Lateefah Simon (middle), (Liz Hafalia/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
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“This district is the birthplace of the Black Panther Party,” Lateefah Simon proudly narrates, as she walks past murals of black nationalists. The camera then pans to shots of the University of California, Berkeley campus. “We taught the nation how to fight for freedom,” she says. “And I’m going to be the one to fight this hard fight.” Simon is a congressional candidate vying for one of the most Democratic open seats in the nation — and she’s a shoo-in.
Her portrayal of the district, which overlaps with much of the East Bay, a region connected by bridge to San Francisco, is a throwback to an idealised past. In many respects, it is the cradle of Californian radicalism and those New Left identity politics that have come to define modern progressivism. But it is also home to extreme inequality and sprawling homeless encampments, with carjackings, shootings, and rampant theft part of daily life. The “most dangerous square mile” in America lies right at the heart of this district.
The revolutionary symbolism of Simon’s campaign also betrays a murkier reality: one that has both reshaped the East Bay and reflects the future of the Democratic Party. For all her trumpeting of social mobility, Simon, who previously worked as an aide to Kamala Harris, is a party operative on the payroll of the wealthiest donors in the state — a self-appointed clique of philanthropist benefactors who have ripped apart the social threads of the region with their extreme policies designed to remake policing and criminal justice. In Oakland, for instance, burglaries are so common that the police department encourages homeowners to warn one another of break-ins with airhorns. Inevitably, the wealthy live cloistered behind gates with their own private security.
Faced with such disorder, one might expect Simon to view fixing crime as a priority. And yet, there are no crime policy positions or any policy platform listed on her campaign website. The local media, parts of which have received funding from her work in philanthropy, haven’t done any significant reporting into Simon’s background or her tenure managing BART, the local train network that has fallen into severe fiscal decline and where violent incidents for passengers have become routine. And in a year since announcing, she has refused to debate any challengers.
This isn’t to say that Simon has shied away from discussing the issue on the mind of every East Bay resident. Following the death of George Floyd, Simon said she would focus on a “complete shift” in policing — an institution “riddled with anti-blackness”. As a BART director, she led the push to shift funds to new programmes that use social workers to respond to the problem of widespread mental illness, homelessness and drug abuse on trains, rather than police. She hired a DEI firm, Be the Change Consulting, to institute her “de-emphasising police” reforms.
“If there is a man who is houseless, and he has no clothes and he has no shoes, we are in conversations and in some agreement that his first interaction may need to be with an outreach worker,” Simon told reporters. “Not a man or a woman trained to take down a soldier.”
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SubscribeThe U.S. is slaloming to a relatively low-tech Philip K. d**k dystopia, something like Running Man.
Ugh. No wonder California is such a craphole. Very discoursing to read how corrupt and undemocratic the political system is in California.
I used to enjoy visiting California and especially San Francisco. Not any more, its a dystopian hell hole and Democratic progressives are entirely to blame. No idea what they are trying to achieve.
Their achievement is laid out for all to see. There is no other explanation that makes sense. It is not possible to reach these results until it is intentional.
You underestimate the human capacity to rationalize facts to fit their ideology and overestimate the ability of humans to think independently of their tribe/social groups. It is very possible for all this to be unintentional. I say we leave them to it.
Let them make their blessed city upon the hill of progressive policy. Let them show us where the path of progressive utopia leads. Let all the world witness the fruits of their tolerance, their compassion, their social justice. Let us hold them up for all to see as a monument for all to see, to see, and to judge for themselves. Nothing more is required to defeat them.
Whether the world sees it or not will make no difference to these self-righteous cranks. They are incapable of introspection, instead simply choosing to believe they are right and the problems are all someone else’s fault.
After all, even after 100 million deaths they still believe that communism works.
I used to enjoy vacationing in California and spent a great deal of time in the Bay Area. However, in 2016 I determined no more of my vacation dollars would be spent in that state. That means I’m not giving sales tax dollars to a corrupt state. We boycott products, so we should also be able to boycott the tourism industry.
Grifters gonna grift.
Just another token minority social climber coasting of neurotic guilt and narcissism of her wealthy white supporters. If AOC and her were to meet, they would probably hate one another out fear of having compete with with one each other.
she would do well as university administrator – or airline CEO. United may have opening when that drag Queen they have now is head hunted by NASA
“California’s elite crowns its own AOC
Is Lateefah Simon the West Coast’s answer to the progressive firebrand?”
Can’t understand why this is the headline… Nearly stopped me reading the article.
I’ve missed something, what or who is AOC?
Alexandra Ocasio Cortez. Congresswoman for Brooklyn. Billed as a radical progressive, but turned out to be a woke grifter.
The low point came two years ago when she was photo-oped in the Met Gala, swanning maskless past a row of dystopian, black-attired, mostly minority masked servants, while she herself was wearing a designer dress on which was splattered in chic-graffiti ‘Tax the Rich’. The dress, it turned out, had been made by a millionaire designer who was facing indictment for non-payment of income tax.
Thanks, i usually associate AOC as a wine classification
You are very right to retain that association. Santé!
Please: AOC’s district is parts of Queens and Bronx – not Brooklyn. We in nextdoor Brooklyn try to maintain some standards. Other than this quibble, your points are well taken.
