When I hear “fool,” one person comes to mind. In handling back-to-back blizzards, New York City’s duly elected fool has proven to be a joke, but the results aren’t funny. His experimental policies allowing homeless people to stay on the streets during extreme cold have come at a steep cost of 29 lives. Unfortunately, we can only expect to see more unforced errors.
How is that “affordability” agenda going? Owners are likely to face a higher property tax, a cost they will pass down to tenants and renters in the form of higher prices or worse living conditions.
How’s that city-owned grocery store? It’ll cost $70 million just to study its feasibility and construct five of them. Even though other instances from around the country have already shown that similar stores have struggled with competition and operational costs, why not try again just for kicks?
How about those 25 new child care centers? Not opening. Because many of the New Yorkers raising the next generation know that nothing is free, and what is billed as “free” is not of good quality. We all learned from what happened in Minnesota. Take it from someone who was born in the former Soviet Union. The loftier the promises, the harder the fall. The greatest city in the world shouldn’t be a place that falls to bread lines and rations.
That wide and lying smile obviously fooled just enough of us, but will continue to grow tiresome. New York is strong, and its people are not ones to be suckered. Fool us once, shame on you. Should New Yorkers be fooled again come November 2029, we will have no one else to blame but ourselves.