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Promoted from the diaries by streiff. Promotion does not imply endorsement.
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(AP Photo/Eric Risberg)
In 1931, Prohibition was still very much real and the city of Chicago was still reeling from the St. Valentine’s Day massacre and organized crime kingpin Al Capone had pled guilty to tax evasion. In 1956, Dwight Eisenhower was President, children were practicing nuclear attack drills and there was no space race. In 1962, Diana Ross and the Supremes were still wondering where their love went as a new sound- Motown- exploded on the scene.
Songs were written to these cities. Chicago was Frank Sinatra’s kind of town, Tony Bennett left his heart in San Francisco, and Motown defined the music scene in Detroit. San Francisco was the gateway to the Pacific with a wonder of the modern world connecting it to neighboring Marin County. Chicago was a commercial and transportation hub connecting the Eastern US with the Western US while Detroit was a manufacturing giant and home of the assembly line.
What do all these years have in common? In 1931, Chicago had its last Republican mayor, San Francisco their last in 1956, and Detroit their final Republican mayor in 1962.
Today, for varying reasons, each of these cities is in decline in some area or, in the case of Detroit, just overall. Today, the city by the bay is overrun with homeless people and illegal immigrants. San Francisco’s municipal leadership never passes up a chance to signal their social virtue. Meanwhile, streets have become literal cesspools littered with human feces and used hypodermic needles. Their response? Pay six figure salaries to people to clean up the defecation and ban plastic straws.
Chicago’s crime problem makes it perhaps more dangerous than war-torn regions of the Middle East. Through August 27th of this year, 2,065 people have been shot. Thus far in Chicago, 355 people have been shot dead which is almost as many killed by Islamic terrorists in Pakistan in 2018. Their response? Double down on their sanctuary city status while mayor Rahm Emmanuel makes “emotional pleas” to end the violence.
In 1960, Detroit was the richest city on a per capita basis. In 2013, the city filed for bankruptcy. Today, it is a squatter’s paradise with many homes owned by the Detroit Land Bank Authority. The Detroit Free Press reports that these government-owned properties are today occupied by dead bodies, stray dogs and squatters.
Consider also that these three former beacons of American urban greatness lie in states represented on the national level by Democratic Senators. We are talking about such “luminaries” as Kamala Harris, Diane Feinstein, Dick Durbin, Tammy Duckworth, Gary Peters, and Debbie Stabenow.
It becomes obvious that cities run by Democratic mayors who implement liberal policies end up with predictable results: crime rates through the roof, squalor and poop in the streets. To be certain, these three cities are not alone in this predicament. Newark, New Jersey has not elected a Republican mayor since 1948 (there was not even a Korean War yet), and in the case of New Orleans, we have to go back to the Reconstruction Era in 1872.
Entire countries have gone down the same path with Venezuela being the poster boy. That country went from the richest in South America to an economic basket case not because of the American Democratic Party, but because of their international counterparts- socialists. This year, the WTO and IMF predict inflation in Venezuela will reach 1 million percent.
The same economic and social policies that have ruined Detroit, Chicago, San Francisco, Venezuela and other American cities are the very policies being pushed by the Democratic Party, Bernie Sanders and his Hispanic mini-me, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. MSNBC and CNN are too tone deaf to say it since they are too busy running interference for the Left, but as goes these formerly great American cities, so goes the country if people like Ocasio-Cortez or Sanders ever get their hands on the reigns of power. Ironically, the dolts in the media would be the first to be nationalized, but then again, they are so enamored with socialism it would not be that big of a controversy. They already spout the lines.
Chicago, Detroit and San Francisco saw their heydays when Republicans or, at least, more moderate Democrats were mayors. It was a Republican- Rudolph Giuliani in New York City- who cleaned up Times Square and decreased the crime rate. It was a somewhat moderate Democrat- Ed Rendell in Philadelphia- who also lowered the crime rate and made the Center City area more business and visitor friendly.
It should come as no surprise that 19 of the 25 fastest growing cities in the United States are in red states (only one in a blue state) while 15 of the 25 fastest shrinking cities are in blue states (7 in red states). The reason is simple: grown-up leadership in red states.
Republican mayors are all but extinct in major cities. In 2016, only three of the top 25 major US cities had Republican mayors. Two years later, that number stands at 4 of 25. Ironically, Democrats like to use the income inequality line to win votes, yet eight of the ten cities with the greatest income inequality have Democratic mayors. Conversely, six of the ten cities with the lowest income inequality have Republican mayors. And one would be hard-pressed to find a Republican US House member from a major city.
The former situation in Detroit is emblematic of the situation. When the state effectively took over the city, there were cries of racism against the action. Said the Rev. Charles Williams of Detroit in an article on Huffington Post in 2013:
I often think about those who sacrificed their lives, like Goodman; Chaney and Shwarner; Medgar Evers, who was gunned down in a driveway in front his wife and kids; Fannie Lou Hamer, beaten bloodied in a jail cell; Dr. King and Ralph Abernathy. It’s a shame to think about so much sacrifice and and so much blood. I also think about those who came to Detroit, like my grandparents who left the south in the great migration because Jim Crow and tactics like poll taxes and grandfather clauses were the law of the land.
So here we are 2013. I’m 32 years older and I’m forced to see the conditions and new tactics that have been displayed to suppress and dismantle democracy, break the back of workers and directly attack our voting rights.
What Medgar Evers, Dr. King and Ralph Abernathy have to do with years of Democratic Party mismanagement of Detroit remains unclear. Apparently, the good reverend was satisfied with the status quo in his beloved Detroit.
So while the poop builds up on the streets of San Francisco, the city leaders ban the use of plastic straws. While innocent people are killed by gang-bangers on the streets of Chicago and the public school system is racked by a sexual abuse of children scandal, the city leaders attempt to ban gun sales for citizens and take the DOJ to court over their sanctuary city status. And while squatters and dead bodies build up in abandoned Detroit houses, leaders play the race card. Unfortunately, Reverend Williams and his ilk leave out an important fact: most analysis of the state takeover of Detroit has been largely successful. In 2018, Detroit for the first time in recent memory may not lose residents. They are even cleaning streets and drainage systems again.
And just as it took a Republican adult like Governor Rick Snyder to make an adult decision with respect to Detroit, it will take a Republican adult leader to get serious about crime in Chicago and the homeless public defecation and drug use in San Francisco.
The post How to Save Cities: Elect Republican Mayors appeared first on RedState.