How lonely do you feel having this viewpoint toward AOC (and other progressive causes) whilst living in ny? Honest question
Oops, sorry. Got me burroughs muddled. Thanks.
That may have been her lowest point but the fake parking lot blubbering photo-op has to be the funniest.
Emphatically agree.
it is the cradle of Californian radicalism and those New Left identity politics that have come to define modern progressivism. But it is also home to extreme inequality and sprawling homeless encampments, with carjackings, shootings, and rampant theft part of daily life.
The reality of the left’s record says there is no “but” to be included. The inequality, crime, and homelessness are as much a part of modern progressivism as the relentless fixation on identity. There are too many examples for this to be coincidence. Her own record shows failure, but in typical fashion, she’ll be rewarded for that.
How wonderful to know that another grifter is going to join our illustrious Club 535, otherwise known as Congress. More taxpayer money to be squandered on a know-nothing who chooses to be stuck in a bygone era.
Everything she has put her hand to she has failed. Yet she is lauded. A perfect example of black.privilege and why the west is falling.
Black.progessive priviloge I should say. BLack conservatives are demonised beyond words by these awful.people.
Its California, competence is not important, it ones wiliness to serve power is all that counts, its why people like her fail upwards.
“Humble beginnings” are an arrest record and teenaged single motherhood?
With more people like this is positions of authority, California will look like South Sudan by 2030.
Zimbabwe, South Africa, Haiti, Detroit and Chicago have all freed themselves from rule by their White oppressors. How well has that turned out?
Ditto Baltimore & Washington DC…places now governed solely by blacks which are ridden with crime, disorder and decay.
And the victims of the out-of-control crime are overwhelmingly black, which explains why the white power structure and white media owners don’t care.
I mean the USA is a democracy and the popular will should be respected. If people in certain areas or certain ethnic groups prefer chronic out of control crime and urban decay to police forces and the rule of law, why not just let them be?
I sort of agree, but in a democracy people are fickle and the less educated are duped by demagoguery and social media, also it is in the interests of the elite to sow discord, if the people are divided they are safe (the elites), throwing the people scraps to keep them happy, scraps that they can write of as tax breaks whilst investing in lobbying to improve their power base.
Lowest common denominator.
Alexandria Ocasio-Torres. A member of the United States Congress from Queens, a borough of NYC. Elected in a complete surprise victory over the years-long elderly, absentee occupant of that position. She had previously worked as a bartender. Well-endowed, very attractive young lady with a drop-dead figure that doesn’t stop, (unlike most Democrat female politicians, who look like out of shape, overweight middle-aged white guys). A member of the far left, pro-Palestinian wing of the Democrat Party. She grew up in an upper middle-class white neighborhood in trendy Westchester County. Well to do parents, excellent education. Keeps her pasty-white, red-headed fiancé (of Scottish origin) away from the cameras when she is attending pro-Hamas and BLM rallies as a fellow Person of Color.
In other words, Sandy Cortez is a fraud, which makes her perfect for the modern-day Dem Party.
You forgot to mention that Cortez auditioned fir the gig and got the part.
Occasional-Cortex is her correct surname. Otherwise a good post.
I’ve always like Occasionally Coherent better.
That sounds sexist Howard, hence the unherd upticks…?
California has become like a corrupt third world state.
Oh no, not another bloody grifter…what an unholy mess California has become due the so-called Progressives. Regressive would be more to the point.
Bombast is not competency. I use to get angry about thus nonsense; now I just laugh.
With a name like ‘Lateefah’ (so VERY non-chique!) how could she possibly fail to be a Democrat or even fail at all?
By her actions shall you know her… or possibly inactions.
As a new subscriber to UnHerd I thank for your courage and excellent journalism. Now I can skip The New York Times story celebrating Ms. Simon as a brave leader dedicated to dismantling systemic racism, fighting misogyny, and giving voice to the oppressed.
The hereditary publisher of the New York Times, the third in his family to hold the top job (just as in North Korea), lives in a heavily guarded New York City luxurious apartment complex. Burly liveried doormen guard the entrance, attend the residents, and walk them to and from their vehicles: equally imposing elevator operators man the building’s elevators. No pushing buttons to get to your penthouse for the Elite, someone pushes the buttons for you. The publisher travels with an armed driver and armed bodyguard when around and about. Has no idea of what New York City’s peasants, or L.A.’s peasantry have to go through to make it alive to the end of the day.
Not to mention that members of the other founding family of The New York Times, the Ochs family, supported the Confederacy during the Civil War. Oh what a tangled web these hypocrites weave.
Great work Lee Fang. As usual.
Thank you for this. Local mainstream American reporters would never report like this. My state of California is a squalid, tragic shambles of its former self, and these destructive policies are squarely to blame.
“We taught the nation how to fight for freedom,”
Quite stunning ignorance.
The US fought the War of Independence, the Civil War, both World Wars and numerous other conflicts….
And this idiot thinks that the ridiculously pompous low IQ morons with a fetish gor ersatz paramilitary gear, the Black Panthers, taught the US to fight for freedom?
My, my, my…….
They were especially good at fighting (and killing) among themselves.