For all that I remain a denizen of a rural community in Alaska, I'm an odd one indeed to be writing about the state of America's urban areas. If you've been reading my work at all, you know I grew up in a rural setting and am a content rural dweller myself now. I have little time for cities, despite having lived in them for four decades. I find them unpleasant; crowded, noisy, and, to be honest, they smell bad. I like the clean country air of the Susitna Valley, and if that means I have to put up with the occasional hour or two spent chopping up kindling for the wood stove, that's fine.
With that being true, why am I still worried about America's cities? Because our cities are the beating hearts of our nation. Much of the country's economic activity happens there. Urban areas contain a lot of the country's industry and academia. What's more, our cities used to be the pride of the nation, but that's not so much the case anymore. Case in point: A growing, senseless, callous disregard for the law, seen in too many of our urban areas.
First, from Brooklyn: A new trend, according to one source, is something called "microlooting," which is just shoplifting by any other name.
If you’re wondering what the hot new trend among Brooklyn progressives is—apparently, it’s stealing from Whole Foods. That’s according to a recent episode of The Opinions, a New York Times podcast, in which host Nadja Spiegelman and guests Hasan Piker and Jia Tolentino discuss what Spiegelman calls “microlooting”—“taking small things from big corporations and . . . feeling justified.”
The full half-hour discussion is something the late Tom Wolfe could have written as satire. Piker, who resides in a $2.7 million West Hollywood mansion, and Tolentino, whose family is sufficiently well-off to run an alleged human trafficking ring, present themselves as stalwart defenders of the poor and downtrodden engaging in “radical” action against a “violent” system. Piker endorses stealing not just from Whole Foods but also the Louvre. Tolentino says blowing up pipelines is probably moral. Spiegelman does a lot of giggling.
One could play "Progressive Claptrap Bingo" with this interview, but what it shows is something we are seeing from the left in disturbingly large numbers: a callous disregard for the law, and a callous disregard for the small business owners and managers in these New York businesses they are stealing from. And no, they are not, never have been, and never will be justified in their theft; it's just stealing, pure and simple, and there is no excusing it. If anything, their personal net worth makes their crime worse. Will any of them be caught and prosecuted? In New York? Zohran Mamdani's New York? That seems unlikely.
Next, another round of "street takeovers," or one might say, riots, in a place that I have always heard was once one of America's more pleasant and peaceful, although I've never been there: Charlotte, North Carolina.
🚨WHAT THE HELL?!!!
— Matt Van Swol (@mattvanswol) April 27, 2026
Absolutely HORRIFYING scenes are emerging from Charlotte NC last night where "teens" blocked off an ENTIRE HIGHWAY for street racing, lit a FIRE UNDER A BRIDGE, and SET OFF FIREWORKS!!!
Children can be heard screaming.
WHAT IS HAPPENING TO CHARLOTTE?!!!!! pic.twitter.com/C75nESjDv3
Video from stunned drivers on I-77 in Charlotte captured the moment a large group of young people blocked traffic on the interstate Sunday night.
The I-77 street takeover happened on Sunday, April 26 between the Sunset Road and W.T. Harris Boulevard exits, underneath the overpass of Lakeview Road.
Several of the people in the group wore masks, and could be seen walking around the stopped vehicles and holding their hands up. At one point, video captured someone light a firework, igniting a small fire on the interstate.
Videos of the takeover showed dozens of cars parked on the shoulder of I-77. Some vehicles attempted to drive through the takeover, but those behind the takeover appeared to halt drivers on several occasions.
This isn't the worst parts of Los Angeles, Chicago, or Detroit. This is Charlotte, North Carolina. But, we are forced to remember, this is the same city where a young, innocent Ukrainian immigrant was butchered on a commuter train by a serial felon who had been through the local justice system's revolving door so many times that one could have attached a dynamo to it and used it as a generator.
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Again: Not only a callous disregard for the law, but a callous disregard for the regular folks of Charlotte, who are just trying to go about their business.
So, why was this illegal gathering not cordoned off, and every participant arrested? That's what should happen, even if officers from a neighboring jurisdiction are brought in. Every person who took part in this illegal riot should be charged. If convicted — yes, they are still entitled to due process — their vehicles should be confiscated. A nice touch would be to force the convicted goblins to watch as their prized vehicles were put in the crusher, but I'm not too sure of how practical that would be.
The cultural rot, this growing disregard for law, the rule of law, and just plain civic order, sure appears to be growing. This is happening in these urban areas for one simple reason: The cities and, in some cases, state governments involved have allowed it to happen. Generations of lax enforcement, of returning serial offenders to the streets, again and again, to pick up with their depredations where they left off, have engendered this. From a wealthy Brooklyn socialite bragging about how she is "sticking it to the Man" by shoplifting, to gangs of young thugs blocking city streets, engaging in dangerous stunts, and impeding the law-abiding people from going about their business; it's all part of the same phenomenon.
And it's a lot easier to get to this state, through lax enforcement, than it is to go back.
Government, as I'm continually pointing out, has one primary purpose: to protect the liberty and property of the citizens. In this task, many, perhaps most, of our cities are utterly failing, and it's getting worse.
