More and more every day, it's belaboring the obvious to point out that California in general, and some of its major cities in particular, are on the point of collapse. One of those cities is Oakland, where a local restauranteur is claiming that the crime epidemic is "the worst [she's] ever seen it."

Stories about high-profile companies in Oakland closing shop or hiring extra security have made grim headlines in recent months. But it's not just corporations that are feeling the crunch of increased crime in the Bay Area.

One local Oakland restaurant owner bluntly told Fox News Digital that the city where she's spent nearly all her 45 years is "the worst I've ever seen it."

Target closed its downtown Oakland location last year after police responded to more than 100 smash-and-grab thefts and similar incidents in 2023. In-N-Out recently announced its sole Oakland burger joint was closing, the first time in the company's history it had to make such a decision, due to rampant burglaries, property damage and armed robberies in the area. A Denny's also closed down last month because of the crime epidemic.

This mess is entirely the making of local and state politicians.

Oakland is the county seat of Alameda County, whose District Attorney Pamela Price has faced criticism for being perceived as soft on crime with her progressive policies, including such measures and efforts as not trying juveniles as adults, seeking lower sentences and probation for more crimes, and doing away with special-circumstance sentencing enhancements. Oakland is also without a permanent police chief at the moment, and Ahmed said she's "fed up" and disappointed with Democratic Mayor Sheng Thao and the City Council.

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The fact is that Oakland and other major urban areas suffering under progressive mayors, police chiefs, and prosecutors are on the verge of collapse.

Think about what the utter collapse of one of these major urban areas would look like. The ongoing trend of businesses fleeing the area would kick into high gear; there would be, for large swathes of these cities, no place to buy food or clothing, no place to have prescriptions filled, no entertainment venues. The tax base for the metropolitan and county governments would crash, forcing cutbacks to services ranging from police to utilities to schools. 

As things get worse, the last remaining productive residents will leave, some driven by desperation to abandon homes and businesses outright. Commercial and residential real estate values will crash into the basement; empty buildings will be taken over by squatters, the homeless, addicts, and many illegal aliens drawn in by those areas' generous "sanctuary city" policies. But it won't stop there; as the blighted areas are increasingly abandoned not only by former residents but by law enforcement, the remaining people will eventually move as well - spreading into areas not yet as badly affected by horrible "progressive" policies.

All this is due to the policies put in place by the "progressive" politicians that the voters of these areas keep sending back to office. They allow the homeless Bidenville encampments to take over streets and sidewalks and adopt soft-on-crime policies that only encourage predators. 

This is not how a civilized, orderly society is supposed to work. There is only one way for the productive people in these cities to turn this around - stop voting for Democrats.