Oregon may be the most liberal, or progressive, or let’s face it, socialist state in the United States. Despite having suffered all that comes with leftist governance: Crime, a moribund economy, and so on, enough Oregon voters keep voting for the far left to keep it that way.

Inside Oregon lies Portland, nestled in there like a rotten red pearl inside a dead, decaying oyster. Portland is, even by Oregon standards, a bastion of the absolute nutcase left.

A column at the New York Post by Fox Business’s Senior Correspondent Charles Gasparino draws some interesting comparisons between Portland and New York, which, under the administration of the new communist mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is almost certainly headed down the same dark path.

If the travails of a certain Left Coast city are any guide, Zohran Mamdani’s plan to paint New York red is not only bound to fail but also to alienate voters once they get a real taste of his socialist “utopia.”

The mayor-elect wants to hand out everything from frozen rents and free buses to subsidized trans surgeries even for kids. He wants the so-called 1% of wealthy New Yorkers who already pay for most of the freebies to pay even more to foot the bill.

That message won him the mayoralty, but what he left out of his pitch is what happens next. Just how much do people really like progressive government, and what happens to local economies and standards of living when lefty pols go there?

A good part of Mamdani’s agenda, of course, just isn’t possible. He can’t just wave his hand and provide “free” buses; on the other hand, he doesn’t seem to even understand that these buses would have to be paid for by someone, somewhere. Oh, he talks big about the “rich paying their fair share,” but in New York and elsewhere, the “rich,” meaning anyone who has a penny more than he does, are already paying far more than their fair share, and in most places, they aren’t getting their money’s worth in return. No, the “rich” will be making for the exits, leaving nobody to tax to pay for Mamdani’s wish list.

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The bill always comes due. And to see what happens then, just look at Oregon, and specifically, Portland.

According to the survey conducted by Public Opinion Strategies (financed by the pro-business advocacy group Save Our Cities), here are the results:

•  67% say Oregon’s economy is “pretty seriously off on the wrong track” because of mountainous taxes, regulations and homelessness.
• Independents are the largest voting bloc and 73% believe the state is on the wrong track.
• Portland, of course, has been one of the epicenters of social justice since 2020. Massive protests and various government programs to provide equity. But people in the state say they now care more about jobs and the economy than this lefty fad by a margin of 62% to 15%.

The numbers don’t lie. Oregon was once a burgeoning tech hub, but big employers like Intel have been cutting staff. Its unemployment rate is growing to 5%, the highest since COVID. The Wall Street Journal recently reported about the difficulty in leasing space in downtown Portland: The US Bancorp Tower, “once a premier address in the city, was afflicted with ‘vagrants sleeping in hallways of vacant office floors.’” 

So, when do Oregon and New York voters have a sudden rush of brains to the head and stop electing these nutcases?

My guess is, sadly, “Not any time soon.” The people with any inclinations to have voted for anyone who is not a creature of the far left have already headed for greener pastures, in Florida, Texas, or Tennessee. That exodus will continue, and the remaining people will still be the few urban elites wealthy enough to afford to live in a socialist utopia, and the dependency class who will keep right on voting for whoever promises them the most free Schiff.

This can only end in collapse. The civil authorities will give up. Law enforcement will abandon their posts en masse. Businesses will close their doors and bail, no matter how much the local politicians rant and rave. You can already see the beginning of this meltdown. The end? Portland will descend into chaos.

Portland is nearing the end of this doom cycle. Watch now, as Zohran Mamdani’s New York rushes to join it.

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