"The mayor is black. The council is almost two-thirds black. The school superintendent is black. The police chief is black, and a majority of his officers are black.
Race riots inevitably end in contention over what social woes led to the trigger point, with one overarching element: a white power structure ruling a black populace.
Baltimore left behind that vestige of segregation long ago, yet the city nonetheless has been perched on the edge of chaos for much of this week, as African American protesters took to the streets to express grievances over police abuse and urban neglect.
“We ain't talking about color,” said John Baptist Watkins III, 53, sitting on the steps of a boarded-up brick row house on North Avenue, as men nearby peddled drugs — one of the few ways to earn money in this part of town.
Even the city's African American elected officials, Watkins said, “have no clue what is going on in the city.”" LA Times
—————–
If the cops in Baltimore broke Grey's neck they should be prosecuted for homicide.
Nevertheless, it should be remembered that, as I wrote earlier today, the list above should include the state prosecutor who is black and Major General Singh, the Adjutant General of Maryland, a politically appointed state officer, who is also black and a woman.
IMO the root cause of this catastrophe in the life of the City of Baltimore is a lack of available jobs that are accessible to entry level men who are not well qualified for jobs that require education and self discipline in a changing economy.
The reason for this scarcity of jobs is the loss of industrial enterprise in the Baltimore area. This is a historic phenomenon that results from changes in the world economy. US government has been complicit in this change. Can the US government help reverse the loss of industry in Baltimore, probably not. pl
———-
Well, pilgrims, the cops who have been acquitted should sue all those involved including the City of Baltimore. pl 27 July, 2016
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-black-power-20150429-story.html#page=1
US (Fed) Govt can make a difference in the job market everywhere. Mfg is unlikely to be a big labor market, but there are plenty of other things we need to do.
Republican Congress has INTENTIONALLY stifled the US economy since Obama was elected because they know that Keynesianism works, but it should only be used when a Republican is President.
New Tech (and management techniques) increase efficiency. So, either we find more things that WE want to have done, and tax the rich to do it, or WE let a lot of people go hungry (or at least waste their lives).
elkern
The decline of Baltimore began long before Obama was elected. pl
Maybe Peter Angelos running up BS asbestos suits against Bethlehem Steel and putting the shipyard out of business has something to do with it?
Always YT’s fault somehow.
Peak Leftism in my lifetime. Whodathunk it?
I thought the comments of David Simon were really interesting as a further explication of Col Lang’s points. He’s was a crime beat reporter in Baltimore for a number of years before turning his hand to the roman a clef that was “The Wire” (highly recommended BTW).
I took his main point to be that the drug war and the political desire for action put pressure on the police to crack down extremely hard on civil liberties – it’s hard to call it a War on Drugs without inflicting civilian casualties. But one insight was that having black cops actually increased the level of police brutality because white cops would otherwise “hold back” for fear of being labelled racist. Instead, this became much more about class and control than a racial divide between cops and citizens.
The loss of the manufacturing base and the ability to be gainfully employed without a lot of higher education is clearly part of the problem, but his comments on policing were something I hadn’t heard of before. Worth the read:
https://www.themarshallproject.org/2015/04/29/david-simon-on-baltimore-s-anguish
Couldn’t agree more. It’s actually close to a point I’ve been trying to push on a few economics blogs for years now– that the central and most urgent question for political economy going forward is, and for quite a while looking backward has been, this: how will people of ordinary motivation, gifts, and attainments be able to earn a decent and legal living? Ensuring a real and satisfactory answer to that question is one of the really core responsibilities of a system of political economy, imho.
This is a systemic and national problem at the least, as you say. And it’s at its worst in rust-belt cities, where until as recently as 40 (or even 30 in some cases) years ago there was urban-based manufacturing that needed a lot of unskilled and semi-skilled laborers and filled a lot of those jobs with local people who could get to work affordably on urban mass transit.
For old and dense urban areas like Baltimore and Philadelphia the catastrophe actually started by the early 60s, when the jobs began to move out to greenfield factories and suburban malls and offices. Then, in moves that have been more widely remarked on, the manufacturing and associated jobs went to the South, then to Mexican maquiladoras, then to east and south Asia. Federal and state and local policies greased much of this displacement and continue to. Even if the factories came back, though, contemporary manufacturing methods also continually reduce the workers needed at all skill levels. Which might be a theoretically good thing, except that the way things are now, people need gainful legal employment. And very few out there are driven, educated, articulate, entrepreneuerial, able to pay for the privilege of preparing themselves exactly as employers want them to be, etc.
Maybe a difference between now and 1968– big parts of Baltimore still haven’t been touched, really, since the MLK riots of that year after which almost anybody with money left most parts of the city– is that the current job decline trend is affecting a demographic that politicians know they should care about. Unfortunately that doesn’t necessarily mean anything real will get done . . .
“Maybe Peter Angelos running up BS asbestos suits against Bethlehem Steel and putting the shipyard out of business has something to do with it? Always YT’s fault somehow.”
Tyler,
I think you largely miss the point:
* What you witness in these asbestos lawsuits against Bethlehem Steel is that the US leaves an employees by and large standing in the rain over work related injuries, illness or disabilities.
I assume for the sake of argument that the people you refer to in all likelihood these do have work related injuries (because if that was not the case you’d accuse them of faking it, and you wouldn’t do that, would you).
Think of the New York cops and firefighters who were exposed to all that noxious dirt after 9/11, and literally sacrificed their health in service – how is it that they had to fight for compensation for year? How is it?
The apparent lack of satisfactory mechanisms to settle such issues compels people who have been hurt to use the tools at their disposal to compenstate them for work related injury – and that is for good or ill the US civil law system.
It is unfortunate for corporations in the US facing such lawsuits that there is the instrument of punitive damage, which can amount to iirc up to 20x the damage caused (last I looked), if the jury feels the culprit has been a real asshole. That is, I hurt you, and your medical bills amount to $ 1.000. The jury thinks I was a real asshole about it and makes it $ 20.000, just to teach me and comfort you. It’s a little like a lottery.
The problems here are (a) the punitive damage and that damages are not capped to the amount of damages actually caused. The second problem is (b) the quota litis, that allows an atorney to work for free but take up to a third (or is it even more now?) of the damages secured – which (c) give an incentive to file high and try to prove asshole-ish conduct. In any case – an employee who sues his employer is very likely put out of his job, leaving him with two problems: No income and his ailment.
This “asshole bonus” is what makes compensations lawsuits so unpredictable for companies and insurances and so lucratice for lawyers. Enthusiasts for punitive damages tend to point out that punitive damages because of their unpredictability are an effective deterrent for misconduct of any kind. In fact, that deterrent was so effective that it deterred Cessna right out of the light aircraft business.
* Maybe a more reasonable aproach to litigation over work-related injuries and ailments would have prevented such lawsuits from allegedly wrecking companies (leaving aside that the demise of the rust belt was probably not entirely due to work related lawsuits – companies not modernising plants for decades but ‘milking them’, not to mention that globalisation thing that may have played a role after all)? Just asking.
* Here’s in brief how it works in Germany:
First, in Germany compensation is limited to the amount of damages actually caused. I hurt you for $ 1.000 – you get $ 1.000 – not more. Punishment is left to administrative and criminal courts. It has no place in civil proceedings. Also, the quota litis is considered unethical and attorneys are prohibited from working on that basis. In non work-related cases of injuries, there are compensation tables which are periodically readjusted by judges based on current developments for treatment costs.
Secondly, and more specifically, in Germany work-related injuries and disabilities are handled through and paid for by ‘Berufsgenossenschaften’. The ‘Berufsgenossenschaften’ create mandatory safety-in-the-workplace regulations and inspect for compliance. Membership is compulsory for corporations, as is compliance with safety-in-the-workplace regulation. In the US conservatives call that “red tape”.
