruction of the American way of life.
When the New York Police Department went “SWAT,” with assault weapons, helmets, flak jackets and looking more like a Marine fireteam than cops from the local precinct, my dad, who retired from his job as a cop, articulated how they were outfitted for war, not community policing, which is not a good look that speaks volumes.
The criminals know guardsmen are not law enforcement, nor will they engage on a crowded subway platform. In politics, optics matter, especially during a presidential election year. The image of a uniformed force in the subway promotes the façade that Democrats are tough on crime. They deserve the Oscar for best picture, not “Oppenheimer.”
New York City is where toothpaste is locked up while criminals roam free. Moreover, beginning in June, anyone entering Midtown Manhattan by vehicle can count on being greeted by a hefty toll.
Tourism has always been an economic engine for the city, but turning it into a Third World haven for illegals and criminals is no tourism strategy unless one wants to relive the 1981 movie “Escape from New York.”
No one has the political courage to take on the underlying problems for fear of being unfairly branded. They only dodge and deflect, being more afraid of the left than they are of criminals. These politicos don’t use public transportation, regardless. How long before a guardsman confronts a hooligan resulting in an injury or death and charges are filed against him? Recall the ongoing fate of Marine Daniel Penny, who was charged with manslaughter last year for using a chokehold while subduing a subway felon. The city refuses to prosecute offenders but charges a good Samaritan for protecting innocent citizens.
The Penny treatment awaits the National Guard.
If the crime wave continues, perhaps the city needs to deploy social workers and climate campaigners next.
What does it say about any locale that requires the military to control its criminal elements? It says the same about the voters who continuously re-elect these dolts.
The Covid-19 lockdown was a practice run. The National Guard in the subways is more of the same. Can martial law be far behind? Need more proof?
New York Attorney General Letitia James wasn’t happy when NYFD firemen booed her and chanted “Trump” at a recent promotion ceremony. A memo instructed all firefighters that they “should understand that (the department’s Bureau of Investigations) is gathering video and identifying members that brought discredit … to the department.” The memo said all malefactors “will come to [headquarters] to be educated on why their behavior is unacceptable.”
It is not just New York but the legion of cities run by socialist Democrats. These cities, once the envy of the world, are on the path to ruin via one-party rule like any other Third World country. Government is to work for its citizens, not against them. Having refused border integrity, the nation’s interior must be militarized.
If Donald Trump did such a thing, the left would bemoan nonstop how this is a “threat to democracy.”
A police state is no answer, but steadfast police officers who are unafraid to do their job is. Hochul needs to restore former Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s Broken Windows and stop-and-frisk policies that turned New York into one of the world’s safest cities.
In a nation where the military must protect its citizens from internal conflict, anarchy will inevitably reign.
Greg Maresca is a New York City native and U.S. Marine Corps veteran who writes for the Sample News Group while residing in the Pennsylvania Coal Region. His work can also be found in the Remnant, a national Catholic publication. In his stickball days, he was a two-sewer bat.
Was searced by Los Gatos CA USA police nearly every day. Mostly looking for Marijuana. San Jose CA USA. Campbell California. Santa Clara county Santa Cruz county. It was a way of life 🧬 back in the late seventies and early 80s. Searched in Sacramento California since the police 🚨🚓 said it was a hi crime area. The police 🚨🚓 can do whatever they want or it was that way. Ask any ugly looking MAN!!Now as a 60 year old 🗝️🗝️, Always calling the police 🚨🚓 for help for being Assaulted..
Mr. Gaiser it is evident that you never rode the trains in the “off-hours” prior to the days of stop and frisk. The city was much safer after it was implemented. Regarding your reference to the 4th Amendment, I defer to Cornell Law School’s website: A stop-and-frisk refers to a brief non-intrusive police stop of a suspect. The Fourth Amendment requires that before stopping the suspect, the police must have a reasonable suspicion that a crime has been, is being, or is about to be committed by the suspect. If the police reasonably suspect that the suspect is armed and dangerous, the police may frisk the suspect, meaning that the police will give a quick pat-down of the suspect’s outer clothing. The frisk is also called a Terry Stop, derived from the Supreme Court case Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968). In 2013 your then-commissioner of the New York City Police Department Ray Kelly: What counts as suspicious? Mr. Kelly mentions “scouting out a car or following people.” Or several young men waiting outside a bodega near closing time, or standing in the shadows near an ATM. As Mr. Kelly describes it, when a police officer observes such activity, he is allowed to approach people and “ask them the nature of their business, what they’re doing.”… If the officer then feels threatened, he is permitted to do a “limited pat down” of the potential suspect. And if the officer feels something that he believes is a weapon, he can conduct a “full search.”
Since you are in favor of stop and frisk is it a safe assumption then due process is not important to you?
You are hypocritical in that you state supportively that your father said that police dressed in SWAT gear is not a good look for community policing but yet you purport the 4th Amendment should be thrown out because someone looks guilty and they “may” commit a crime.
The US Constitution is for all people, not just those that you agree with.