'Safe passage routes' ?!?! WTF?!?!

[vision]

Quick question before I start back-tracking and pulling apart what you folks have done to Will's idea: Slick... what makes you so absolutely set on blaming economics for what is unavoidably a complex issue involving morality and law?

Morality and law are things people worry about after they have sustainable food and shelter. Don't believe me? Go live in Syria for a few weeks and find out.

Having grown up in Chicago (did I mention I'm from Chicago?) I can tell you that economics are probably the biggest factor. It's also tied into white-flight. Industry moved from the inner city to the suburbs and those with economic mobility (mostly white) followed. Poor populations increased while jobs decreased, slowly, over time, and like quicksand those left behind found themselves stuck in decrepit buildings surrounded by empty factories and warehouses. When Spidey says declare Chicago uninhabitable that's actually not to far from how some of the neighborhoods look. Buildings really do looked bombed-out like a war happened.

It's not like the people in the city play the victim card and don't try, but there are real physical limitations: a finite number of jobs and limits to the public transportation system. At some point you are commuting three hours or more just to reach a minimum wage job, leaving no time to work a second part-time job (if you can find one) to cover the rest of your bills. We all know how the system works. Once you are rich it is easy to stay rich. Once you are poor, it's damn near impossible to get out of it. Yes, it can and does happen. But if everyone could do it then no one would be poor. There are millions of people who "take personal responsibility" and try their hardest only to find all their efforts are for naught. It is utopian to think everyone who is poor and living in violent neighborhoods is there because they didn't take responsibility for themselves. That notion is ridiculous. And people call me a delusional idealist, hahaha.

And finally, one thing to consider is this: Chicago is actually doing all the right things -- but there just needs to be more of it. There are great programs to help people. Police are on the street cleaning up. Everyone's attention is on the problem. However, again, there are limits. All cities have budgets. And it is extra hard to create better neighborhoods when the economy is bad. But keep in mind violence in Chicago is actually lower than is was in the 70's and 80's, just like the national average. Things are getting better, though slower than the rest of the country.

[callmeslick]

Quick question before I start back-tracking and pulling apart what you folks have done to Will's idea: Slick... what makes you so absolutely set on blaming economics for what is unavoidably a complex issue involving morality and law?

because it's been seen time and time again, across all societies, that when economic hardships grow bad enough, morality and law tend to go out the window.

[snoopy]

would that it were that simple. But, then again, that is the problem with a lot of Americans. They want easy answers, quick solutions. This is the byproduct of all those economic trends I post about in here. It's yet another of those signposts to oblivion when you stop rewarding labor income and focus an entire national economy on investment income. These folks in Chicago and Detroit are simply canaries in a big coal mine.

I agree.

[callmeslick]

economics leads to breakdown, South Asian version:
http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013 ... india?lite

[Spidey]

I think Will’s plan would work with a little modification…

No you can’t use boots like an occupation force, but you can use them in large scale crackdowns when someone is killed. The plan would work like this…

Whenever there was a killing, the troops would move in and shut the entire area down for a pre-determined time. During that time there would be no business for the gangs, and a lot of them would be arrested as well.

Then you release the gang members and let the area return to “normal”.

The action here is called “behavior modification” the point being to let them know that violence will not be tolerated…period.

After some time they will learn that the only way to stay on the street and do their business is to behave in some sort of civilized manner. Yes it involves some looking the other way at illegal activities, but at least it might stop some of the drug related killing, while you can work on a long term solution.

For me the idea that nothing can be done about the violence because the local economy depends on it is utterly absurd, and the society at large has no right to tolerate such.

Of course any action at all depends upon political willpower, which there is a severe lacking there of.

As far at the capitulation, well I would rather declare an all out war, then see people beg "please don’t kill us" that kind of sickens me.

[callmeslick]

I think Will’s plan would work with a little modification…

No you can’t use boots like an occupation force, but you can use them in large scale crackdowns when someone is killed. The plan would work like this…

Whenever there was a killing, the troops would move in and shut the entire area down for a pre-determined time. During that time there would be no business for the gangs, and a lot of them would be arrested as well.

Then you release the gang members and let the area return to “normal”.

The action here is called “behavior modification” the point being to let them know that violence will not be tolerated…period.