Job related injuries must be reported to the ‘Berufsgenossenschaften’ by the company. The various ‘Berufsgenossenschaften’ cooperate and have clinics specialising in job related injuries, and generally an excellent level of quality, equipment and competence. The idea is to get an employee back to health, and to work, quickly.
In case of a work related injury, the employer reports the case to the ‘Berufsgenossenschaften’. They pay for treatment with their specialised doctors. After treatment the employee returns to work, or, if he is unable to, receives disability compensation. If the injury was the result of non-compliance with safety regulations the ‘Berufsgenossenschaften’ will iirc charge the treatment costs on the employer, and fine him for non-compliance. The eployee is out of that angle entirely.
Now before you cry socialism and big government – for just a second consider the very practical benefits:
We do not expose our corporations to risks like punitive damages over work related injuries. We do not compel employees into (year long) lawsuits (of financial and psychological attrition) against employers (with far deeper pockets) to seek regress. Also we avoid destroying the relationship between employee and employer. The employer does not face unpredictable risks of litigation (driving down costs for insurances). And we do not leave the injured emplyoee standing in the rain. We have that system ever since Bismarck.
* The nature of the US legal system is a *choice* and the result of letting it grow that way. To not do something about its defects or excesses is also a choice the US as a nation makes for their legal system.
To blame greedy plaintiffs and their greedy lawyers for allegedly driving companies into ruin with stuff like asbestos lawsuits is preposterous. What else are they supposed to do? Stay at home sick, out of a job, and suck it up?
Col. Lang –
I think there are things that can be done. Whether they will get done is questionable.
Our country has serious deficiencies in our public infrastructure, problems that will have to be addressed sooner or later. It would be a large public works project, and would at least offer a several year boost for construction work.
Long term, de-industrialization is a major issue that I don’t see anyone addressing. Or I should say, I see plenty of people addressing it by moving to the service sector, but no kind of large scale thinking for how it will affect our society. In a decade or so we may be at the point where only 50% employment is necessary to provide all production and services for the economy – what about the other 50%?
Jobs are disappearing all over the First World due to advancements in technology. More and better robots are popping up all over the place. Some of the jobs the robots take over are a blessing due to their strenuous and dangerous nature.
But where are the tens of millions of new, good paying full time jobs we need to have in the private sector in America?
They are not here. They are not coming, not in the required numbers. Instead of dealing with this head-on, the people in charge have decided to ignore the signs that a job crisis is building.
All,
Corporations should be rewarded for opening business in the inner city and rural areas and be penalized for moving production offshore. No tax breaks and the import fees for the slave wage products should be astronomical for those who do. They should also no longer we able to claim status as a US company. Wal-Mart ( proud to say that I never darkened their doorway) is now closing several large stores after destroying all of the former competition and moving to China!
Protectionism? Damn right.
jerseycityjoan said:
“Jobs are disappearing all over the First World due to advancements in technology. More and better robots are popping up all over the place.”
Iirc around Christmas last year there was an odd and thus memorable nationwide ad campaign by BMW, which at the time were rolling out their new composite hybrid. The ad had the theme, roughly summed up as, “the robot – your fried”.
Someone on the web had the good sense to take a picture. Translation:
“Why we use robots?
Because it has no consequences (for your health).
Innovative production without physical strain.
For us, the next step.”
http://tinyurl.com/ocj9akg
And what’s the step after that?
http://www.bmwgroup.com/com/de/verantwortung/whats_next/roboter/index.html
“Collaborative work (with robots) – work healthier with less strain”
Brave new world indeed.
Perhaps former Baltimore Mayor and Governor should be asked on his role in shaping modern Baltimore? Does he have the same vision for the entire USA?
As to black leadership from elected politicians–not much in my opinion but perhaps more than many white politicians.
The political class in the USA deeply corrupt and all about incumbency and manipulating their elective positions to self-deal benefits for friends and family while in office and afterwards.
An excellent point! No one has said this so far.
Richard Sale
There was an enterprise zone during Mr. Clinton’s presidency in Detroit – funded by the largess of US government – and failed due to the endemic corruption, venality, and incompetence of the City of Detroit’s publicly elected officials – a city controlled for decades by African-Americans.
Detroit suffered the same fate that many newly independent 3rd World countries did when the Europeans left the scene; in Nigeria, in Zimbabwe, in Ghana, in Uganda – to name a few.
These are self-inflicted wounds and one cannot blame others – in my opinion.
This is a spurious argument; would you have road and construction heavy machinery banned as well?
Lots of people could be employed digging ditches and building berms and wells and walls.
Or would you make container ships illegal as well?
Then many more could be employed as stevedors..
I think if you consider the wider context of the American continent; you would notice that countries with heterogeneous population on this continent, on the average, are much more violent than the European and Asian states:
Mexico, Guatemala, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, United States, Honduras, and Panama and others.
The violence is not due to the loss of manufacturing jobs; something other is causing it.
Altoid,
All I would add to what you have said are Baltimore specific situations that made the problem worse there. Baltimore always had a large industrial base, but those companies were never headquartered in Baltimore. When foreign competition and the recessions of the 70s and 80s caused plant closings it was easier for companies to do it in Baltimore where they were not as deeply involved in the community as in their home cities. This was multiplied by the end of large scale Federal assistance and programs to urban areas that began in the 70s and accelerated through the Reagan era. Baltimore revitalized itself to an extent in the 80s by shifting its economy to tourism (inner harbor, etc). But those jobs could never pay as well as the union jobs of the old industrial economy. Additionally, the money of the tourist trade: hotels, mall stores, etc. did not necessarily stay in Baltimore. Combine this with higher wage earners leaving the city proper to live in the counties and commute, and the drain in capital and in interest in the welfare of the city and its residents outside of the shiny business and tourist areas created the somewhat intractable problems we see today in Baltimore. The riots in Baltimore should not be a surprise, the surprise is that it hadn’t happened sooner.
Cee
Jack Kemp proposed this idea in the
70’s I believe and called it “enterprise
zones”. Reagan and other pols made
the pilgrimage to the Bronx and Harlem
to emphasize this. Nothing was ever done.
Off shoring was easier. Agree on the taxation
issue. Obama was going to rectify this as
part of his Hope and Change. Neither.
Col: “IMO the root cause of this catastrophe in the life of the City of Baltimore is a lack of available jobs that are accessible to entry level men who are not well qualified for jobs that require education and self discipline in a changing economy.”
So true. Failure then reinforces failure. When the only shiny new building in your part of town is the jail, the problem’s a lot bigger than the police.
William C: Interesting you should mention O’Malley’s role. Yesterday I ran across a fascinating piece by a former crime beat reporter for the Baltimore Sun, David Simon, who lays a considerable amount of the blame for the city’s police department dysfunction precisely at the former mayor’s feet. He argues that actions O’Malley took in order to buff his image in preparation for ascending the political ladder undermined the integrity of the department. Regarding the race issue within the department, he asserts that in his experience the officers who treated black detainees most brutally were almost all African American themselves. Here’s a quote:
“When Ed and I reported “The Corner,” it became clear that the most brutal cops in our sector of the Western District were black. The guys who would really kick your ass without thinking twice were black officers. If I had to guess and put a name on it, I’d say that at some point, the drug war was as much a function of class and social control as it was of racism. I think the two agendas are inextricably linked, and where one picks up and the other ends is hard to say. But when you have African-American officers beating the dog-piss out of people they’re supposed to be policing, and there isn’t a white guy in the equation on a street level, it’s pretty remarkable. But in some ways they were empowered. Back then, even before the advent of cell phones and digital cameras — which have been transforming in terms of documenting police violence — back then, you were much more vulnerable if you were white and you wanted to wail on somebody. You take out your nightstick and you’re white and you start hitting somebody, it has a completely different dynamic than if you were a black officer. It was simply safer to be brutal if you were black, and I didn’t know quite what to do with that fact other than report it. It was as disturbing a dynamic as I could imagine. Something had been removed from the equation that gave white officers — however brutal they wanted to be, or however brutal they thought the moment required — it gave them pause before pulling out a nightstick and going at it. Some African American officers seemed to feel no such pause”.
https://www.themarshallproject.org/2015/04/29/david-simon-on-baltimore-s-anguish?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share-tools&utm_source=twitter&utm_content=post-top
Of course (“decline of Baltimore began long” ago). Baltimore is the south-east corner of the Rust Belt; a midling Port city, from which we once shipped manufactured goods all over the world. Unionized factory jobs were the gateway to the middle class for millions of Americans – particularly “hyphenated” Americans, including Blacks.
