BSR

Interesting comments about wealth inequality, but it's still laughable to blame the wealth gap for the explosion in shoplifting. If the vast gulf between rich & poor triggered skyrocketing theft, then we would see it all over the country. Instead, we see it mostly in just a few cities, ones which not coincidentally coddle criminals instead of punishing them. If your local DA believes that cash bail is racist and that criminals are actually victims, expect your local pharmacy to lock up the shampoo. Miami's gap between rich and poor is wider than most. Billionaires and centimillionaires from around the globe own 2nd (3rd? 4th?) homes, $multimillion part-time pads, while so many Miami residents work low-paying service sector jobs. Where are the flash mobs of thieves, the locked-up Hot Pockets, the lucite cases? Nope, none of that sh*t, because Miami actually sends thieves to jail. You obviously have some passionate opinions about wealth inequality. You should start up a separate thread about it instead of trying to jam a square peg into a round hole.

I get your point, even if I don't necessarily agree. But can you prove that this greater gap between the top 10-20% and the rest is what causes this explosion of shoplifting?

Today's crisis is costing retailers $billions and forcing them to resort to locking hair dye up in lucite cases. Can you provide any stats as to how widespread it was in the 80s? I'm sure it did happen, but I'm guessing the problem was more isolated cases vs. today's epidemic, unless you have evidence to the contrary.

So cut it in half. $2.2 billion is still a sh*t-ton of shoplifting. And if you watch the video, none of the thieves is stealing bread to feed their families, LOL.

NY lost $4.4 billion to shoplifting in 2022. The shoplifting crisis is real, not some overblown trending topic. Your theory about fewer security guards is a possibility, I guess, but in all the discussion of this explosion in shoplifting, I've never seen anyone cite that as a cause. Can you back up your claim? I do agree that the shoplifting crisis is very much a localized phenomenon. It's not nationwide, just in cities with soft-on-crime policies. Once people figured out that they could steal all they wanted and get away with it, shoplifting exploded.

Has income inequality gotten even worse? Perhaps, although the gap between the Vanderbilts & Carnegies and the millions of immigrants who came to NYC with just the shirts on their backs was a helluva stretch. Please note that there was no Section 8, Medicaid, or food stamps in the Gilded Age. Back in the day, the poor literally starved. Blaming the very recent explosion of shoplifting on income inequality is bullsh*t that might play well in ivory tower sociology departments, but nobody in the real world is buying it.

What a steaming pile of cowplop. Huge wealth inequality has plagued NYC for decades, even centuries, yet this explosion of shoplifting is quite recent. Toothpaste wasn't locked up in 2019. I think the root cause is a lot simpler: if you can steal and get away with it, you're going to keep stealing. Hey, it's a heckuva lot easier than working for a living. No alarm clock, no boss, waaaaay better pay, choose your own hours, and best of all: no jail! Back in 2022, just 327 individuals were responsible for ~30% of NYC's shoplifting arrests, yet despite their brazen recidivism, most of these super-repeat offenders were still free as a bird instead of behind bars. What changed? In 2019, a no-bail policy for nonviolent offenders was established. City DAs with abysmal conviction rates see criminals, even those who commit violent crimes, as "victims." These policies create a sense of lawlessness in which criminals are like kids in a (free) candy store.

Since you follow his social media, do you know how old his Rentmen photos are? I pity the poor client who thinks he's getting the guy in the RM ad, only to open the door and see the guy in the photo you posted above. Yikes, helluva difference.

A few random thoughts: 1) Iran recently started to convict gay men for bogus crimes, like rape or pedophilia. The Iranian government does this to avoid international outrage for their execution of gay men for the simple "crime" of being gay. Of course, I'm not saying that's the case here, but I couldn't help but think about it. 2) While I passionately believe in presumption of innocence, sometimes details of a case can test my principles. If solicitation of a minor was simply the least serious but most convict-able charge, as @TJMS reminds us is often the case, yikes! But if he is acquitted, I shall erase the arrest & trial from my memory. But if acquitted, would I hire him? Uh, I take the 5th. 3) On a lighter note, the guy in the linked story about the solar eclipse looks much older than the escort's stated age of 31. Of course, age-shaving is not a crime. 4) I love dogs, but wow, his dog is fugly. If it turns out to be a sweet, loving dog, my perception would change, but just looking at it, that dog is fugly.

My hobby is languages. As I've mentioned in other threads, I watch a lot of Spanish TV & movies. Every day without fail, I watch something in Spanish even if it's just a 10-minute YT video. Some days, it's hours of binging. I learned Spanish in Salamanca decades ago, but it got woefully rusty until I discovered Spanish TV via Internet a ~decade ago. My speaking ability is actually (far) better now than it was at the end of my year in Salamanca, and my listening comprehension is at least 10x better. I also picked up French again after a 4+ decade break in study. Yikes, more rust than the remains of the Titanic! I've been doing Duolingo for only 6 weeks, but least I haven't skipped a day so far. My goal is to be able to watch French series & movies on Netflix without English subtitles. That's a long way off, but hey, the longest journey begins with the first step. And last, I watch YT videos in my original but forgotten native tongue, Tagalog (Filipino). Unfortunately, my parents didn't know that you could raise kids bilingual and were very worried that I wouldn't learn English. As soon as I picked up English in kindergarten, they stopped speaking Tagalog at home. But I still understand it OK and was delighted to find a few great YT channels in Tagalog: one about Filipino history, one by a guy dedicated to reviving the Spanish language in the Philippines, and one hilarious cooking channel by a super-campy gay guy. Interesting note: I can watch Tagalog YT vids at 1.5x speed just like almost every video in English despite very limited vocabulary (my vocabulary in Spanish must be 20x my Tagalog). I can watch Spanish vids at 1.5x also, but it requires so much concentration that I'm mentally exhausted after 5 minutes. Learning a language as a child must set in your brain in a way that adult learning simply can't match, no matter how much effort you put in.