Vision can answer with absolute accuracy, but isn't this what happens now, anyway, to a great extent?

After some time they will learn that the only way to stay on the street and do their business is to behave in some sort of civilized manner. Yes it involves some looking the other way at illegal activities, but at least it might stop some of the drug related killing, while you can work on a long term solution.

For me the idea that nothing can be done about the violence because the local economy depends on it is utterly absurd, and the society at large has no right to tolerate such.

Of course any action at all depends upon political willpower, which there is a severe lacking there of.

As far at the capitulation, well I would rather declare an all out war, then see people beg "please don’t kill us" that kind of sickens me.

the piece I saw on Drugs Inc(Nat Geo channel?) the other night indicated that up to 30% of the population on Chicago's South and West sides, in some neighborhoods, are tied economically to the drug trade. That is not a situation that you try to mop up piecemeal. I agree with the political will, but it requires public will and awareness of the long-term economic trends in the nation that have led to this. As I said earlier, these are simply canaries in a coal mine. If the trajectory doesn't change you will see this sort of ammoral behavior nationwide, in areas that used to be seen as 'nice neighborhoods'. Think Mexico, by way of example.

[snoopy]

The piece I saw on Drugs Inc(Nat Geo channel?) the other night indicated that up to 30% of the population on Chicago's South and West sides, in some neighborhoods, are tied economically to the drug trade.

Sorry, I have no sympathy. If you choose to tie yourself to crime, you deserve any consequence that comes from law enforcement. If you're tied to to crime, then whoever did the tying should be held liable for the damage done when the law is enforced. If the person doing the tying can't be held liable, then provide what assistance is possible to get the innocent out of the situation. Crack down hard on crime.. drug related or no. Allowing it to continue will only make the problem worse in the long run.

[callmeslick]

easier said than done, Snoopy.

[Will Robinson]

slick, on the best case scenario of the economic conditions improving the drug trade is going to pay more than whatever jobs you could hope to create with whatever uptick anyone can reasonably expect to coax out of world economy as a whole.
You have to do more than increase employment to stop the feral beasts from thriving on the kills they make as they walk freely among the innocent working class!

It is NOT just an economic problem. You can go hand out all the typical jobs you want and you will still get turf wars and school children shot for being in the way of thug life! Culturally we have tolerated far too much. We have far too many 'leaders' enabling the downward spiral by trading excuses for votes or a place of power in front of a TV camera. Rainbow Coalition my ass! Jackson and Sharpton and Obama are nothing but vultures with regard to what has happened!

By all means improve the economics, sure it will help some but if you don't crack down on this thug culture it will thrive in the good economy just like everyone else will...and it will keep feeding off of the weak while they do it.

Emergency measures that allow flash raids on streets and known drug/gang locations that allow stop and search. Profiling gangbangers and druggies. On a scale never before unleashed.
Mandatory 25 year minimums for carrying an illegal weapon in an emergency zone. Mandatory life imprisonment for using a gun in a crime in an emergency zone. That is what is needed at a local level. At the national level we have to cut the legs out from under the cartels. Decriminalize and let the government fund and tax distribution.

Yes, I'm purposely specifying the zone to send a message. Enough is enough. We are taking back the streets by taking thugs off of them. End of life as they know it. Behavior modified. Period.

[callmeslick]

see my response to Snoopy, Will.


there is no public will to spend the time and money needed for any of those components, so it likely isn't happening.

[Will Robinson]

see my response to Snoopy, Will.

Yea, I saw that "easier said than done, Snoopy."

It's also easier still to do nothing and count bodies and let the two political parties harvest rhetorical campaign fodder from it.
I'm tired of being blamed for the plight of the slaves on their plantation. So lets do something, even if it is difficult.

If there was some leadership there could be will.

[callmeslick]

what 'campaign fodder' emerges from a drug war? Oh, and where do you get the 'slavery' angle here? The shooters are as much Hispanic as Black and plenty of good old white folks in there, from time to time. Like I suggested earlier, the fix is addressing the long term trajectory of the economy, otherwise you will see 'Chiraq' in every state in the nation within 25 years or so. Oh, and what national figure has been trying to get the public focused on that trajectory and changing it, for about a decade???

