The woke, or progressive, fantasy is that idealistic motives can and should underlie all government policy. By this thinking, progressives feel sorry for criminals, particularly criminals of color, whom they perceive as the victims of “systemic racism” and predatory capitalism. Therefore, punishment for criminals of color should be minimized, no matter how heinous or frequent the wrongdoing has been. Only in this way, progressives believe, can “systemic racism” be combated.

Fife is such a phony. Suddenly “traffic safety” is her #1 issue. This, from “defund the police” Fife and “Moms 4 Housing” Fife and “Protect the encampments” Fife. None of those issues is resonating with normal people, so Fife has found a new cause—or is pretending to.

I’m still trying to figure out what the progressives really believe concerning rent and housing. Their actual agenda, I’m convinced, is a mystery wrapped in ambiguity, surrounded by a bodyguard of lies.

The radicals in the woke movement speak a great deal of gibberish about “holistic justice,” making it sound like a valid scientific concept when, in fact, it’s just a get-out-of-jail free card for criminals. Pamela Price talks about it all the time, as if “a holistic approach to justice” is the solution to all the crime and misery in Oakland and Alameda County. But, of course, once you get past the gobbledegook and double talk, you’re left with Price’s real agenda: letting criminals under the age of 25 go free, paroling dangerous predators, firing dedicated prosecutors, and—of course—going after cops with the vengeful hatred of the true Oakland wokester.

On Grand Avenue, there’s a store with a sign in the window that says, “SHINING BLACK PEOPLE! We are retrieving all that would be stolen by our ridiculous foes.” With all this chatter about reparations going on, I fear the feeling is increasingly widespread, in the Black and progressive communities, that America owes Black people a lot of money.