The Color of Crime
The execution-style murder of three African-American college students in Newark, N.J., forced to kneel and shot in the head—allegedly by an illegal alien from Peru who was out on bail for the serial rape of a 5-year-old—has the makings of a Willie Horton issue in 2008.
Newark, like New York, is a "sanctuary city," where cops are not to ask criminal suspects if they are in the country legally. Mitt Romney has been hammering Rudy Giuliani on the issue, trashing his tough-cop resume by painting the mayor as den mother of the Big Apple's playpen for illegal aliens.
The arrest of Jose Carranza in that Newark massacre, amid reports he had Hispanic accomplices and the murders may have been part of a gang initiation, has also elevated the issue of the black-brown war raging in U.S. big cities.
In the Aug. 10 Washington Post story that covered the Carranza arrest, the same page had two related articles. One was headlined, "Study: Almost Half of Murder Victims Black," the other, "Slaying of Popular Editor Stuns Blacks in Oakland."
The second headline reveals an ideological slant. One would assume that everyone in Oakland was stunned by the daylight execution of African-American editor Chauncey Bailey, allegedly by a teenage foot soldier at Your Black Muslim Bakery, which Bailey was investigating.
At Bailey's funeral, a mourner held up a sign reading, "Stop Black on Black Violence." That was the subject of the second Post story.
"Nearly half the people murdered in the United States are black," declared the opening paragraph, "part of a persistent pattern in which African Americans are disproportionately victimized by violent crime, according to a new Justice Department study."
Among other conclusions reported by the Post:
—Blacks are more likely than whites or Hispanics to be victims of crime.
—Blacks are more likely than any other group to be victims of "serious violent crime," such as rape, assault and robbery.
—Blacks were more than twice as likely as whites to be confronted with a firearm during a crime.
"Overall, the new Justice findings jibe with previous studies," said the Post. "For example, a review of FBI data from 2004 by the Violence Policy Center, a liberal-leaning group that campaigns for stricter gun control laws, found that blacks accounted for about half of the nation's murder victims that year."
"Black victimization is a real problem, and it's often black on black," said David Harris, a law professor at the University of Toledo who studies crime statistics.
"Often"? Correction, Harris. As the Post reports and Justice concedes, in more than nine out of 10 cases, black victims are murdered by fellow blacks.
Utterly absent from the Post story and Justice Department stats is anything about white victims of crime. Not a word. Do white folks not count, though they are two-thirds of the population?
Yet, in "The Color of Crime: Race, Crime and Justice in America," produced by the "right-leaning" New Century Foundation in 2005, using the same FBI and Justice surveys, startling facts emerge:
—"Blacks commit more violent crime against whites than against other blacks." Forty-five percent of the victims of violent crime by blacks are white folks, 43 percent are black, 10 percent are Hispanic.
—Blacks are seven times as likely as people of other races to commit murder, eight times more likely to commit robbery and three times more likely to use a gun in a crime.
—"Blacks are an estimated 39 times more likely to commit violent crime against a white person than vice versa, and 136 times more likely to commit robbery." (If decent black folks have trouble hailing a cab, and they do, these numbers may help explain it.)
—Black-on-white rape is 115 times more common than the reverse.
Even the two most famous sexual assaults by white men on black women in the last two decades—the Tawana Brawley and Duke rape cases—turned out to be hoaxes.
What do these statistics tell us? A message the Post will not report. The real repository of racism in America—manifest in violent interracial assault, rape and murder—is to be found not in the white community, but the African-American community. In almost all interracial attacks, whites are the victims, not the victimizers.
Why does the Post not report such statistics? My guess: Because the stats would shatter the Post's cultivated image of America as a land where white racism is the great lurking malevolent monster. Stories that conform to the image get play. Stories that contradict it are buried.
But, if the Bush Justice Department is doing in-depth studies on black victims of crime and who is responsible, why not one on the victimization of Americans of all colors and who is responsible?
Or is that information we ought not know, and news not fit to print?
COPYRIGHT 2007 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.
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After a night's reflection on #88.
Certain minds can only think in polarities: left/right, liberal/conservative, etc; or use the "opposite" extreme to categorized their opponents. Thus when Cultural Marxists disagree with someone, he's denominated a "fascist". When the Browns disagree, he' labeled a "Communist" ("Leninist"). The writer of #88 gives sound advice -- that one should see the shades of grey, or even that something is a different color altogether than just black or white (so to speak) --, good advice that he doubtless will practice himself. Whether Paul Gottfried has anything to say about Robert Welch in his new book I can't say.