........I'm suspecting you know, and just don't wish to admit it.

[Will Robinson]

what 'campaign fodder' emerges from a drug war?

the parties do nothing bold to stop it, they merely distill it down to talking points for re-election use...here is a great example, Maxine Waters response to gangbangers and drugs in her district:
"We shouldn't be putting young black men in jail for selling crack because it is the only job the white man has left them.".

Black people aren't the only ones living in low income areas. Black people aren't the only ones trying to find a job. So why is it that unemployment for black teenagers is TWICE as high as it is for non black teenagers?
Whatever the truth is behind that it can't simply be economics. I'm going with 'What is cultural dysfunction for a thousand Alex!"
Stay tuned for Double Jeopardy where one of the topics is: What has Obama done about it? But beware, the answers are very difficult will spin you dizzy!

[Jeff250]

And for those that worry about a precedent and having it happen elsewhere....if your city is over run like Chicago you should be hoping for it to happen.

Your idea that we can have a little more safety if we just suspend a few more of our rights and install a little more surveillance is hardly unique. In fact, it's been an ongoing trend in our country for a while now. The problem is that when you give the government this kind of power, they don't like to give it up. Rather, they'll take it and run with it.

[callmeslick]

Black people aren't the only ones living in low income areas. Black people aren't the only ones trying to find a job. So why is it that unemployment for black teenagers is TWICE as high as it is for non black teenagers?

can we all see these statistics, with a breakdown of economics of the families involved, and white vs hispanic vs black, please??

[vision]

I understand what Will and Spidey propose. There is a little bit of that forceful take back going on, but the scale is much too small to be effective. I'm sure it would be larger if Chicago could afford it. And as we've discussed in this thread, that kind of action is ineffective without putting in sustainable measures. When I say we need to "increase the well-being" one neighborhood at a time, this is what I'm talking about. Brute force can be used to root out the troublemakers, but without a caring hand to rebuild the area it will simply revert. Again, this is expensive.

Will, the dysfunction in African American culture is no secret. There are books written about the "two types of black people" by black authors even. Education can help expel that mentality. Again, it will be a slow, expensive process of securing neighborhoods, increasing education and other resources, and hopefully building local economies. When the local economy is strong enough the incentive to get into illegal drug trade is diminished.

I guess there is a tipping point we haven't reached yet. It's more like a stalemate.

[Will Robinson]

..

I guess there is a tipping point we haven't reached yet. It's more like a stalemate.

My reason for starting this thread is the profound incredulity that swept over me at the thought this isn't the tipping point for everyone who became aware.

It is the antithesis of everything 'American' to me that we would find ourselves trying to walk our children to school through war zone environment like missionaries in a foreign land that are on the verge of being slaughtered by the local militants.

Jeff250, I'm usually right there on board with that line of thought but having lived through hamfisted help of National Guardsmen sent by the Governor for hurricane evacuation and looter control...curfews, restricted travel, multiple ID stops, suspension of property rights, etc etc I see this emergency far more compelling for a temporary measure to be allowed. This is beyond the average justification for emergency measures both due to the magnitude of the threat and the fact that decades have passed and it is only getting worse. This is epidemic in nature. An easy call in my mind....emergency time.

It would be best if they gave a endgoal that would terminate the emergency power. Probably a review after a predetermined time by local authority like the Sheriffs from the affected counties to declare a reduced threat. They can consult with city police to make the determination but it needs to be an elected official with primary function as law enforcement to make the call and it can't be a set time frame that the thugs can just decide to wait out.

[callmeslick]

My reason for starting this thread is the profound incredulity that swept over me at the thought this isn't the tipping point for everyone who became aware.

It is the antithesis of everything 'American' to me that we would find ourselves trying to walk our children to school through war zone environment like missionaries in a foreign land that are on the verge of being slaughtered by the local militants.

here is something with which I agree. The problem, as I see it, is that there is a divisive level of disagreement over what got us to this 'tipping point' and how to pull back from the precipice we have reached. Thus, our form of governance ceases to work(it is based on reason and compromise, both in scant supply), and we dither for decades. Hopefully, not forever, or even 'until it was too late'.