The IRS assumes a tip income and collects taxes on 9% of the total checks for a server, 10% of the meter total for taxi drivers. Mind you, in most parts of the country, servers & cab drivers make more than 9-10% in tips, but there are a few areas where it could be that low or (eek!) less.

Thanks for the info. I didn't realize that Park MGM's casino was nonsmoking (haven't been there since it was the old Monte Carlo). I thought the Westin made a mistake when they made the whole property nonsmoking (brand-wide policy) except the casino. They could have marketed themselves as the only nonsmoking casino in Las Vegas, but perhaps that was too avant-garde a notion when they opened back in 2003. I stayed there in late 2003 and remember being a mite annoyed that they advertised heavily as a nonsmoking property, yet you could smell the stench of smoke every time you went in & out of the hotel. Gambling revenue could not have been that significant given how small the casino was (less than 300 machines, only 10 tables). When a new owner took over after a foreclosure, they got rid of the casino, and all accompanying smoke, entirely.

If you're seriously interested in retiring in Peru, language isn't much of a barrier. A bit of googling showed a number of Spanish language schools in Lima, at least one of which has a DELE-certified teaching staff (DELE = Diplomas of Spanish as a Foreign Language, the internationally recognized certification of Spanish language level). You'd be surprised by how quickly your Spanish becomes good enough to get by day-to-day. Of course, fluency will take longer, but rest assured that DELE-certified teachers will help you get there. Skimming over the American expat's other videos, I gather that he has a Vietnamese-American girlfriend (gay4pay? *fingerscrossed*). Apparently he knows a little Vietnamese, and then he always has his girlfriend to translate if necessary. Plenty of expats are just fine living the rest of their lives knowing only enough to get by in the local language. I couldn't do it because I'd eventually feel too isolated. But if you're OK with it, you certainly have plenty of options for countries to retire in.

So awkward ...

Thanks for the article. I had a sneaking suspicion that there was more going on. Unfortunately, we initially heard only part of the story because "Gluttons Eat Red Lobster Into Bankruptcy" grabs a lot more clicks than the nerdy details of a private equity buyout.

It sounds like her medical issues are sublimated narcissism, like she expects the whole world to kneel like vassals at her feet. Even though you made one heck of an effort to accommodate her, instead of so much as a speck of gratitude for all you did, she hammers away at all the ways you fell short and failed. Charming. I'm guessing she wasn't like this before, otherwise you wouldn't have become such close friends. But she's a different person now, one who storms through life brandishing a shield of MY NEEDS. Treasure the memories of the friendship you used to have, but cut the person she has become out of your life.

I did read it. Either I had a senior moment (eek! hope not), or my brain short-circuited trying to process the information. In Honolulu where there must be a zillion different spots for fresh-caught seafood, people are lining up to go to always-frozen-never-fresh Red Lobster?? Baffling, to say the least.

I noticed a lot of Hawaiians in Las Vegas every year during the National Finals Rodeo. Since Hawaiians come to LV all year round, I figured they were just taking advantage of lower rates or special deals until a Hawaiian told me that they came to LV because of the Rodeo. Turns out some of the oldest rodeos in the US were started in Hawaii. Wow, the things you learn at the poker table. Out of curiosity, I looked it up: believe it or not, there is a Red Lobster in Hawaii. I wonder if that location serves previously frozen seafood like every other RL or if the Honolulu spot offers more fresh-caught items. I mean, with all the fresh seafood available, why would anyone in Hawaii go to a Red Lobster? Is their cheddar biscuit addiction that bad??

There's a Red Lobster in Woodbridge NJ where I went with an aunt and/or cousins a few times. Whenever we went, I noticed that a lot of the customers were black, disproportionate to the demographics of the area. When I asked my aunt/cousins why it was so popular with blacks, they had no idea but said it always has been. Aha! so that's why. Thanks for that bit of history, @samhexum. While I can't say it changes my opinion of the food, it certainly boosts my opinion of the company. Tough times ahead for RL. I wish them all the best.

For all the employees who have lost or will lose their jobs because of this bankruptcy filing, yes, it's very sad. For the world of gastronomy, meh, not so much.

Again, it all depends on the murderer's race. Granted, this genocide against whites is happening half a world away, but given the horrifying number and brutality of the murders, one would expect some coverage by American media. Instead, the response of so-called journalists --> deafening silence.

Bulge Hall of Famer Jon Hamm ... https://twitter.com/sinfulfire/status/1792213570748326014?t=dFKgeSFRW5KcgAgEzeNirQ&s=19

Might you be guilty here of just a wee bit of hyperbole? That said, I couldn't stop laughing.

But did we ever print so much money so quickly? Every stimulus was hundreds and hundreds of $billions printed overnight, and the cumulative series printed $trillions out of thin air in just a couple of years. To me, money-printing in the past was a steady leak whereas the stimulus printing was more like a dam burst.