T. French,
I put up with Sid's rants with relatively good humor, but now you have gone and made me REALLY MAD.
They Live did not go strait to video, and it was certainly no stinker. It was classic 80's cinema. It stared "Rowdy" Roddy Piper which is alone all that should need to be said. But it has probably the best fight scene in the history of cinema. Go on any movie/martial art flick forum and look at the list of best fight scenes. They Live is consistently at or near the top. They Live is to classic fight scenes what Bullitt is to chase scenes.
Perhaps you want to rethink your assessment.
Red,
Sorry, just can't seem to keep my feet off others toes. I'm not a film geek(and no I don't mean that in a perjorative sense) so the relative merits of They Live has never been something I've explored. Was I wrong to find the reference (if I make the connection correctly) odd?
Gotta admit though I fully agree with your assesment of Bullitt.
The point that a propensity for violent crime is a well known characteristic of the lower classes is indisputable.
There was a time when other ethnicities than black predominated amongst the lower classes of Northern cities. At various times and in various places, the face of violent crime was Irish (from the mid-nineteenth century "Gangs of New York" through Dion O'Banion to Whitey Bulger); Jewish (e.g., Louis "Lepke" Buchalter and Meyer Lansky); or Italian (e.g., Al Capone, Carlo Gambino, John Gotti). As people of Irish, Jewish, and Italian ancestry rose from the lumpenproletariat to the middle class, their association with crime ceased to be as significant as it had been. Today, the face of crime is black and Hispanic. To be sure, this has a lot to do with economic and social class.
It would matter little whether we spoke of black crime in terms of class or ethnicity rather than race, but for one reason: it is widely perceived in terms of race and race discrimination. I do not think that when Murder, Incorporated's "Lepke" Buchalter went to Sing Sing's electric chair, anyone considered his execution as an act of anti-Semitism. Yet we may recall that when the Crips' Stanley "Tookie" Williams was executed in California, he was portrayed as a martyr to racism.
The high incarceration rate amongst blacks is routinely treated as evidence of race discrimination rather than as a natural consequence of high levels of crime amongst the black underclass. In some jurisdictions with high black populations, all-black juries empanelled to try black criminals are encouraged to practise jury nullification, bringing in not guilty verdicts even where ample evidence of guilt exists, so as not to send another black man to prison.
As long as severity in dealing with black criminals is perceived as racism, and laxity in dealing with them is viewed as sympathy with the black community, there will be high levels of black crime, and many of its victims will be black.
red, t. french, that's why you get the dames and the big bucks... for the latter half of sunday august 26, i made the misguided attempt at becoming a southern gentleman by drinking jim beam black bourbon whiskey 86% proof - by reckoning next morning over 17 ounces - beer chasers ... but no even that did not make me sid c. or SC, or did it? Is he a southern gentleman? sid apparently stays up all night 'considering' clyde W.'s # 88. my only regret is that under the weather i let slip the dogs of war at moses, an admirable chap. mea-culpa. that i'm a wannabe southern gentleman, even though it may not be in the cards... doesn't require a mea culpa. sadly though i am alone as you suggest; probably 'like' sid, at least it's me and my tapeworm. it's how i stay thin. be ware of the FAT man who also has a tapeworm... that's a glutton?! but remember red's usually only 'logical.' as for t. french... well, - he passes the envy test.
BRILLIANT, #104.
I'm inclined to say "no hard feelings" to Mr. Springer, though I'm no longer sure that this IS, in fact, Mr. Springer.
What-?- aren't you overseas yet? ... convince you? I'm not convinced you're 'moses' ... needless to say. all of this should be attended by both mud wrestling women, we're betting on... and then mixed-martial arts we're either in - ourselves - or at least betting on. there's no 'other' way to be convinced. admirable - your skepticism... am i supposed to believe you're only a college senior... i hope for my ego's sake, your finishing your PhD? don't make me smack you - now that's Springer, no?
I was referring to the fact that the erudition and technical quality of posts under the name "Jeff Springer" collapsed rather suddenly and without explanation in the course of this thread, although, looking back, it actually happened in the middle of one post, so I suppose I ought to trade my skepticism for bafflement and a moderate amount of amusement.
