jstol3's Blog

I agree and thought I’d throw in my two cents:

In a recent media photo-op and rally Mayor Mark Funkhouser talked about diverting funds to invest more (money) in the urban core. He sees a need for a strategy for economic development in distressed areas and is working toward a plan for promoting economic development to restore jobs and hope in the inner city. It seems that rallies and prayer vigils just aren’t working.

How do you buy hope and how much will it cost taxpayers? Where are you going to find jobs for unskilled workers with a salary that can compete with the amount of tax-free money to be made in drugs, prostitution and other criminal enterprises that are so blatant in certain portions of our city? And where are you going to find legitimate businesses to provide these jobs that are willing to risk their money and lives to locate a business in what can only be describe as a war zone?

Our mayor, city council, community leaders and activists live in a perpetual state of denial fostered by an idiotic sense of political correctness and racial sensitivity. The true fact is that if you’re not part of the solution, then you’re part of the problem. I’m tired of hearing inner city community leaders say they need more money for community centers where young people can gather and enjoy safe recreational activities that will help keep them off the streets. They seem to think that basketball courts are going to compete on an equal basis with the allure of drugs, liquor and the excitement of guns and gang affiliation that dominates the streets. Shooting hoops doesn’t comp

Response Cont:

cooperate with the police because they don’t trust the police and are afraid of retaliation. It isn’t the police that are doing the drive-by shootings, the rapes, robberies, car-jackings, and burglaries and assorted other crimes. What are they afraid of, that someone they snitch on is going to kill them or a family member? That’s happening anyway, and it’s happening because of the community-supported immunity given to the criminals in their neighborhoods through their silence.

The situation will never get better and will only worsen as long as people use economics and claims of racial inequities to excuse what is actually a failure in personal and moral commitment as well as parental and social responsibility. It doesn’t take a social scientist to see what is occurring and why. The neighborhoods where the violence is occurring have to change their mindset and start taking responsibility for what is happening there.

Until people in the black community get over themselves and stop seeing racism behind every tree and start taking a hard look at what is actually happening in their community, nothing will change. However, there is an ever-increasing number of African-Americans who are rising out of their situation and are becoming well respected and financially independent in their chosen fields. When you talk to these people you find that many of them came from the same improvised neighborhoods as those who have turn to crime. The difference and underlying theme to their success is that they had strong family values and support despite their environment. If family support was lacking, they were fortunate enough to find someone outside the family to take an interest in them and to mentor them.

I am not an Obama supporter; his views are too liberal for my taste. But in a way I would like to see him get elected in the hope that whites will be able to put away their guilt and blacks can stop living in the past. That might be the greatest change/gift Obama could bring to his presidency, but I’m afraid I’m not that optimistic.

The mission statement of the NAACP states clearly that their purpose is to improve communities for the the black core, so why aren't they helping. Alvin Brooks go door knocking on Jesse Jackson's door, it would be a tax write off for him. Your right Jstol3 about the police, maybe a black chief of police to work that vacinity not affraid of any racial profiling could do a better job of controlling. If they aren't going to use the equipment given for illegals, then what was the point, isn't that also a homeland security issue?