Who Failed Chicago?

Prepare to buckle your boots. Obama is opening the Chicagoland can of worms this Friday by using his hometown to stump for Gun Control. How Ironic... and Just plain Loony!!

On Tuesday, President Obama and the first lady used the State of the Union spotlight to pay tribute to an innocent teenage girl shot and killed by Chicago gang thugs. On Friday, Obama will travel to the Windy City to decry violence and crusade for more gun laws in the town with the strictest gun laws and bloodiest gun-related death tolls in America.

Does the White House really want to open up a national conversation about the state of Chicago? OK, let's talk.

Bring it on!!

Obama, his wife, his campaign strategists, his closest cronies and his biggest bundlers all hail from Chicago. Senior adviser and former Chicago real estate mogul/city planning commissioner Valerie Jarrett and her old boss Richard Daley presided over a massive "Plan for Transformation" in the mid-1990s to rescue taxpayer-subsidized public housing from its bloody hellhole. How'd that work out for you, Chicago?

Answer: This social justice experiment failed miserably. A Chicago Tribune investigation found that after Daley and Jarrett dumped nearly $500 million of federal funding into crime-ridden housing projects, the housing complexes (including the infamous Altgeld-Murray homes) remained dangerous, drug-infested, racially segregated ghettos. Altgeld is a long-troubled public housing complex on Chicago's South Side, where youth violence has proved immune to "community organizing" solutions and the grand redevelopment schemes championed by Obama and company.

The reality

lucrative contracts went to politically connected Daley pals in the developer world to "save" Chicago's youth and families. Another ghetto housing project, the Grove Parc slum, was managed by Jarrett's former real estate empire, Habitat, Co. Jarrett refused to answer questions about the dilapidated housing development after ascending to top consigliere in the Obama administration.

But as the Boston Globe's Binyamin Appelbaum, who visited the slums several years ago, reported: "Federal inspectors graded the condition of the complex an 11 on a 100-point scale — a score so bad the buildings now face demolition. ... (Jarrett) co-managed an even larger subsidized complex in Chicago that was seized by the federal government in 2006, after city inspectors found widespread problems." Grove Parc and several other monumental housing flops "were developed and managed by Obama's close friends and political supporters. Those people profited from the (federal) subsidies even as many of Obama's constituents suffered."

Obama and his ineffectual champions of Chicago's youth will demand more taxpayer "investments" to throw at the problem. But money is no substitute for the soaring fatherlessness, illegitimacy and family disintegration that have characterized Chicago inner-city life since Obama's hero Saul Alinsky pounded the pavement.

Chicago is the poster child for all that is wrong with bloated govt and the strictest gun laws in the nation...They have already broken a new record for the number of homicides for Jan 2013 and are quickly on pace to exceed last years record breaking number of murders. Wow! I just can't believe that Obama has the audacity to make this trip and campaign for his gun control measures.

cnsnews.com...

I sincerely hope that his former constituents turn out in droves to call Obama out on the pathetic game that has been played on them by Obama and ALL of his closest Chicago Cronies who now work for him...

Oh really? Tell me it isn't so.... Will he REALLY be this incredibly stupid??? We couldn't BE so lucky. I mean, if people focus on the root causes of Chicagoland's problems, we'd just be accused of picking on Chicago and being mean or something.

If the Speech Giver-In-Chief wants to make it the poster child for gun control though? Christmas HAS come early! !

He opens every door otherwise closed and locked in civilized debate. For instance, we need to look at the Daley legacy and the near Royal line of control the Daley family has had on Chicago going back to when Kennedy was a pup just considering a run for President.

We can open that nasty door where dark corners of Italian 'Family' influence lay and STILL stand in the windy city. Oh goodie... I can hardly wait. I'll be good though. I'll wait until he has formally opened the door, to be polite. After all, it is kicking Chicago while they're down to highlight these things NOW. Obama has to invite the examination.

Then? Oh indeed..... (rubs paws together in anticipation) I never thought the day would come.

Okay I have lived here my whole life. The poor people from the ghettos shoot each other all the time. Then they come into wealthy areas to rob people. You cannot have a gun in your car in Chicago-but thugs do. Laws aren't going to do it. They know where the guns are-they need to go take them all in one nights' sweep.

If they're going to make new gun laws based on Chicago's murder rate, they should be laws that effect ONLY Chicago. You can not take one city problems and make rules for a whole state. Sadly, they don't see that. A Chicago gangbanger is the same as a Southern Illinois farmer in their eyes.

lol this should be a hoot

more murders in Chicago than allied causalities in Afghanistan for the 2012 year

lets see that on a poster

reply to post by DrNotforhire


For a minute there, I thought you said "this should be a SHOOT"

Shooting ducks in a barrel.

reply to post by jibeho


LOL how funny, its like pun day in chicago... well its about to be!

I mean seriously.... Where in Chicago can this meeting be held where there aren't bullet holes everywhere

reply to post by jibeho


First off, this is an op-ed by Michelle Malkin, graduate of the Ann Coulter school of "journalism".

