Hey Jon - I agree with most of what you have said here - just want to point out something in:re the Target closures - it looks like Target is blaming “crime” for the store closings, a narrative which has been parroted frequently in the mainstream media. The truth is that crime at these stores is in many cases lower than at similar nearby Target locations that aren’t being closed. This isn’t to say that crime isn’t an issue - my point is just that we should be questioning what corporations are trying to tell us, how they benefit from the narrative they spin, and not just accepting at face value that they are telling us the truth.
One quick source I could find - Target says it's closing 9 stores due to theft. The crime data tells a different story.