That’s gone, and it ain’t comin’ back. But that’s not the only way to have a strong middle class.
My point is more short-term: that Republican obstruction prevented the US Gov’t from using Fiscal policy to restart our economy after the crash of 2008. If we had borrowed $1T, at basically 0% interest, and invested it in infrastructure, we’d be in much better shape now:
– better roads, bridges, rails, & internet would make everything better, faster, and cheaper.
– millions of young people would have gotten job experience in the prime of their lives, rather than sitting in their parents basements, wiggling their thumbs.
– spreading the money around makes things better for everybody, except the .1% for whom “better” means “more better than everybody else”. Middle class people buy things & services from other people, spreading it around (here) even more.
I’m not justifying the stupidity & immaturity of smash-&-grab rioters. But the INTENTIONALLY SUPPRESSED Job market makes hard work a hard sell. Things have been getting worse & worse for the working poor (of all “races”, etc). A better economy wouldn’t fix all the problems of the ghetto, but it sure would help.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/freddie-grays-life-a-study-in-the-sad-effects-of-lead-paint-on-poor-blacks/2015/04/29/0be898e6-eea8-11e4-8abc-d6aa3bad79dd_story.html
There’s a theory going around that spikes in violent crime in previous decades were due in large part to lead poisoning.
yes labor has manifestly manged to seize control of capital, whodathunkit indeed.
All
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltimore
“Once a predominantly industrial town, with an economic base focused on steel processing, shipping, auto manufacturing, and transportation, the city experienced deindustrialization which cost residents tens of thousands of low-skill, high-wage jobs.[133] The city now relies on a low-wage service economy, which accounts for 90% of jobs in the city.[134][135]” wiki pl
Babak,
of course it is spurious, that is the very point. For the corporation, the emphasis is quite naturally cheaper, faster and more accurate production. The health aspects are just the selling point.
The campaign suggests to me that BMW is acutely aware of potential buyer rejection of robotically built cars. That was what made the campaign so remarkable.
WRC,
Which Governor, the Democrat (O’Malley) who was until January 20th and is now running against Hillary or the Republican who has been in office less than 90 days? Perhaps St. Angelos of the Twitter post can give an update on what his family’s political involvement has done to improve things over the past 3 decades.
CP,
That’s a lot of words to dance around the fact that trial lawyers made the most money out of that and is part and parcel for Baltimore’s economic collapse.
Maybe we should import more immigrants to do the jobs Americans just won’t do.
The spin spin spin in regards to how this is whitey’s fault when you have a black controlled city from top to bottom is making me dizzy. There’s a reason why Annapolis ain’t going to be suffering any riots anytime soon.
Cee,
” No tax breaks and the import fees for the slave wage…”
That sure creates a problem for Obama’s support of the TPP and Clinton’s passage of NAFTA.
The World Economic Forum produces an annual Global Risks Report the aim of which is “to identify global risks and their interactions, and to assess them on two dimensions: their perceived likelihood and impact”. The 2015 report is the 10th and while the experts used to compile the report are supposed to look at a decadal time scale – which should make changes in the table gradual – it is interesting to see how rapidly one of the key regular tables (Top 5 Global Risks in terms of Likelihood) change.
This may seem an odd post to add to this thread but if I list the top threats from 2007 to 2015 it may become clearer.
2007 – Breakdown of critical infrastructure.
2008-10 – Asset price collapse.
2011 – Storms and Cyclones.
2012-14 – Severe income disparity
2015 – Interstate conflict with regional consequences.
Severe income disparity did not gradually creep up the list it just appeared in first place and stayed there. The tables have many other interesting features for instance in 2007 to 2010 there were 0 (out of 20) risks in the ‘Environmental’ category but post 2011 they make up 11/25.
The reports can be accessed here
http://www.weforum.org/reports?filter%5Btype%5D=Risks%20Reports
and the table I have been discussing is on page 16 (of the 2015 report).
I think the key takeaway is that wealthy neoliberal elites have supported policies that hurt poor blacks and poor whites alike.
This could happen in NYC, Chicago, or LA and none of those cities are majority controlled by blacks. Detroit is but I haven’t heard of any recent major unrest set off by police action there. It’s not a black white issue but the race hustlers and reverse race hustlers are making it one.
As for riots.. I think its similar to how Palestinians throw rocks at Israeli police/military. That’s all they have the power to do. The media hypes it up and it’s fairly effective in making the suburban and rural whites piss themselves in thinking blacks are going to come for them.
I recommend you take trip to Ghana or to India and see for yourself what the absence of the internal combustion engine does to human body.
The issue is not robots; in my opinion.
The issue is the unwillingness by many to face the fact that the days of economic scarcity are behind us; have been for more than a century.
What is needed is to devise clever ways to keep people occupied so they feel productive and live productive lives.
“What is needed is to devise clever ways to keep people occupied so they feel productive and live productive lives.”
Exactly Babak, that’s the key! One of the reasons I have a low opinion of economics is it’s minimal (at best) attention to the issues of jobs and job creation. Lack of employment is acknowledged as a serious issue in a statistical sense, but in the real world I see very little attempt to remedy that. And worse, economists seem to wring their hands and act all helpless about the jobs issue. The availability of jobs is fundamental to social stability. More could be done in this area.
Tyler,
I seriously doubt the causality you suggest. It is very hard to belive that it was, of all things, lawsuits that killed baltimore’s economy. Are you serious?
What you lament is a symptom, not the disease. The trial lawyers made all that money – why? Because the legal system allowed them to secure these damages though punitive damage. Becaues the quota litis made them cash in big. Because asbestos gave them the pretext. Because juries decided in their favour.
Conservatives are said to like tort reform. That is what could fix this – if Republican interest were not primarily about campaign finance. According to Grover Norquist:
“Modest tort reform, much of which has been actively considered by committees in both houses, would defund the trial lawyers, now second only to the unions, and this is debatable, as the funding source of the Left in America”
Yes, now THAT is a reason to reform litigation …
Alas, in the absense of reform – be it reasonable or along Norquist’s lines – you get destructive lawsuits. As I said – to have that instead is a choice that America made.
It’s not the layers. Judging by the results there must be a manifest American unwillingness or inability to fix their legal system to prevent such excesses.
But then, with one party rejecting governance as a matter of course, it wouldn’t work anyway. Perhaps the market will come to the rescue, and correct the legal system? Would that not be marvellous?
CP,
I think the logic operates in both directions. (to be fair, US does have a fair amount of compensation mechanism for workplace related injuries, but it is not as flexible when new issues and revelation of hitherto unknown damages arise, or so I understand it–plus the regulation is largely at the state level). The bottom line, no matter the cause, is that much of the “big ticket” workplace injury compensation cases are handled through the judicial means, and I think this is maintained by choices from both sides.
Those who are “injured” are willing to put up with the judiciary-centered, rather than an administrative, system, with aid of the legal industry that see them as the means of enriching themselves. The corporations, especially if they believe that the potential plaintiffs are likely to have relatively weak cases, also prefer the legal venue rather than the administrative venue. This also fits the American suspicion of a bureaucratized process based on allegedly “one-size-fits-all” mechanism in favor of allgedly case-by-case considerations through the court system. (I am not saying that administrative process is always one-size-fits-all or courts are always case-by-case–the truth, I know, is often contrary.) The consequence of these is that whenever some attempt at creating a serious bureaucratic means for handling contentious issues arise, they are shot down from both “liberal” and “conservative” sides. (and knowing the environment, it is not clear that many of these attempts in US are really all that “honest.”)