[Tunnelcat]

...I also just want to say, in response to some of the bastardizations/misunderstandings of what Will is saying: you do not kill people for being criminals, or for being less than upstanding members of society, even if some sick son of a ★■◆● could make a convincing argument that it would result in a utopia. We are not playing thought exercises at being some kind of petty God here. What I was talking about, and I believe what will is talking about, is forcing the hand of and targeting those who are willing to harm or kill innocents to get what they want, and either throwing them in jail or killing them in a stand-off. Not outside the law. The end-result being a community with less predators and less threats to innocent, law-abiding civilians where people don't have to look over their shoulder as much.

How do we deal with kids like these that don't even have a smidgen of humanity? Are they worth the huge effort and expense to either imprison them for life, or else try and reform? It's just a philosophical question I'm posing, because as our society slowly melts down, there will be some hard moral and ethical choices that we'll all have to make. Do we try and reform every criminal and return them to society, or dump them into prison like garbage just to solve our problems? We're fast getting overwhelmed with the problem.

[callmeslick]

How do we deal with kids like these that don't even have a smidgen of humanity? Are they worth the huge effort and expense to either imprison them for life, or else try and reform? It's just a philosophical question I'm posing, because as our society slowly melts down, there will be some hard moral and ethical choices that we'll all have to make. Do we try and reform every criminal and return them to society, or dump them into prison like garbage just to solve our problems? We're fast getting overwhelmed with the problem.

oh, you left out a choice. Simply revert to killing and sterilizing them out of our society. Don't think that slippery slope won't be approached, on the current trajectory, at some point.

[Spidey]

Anybody that thinks you can fix the economy of these places "before" stopping the violence is an idiot.

Sorry about being blunt.

[callmeslick]

Anybody that thinks you can fix the economy of these places "before" stopping the violence is an idiot.

Sorry about being blunt.

no, you have to work on both at once, frankly. In other words, work at the roots of why we are sending billions to cartels for drugs, patrol the streets, jail the killers, improve the education, inprove the infrastructure AND re-tool the whole economic emphasis of the nation. Easy? No, but in my mind, the true idiots are those who give easy answers to complex problems, or offer fast tixes at the expense of levelling with everyone about the road being long.

[Tunnelcat]

How do we deal with kids like these that don't even have a smidgen of humanity? Are they worth the huge effort and expense to either imprison them for life, or else try and reform? It's just a philosophical question I'm posing, because as our society slowly melts down, there will be some hard moral and ethical choices that we'll all have to make. Do we try and reform every criminal and return them to society, or dump them into prison like garbage just to solve our problems? We're fast getting overwhelmed with the problem.

oh, you left out a choice. Simply revert to killing and sterilizing them out of our society. Don't think that slippery slope won't be approached, on the current trajectory, at some point.

That's the kneejerk reaction that most people might come up with, because it's an easy out. The expensive and hard work of making sure all people have an education and a good job takes too much money and effort. Besides, most city slums are out of sight, out of mind, until they blow up or spill over into the good neighborhoods. Then people throw a fit. And yet, they still don't want to come up with a better solution. It's always the easy-to-take solution, which is usually imprisonment and warehousing. That's what happens to the mentally ill most of the time right now. It's not a solution, but a temporary stopgap. If people don't like the liberal feel good way of helping people out and making sure they succeed, they'll be stuck with the temporary stopgap way, that usually ends up multiplying or exacerbating the problem.

[Spidey]

If you could “make sure they succeed” I would go register Democratic tomorrow!

[Tunnelcat]

That's the problem. Most attempts are half-hearted at best, because half the country is liberal and half conservative. Most conservatives think that cutting funding for those evil public services and locking up people when they go bad solves all problems. Most liberals think that throwing wads of money at everything will solve all our problems. The solution is really somewhere in between.

[Will Robinson]

That's the problem. Most attempts are half-hearted at best, because half the country is liberal and half conservative. ...

More like because half hearted is all it takes to get re-elected and standing up for anything more than that begins to sound like trouble for some of your teams more vulnerable districts so your party leadership begins to fold up and shun you.
No one goes bold anymore. Visionary's are dangerous team mates and it is all about preserving the teams power. It is to the point they started to openly show contempt for a citizen expecting sacrifice and hard choices from their representatives. And that is true for both party's so stop that knee from jerking TC....