HA! Magnum Force, 1973, San Francisco, "A man's gotta know his limitations." Good weave in there.

Over the last 30 years, I've generally visited SF on business at least once every five years or so, with my most recent trip coming last year. The noticeable decline in that period has been steep. It's almost impossible now to avoid the aggressive panhandlers, the schizos, and the very public nuisances who receive full protection of the law at the expense of decent, taxpaying citizens. It's the ultimate progressive fantasy brought to life.

Sounds a lot like the French, Spanish, Italian, and South American cities where I had frequent layeovers in '50s-'60s. I often wonder if they got worse or better in subsequent years.

Was there for "a cup of coffee" in the late seventies, while still in the military. Not hardly long enough to get any on me. Strongest memory is of wind blown trash, and how friggin' dangerous Oakland was. New York is eclipsing back into the seventies I hear, so those not local to SF, will be able to share in the joy of public defecation/masturbation/fornication once again. Oh, and the crime as well.

I've seen the defecation scene time and again. Used to be a regular feature in Chinatown, elderly men and women squatting between cars...20 years ago...the pervasive smell of urine down Market St, the naked walking around (still to this day, all of this)...
Hey, wasn't it "Da Mayor" Wille Brown who first decided to just give the homeless cash? Great frickin' policy.
And yes, just keep growing that bureaucracy, socialist-style.
Feel the Bern!!

Had the same shock when I moved to Los Angeles for a few years. If you are going to be a bum, it makes sense to be one in California.

Some of "the better neighborhoods" such as Santa Monica were ridiculously accommodating of the homeless. Some more working-class neighborhoods had no patience for them and would chase them out.

re: "If you are going to be a bum, it makes sense to be one in California." Drake

Nah, Maui is the best if one can get there.

Dan Kurt

Hard to hitch-hike to Hawaii. But in the era of Hope and Change, all things are possible, I guess.

It is the external manifestation of 50-60 + years of Leftist thought that has permeated, the Media, entertainment, higher education, and the rest.

Hatred of the good for being the good. A complete moral inversion. Let us worship and praise the homeless, the drug addicted, the public intoxication, the public exhibitions of sexual perversity as proof that we love mankind (or...do we?).
Love mankind. It's those odious individuals that make me sick. The indulgence and encouragement of this sort of thing is actually a sure indicator of the deep seated hatred of Truth, Virtue and Beauty which the Left found in Old America all those years ago. So glad we have put that behind us, eh?