While not on the issue of workplace injury compensation, this is precisely what happened with the healthcare reform business. The idea of creating a centralized, government-led/controlled/aided administrative procedure for dispensing medical care was much lampooned by all and was never given a serious chance. (I don’t even think a really serious and workable proposal was ever proposed.) People on the left had to be forcibly dragged kicking and screaming in favor of a proposal that they did not like. People on right saw it as a cross between farce and bureaucratic nightmare, which, I still think, was and still is rather more justified than not. Rather than dwell on whether it was a good idea or bad, I am just using it as an example of how distrust of the state from both sides, feeds into a highly inefficient and often self-destructive consequences seemingly common in American politics.
Thanks PFC Chuck!
YUP! O’Malley!
Thanks JJackson for info and links.
Was a 10 year resident of Annapolis, still own property there. What I recall of that era was the love of Willie Don Schaefer. A true old-time pol. Reminded me of Moon Landrieu in New Orleans. I’m not sure things were quite a rosy as their PR machines led us to believe. And in that era I think in Maryland state politics it was Baltimore City and then the rest of Maryland. (Note that in Maryland government organization Baltimore City is entirely independent of any other government, including Baltimore County.)
Schaefer went on eventually to become something of a “governor emeritus” as the elected Comptroller of Md. Baltimore City probably was never what it was portrayed under Schaefer and that’s what we see today.
Economically, in my Annapolis days (80’s) Annapolis was largely oriented towards Baltimore. But today I would say more towards DC.
BM and others,
Exactly! And the solution is not exactly unknown either: as John Maynard Keynes supposedly said in jest, you should employ half the unemployed to bury money in empty spaces and employ the other half to dig it up (or something to that effect). It’s not so much that academic econs are unaware of these: one could fill many pages with clever but morose econ jokes about “pointless” employments that will change economic stats to make things seem better. But can anyone tell policymakers these tongue-in-cheek (half serious) solutions with a straight face?
Will,
Ding ding ding. Winner winner chicken dinner.
Neoliberal policies are crushing the working class, especially the idea of open border immigration artificially depressing the labor market.
CP,
I imagine that knocking out a major industry isn’t helping.
Will,
I should have expanded: Baltimore is mostly black controlled while the Narrative surrounding Ferguson with gentle giant/pre med student Michael Brown was that white controlled Ferguson was systematically oppressing the blacks of Ferguson.
As for your “hypes it up” about blacks coming for whites, well Section 8 and HUD shipping urban blacks to their nice suburbs kinda points towards the fact that yes, blacks are coming for whites the way locusts come.
Unless you think “white flight” has to do with racism vs. the very real threat blacks pose, as illustrated by this series of pictures that for some reason never got as much air time as St. Trayvonius, Gentle Giant Michael Brown, or Freddie Gray:
http://imgur.com/a/XWgKG
Warning: Each of these is pretty horrible for the senseless violence, but as I said, they never make it past the local news.
Scott,
I remember living on the Eastern Shore when Schaefer was governor. Even then I can remember the attitude that all the tax dollars went to keep the cities in Western Maryland afloat while they saw nothing back.
Delmarva was a nice place to grow up in, but I wonder how much of that is still around?
yes, CI, who would have imagined that an African Muslim would lead the USA into the true Workers Paradise. It would never have been possible without the glorious cooperation of the Tea Party Republicans!
I don’t think it’s technically hard to deal with the concentration of wealth, but it’s politically impossible right now.
All we’d have to do is repeat what ALL developed countries did, over a century ago: shorten the work-week.
Tax the Rich to pay for it(up to, say, 50%?). We’d still have plenty of Billionaires.
Use the money to pay for things we all need and can share (INFRASTRUCTURE again, plus healthcare, education, etc). Most of those things help the rich as well as the poor, just not as much.
Easy, huh?
Yeah, Infrastructure!
Tax the Rich to pay for it; they’ll still get richer. And Infrastructure improvements tend to make it easier for Capital to concentrate (rich get richer faster), so everybody wins.
Tyler,
Was fishing there this past weekend. Still a beautiful spot.
Babak,
Where’s the income coming from?
There may not be enough work for all but there needs to be enough income for all.
We don’t even have that in the First World now (not from people working at fulltime jobs in the private sector) and we sure don’t have it in the rest of the world.
The world population figures have recently been revised — upwards! We are at around 7 billion now, 9.6 billion humans are expected to be on Earth in 2050.
The potential Utopia may be there in theory but how will it work in practice?
Valissa and Group,
Here’s one perspective, from Clinton’s Secretary of Labor:
“But the economy toward which we’re hurtling – in which more and more is generated by fewer and fewer people who reap almost all the rewards, leaving the rest of us without enough purchasing power – can’t function.
It may be that a redistribution of income and wealth from the rich owners of breakthrough technologies to the rest of us becomes the only means of making the future economy work.”
http://robertreich.org/post/113801138315
I do not see the “redistribution” Reich describes happening in the US in my lifetime, yet his description of the changes happening is not incorrect. I was pretty startled when I read this. So far all the experts have been “waiting” for this to return to some kind of normal since the Great Recession.
Tyler:
I know what you mean about spinning. My head spun a few times when I saw them interviewing the nice, white, Jewish lady on TV whose store was being looted. My first thought was – why wasn’t that a black owned store in that part of town? I wonder how many of those apartment buildings we’ve seen the last few nights are black owned? How many are owner occupied and how many are absentee landlord? What do you think?
So what do you think about all these fools down here in Texas who think an Army exercise means the big, black Obama is coming to take over and occupy Texas. I see the governor is on the ball and has called out the National Guard to watch over the exercises. Frankly, we’d have better government down here if it were true but unfortunately I think it’s just a bunch of rednecks on a rampage against the black guy.
GCP
“… has called out the National Guard.” I believe that to be factually incorrect. So far as I know, Governor Abbott has given that task to the “Texas State Guard” a non-NG portion of the state’s militia. pl
Valissa wrote: ‘And worse, economists seem to wring their hands and act all helpless about the jobs issue. The availability of jobs is fundamental to social stability. More could be done in this area.’
Under capitalism – nothing. The whole idea is to produce for less and sell for more until there are a few winners and many, many, many losers. What do you think the Reagan Revolution was all about and why he’s the worst president this country has ever had? Economists have known this mathematically for a long, long time. Don’t blame them for the greed of politicians, capitalists and the simple stupidness of people who continue to vote against their own economic interests because their religious leaders tell them to do so.
Fred,
Shh. You aren’t supposed to notice that for all his talk Obama is basically another believer in neoliberal economics.
jerseycityjoan wrote: ‘It may be that a redistribution of income and wealth from the rich owners of breakthrough technologies to the rest of us becomes the only means of making the future economy work.”
Why don’t we break up the banks until no bank has more than 5% of the total banking market and see how that goes? It’s not breakthrough technologies nor any technology that is the problem. It’s who controls the capital stock of the country and that capital stock is in too few hands.
GCP,
I’m not sure what you mean except to demonstrate for me a case in point of liberal “arguing”. We have non sequitors, ad homs, strawmen, and argument via assumption.
Nick,
I got pictures of my family back there crabbing – glad to hear things are keeping on keeping on in slower, lower Delaware and associated areas.
Babak Makkinejad wrote: ‘Lots of people could be employed digging ditches and building berms and wells and walls.
Or would you make container ships illegal as well?’
Not necessary. When it comes to manufacturing and entry level jobs what we need are tariffs. Tariffs high enough so that wage differentials and capital manipulations no longer make a difference. In other words, if you want to sell here then produce here; otherwise, bye – bye.
JCJ,
Net economic output has been rising faster than population growth for a few centuries. The problem is more that of distribution, not of scarcity. The econs will say that distribution and production are two sides of the same coin, but it is hardly obvious that top heavy distribution favors more production (Piketty actually argues the opposite.)