Second, the "record breaking number of murders in 2012", sorry, no. The record is 970 back in 1974. That's nearly twice the 504 in 2012. 1974 saw 29 homicides per 100,000 residents. 2012 was at 18/100,000 so even by that metric it's still a lie. (To make a point, Oklahoma City has a homicide rate of roughly 17/100,000. According to the Brady Campaign Oklahoma is second in the nation in least restrictive gun laws trailing only Utah. Salt Lake City had 49 in 2012 with a population under 200,000 equating to about 25/100,000.) Facts don't fit the narrative? Facts be damned!

Third, Chicago doesn't have the strictest gun laws. Washington DC does (88 homicides in 2012 - 14/100,000), followed by the entirety of New York state, and then Hawaii and California. Other entire states such as Maryland, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island have essentially the same level of gun control as the city of Chicago. Recall the Supreme Court decision of McDonald v. Chicago from June, 2010 removing the handgun ban. (Just to play the NRA correlation is causation game, do notice that since the SCOTUS decision the Chicago murder rates have skyrocketed.)

So just how is it audacious for the POTUS to go to his hometown, which has gun crime issues, to discuss gun crime issues?!? It seems rather appropriate, does it not? Perhaps he should find some tiny town that hasn't had a gun crime in decades to discuss it instead? That wouldn't make much sense. The gun crime problems in Chicago have so many more facets than gun control or fatherless homes.

To whack-a-doo Malkin's op-ed:

...presided over a massive "Plan for Transformation" in the mid-1990s to rescue taxpayer-subsidized public housing from its bloody hellhole. How'd that work out for you, Chicago?

It worked out pretty well, actually. Violent crime and murder rates dropped dramatically after these initiatives. Murders fell from 931 in 1994 to 828 in '95, to 796 in '96, and on down to 435 in 2011. Graph This wasn't the only policy that influenced the drop-off, but it was significant.

A close friend owns a grocery store in Hegewisch, the neighborhood directly east of Altgeld Gardens. The major issue there is the fact that the government ever built ghettoes. When you talk about ghettoes, you must discuss economic issues. Having been there dozens of times, it's not pretty. But the area is not a hotbed of violence and crime. The only reason Malkin even mentioned Altgeld Gardens is because Obama once worked within the community there and she is trying to score points with her ignorant readers that have literally zero knowledge of the area.

Grove Parc Plaza - What Malkin doesn't say is what Binyamin Appelbaum explains:

Grove Parc has become a symbol for some in Chicago of the broader failures of giving public subsidies to private companies to build and manage affordable housing - an approach strongly backed by Obama as the best replacement for public housing.

Source

This is actually a common problem everywhere this happens. Private companies running public housing for profit, first and foremost. However, to my knowledge Grove Parc no longer exists and has entirely new facilties under construction. I rarely ever go through the Woodlawn neighborhood so I don't have first-hand knowledge of what's going on there. I do recall an article in the Sun-Times a while back, though I can't find it. This is the best I can do.

In the end, Malkin, much like every regressive columnist, gives zero alternatives to the current policies. Do I believe the current policies are working? Well, yes and no. Have they improved things? A bit in some situations. Have they solved the problems? Nope. Do I believe the policies need to be changed? Yep. Do I have the answers? Nope. Does Malkin give any alternate options? Nope. Did she essentially write an article full of lies, spin and a whole lot of nothing? Yep.

Nothing is going to change when your city is floating in a sea of 300 million guns. We don't need each state to have their own set of laws. We need something at the federal level. Time for congress to act.

Originally posted by DrNotforhire
lol this should be a hoot

more murders in Chicago than allied causalities in Afghanistan for the 2012 year

lets see that on a poster

How about this one,

Since 1968 more Americans have died from gunfire in the US, than in all of the wars the US has fought in.

How about that for your next NRA poster?

reply to post by LuckyLucian


First of all, you are throwing States into the Gun Law discussion. Chicago is a city and when compared to other cities, Chicago does indeed have some of the strictest laws in the country.

Despite the superintendent’s claims, Chicago has some of the strictest gun-control mandates in the country. “Assault weapons” and high-capacity magazines are completely banned and, until a 2010 Supreme Court decision, so were handguns.

Residents now can get a permit to own a gun, but the process requires training, background checks and a firearm owner’s identification card

Yes, DC has crazy gun laws too. But the laws are ineffective in either city. Criminals run the streets and the victims keep their mouths shut because they are fearful of being a "snitch"


Read more: www.washingtontimes.com...

Second, Obama is stumping for stricter NATIONAL laws in a city with an already restrictive gun legislation and a high murder rate despite years of tight restrictions. (I was not aware of the high numbers in the late 70's.. Wow!)

I read stuff like this... and I have to wonder...

The surprising stats show the city is worse off now in the category of murder than at the height of the era that has driven Chicago's reputation for almost a century, Capone's "gangland" Chicago.

Let's compare two months: January 1929, leading up to the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, and last month, January 2013. Forty-two people were killed in Chicago last month, the most in January since 2002, and far worse than the city's most notorious crime era at the end of the Roaring Twenties.