As for my education, you can believe whatever you like about me.
I don't care about you per se.
Like say - the poetic sensibility teach us to care and not to care.
but you are young. but intelligent at the moment beyond your years. people like you, frankly speaking, usually stay right where you are now for the rest of your life. it's enough. i don't blame you.
you'll never be me. ... i'll never be you. - the only question is do you have the balls or the courage to DO anything like go overseas? i doubt it, since those are the odds.
why, - very sensitively you noticed it changed as per my posting almost right in the middle of one (if it did, i trust you) is because one can draw lines on the wine bottle... as to how you'll be, or perceive - we're highly limited, imperfect beings. (sorry) or, imperfect's perfect?
be imperfect - have courage?! if possible. i hear you.
N.G. P.Moses, J. Springer, et al.
I was under the impression that our correspondent JS was succumbing to a fit of morbid paranoia. I’m glad that’s cleared up. If I used emoticons or whatever those smiley icons and sunny winking faces are called I’d put one here.
You’re OK by me Jeff, I’m not the drinking man I once was but this thread gave me a thirst too. Just the same be careful with Bourbon, its brown liquor and we all know what that inevitably leads to. Although some would argue that the color of your favored tipple changes when illuminated with different wavelengths of the electro-magnetic spectrum, still it is suspect. And of course Bourbon didn’t exist until the late 18th century and was only defined by congress in 1964 as having a set proportion of corn in its make up. Let us consult the wisdom of the ages that we may learn. All the great drinkers of yore would agree with this:
"Johnson harangued upon the qualities of different liquors; and spoke with great contempt of claret, as so weak, that "a man would be drowned by it before it made him drunk." He was persuaded to drink one glass of it, that he might judge, not from recollection, which might be dim, but from immediate sensation. He shook his head, and said, "Poor stuff! No, Sir, claret is the liquor for boys; port, for men; but he who aspires to be a hero (smiling) must drink brandy. In the first place, brandy is most grateful to the palate; and then brandy will do soonest for a man what drinking can do for him. There are, indeed, few who are able to drink brandy. That is a power rather to be wished for than attained."
Boswell: Life of Johnson
See? Not a single mention of Bourbon. I could cut and past some more and I will if pressed. Save yourself, be a hero, repent of your evil ways and drink brandy.
As an aside, I’m not sure what an envy test is. If it means that I am not to be envied I would agree. I can’t imagine what else it could mean, now that I think about it. So I was correct about the movie reference…?
I'm hooked up like myths of old to the OCEAN... that's why others can be beat me in drinking contests... they think they've fooled me but I just get to drink MORE... (and lose?) strange rivers... sorry. i'm ok by me too though...never met the man who stood in my face that i didn't grab by the balls until he said otherwise.
we give each other our ball us men, way it is. Thanks, bud. ...thanks.
I meant no offense to Mr. Springer, and I can certainly sympathize with the need to anesthetize onesself, as it were, though if that is the explanation I cannot help but be somewhat amused and puzzled at such a spectacular and lengthy high (albeit not an uninsightful one).
Do I have the courage to go overseas? Not without a work visa, I'll be the first to admit.
Come, listen, all you gals and boys, I'm just from Tuckyhoe;
I'm gwine to sing a little song, My name's Jim Crow.
Chorus: Wheel about, an' turn about, an' do jis so;
Eb'ry time I wheel about, I jump Jim Crow.
I went down to de river, I didn't mean to stay,
But there I see so many gals, I couldn't get away.
I'm rorer on de fiddle, an' down in ole Virginny,
Dey say I play de skientific, like massa Pagganninny.
I cut so many munky shines, I dance de galloppade;
An' w'en I done, I res' my head, on shubble, hoe or spade.
I met Miss Dina Scrub one day, I gib her sich a buss;
An' den she turn an' slap my face, an' make a mighty fuss.
De udder gals dey 'gin to fight, I tel'd dem wait a bit;
I'd hab dem all, jis one by one, as I tourt fit.
I wip de lion ob de west, I eat de alligator;
I put more water in my mouf, den boil ten load ob 'tator.
De way dey bake de hoe cake, Virginny nebber tire;
Dey put de doe upon de foot, an' stick 'em in de fire.
so much for bourbon... do we still make anything else? last question why do (our enemies?) iranians hold all their poets dear...
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