So here’s a nice little take down of some Pravda style journalism from a local lefty rag, City Journal:
http://imgur.com/gallery/QVh32
The “too long didn’t read” version: There’s a picture some of you may have seen of a redhead having her purse snatched by a vibrant urban youth, and her fighting to get it back. Well City Journal reporters claimed that drunk white sports fans were pelting innocent vibrants with bottles and that’s what started the fracas, with this redhead trying to STEAL the pink purse back from the noble youth (no really). Two of the reporters, Caitlin Goldblatt and Brandon Soderberg, claim that this is what happened while video at the scene contradicts it. The link above is a pretty good take down of the entire BS attempt to whitewash the riots.
Social justice is a cult.
GCP,
I doubt hardly anyone votes against their economic interests “because their religious leaders tell them to do so.” In most cases, people who claim that they have the best (economic) interests of the poor and the middle classes in mind are those holding alien worldviews that make little sense to the masses of voters, who seem to have (and in many cases do) have their own hidden agendas and cannot be trusted. So many people face two unpleasant choices: Devil that they know and inscrutable aliens that they can’t trust. Only if the Dems wise up, realize that “culture” matters, and learn to talk to their own people in terms that make sense to them while acting in a manner that seem reasonable will they be able to get their attention.
CP,
“The second problem is (b) the quota litis, that allows an atorney to work for free but take up to a third (or is it even more now?) of the damages secured – which (c) give an incentive to file high and try to prove asshole-ish conduct.”
You mean some poor folks like Freddie Grey and Eric Garner who get killed should not be able to hire lawyers – on contingency – to sue the state? Nor all those folks who sued Pacific Gas & Electric really weren’t injured? (Even Hollywood got in on that act, surely you saw “Erin Brockovich”?)
Didn’t some Union Carbide settle things that way, minus the lawyers and real economic settlements, in Bophal? Corporate America though, will love your idea.
Colonel,
Baltimore is the Eastern Edge of the Rust Belt. What kept the lid on through its deindustrialization was the port, tourists, and long commutes to jobs in DC; plus Mayor Martin O’Malley’s zero tolerance policing and jailing of trouble makers.
The strange aspect of the 21st Century is the complete detachment of the ruling elite from reality. “Hillary Clinton hopes to undo the mass incarceration system”. Where in the hell will these released prisoners go? Straight to the streets of Baltimore with absolutely no chance of finding a good paying job. From Cold War 2.0 brought to us by her future Secretary of State, Victoria Nuland, Regime Change in Syria and Libya, to the mass release of prisoners, the results are a world in chaos.
Will,
I think its similar to how Palestinians throw rocks at Israeli police/military. That’s all they have the power to do.”
You mean the public housing projects in Baltimore are fenced off with armed police preventing exit and all residents required to have identity cards and travel permits? When did the elected government impose that?
“It’s fairly effective in making the suburban and rural whites piss themselves in thinking blacks are going to come for them.”
I don’t think any rural white’s are “pissing themselves” thinking blacks are coming to get them. Did you forget just who is being demonized for all that gun ownership in America? They might, however be pissed off at the state legislature funding out of wedlock births multiple times, public housing with public maintenance etc, etc.
GCP,
I think the question of why the TV network couldn’t find a black business owner to interview should be directed to the network. As to the question on who owns the apartment buildings, do you mean the ones the crowds, including the rioters, lived in or just ones damaged? I Spoke to my brother in Annapolis earlier today, he said the count is 144 vehicles and 55 structures damaged or destroyed. One of the later being a 60 unit sensor citizen housing complex that was under construction. How much of that is justified because a man was killed by a police officer a week ago?
As you say, politically impossible. Ironic that the groundwork for the modern welfare state was laid by Bismarck, flaming red that _he_ was.
Awe Tyler,
Don’t harsh on the City Paper. Sure it has a point of view, but it’s not making any secret of it either. It’s just another part of Baltimore’s funky charm. Full disclosure, when I lived there I read it all the time, and one of my friends is a senior reporter there. I’d bet you two would get along.
Found a very interesting article today about Baltimore’s violent history. Headlines that the reader would believe were ripped from today’s headlines were actually from the 1700s, 1800s, and 1900s.
http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1992-11-01/news/0012150458_1_violence-mob-town-baltimore
Nick,
I’m harsh on them like I’m harsh on every other progressive cultist who’s dragging this country into a Hobbesian hell of all versus all in the name of their insane dogma.
As far as get along goes, depends how good looking she is.
Right, you were trying to connect the situation in Baltimore with a totally different situation in Ferguson. I have no problem getting rid of all Section 8 housing and gentrifying the crap out of most major cities. That’s different from riots reaching the suburbs which was my point.
I don’t care about white flight or racism. I live in the exurbs.
I don’t really care about the specific situation in Baltimore or the cultural pathologies you take issue with. The comparison to the Palestinians was meant to highlight the limits of their ability to do damage. Rioting is the easy action of the weak and one which ultimately hurts themselves more than anything else.
Certainly not.
For brevity and lack of a better metaphor atm – take a look at cancer for a second:
As for causes, while there is genetical predisposition, neither asbestos, DU in your bloodstream or smoking help. One may win the lottery of misfortune big time and get it because of all four reasons cumulatively or for every single one of them individually. Even so, you still have cancer (and a serious problem).
My problem with your argument is that you suggest a single cause and single out your favourite guilty party for it when it is exceedingly unlikely that they were alone let alone causal in this.
You see, we dumb Euros have enacted laws that regulate (read: cap) attorney compensation and fees. Since European attorneys by general rule are far from paupers, that is not as dramatic as it seems. That is why our attorneys can well do without the quota litis.
Our problem is with the quota litis, in particular in combination with punitive damage, is that it gives the attorney a more intense monetary interest in the case than necessary for justioce tom prevail. It also drives up compensations beyond what is necessary to compensate for damages caused.
If BMW delivers a defective car to you, which needs to be repaired for $ 1.000 – is there a compelling reason why you should get more than that even when they knew of the defect and were negligent. After all, your damage did not increase because of BMW’s state of mind.
Also, since punitive damages are reserved for when the defendant has displayed actual intent to cause harm, they result in an emphasis to prove ‘asshole-ish’ behaviour on the sued party – and indeed, if punitive damages are the very point of the lawsuit, as to be expected by ‘ambulance chaser’ type lawyers, that even makes it imperative to allege the worst sort of misconduct.
Arguably that does make cases more acrimonious than they need to be, prolonging legal disputes and making them more expensive (and lucrative, because attorneys, under loser pays all, iirc get expenses in addition to the quote litis) – i.e. it is not contributing to a speedy or objective settlement of disputes.
In sum, the US system provides incentives for aspects we have excluded in Europe becase we find them harmful and detrimental.
PS: we dumb Euros also give legal aid to the needy, so they they need not entrust themselves to an attorney offering to work for free in chase of a quota litis.
Finally, an attorney working for free makes it, to be pointed, suggestive to sue promiscuisly anyone for anything.
No costs up front, a big score as a prospect, and (as the only disincentive in the fine print) potential legal costs in case of loss (court fees, not attorney fees) – i.e. more unwanted incentives and consequences.
CP,
The US legal system comes out of the English system. We’ve always been litigious. Unlike Europe there are plenty of unsuccessful lawyers and our legal schools keep graduating more every year, though that bubble is bursting. We, unlike the socialist utopia you describe, have plenty of judges and jurors who understand incentives to asshole-ish’ behaviour by both parties and there is a mechanism to address abuses and extravagant awards. We also have plenty of people who lack integrity serving as judges and jurors. As much as our corporations and some politicians complain about the very abuses you describe the chances of the US adopting the European legal system are essentially zero.
Will,
Yes, the urban poor are still poor after decades of urban renewal, welfare, welfare reform, affirmative action and a variety of other programs. Powerless? They don’t have any means in this democratic system of government to change policy? That is untrue.
