The Patriot Post® · In Stockton, CA, Crime Pays

How does one sell a bad idea? Dress it up with a lot of false conjecture and two-bit moral platitudes designed to guilt the audience into acquiescence lest they be labeled as heartless bigots for opposing it. Leftists have been using this tactic for decades, and the latest example comes out of Stockton, California.

The youthful 27-year-old Democrat mayor of Stockton, Michael Tubbs, recently announced his new plan to combat crime. He’s calling it “Advance Peace.” Tubbs’ program would grant a stipend of up to $1,000 a month to “those individuals deemed most likely to shoot somebody.” It is a novel take on the Universal Basic Income ideology, which is essentially a welfare program for displaced workers predicated on the notion that as technological development increases automation in production, workers are left behind without the means to earn a livable wage. Tubbs’ version, rather than providing basic income for a worker whose job skills have become obsolete, would focus on dissuading potentially violent individuals from engaging in criminal activity by essentially paying them not to commit crimes. What could possibly go wrong?

It’s like a school lunchroom monitor giving a bully a free meal in the hopes that he will feel no need to steal other kids’ lunch money. Instead of punishing criminal behavior, the program rewards it. How exactly will this lead to less crime? Clearly, the fundamental assertion being made is that poverty, not human nature, is the root cause of crime. While poverty in certain ways does exacerbate it, the fact of the matter is criminal behavior exists throughout all social economic spheres. Lying, stealing, cheating and murder are not isolated to poor communities. The root culprit for all crime is found in human nature. Wherever humanity exists these behaviors will quickly manifest.

An obvious objection to the program is this: What’s to stop individuals within the program from wastefully spending the free money? Tubbs’ answer is laughable for it naivety. The Los Angles Times writes, “Tubbs said what he’s heard from residents is that if their number comes up, they won’t use the extra $500 a month to buy a new car or television. They’ll pay bills. One mother said it would help with inflated food and utility costs when her kids come home from college for the summer.”

Clearly, the program is intended as a gateway for leftist propaganda. While initially funded by private individuals, what’s to stop taxpayers from having to eventually foot the bill in the future? As with all these leftist welfare schemes, once people are hooked into the program it becomes tremendously difficult to cut them off. Political pressure will mount over any proposal for ending a source of income that people depend on. It will be met with howls of outrage for the supposed lack of concern for the poor or the insistence that doing so would guarantee a rise in crime. We all know how this game works.

(Edited.)