NYT: Camden's Streets Go From Mean to America's Most Dangerous City, Liberalism's Showcase

New York Times ^ | December 29, 2004 | JEFFREY GETTLEMAN

[OESY]

A young woman and child pass a corner on Ferry Street in Camden, N.J., scene of a drug-related killing in October.

A wall memorial to a gang killing in North Camden.

Some homeowners, like Jose Gonzalez, have enclosed their porches in burglar bars for protection.

Sister Helen Cole, left in photo, with Theressa Hokke-Sanchez, whose brother and sister were killed in Camden.

The walls of abandoned houses are often decorated with tributes to young men, some of the dealers, lost in the drug wars.

A memorial street mural honoring "B," described by the police as a drug dealer; there are plans to tear it down.

Nathenia Kirkland comforting her 3-year-old daughter Yaya, who was wounded by a stray bullet in October and has undergone six operations.

A memorial for a youth shot and killed in North Camden.

Police officers in North Camden arresting a suspect in an armed robbery.

THE BIG QUESTION: If Camden's residents were concerned, why would they keep electing Democrats to solve their problems?
Giuliani made NYC safer than over 200 other U.S. cities, which translates into saving more than 2000 lives each year.

[HMFIC]

THE BIG QUESTION: If Camden's residents were concerned, why would they keep electing Democrats to solve their problems?

Because STUPID IS as STUPID DOES.

[independentmind]

THE BIG QUESTION: If Camden's residents were concerned, why would they keep electing Democrats to solve their problems?

LOL. How much do you know about Camden?

[Wil H]

It seems that the murders are mainly among the drug community so maybe the "Iraq terrorist philosophy" applies here - Better to have them all concentrated in one place and deal with them there than have them move into our neighborhoods...

[Mr. Jeeves]

"I feel like I'm in Falluja," said Edwin Figueroa, Camden's police chief. "I don't have enough soldiers. The enemy is out there. And we're fighting the same battle over and over and over again."

A couple of Marine divisions could clean up Camden, too. ;)

[TFine80]

"The latest craze now is "wet," a marijuana joint rolled in embalming fluid."

What the heck is this?

[Recovering Ex-hippie]

This is unbelievable. I visited this city to visit a nun 10 years ago. I drove there in the daytime. It was not this bad! The nuns live in an old, huge convent with double walls..they are cloistered nuns. I just don't get it. So much for Clinton's legacy. Why doesn't he move there with his office?

[Falcon4.0]

I gotta tell ya, He's right. I live near Camden and YES they keep electing Democrats. And many of them have been charged with corruption. It's a stink hole. I dread having to drive through Camden.

[Russ]

Gangs are nothing but urban terrorists and should be treated as such. Shot on sight! Until we are willing to take draconian measures to deal with these terrorists it will only get worse.

[L98Fiero]

The citizen's heroes are dead drug dealers. That's f'ed up on so many levels.

[XRdsRev]

It may sound crazy but one of my hobbies is digging for antique bottles. Myself and my digging friends dig out old privies which sometimes contain really good old glass from the 19th century.

The old cities are the best places to dig but you have to go into the worst neighborhoods to find "spots". Over the years I have dug in some rough parts of Philadelphia, Newark NJ, Elizabeth, Trenton, New Brunswick etc. We have had guns pulled on us, bricks thrown at us and have had to deal with lots of bad people. I can tell you that Camden is definately a scary place, one of the worst that I ever dug in. It does have some nice old bottles though ;)

[pgkdan]

I truly believe that Camden is beyond fixing. I was born in Our Lady of Lourdes hospital, went to St anthony of Padua School and lived in the Cramer Hill section of the city in the 60's. It was urban, but Cramer Hill was still a community back then. I was there 2 years ago and felt as if I'd entered some weird parallel universe where everything was ugly and bombed out. Our old house was still lived in but about 6 of the other 9 houses in the row were collapsed. The block literally looked bombed out.

I went to my old Church, thought I'd attend Mass..no way. The one Mass of the day was over and the Church was locked up and the entire campus...Church, rectory, convent and school were locked behind a chain link fence with barbed wire at the top. I drove there the same way I used to walk to school and nearly every building I passed on River Road from the old RCA building to the school was boarded up, burned out, collapsed or all three. It was the most ugly and depressing thing I've ever seen. I've never seen even a Hollywood portrayal of urban blight that came close to what I saw that day.

[MarineDad]

Gangs are nothing but urban terrorists and should be treated as such. Shot on sight!

Bingo! We DO have a winner! Give that man a kewpie doll STAT!

[Burf]

I don't know a heck of alot about Camden but I am willing to bet on a couple things:
Probably run by liberal democrats.
Probably against the law for the average law abiding citizen to own a gun.
That the money they are gonna spend to "revitalize" Camden would be as well spent flushing it down a toilet.

[gridlock]

Ten years ago, my wife had to decide between Camden and Newark for law school. I took a day off to drive around downtown Newark and downtown Camden to check things out. When I got home, I gave her some mace and an auto club and told her she was going to Newark. Camden was beyond scary then. I can only imagine what it is like today.

New Jersey has been pouring money into Camden with all the usual boondoggles. Highway beautification, the NJ Aquarium, the Battleship New Jersey museum, an arena, minor league baseball, the works. And still it gets worse and worse. The parking lots by the waterfront attractions are all empty because the visitors drive across the river, pay big bucks to park in Philadelphia, and take the ferry back across the river, rather than drive ten blocks through Camden.

[Sam the Sham]

What difference would a Republican make ?

New Jersey does not need its cities (aside from Newark Airport and Trenton State House) or the people in them. New Jersey is all suburban. The days of smokestack industry that the cities were intended for is over. The big pharmaceutical firms are along the highways and much of the state is bedroom communities.

And since Camden is just across the Delaware from another city with similar but not as bad problems, what does it offer that isn't in Philadelphia ?

[Jim Noble]

For decades, Camden has been the classic model of urban despair

Corrected text: Classic model of urban despair government by Democrats.

[Cloverfarm]

Judging from the graffiti adn the memorial murals, there are some seriously talented artists there ... going to waste. Like the person who did the portrait of B. Awesome. It also reads like the people are either predators, or paralyzed.