I think there are a lot of folks coming down off drugs,etc. and unfortunately children and little old ladies are trapped with them.
This will be one for the history books, sociologists and national security planners.
Trouble is all the men ages 18 to 30 who are capable and obligated to defend the weak are in those frickin' gangs.
Drugs have nothing to do with this. They have nothing to do with people cleaning KMarts.
It is immorality in the community that has been there for a long time, manifesting itself in tolerance to crime in peacetime, in pointing to the government and white man as the root of evil and excuse from personal reposnibility.
I think it's cultural. Mix the redneck values from Deliverance with West African Voodoo, then stir with Jerry Springer and Jesse Jackson and gansta rap and you end up with what you got in New Orleans (and a whole lot of neighborhoods in U.S. cities).