Captured on film, handcuffed, and set free

Cities controlled by Democrats have decided that arresting criminals is too hard. It is much easier to turn their cities into surveillance states.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that 480 surveillance cameras would be installed in and around Oakland. According to Newsom, “we’re equipping law enforcement with the tools they need to effectively combat criminal activity and hold perpetrators accountable.”

That’s all great and swell, but ultimately, this barely moves the needle. Oakland’s problem hasn’t been law enforcement, but prosecution. With a district attorney who doesn’t think her job performance affects crime and who thinks that violent criminals should get no jail time for their crimes, you can catch as many criminals as you want in Oakland, on camera or otherwise. You just can’t keep them behind bars.

So what will Newsom achieve by putting up a bunch of cameras? Those cameras will identify criminals that Oakland doesn’t want to prosecute, as evidenced by Oakland’s unwillingness to vigorously prosecute any of its criminals. It would appear that Oakland is going to transform into a surveillance state with crime as the excuse, when the city’s top law enforcement official doesn’t care about crime in the first place.

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The only thing that could make this more representative of California’s (lack of) competence would be if each camera cost $1 million and didn’t function at night because they run on solar power.

Oakland doesn’t need cameras. Oakland needs leaders who think crime is bad and criminals belong in jail. So long as it doesn’t have those people, those cameras won’t help anyone do anything but get instant replays of crimes the city doesn’t care to prosecute. That is, if California actually ensures those cameras can function. You can’t take anything for granted in the Golden State anymore.