Posted on 08/06/2019 5:30:21 AM PDT by Kaslin
GARY, Indiana -- If you want to know the true state of a city, drive through all of it, not just the pretty parts where politicians line the streets with bike lanes and lavish developers who have deals to build by stadiums and riverfronts.
Here in this Indiana manufacturing town, there are hollowed-out neighborhoods, abandoned homes and boarded-up businesses lining U.S. Route 20 right beside well-kept homes whose owners are trying to restore dignity and stability to their home and community.
When President Trump took a swipe at Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland's 7th Congressional District and called the district filthy and rat-infested, the reaction ranged from cries of racism to a defense of rodents by the Baltimore Sun: "Better to have a few rats than to be one."
Lost in the outrage is the fact that there are rats in our largest cities, but there are also deep and profound issues plaguing the African Americans who live in cities like Baltimore and Gary: generational poverty, gun violence, gang wars and the collapse of the family. These cities suffer from a sense of despair and feeling stuck, not that different from rural or post-industrial regions in this country where generational poverty, lack of resources or lack of opportunity have led to high rates of opioid addiction, suicide and family collapse.
Most of America's challenges are not easily or fairly categorized by base-level demographics, such as race and geography, said Bruce Haynes, vice chairman of public affairs for the public relations firm Sard Verbinnen & Co. "They are primarily challenges created by the loss of adherence to values and the lack of access to opportunities," he said.
Instead of skin color and geography, the most powerful boundaries of isolation and forms of segregation today are drawn along the lines of marriage and faith: barriers to economic opportunity, community resources and quality education.
"Where we find a lack of commitment to, and resultant abandonment of, the traditional institutions of our society such as our schools, businesses, communities, churches and families is where we find generational poverty, violence, addiction and lack of opportunity," he said.
Politicians instead look at places like inner-city Baltimore and rural West Virginia and use divisive attacks that both trivialize and tribalize us. "These politics fail us all and exact a high cost," said Haynes. "We are all made in the image of God and we are all in need of Grace, not just from God but from each other. We all deserve an opportunity to have work, dignity and be a part of a family and a community. When people become isolated -- by choice or by loss -- from these most traditional and basic institutions of our society, they fall into a desperate cycle of despair from which it can be incredibly difficult to recover."
The best hope we might have is for politicians to return to one of our founding virtues: honesty.
Instead of using these problems as political sledgehammers to crush their opponents, they should use them to draw us together, rally us as a people around the need to reinstate the values that made our society great, and support institutions with the public and private resources necessary to flourish in challenged communities.
"That is the ultimate promise of populism, but it has historically always been an empty promise because it has been used to divide," said Haynes.
Perhaps a leader will come along one day who will worry less about finding ways to get the have-nots to hate the haves; not condemn us for our privilege or despair, or divide us by demographics; and instead focus on how to create more opportunity, prosperity and community for all, regardless of circumstance.
President Trump seems to be that kind of leader, the kind who wants to bring prosperity to all Americans and Make America Great Again. The left hate him for it!
Exactly
When mental hospitals were closed en masse in the United States, the severely deranged and demented gravitated to urban settings. Now they are part of the leftist political narrative and any pretense of treatment or constructive dealing with the problems of untreated mental illness and human misery has been abandoned. Instead they pitch their tents, defecate on sidewalks and become a visual reminder that “capitalism does not care, you should feel guilty about your life, if only you would pay more taxes and give power to people who really care and understand... etc.etc.” The Left uses these unfortunate people as props.
One of the best reporters around...
The people living in these conditions need to be the people who change it. They let the gangs in, they abdicated to fear rather than assume the mantle of responsibility for policing their own neighborhoods. If they are serious about cleaning up this mess, it needs to start with them. Outsiders can supply help, but billions have already been thrown at cities like Baltimore, Detroit, Trenton, San Francisco, and others. It hasn’t worked because of graft and a lack of will by the people. Until we see some “internal” movement by those living there, it’s the fool who repeats the same experiment and is surprised when the results don’t change.
HA! I remember about 15 years ago when I worked in Seattle I was at an intersection of Second (or first) Avenue and Seneca with my briefcase in my hand, and there was this monster rat in a doorway vestibule. I desperately tried to squish it with my size 14 wingtips. A lot of people were watching. The sucker ran around as I made several stomping attempts. I got it fairly good, but it was still able to get onto the street and down a storm drain. GRRRRR!
If you want to know the true state of a city, drive through all of it, not just the pretty parts where politicians line the streets with bike lanes and lavish developers who have deals to build by stadiums and riverfronts.
Same with LA county. And, obviously, Chicago.
One comical one is Concord, NH. Take a drive around at 11:00 pm. Seriously, I think most of the cars on the road are cops.
In all seriousness, one can use google maps street view to tour the ugliest neighborhoods in our country’s cities. It’s actually quite fascinating. And no, it ain’t just Detroit that’s rotting.
The easiest way to clean up so many of our cities is to enforce the rule of law. Period. If you don’t, well check out Google street view.
I think that eventually, assuming we don’t ultimately collapse for some other reason, we will eventually be forced to get TOUGH on crime. And I mean “storm-trooper tough”. I’m not for it, but I believe the people will embrace it if things get bad enough. And they are on a fast train to exactly that.
The first step in solving a problem is identifying it correctly. President Trump is doing that, IMO, with Baltimore. It is not lack of money, but rather lack of ethical use of said money.
The dems always point to the dollar amount, not how it was spent. Most repubs do the same.
Dems spend money on social programs not housing and mental health problems or drug abuse ones. You just have to feel good about yourself.
Lets see, I’ve lost both parents to Lung cancer, 6 aunts, 1 uncle, and my brother, 2 children, and I’ll be 71 on the 19th. Raised 2 kids for a decade by myself as I’d not tolerate a abusive man. Never got welfare, or food stamps. Parents did the school vacations babysitting. I don’t go around crying woo is me. I get angry, sad, Vendictive as I forced the POS Sociopath who Killed my 16 yr old with a 2 ft section of fence post. Ass AG RINO plea bargained his sentence down from M1 to M2, 20 yrs, and promised him he’d serve 1 yr. Well he didn’t count on Mamma Bear. I used their lying Stats against them. And eked out 10.5 yrs as you can’t stop the Prison Over Crowing crap from deducting day for day served.
And If he ever shows up for revenge because I made him serve those 10.5 yrs, I have a Nice Taraus Ultra Lite I’m not affraid to use. And am not a bad shot. I’m his #1 TARGET.
Bears repeating often and loudly.
Maybe there needs to be a way to try to fix the damage the welfare state. What about building homes or apartments that give prefer range to married couples and families with at least one member working? They could be nice clean places with reduced rents. We need to start rewarding intact families to get back to ground zero.
They would be surrounded by other like minded people. You could make it a place where everyone would want to live and that would encourage people to want family life.
lavish developers
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