Fred, you keep writing about issues that I haven’t commented on as if I have. Yes, many of the poverty programs have failed to bring poor folks into the middle class. I’m not sure they’re designed to do that or if it’s even possible. Yes, they can vote.
Meet the economist who grew up among crack dealers and won a ‘mini-Nobel’ for his research on race http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/04/30/meet-the-economist-who-grew-up-among-crack-dealers-and-won-a-mini-nobel-for-his-research-on-race/
Some of Fryer’s most ingenious, surprising and polarizing work has found that black and Hispanic students with high levels of academic achievement have fewer friends. The research appears to confirm what some parents of high-performing children say: that when their kids get good grades, their classmates tease them for “acting white.”
… The study, in particular, looked at how students gained or lost friends of the same race depending on academic performance, in order to figure out whether members of that race were more or less likely to have friends if they did better or worse in school.
In general, the study found that students with better grades were more popular. But that was not true for the highest-performing African-American students, those with grade-point averages of at least 3.5 (B+/A-). These students had somewhat fewer black friends than students with somewhat lower grades.
Most black students received a B average or lower, and among that group, better grades meant more friends. Hispanics, by contrast, were apparently forced to choose between their grades their friends even if they had a lower level of academic achievement. The more Hispanic students’ grade-point averages exceeded 2.5 (C+/B-), the less popular they were.
——————–
The question is… how does one change these types of cultural attitudes?
The English, with their common law system – the the US you took and ran with (which generated some good results and some quite atrocious ones) – likeweise have put limits on their lawyers to an extent unheard of in the US.
And that socialist utopia is by and large a European reality with which we live, and live well, for well over a century now. Just saying.
The difference in the is that a lot of your legal system is on a state by state basis, which makes it very heterogenuous (and unlikely you are ever going to reform it comprehensively, however severe its flaws, since the locals and the local lawyers like it that way).
So, just for the sake of being hyperbolic:
You like your legal system like your financial system, i.e. have the holy market find an equillibrium.
In that reading excessive damages awarded are like the bubbles in your financial market – harmful and inevitable – but the pendulum will swing back at some point. And what will make the pendulum swing back is then a precedent that reigns that excess in.
I mean, even the US still retains the option to govern. For the commom good and all that. Naturally, one would need to have a constructive debate as for how to do that beforehand and I have my doubts the US curently is actually capable of having that.
I just today saw a video of Dana Rohrabacher arguing that melting polar ice caps couldn’t possibly result in sea level rise, because when the ice in his bourbon melts, the level of liquid in the glass doesn’t rise. Unless of course he drinks. With a level of discourse so bottomless dumb, dyfunction is a feature, not a bug.
“I doubt hardly anyone votes against their economic interests “because their religious leaders tell them to do so.”
“Only if the Dems wise up, realize that “culture” matters, and learn to talk to their own people in terms that make sense to them while acting in a manner that seem reasonable will they be able to get their attention.”
I disagree. Maybe you should come live for a while in Texas. What you are saying is the Dems should adopt the same attitudes/policies that have and always will cause problems under the Republican brand of non regulated capitalism. That doesn’t make much sense to me. Nor does it make much sense that the Dems should appeal to the culture of the neophytes. Their culture needs to be marginalized. Not applauded nor appealed to by the rest of the citizenry.
You know exactly what I mean. What would things be like in your area if all the capital stock was owned by blacks and the nice lily-white businessmen and apartment dwellers had to rent from them?
It’s about who owns the capital stock and even in urban black areas that is usually white people.
Fred wrote: ‘How much of that is justified because a man was killed by a police officer a week ago?’
It’s not just one man a week ago. It’s 400+ years of slavery and exploitation.
I stand corrected.
By the way, Wolf Hall is very good as you stated. I found the back episodes online and am caught up through episode 4. The actor portraying Cromwell reminds me of a younger Richard Harris – perhaps because of the haircut.
Thanks for the tip.
“Can the US government help reverse the loss of industry in Baltimore, probably not. pl”
Not when it is the Feds who are leading the way with the de-industrialization of America. The US is unique in that it has a ruling class of globalists who have decided that the US shouldn’t be a manufacturing economy but a service economy. People familiar with the Wall Street Journal editorial page know that as the mouthpiece of these folks it has been pushing this idea for years.
There are two things that can be done. One, is to oppose amnesty and support a big cutback in legal immigration and two, oppose the Trans Pacific Partnership working its way through the congress. If there is one thing America doesn’t need right now is another “free trade” agreement that only benefits a few connected plutocrats.
Two of their favorite toys are the Ex-Im Bank which is coming up for a re-authorization vote and the little known Overseas Private Investment Corporation. This govt. entity pays companies to relocate overseas.
Right now the GOP leadership is pushing for “fast track” authority that would only allow an up or down vote on trade treaties. This is funny. On one hand Obama can’t be trusted in working out a deal with Iran but on the other hand he’s quite trustworthy when it comes to trade issues.
“Fast track” for the Trans Pacific Partnership passed the House Ways and Means committee a couple of weeks ago. There is still time to stop this abomination and to prevent congress from making an unconstitutional grant of its authority to the executive branch when it comes to trade deals. The talking point that we can’t have 535 trade negotiators is nonsense as the nation did quite well for well over a century with congressional involvement. The proof is that the US ran trade surpluses. Today it runs trade deficits.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/apr/24/trans-pacific-partnership-bill-on-trade-deals-passes-key-congress-committee
And an old article about the TPP:
“The Trans-Pacific Partnership treaty is the complete opposite of ‘free trade'”
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/19/trans-pacific-partnership-corporate-usurp-congress
When it comes to destroying a nation without firing a shot “free trade” and immigration, legal and illegal, are joined at the hips.
WRC: The events in Baltimore have effectively ended O’Malley’s run this time. He’s politically sunk.
GCP: I’m really enjoying Wolf Hall as well. But as a Catholic school boy, I just can’t get my head around a sympathetic Thomas Cromwell.
CP
Yes. It is true that we do not want to be German (or English)or to adopt the unitary state form of federalism that we gave you. pl
We already had federalism before WW-II.
Except for that, I fully agree with you.
CP
Yes. Your federalism grew from the Imperial unity that Bismarck forged on the occasion of French defeat. One of the empire’s first acts was to rip off Alsace and Lorraine, I also remember that Goring was minister of police of the State of Prussia. From that the Gestapo grew. pl
I’m an old Catholic school grad also but it is a well produced series. I thought the dialogue between More and Cromwell in episode 4 was especially well done.
Too bad, Tyler. ‘She’ is a ‘he’.
Progressive cultists dragging the country into a Hobbesian hell? All vs. all? You really think progressive cultists have that kind of juice? Would the converse of ‘all vs. all’ be ‘can’t we all just get along’? Is this a Rodney King moment we’re having here, Tyler? 😉
Pat,
I do see your point about where centralisation can lead to. And I have no problem with your brand of federalism. Sure, I prefer ours, but your constitutional organisation is your choice. I still watch with incredulity its results.
Some of those could be addresssed state by state, but my point is that by and large they aren’t. That inaction is either a choice, or an expression of an inability to do so.
In that light, a related issue that continues to astonish me is in my eyes the rejection of governance itself as a matter of course, in particular by the Republican party.
I am frankly concerned that America is too polarised to address pressing issues and to govern itself.
I mean, just take quote from Norquist on tort reform – the only thing he is concerned about is not that damages are exccessive and destructive but that it gives the D’s a campaign finance advantage because they enrich lawyers i.e. D donors.
The Roharabacher episode exemplary suggests that serious debate or objective assessment of reality is notable by its absence.
That streak runs from environmental policy to foreign policy if the frankly delusional statements one hears in from foreign relations comittee are any indication.
CP
“and to govern itself.” I understand. You think the federal government should be all powerful as yours is. I understand. pl
Not necessarily. There are ways to achieve harmonisation while retaining state sovereignty.
