You thought leasing retail space was hard before. Now you have to worry about the religious affiliation of your tenants, and the political views of the local government. While there have been internet motivated attempted boycotts of various stores in the past, I don’t recall anything like what we see with the Chic Fil A attacks from senior government officials in a totally unconstitutional attempt to control what people think and say. As you may be aware, in New York City, the lesbian chairman of the City Council demanded on writing that NYU break the lease with Chic Fil A for their outlet in the campus food court. So here we have a government official demanding the destruction by lease breach of a shop because that official is against the religion and beliefs of the CEO, owner. Do you recall Crystal Nacht. The Nazis destroyed Jewish stores because they objected to the religious beliefs of the store owners. There is no difference other than the destruction proposed in New York is by illegal breach of a lease and constitutionally illegal attacking freedom of speech and religion instead of physically destroying it as the Nazis did, but there is no real difference in result and intent. The mayors of Boston, Philadelphia and Boston were little better but only because there are no outlets yet in those cities.

It is pretty safe to assume that now freedom of speech by retailers is shut down. Target got hit because they donated perfectly legally to some organization that then gave money to someone who was against gay marriage. I am sure no retail CEO is now going to speak freely.

What has this country come to. Liberals seem to forget that the Pilgrims came here to have religious freedom and freedom of speech. That is the bedrock of America. Ironically it is the left wing who would go berserk along with the NY Times if a governor said no more Amazon sales in my state because Jeff Bezos contributed to a pro gay marriage group. I am old enough to remember the McCarthy hearings where Joe McCarthy tried to attack journalists and Hollywood for their supposed political views. Eventually he was censured and driven out of the Senate. The country seems to have forgotten the lesson. Now we have McCarthyism of the left in exactly the same way of now striking fear into business owners for their thoughts and speech. There is no difference. Maybe you are old enough to have read “1984”. If not, it was all about the government dictating your thinking. That is what Christine Quinn of New York wants to do and she may very well be the next mayor. Just imagine when she has that power.