But, as Buchanan notes, something bigger is going on here. Crime is spiking in a number of inner cities. Why? A major factor is the Democrats' vehement hostility towards law enforcement and prisons. They are now pushing a soft-on-crime agenda that, not surprisingly, reliably leads to more crime.
For Buchanan, the comparison to the late 60s, when crime and unrest was mushrooming, is natural. As he points out, Ronald Reagan was twice elected Governor of California as the "law and order" candidate. Richard Nixon was elected President in 1968 partly by promising to restore safety and order to America's cities. The "law and order" agenda was immensely popular in America from the late 60s until the 1990s, when tough law enforcement tactics and mass incarceration finally succeeded in turning the tide against the criminals, and crime rates and violence began to abate.
Slowly, though, Americans became complacent, and Democrats became positively brazen -- once again undercutting law enforcement and making excuses for criminals. We're seeing the first fruits of their weakness on crime now, in places like Chicago and Baltimore. We will, however, be seeing much more mayhem in the years ahead, because "progressive" Democrats are tying the hands of police and emptying out the prisons on an industrial scale. Americans are about to experience a crime wave, the scale of which we can only guess at. To be sure, the media will do its best to pretend that this crime wave doesn't exist. It's only a matter of time, however, before Americans become anxious and afraid.
The interesting political question is: will all this happen in time to be a major factor in the 2020 election? That's hard to say. But one thing is certain: American voters have always preferred candidates who take the side of the police, and they rightly disdain candidates who take the side of criminals. In this regard, Trump is on the right side of history.
Ironically, Trump may also have hit on one of the best ways to increase his share of the black vote. Blacks, after all, want and need "public safety" just as much as whites. It is Trump and Republicans who are promising a return to "law and order". For many urban Americans, that will be music to their ears. For Trump, it may even be the key to his re-election.
https://townhall.com/columnists/patbuchanan/2019/07/30/is-trump-capturing-the-law-and-order-issue-n2550839
When reading this article, the first thought that came to my mind was that the President was pretty ticked off when Cummings went off on the acting DHS Secretary McAleenan (which was mentioned). I do believe that is what started all this. I am a firm believer one has to fix his/her own home before muddling in others.
ReplyDeleteBack to Buchanan, he is right on point. It is not racist to call out the truth, no matter how uncomfortable it is. The President never called Cummings a racist name, he simply pointed out the truth. I also believe the President does his homework before he tweets out stuff. Of course the President knew he would get the blowback, but you know, again, the truth speaks. The dems only have the race card to play and nothing more. None of the candidates running for office are offering anything but socialism. The big question is, What do democrats stand for now? The line has become so blurred, sad to say. No more are they fighting for America, it seems to me they fight for illegal immigrants and crime, yes I said crime. Oh and lets not forget the big money from lobbyists.
Linda and Dr. Waddy: In my career in NYS corrections I encountered several Central Office administrators, some of them in control of statewide policy and millions of taxpayer dollars, who were very frank in the assertion of their conviction that criminals are victims and that the lawful owe them. Dukakis was of course the most extreme of such types in government, though Cuomo bids fair to outdo him. And, by golly, Dukakis was telling the truth when he made his fortuitous faux pas about his compassion for rapists and murderers. He backed it up! "Why, that poor 'guy' (a term criminal lovers delight in using) rotting away in prison for having stabbed a kid so many times he drained the kid's blood. I mean c'mon, give 'im a break!" And he did and when the subhuman used his vacation for mayhem,"Michael" demonstrated only disdain for his victims. This is madness, nothing less and its coming back bigtime if we don't slap it down.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy and Linda: In 1968 we were but some three years "progressed" into the reflexive iconoclasm perversely embraced by so much of the baby boom generation. It was, at that time, incredible; it took time to prove itself. That law enforcement is good and criminals bad was not controversial in a time still dominated by the great good sense of the Greatest Generation.Accordingly, "law and order" was a sound theme to campaign on. Today we can look back on the laboratory of over 50 years of actual, insane enactment of a tragically misguided and wrongheaded inversion of common sense in our treatment of crime. But we have also seen the unquestioned efficacy of a forceful reaction to this outrage in the tried and true policies of just and courageous men like Rudolph Guiliani. The results of the experiment are in and "law and order" wins hands down. Why imagine that!