CP
Yes, but we lack your well known talent for harmony and clarity. pl
No need for that, just a sense for the practical.
What I had in kind are treaties between states, Staatsverträge. Admittedly, that approach was ‘not invented here’ and anyway, why should what works in our federalism be in any way relevant to the US? Still, they work that way:
The fifty states could agree to harmonise law (make model codes and agree to enact along those lines) in fields that they have state sovereignty over – and all that without sacrificing any amount of power to the federal govenment.
As it goes, the states don’t do that. So lobbyists like ALEC do it for them.
The other problem is that for such an approach the fifty states would first have to agree on the need that they need to agree on something. I am not sure they are able or willing to that.
Many won’t see a need for reform, for instane tort reform, after all, punitive damages are, as Erin Brocowich proves, something desirable.
CP
“The fifty states could agree to harmonise law.” Most of us do not want to harmonize state law. We are not enough alike to want to do that and any presidential candidate who advocates that is unlikely to be elected. pl
CP,
I was making an offhand comment (made more ironic by Angelos’ son kvetching about ‘inequality’). Point where I said the closure of Beth Steel was directly related to every single problem in Baltimore (pro tip: I didnt) You’re the one who couldn’t respond without turning everything into a college thesis. A habit you seem to be noting.
Will,
Its only totally different if you ignore everything similar in the media’s response, right down to the fawning coverage of the rioters.
” Most of us do not want to harmonize state law. ”
As I said, thus entities like ALEC do it for you, without the benefit of public debate.
GCP,
And if my aunt had balls she’d be my uncle.
Maybe if opening a business wasn’t a losing proposition in the slums due to the natives there’d be more capital investment.
GCP,
Ah and the “original sin” of Leftism has arrived.
Funny how the Left has been running the show for the past 60 years for thr most part and it just keeps on getting worst and worst for them. Wonder why?
The Jews got Holocausted 70 years ago, and they’re doing pretty awesome for themselves. What do you think “indentured servitude” was?
Nick,
You’re trying to be cute because you know you’re playing with a losing hand.
The Left dominates media, law, politics, and academia, by and large. I understand you have to pretend you’re still the underdog but don’t try to pull that sh*t on me like its a big joke while the country goes under, TIA.
Shorter CP:
“Our tyranny is different, so that makes it okay.”
Power is the State Religion
Is the same not true of high performing kids in poor white communities with low rated schools?
GCP,
The closest people I have to in-laws are from rural Louisiana. In fact, I suspect that they are precisely the people whose culture you think “needs to be marginalized.” Do you see where this is headed?
I’ve found them to be very reasonable people when it comes to their worldview, aware of the practical problems of the current policies and very much open to consider alternatives. What they do have problem with is with the people who hold them in contempt and in condescension and they will be absolutely hostile to those who they think look down on them, as well as they should. I don’t think the vast majority of people in the flyover country are all that wedded to the policy being undertaken by the current Republican Party. They are, however, suspicious of the Democrats and their agenda more than they are of the Republicans. What the Democrats do, including the overt contempt that many Democrats have for people like my quasi-in-laws, only reinforces this suspicion. From what I hear of the liberal camp, it strikes me that much the same holds true with the bicoastals and the Democrats–and the Republicans. The only way out of this mess is to break the distrust, and if that is through making appropriate “cultural” appeals, then so it must be. What else would you have? Send those whose culture you hold in contempt to reeducation camps until they recant (this applies as much to the conservatives as to the liberals, by the way)?
rjj, I have no idea, but I am curious. Feel free to research that topic and post your results 🙂
Tyler,
Sorry for trying to have some fun and develop a little rapport. If you want to be dour that’s your choice.
Substitute ‘rich’ for ‘left’ and I think you’d be closer to the mark.
Tyler wrote: ‘The Left dominates media, law, politics, and academia, by and large. I understand you have to pretend you’re still the underdog but don’t try to pull that sh*t on me like its a big joke while the country goes under’
Complete nonsense. It’s your side that’s dragging the country down trying to take us back a few centuries.
As for all that domination – more nonsense.
You think it’s worse for them now than it was in the 1950’s? Would you really like to make that case?
Do you expect 60 years of the left to wipe out 400+ years of slavery and domination? Give us the same 400+ years your right wing slaveholders had and we’ll certainly generate a better outcome than your friends did forcing them to the back of the bus.
As for the Jews, give them the same amount of land, armaments (including nuclear) and money every year on a per capita basis and the blacks will do just fine for themselves.
Tyler wrote:
‘Maybe if opening a business wasn’t a losing proposition in the slums due to the natives there’d be more capital investment.’
If it is such a losing proposition then why are the white business owners down there? Why don’t the slumlords sell their properties?
Frankly, you do have a point though. What the blacks really ought to do is take the riots out into the suburbs and burn some of them instead. That noted left wing media outlet – Faux News – could have a lot of fun with that.
GCP,
You are demanding I not only feel guilt over an injustice I did not cause which was inflicted upon people who are no longer alive but that I must also pay morally and economically to someone who was not injured by my conduct solely due to the color of my skin. Let me know when you are going to demand this from the Italians, their slave empire lasted a couple of millennia. As a descendant of Spartacus I’ll be happy to demand reparations. Otherwise the polite answer is no.
Tyler,
ah, Germany is a tyranny. You probably just forgot to add the ‘socialist dystopia’. On the scale of tyrannies I live somewhere near the petting zoo.
CP “that socialist utopia is by and large a European reality with which we live, and live well, for well over a century now. Just saying.”
A century ago was the middle of WW 1, that wasn’t European paradise. Neither was the follow on war. I don’t think those currently unemployed in Spain or Greece are particularly enamored of the European reality.
Fred,
” A century ago was the middle of WW 1, that wasn’t European paradise. ”
When I wrote ‘well over’ I meant more than a hundred years, and not ‘exactly a hundred years’.
Social security insurance was introduced in Germany in 1883/1884. We enacted our BGB, the civil law code in 1896, after 22 years of deliberation. The procedural code ZPO went into power in 1879. We use all of that still.
Now that you have changed topics and threw in some general Germany- and Europe-bashing – Greece’s problems today have everything to do with bad governance in Greece.
As I have said here before, when you have specific euphemism like ‘fakelaki’ for the little envelope with whith you give the bribe, then that is a very good indicator for a broader phenomenon and its acceptance as a fact of life.
Yes, austerity is bad, painful and very probably also wrong, but that doesn’t change anything about Greece’s own responsibility for the majority of their problems.
It isn’t Germany’s and also not Europe’s fault that Greece didn’t raise taxes to pay for all their expenses or their debt, or that the public sector made up iirc about 50&% of their exonomy, not to speak of the endemic fraud. We didn’t encourage them in any of that, and they are a sovereign country. They liked it the way it was before it collapsed.
Babak mentioned the need to make sure people have useful productive jobs in order to be able to live meaningful lives. I agree wholeheartedly.
In Greece that often meant giving someone some public service job, sometimes a no show one, so he wouldn’t sit on the street. That Greece cannot afford that anymore is not Germany’s or Europe’s fault. It is that way because it wasn’t very economic to begin with.
If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.
Tariffs tend to be contagious (Smoot-Hawley, anybody?) and capricious (how much on which things?).
But we cold at least drop a carbon tax on the heavy oil burned by those container ships which come in heavy & go out light.
Actually, I’m not demanding anything but to ignore that injustice as the primary cause of problems today and to deny as a white man you profited from that injustice (even peripherally) is ignorant.
What the blacks demand to rectify the problem is up to them but I’m not demanding anything.
Smoot-Hawley DID NOT cause the depression.
kao_hsien_chih wrote:
‘The only way out of this mess is to break the distrust, and if that is through making appropriate “cultural” appeals, then so it must be. What else would you have? Send those whose culture you hold in contempt to reeducation camps until they recant (this applies as much to the conservatives as to the liberals, by the way)?’
