An early TV game show, “Truth or Consequences,” aimed to spoof contestants with zany stunts and surprises. It was all good fun, and even the losers came out winners.
Something similar is happening in New York, minus the fun. Truth is trashed everywhere, but there are no consequences — for now.
Not long ago, the report in Sunday’s Post that top educrats often changed Regents test scores so failing students could pass would have sparked outrage and calls for an investigation. This time, Mayor Bill de Blasio treated it as business as usual.
“This is a process that is done from time to time. It is not an unusual process,” he said.
It’s certainly not unusual in his administration, which is zealously erasing inconvenient facts wherever they are found and substituting a pretend reality. Take the legislation de Blasio signed the other day that forbids employers from asking about a job seeker’s criminal history before making a conditional offer.
“This bill opens the door to jobs for New Yorkers who have already paid their debt to society,” the mayor claimed. “Now, all applicants will get a fair shot at the opportunities that can lead them on a pathway to success.”
The law’s Orwellian name, The Fair Chance Act, assumes a criminal conviction of any kind is an “unfair” burden. Thanks to that assumption, an employer who merely asks about arrests now could be guilty of “employment discrimination.”
The nutty concept distorts the plain meaning of the word. Discrimination on the basis of race, for example, is and should be illegal. Discrimination on the basis of behavior is common sense.
Did the de Blasios hire baby sitters who had arrest records? Would they let a convicted burglar put new locks on their house?
City Hall even trotted out the poster ex-con for the signing, a woman named Marilyn Scales.
“Today, I see hope for people like me,” she told a reporter, repeating a claim she has been making for years — that she’s never been able to get a full-time job because she spent two years in prison during the ’90s for dealing heroin.
Her story made her a hero among radical activists, but potential employers shouldn’t even think of asking about that two-year gap on her résumé or why she hasn’t had a full-time job. Soviet Union airbrushers were successful at this sort of thing, but they didn’t have the Internet to worry about. Google Marilyn Scales of The Bronx and you won’t need to ask about her record.
Oddly, despite the sweeping statements about discrimination and fair chances, the law includes exemptions for employers, public and private, who are required to conduct background checks, including police and fire departments. In other words, ex-cons can be trusted only in some situations, and the government will decide which ones qualify.
The city’s rent freeze is another truth-free, consequence-free fantasy. The mayor says he wants affordable housing, yet keeps squeezing private landlords by jacking up property taxes and fees while freezing their incomes.
Tenants get a bargain, until they want repairs and quality maintenance. Something has to give when costs exceed revenue — see Greece and Puerto Rico — and apartments in New York aren’t exempt from the laws of economics.
Not incidentally, the mayor still charges $5,000-a-month rent for each of his two homes in Brooklyn, which fall outside the regulated system. If he’s so convinced of the fairness of the freeze, he should voluntarily put his units under the restrictions. Fat chance — do as he says, not as he does.
Alas, reality always intrudes on utopia, and consequences are inevitable. At some point in their lives, students who get degrees they didn’t earn will find themselves unable to meet job or college demands.
Employers who have any suspicion about a job applicant’s past don’t need to ask questions; they can just hire someone else with a complete resumé and clean record. And landlords will just abandon money-pit apartments instead of keeping the lights on out of the goodness of their hearts. In all those cases, the mayor’s so-called compassion will hurt the very people he says he wants to help.
Those are the consequences New Yorkers will face, even as their mayor hides from the truth.
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