Even though the image of Chicago, perpetuated by Hollywood over the years, was that mobsters routinely mowed down people on the streets, the crime stats tell a different story. January 2013's bloodshed has caught the attention of Chicagoans, politicians, the White House and people around the world.In January 1929 there were 26 killings. Forty-two people were killed in Chicago last month, the most in January since 2002, and far worse than the city's most notorious crime era at the end of the Roaring Twenties.

There were no uniform gun laws back in that day..
abclocal.go.com.../iteam&id=8977635

Now, the 1999 Plan for Transformation. One of the goals of that program was to destroy 18,000 housing units. Those displaced by the destruction were just spread around other poor neighborhoods in Chicago.

Under the Plan for Transformation, the city has lost more than 13,000 housing units for the poor at a time when low-income families face one of the worse housing crises in recent history. After years of neglect and abandonment, many residents doubt that Jarrett [Habitat CEO] and CHA officials have their interests at heart.

www.chicagotribune.com...

A Tribune investigation found that almost nine years into what was billed as a 10-year program, the city has completed only 30 percent of the plan's most ambitious element-tearing down entire housing projects and replacing them with new neighborhoods where poor, working-class and wealthier families would live side by side.

So, who failed who?



Obama's slum lord connection
www.npr.org...

A point to ponder and a point that was never touched by the MSM in the 2008 election. They turned a blind eye to Obama and his cronies who turned a blind eye to the low income residents of Chicago. They were used as tools to get rich quick... Compliments of the Daley machine...

If the full story is ever widely known of Illinois State Senator Obama's association with several South Chicago slum landlords to whom the Daley's administration turned-over ownership and management of public housing properties, the voters will rightly ask:


Did the candidate who tells us to be our brothers' keeper not know how developers in and near his district were turning housing for the poor into even more horrific slums? Or, did he know full well what was happening and either didn't care, or was afraid to speak-up? That seems a fair question.
www.americanthinker.com...

Whatever the answer, the myth of the community organizer fighting for the poor is seriously busted.

reply to post by jibeho


I brought up those states to make a more succinct point. I don't have the time to list every city, town, county and jurisdiction in those states to make a complete list of places with stricter gun laws. In that ex-text you could swap out "Chicago" for "Hawaii" and it would still be true. I'm not trying to pull a sleight of hand, I just didn't want to compile a seemingly endless list. The "snitches" thing is specific to rather small areas of specific neighborhoods, and is a social/cultural issue unrelated to gun crime specifically.

The murder rates in the 70's were unreal. The murder per 100,000 rates were rather steady from about 1912 through around 1962 with a peak of about 14 in 1929 and a low of about 6 in 1913. To me, it's interesting to look at the murder rates compared to population growth rates and how similar the two are. Secondly, murder rates make a jump over the longer term coinciding with certain illicit drug sale rates. Peak in the late 20's during Prohibition, peak in the 70's along with heroin, peak in the 80's along with coc aine, peak in the late 80's/early 90's with crack. Point being, you can't make a direct correlation between murder rates and gun control. No, there weren't uniform gun laws back in that time. There also wasn't the same sort of access to guns either. There weren't hundreds of gun manufacturers clamoring for business.

Your Tribune link doesn't seem to be working so I can't read the article you're quoting from. But the parts you quoted make it clear what its point is. Money. Take a drive down south State Street and tell me that hasn't been money well spent. It's an entirely different place. Where there was once high-rise Projects and a scene that you'd expect to see in a war torn country, there are now open plazas, clean streets, new shops and businesses, new public transportation, modern mixed income residences (some are houses, some are nice modern apartment buildings, condos, lofts, etc.) The Projects at 49th and Cicero are completely gone and building is supposed to begin this spring and summer. Frankly, I don't care that it's taking longer than expected. These are things that need to be done. So since they're taking too long there's no chance for success? Since it's taken longer than expected should we just abandon the entire thing?

Supposed connections between Obama and "slum-lords" has what to do with gun crime and gun control issues? I've already veered off-topic. So, who failed Chicago? That's quite a long list. But Obama is way, way, way down that list. Richard M. Daley is up near the top, But Bilandic and Byrne are ahead of him. A lot of the people down in Springfield are near the top. Large corporations like American National Can and US Steel are up there. Ronald Reagan and his congressional cohorts are up there. How long does this list have to be?

Spent most of my youth living in inner city Chicago and you know what? Criminals living in inner city Chicago actually have cars, so they can travel to other States to get guns, where the gun laws are different.

There are actually studies that show that inner city youth living in Chicago experience Delayed Stress Syndrome, because of what life is like their. Chicago is effectively a "Hub," of the United States and as such a very difficult place to live in. Myself I spent much of my youth their and can tell you it is a place a person can get killed just because they were at the wrong place at the wrong time.

Just like all the other incidents....perhaps we should blame it on GM

Any thoughts?

Oh and this may sound suprising to some of you but, some of these criminals, actually do not have a criminal record not that it matters in certain States