No, I don’t think making cultural appeals (i.e. – surrender to them and their religious culture) is appropriate at all. What is appropriate is for them to let everyone live their life as they please (which includes them living their lives as they see fit) and keep their religious views out of government policy.
You (like the colonel sometimes) like to use the word ‘condescension’. It’s not that at all. It’s as though you want the rest of the country who disagrees with these people to treat them like three year olds throwing a tantrum. Just give them what they want so they’ll shut up. Is that what you are proposing? In the year 2015 why should a woman not be able to use birth control at will, or get an abortion if she so desires? What business is it of theirs? Why should two gay people not be able to wed given the legal benefits? What business is it of theirs? Are we all to live by their religious dogma? They side with industrialists, international capitalists and war mongering profiteers at the expense of labor (which includes them) so they don’t have to bake cakes for gay weddings and we are all supposed to coddle them?
No reeducation camps are necessary. The world is passing them by. The world isn’t going back to the 1500’s.
GCP,
The world is passing them by? That’s awfully Francis Fukuyama of you. In 18th century, “educated” people thought the future will be an enlightened world where everyone would be behaving “rationally.” 19th century did not look anything like that. “Educated” people at the end of 19th still thought their future would be different. 20th century did not exactly turn out as expected. So are we back to pronouncing that OUR future is going to look different?
The old-fashioned people whom we may not agree with are not going away. They are perfectly able to adapt themselves to the modern technology and the ways of the future without changing their worldviews. They are as part of the future as much as you and I are, and in some sense, perhaps more than we are. Declaring them irrelevant because we think their views are outdated is both utter arrogance and madness. They have to be dealt with, in some fashion, and if you won’t “fight” them, you have to talk to them, since I am not going to “fight” my people (in a manner of speaking), I don’t see an option other than talking to them and engaging them. And contra the left wing dogma, I have found many of them perfectly reasonable and thoughtful people who are very much amenable to arguments not born of condescension, and often, even able to point to flaws in my own thinking.
Does anyone know the status of the police officer whose condition was listed
as “non-responsive”? or the condition of the fire fighter who was hit on the head with a cinder block?
Does anyone doubt the presence of “Occupy” professional hell raisers…
their sponsor ought to pay for the rebuilding of the CVS & the senior center.
kao_hsien_chih wrote:
‘The world is passing them by? That’s awfully Francis Fukuyama of you.’
‘Declaring them irrelevant because we think their views are outdated is both utter arrogance and madness. ‘
Don’t misinterpret what I’m saying. In the 1800’s all those fine southern christians justified slavery with their Bible. Do you hear any talk like that today? What is referred to today as the ‘culture wars’ will be won by the liberals over time and your friends will have to get over it. They’ll still be able to cling to their guns and their bibles but they won’t be able to use them to impose on the rest of us.
GCP,
In the 18th century, there were many who believed that in the upcoming age of reason, everyone will get along fine because everyone will be rational. These people have not gone extinct notwithstanding two centuries of slaughter and unreason.
Before there was the religious justification of slavery in 18th and 19th century, there were many who argued that religion made slavery obsolete, as early as late Middle Ages–and slavery did become obsolete in a good chunk of Europe, only to reappear when circumstances changed–and with religion recruited to justify slavery. I hesitate to think that just because the slavery nonsense looks to be in the past tense, being a century and a half removed from our history, it won’t make a come back in some fashion, along with many other things that we think are consigned to the dustbin of history, when the circumstances change.
There were many who argued that wars became obsolete in late 19th and early 20th centuries, including all the way up to the eve of the First World War. We should know better than to think anything belongs firmly in the past never to come back.
I Would not recommend cops suing the city. The rules of civil evidence and discovery are different , they will win nothing and come out looking worse once they are deposed. nothing changes the basic fact , a live citizen ended up dead in police custody, chances are very high that the city could contersue and get upto the civil level of evidence against the cops, ( preponderance rather than beyond reasonable doubt)
elkern –
This is absolutely correct, and is another example of how the supply side obsession over the past 30 years has led to a demand starved economy. There are other factors like automation and free movement of capital (without free movement of people) but it’s been an intentional hollowing out of the economy based on faulty assumptions.
James Lafond’s Harm City Blog and Baltimore Travel Guide is a great resource on living/surviving in and with inner city Baltimore – if anyone is inclined to take a walking tour.
http://jameslafond.com/?c=2
http://jameslafond.com/btg/
I’m a hispanic liberal, and I agree completely with the assessment in your post. This civil unrest is due to the loss of industrial jobs in places like Baltimore. This is due to global issues helped by neo-liberal national economic policy that is bi-partisan and has been advanced for the last 40 years.
I went to school in Baltimore a couple of decades ago. Since then I’ve only been in Baltimore once, back in 2009. A few months ago I visited my nephew going to Hopkins. I took 40 in through West Baltimore. Dear God, what a frightening hellhole it has become. Even though it was midday it felt extremely unsafe to be driving through there, especially as a white guy who is often mistaken for a cop. I recall thinking how I wished I had an up-armored Humvee with Blackwater mercs for the drive. But I didn’t, and every light I was stopped at, I had images of Reginald Denny being dragged into the street, and brutalized, running through my mind.
On a related note, Trump had a great line in the press conference today. He said Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby “ought to prosecute herself”. LMAO.
The railroading of the police officer is what Black Run America looks like, from the rhetorical “I hear you” grandstanding to the shoddy indictments.
Thank goodness for the black judge that had enough sense to call this clown show what it was.
Disbar Mosby.
Good thread, thanks to all commenters.
I don’t have anything much to add beyond another shout-out for “The Wire” (David Simon was one of the creators).
The fact that Baltimore is around 65% black and almost entirely governed by blacks, and that riots and social unrest and police brutality (black-on-black) still take place suggests that some other factor(s) is(are) at work. I agree that the root cause is economic inequality, and believe this needs to be stated and restated until it becomes an inseparable part of the explanatory narrative. As an aside, the fact that the city is black-governed and policed, and violence still occurs – wouldn’t that suggest that the division is not so much racial as economic (a power/financial elite vs. the disenfranchised)?
I don’t have a solution, but was wondering – does anyone know of an old industrial city in the U.S. or abroad that has been successfully revitalized through the provision of middle-class alternatives to manufacturing jobs? Baltimore seems an ideal test-case for such an initiative.
I love the city, btw – have been there multiple times in the past few years to visit family.
A prominent BLM activist, DeRay Mckesson, was recently appointed to a $165,000 a year post in the Baltimore City Schools Dept.
I’m sure he’ll help produce a better qualified workforce.
CP: Here in Virginia punitives are capped at $350,000. In Maryland there is no cap, but there is also a standard requiring actual malice, i.e. actual evil intent- not conduct so negligent as to equal “intent.”
Also, it has been well established that a lot of the shipyards and other manufacturers well knew as early as the turn of the 20th century that asbestos was killing their workers. Asbestos is a particularly pernicious ailment, you die slowly and with great pain and suffering and the condition is objectively provable.
There are a lot of “trial attorneys” that have gone broke losing contingent cases. It is hugely expensive to take these cases on. While I agree that these are sometimes inappropriate motivators it is the system the business community actually wants. Its easy to crush any but the deepest pocketed plaintiffs firm.
As usual, Tyler is talking out of his a$$. And no, I don’t do PI work.
I entirely agree with Confusedponderer. Out of personal experience and without judging the legal aspects of work injuries, if you are injured, this means destitution in US. You won’t be able to afford your (already more expensive) medical treatment. I entirely understand the litigiousness of the patients.
In Belgium a similar system exists for medical errors and how they are handled. Obviously the medical malpractice insurance costs are much lower, as lawyers become almost redundant and the compensation is reasonable and paid in a timely manner, thus benefiting both parties.
dbk,
Pittsburgh.
Baltimore will not be revitalized until you deal with the demographics.
dbk,
There are a few million Mexicans in America who left home to make a better life. What is it that chains black Americans in Baltimore to the city?