Greg Gutfeld: People die in crime wave as liberal city leaders obsess over statues

So finally, justice has arrived. After all the rampant crime, the smash-and-grabs, the subway shovers, the brutal random murders of young women. Our leaders are finally doing something about it. 

Late Wednesday night, a statue of Theodore Roosevelt — that's a president, Kat — was removed after standing in front of the American Museum of Natural History for more than 80 years. 

Yeah, instead of removing the vagrants who've been defecating, doing drugs and assaulting people, go after the inanimate stiff — that'll make life better. 

But hey, Teddy was evil. Those glasses, that mustache — he probably wore those as a disguise while he was beating up people of color. 

So get lost, you jerk, and take your racist horse with you. And what a heroic feat to rid us of Teddy, or at least his statue — so typical of liberals to pick on something that can't hit back. 

By the way, the removal cost the city $2 million. So where are they sending Teddy to, private school? Antifa could have done it for free with ropes, with CNN looking the other way. 

Hell, Kat would have done it for two Sixers — the beer, not the players. 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT STATUE REMOVED FROM FRONT OF NYC'S MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY

But where else would you like that money to go? For more policing in the subways or the streets where crime is rampant? Shut up, you bigot! 

Did you know the statue was deemed so offensive they covered it with a massive orange tarp — the same one Brian Stelter uses as a towel in the steam room? 

The monument's now in a library in North Dakota. So like all residents fleeing New York to Florida, it's probably safer. 

In the New York Post, they quote one of Teddy's descendants, Theodore Roosevelt V, who cheered the removal, saying the statue is being relocated to a place where its composition can be recontextualized to facilitate difficult, complex and inclusive discussions. 

Well, thank you, you pretentious -----. If Teddy were alive, he dress you up like a white rhino and chased you through Central Park with a 12-gauge. 

You think I care about these statues? I don't. I'm not into statues, except for the nudes. And even then, the security at the museum keeps a pretty good eye on me. 

But this is part of a larger problem. Americans care about crime. They don't care about statues any more than they care about trans bathrooms or pronouns, but someone does. 

It's our craven leaders who are under the thumb of a tiny, woke mob. This, as crime explodes in every city run by libs. We hear the tragedies every day, but they don't get the outrage you saw over statues in those heady days of the George Floyd riots, when statues were dropping like Jeffrey Toobin's pants during a Zoom call. Never gets old. 

Now, many were of Confederate soldiers toppled by protesters, but it didn't stop there, and even the city leaders joined in, just as one guy predicted.

FORMER PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: In the proud tradition of America's great leaders from George Washington. Please don't take his statue down, please. Please. To Lincoln, to Teddy Roosevelt, I see they want to take Teddy Roosevelt's down, too. They're trying to figure out why — they don't know. They're trying to take away our culture. They're trying to take away our history, and our weak leaders — they do it overnight. These things have been there for 150 years, for 100 years. Weak, weak people. 

We didn't deserve him. Protesters tore down statues of anti-slavery heroes, as well as statues of governors. They removed monuments honoring citizens who fought in the Union Army. 

They trashed statues of the missionary Junipero Serra. That's my high school — my school's named after him. And they better leave my statue alone. I'm riding Tom Brady on horseback. 

Of course, Columbus was removed in Chicago by Lori Lightweight. Black kids are getting shot by other black kids, and she's like, "Let's get that dead Italian out of here." If only we had a visual aid to shed some light on these misplaced priorities.

So as crimes spin out of control, our media saw progress in this pointless purge. 

Abe Lincoln's statue was toppled in Portland. I guess they're siding with John Wilkes Booth. 

Both Thomas Jefferson and George Washington were also knocked down in that town. 

Then, they destroyed the city. Of course, there's no correlation there. 

Andrew Jackson in Mississippi. Francis Scott Key in San Francisco. Ulysses S. Grant also toppled in S.F., probably to be replaced by a giant bronze pile of human feces. 

Even Frederick Douglass wasn't safe. He was torn down in Rochester, New York. Like Brian Kilmeade's fleas, that's a head-scratcher. 

The Virgin Mary was decapitated in Tennessee. Jesus Christ — decapitated in Miami. Probably because it needed a nose job. 

Gandhi, even Gandhi, was vandalized in Davis, California, and we all remember what a jerk he was. 

And yet the media and our politicians thought it was progress that this would help cities and help people. But like what Disney did to "Star Wars," they destroyed something and replaced it with something worse. 

The rest of us, though, we knew this was an excuse for mayhem. A gateway for more than just destroying statues. 

TAKE ‘EM ALL DOWN? 10 OF THE WORLD’S ICONIC STATUES AND WHY THEY COULD BE REMOVED

And what came next? 

Businesses and police precincts destroyed. Nothing was sacred. And when looting is defended as a good thing, society is as backwards as Chris Cross's pants. There's a reference. 

It's the broken window theory on meth. You let society go to hell, and it quite literally goes to hell. 

We have criminals released from prison to commit more crime on New York subways, L.A. bus stations, high-end furniture stores. 

They'll stab you because they're as soulless and cold as the statues is being torn down. 

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And yet, even now, the statues are still a priority because fake virtue-signaling is easier than dealing with real suffering. 

And politicians were just more terrified of the mob than they were of you. Bill de Blasio, Ted Wheeler, Jacob Frey. If they were any more yellow, they'd be on "The Simpsons." 

And now people are dying, in part because leaders felt a piece of stone was more harmful than a dude with a knife when the truth is, sometimes the statue is the only thing between you and the dude with a knife. 

So now the only safe statue is the one in the White House. 

Until they make a real one of him — then they'll tear it down in a heartbeat. 

This article is adapted from Greg Gutfeld's opening monologue on the January 21, 2022 edition of "Gutfeld!"