ReplyDeleteGo for it Mr. President; speak the truth to anarchy! Thank God you have the guts to do it.And if we don't back you then we don't deserve your service.
Linda, I couldn't agree more -- the Dems have little to offer but race-baiting and class warfare. Those are both tired themes, and I'm surprised that anyone takes them seriously, but at the same time we can't discount the danger these talking points pose, when the media is determined to advance them uncritically.
ReplyDeleteJack, you're right -- it truly IS madness to turn a violent criminal into a "victim". Nothing could be more obscene.
Whether "law and order" is still a winning campaign slogan remains to be seen. I'd like to think that the American people are smart enough to know that, given the choice between a policeman on your doorstep or a drug-crazed criminal, the rational choice would be the policeman! In the same way, those who advocate emptying out the prisons ought to be committing electoral suicide. And yet, I fear, the public's anxiety about crime has been dramatically reduced since the 90s. On CNN and MSNBC, I suspect, one would see more stories about police brutality, false arrest, and prisoners-turned-saints than one would about the sort of horrific crimes that are committed in this country every day. That kind of "fake news" has a cumulative effect.
Dr. Waddy: The MSM has practiced that kind of bias for a very long time in its coverage of gun usage. One would think, by their lights, that guns are never used to defend the lawful from criminals. Ironic, since they seem to consider any harm done to actual criminals to be criminal in itself and they sure do make haste to pay attention when guns are used to do harm to those even the MSM grudgingly admits unworthy of harm. NRA documents every month several incidents of the lawfully armed insolently resisting thugs. But it is of no moment to an MSM bent on persuasion and that's an attitude they may, at their pleasure, evince in any setting.
ReplyDeleteIndeed Jack, indeed. smiles
DeleteCrime and violence strike me as domains in which media bias has particularly free rein, simply because there is so much of it that, by picking and choosing which acts of mayhem to cover, the press can manipulate our perceptions. If they were to cover violence in America impartially, we would be struck by how much drug-related violence there is, especially amongst poor people in the inner cities, and we would be outraged about it. These mass shootings, by contrast, at least statistically speaking are anomalous.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy: That's a definitively germane point. I think two weeks ago several tens of people were killed in Chicago's liberal enabled anarchy. Their deaths were not much beyond a mathematical declaration, so routine they have become.Other cities like nearby Buffalo , had similarly predictable news. The stats generated by gangbangers are "irrelevant" since they are the product of excusable social pathology, yes? And that gun accomplished suicide accounts for the majority of American gun deaths is to be ignored too. The apparent at least 32 deaths resulting from recent shootings outside of inner cities will, nonetheless, I think, have a decisive effect. I fully expect Prince Cuomo to summon his legislature to a special session to enact restrictions against lawful gun owners and their advocates (NRA) which will aggressively test Constitutional standards. (So, sue me, ah'm a New Yawka!) He knows he'll lose some but he trusts his crusade to disarm the lawful will advance , at least in his increasingly unAmerican fief.Like all leftist gungrabbers, he knows he can't stop insane mass violence, be it done by guns, trucks or "whatevah". He wants to control US, not guns!
ReplyDeleteHear hear, Jack! You're right -- the anti-gun fanatics will be capitalizing on this latest round of tragedies. They're good at that. What depresses me is not the Left's exploitation of these mass killings -- we expect that -- but the willingness, even eagerness, of many establishment Republicans to cave on the issue. We are, it often seems, fighting a losing battle on guns, although thankfully if we are losing, we're losing very, very slowly.
ReplyDeleteD. Waddy: Respectfully, I don't think we are losing yet. The vast bulk of the gun owning real America has not been fully mobilized! They still cannot believe, in the blessed reaches of that vast expanse dominated by common sense and free of coastal dreaminess, that their country could be so degraded. The more the left tasks them, the more they will believe! And the left is poised now, after these latest leftist encouraged abominations, to move for decisive lawful gun owner restriction designed to suppress legal gun ownership. Why? Because they know gun owners and their organizations like NRA, directly block their incipient totalitarian takeover of these United States.
ReplyDeleteYou're right, Jack -- every time the Left gets enthused about gun control, they poke the bear of gun-owning America. They may well live to regret it!
ReplyDelete