Either way, something else interesting came up during Obama's brief Jamaican vacation. (He was there Wednesday and Thursday.) The President held a town hall meeting with the locals. In the crowd was an American woman from Chicago, who happens to be in Jamaica studying. She had a question for the President.
“I love my city," the woman said, "but the violence is terrible, particularly among young black men.”
“I know we are talking an awful lot about police brutality," she added. "But I’ve lost a lot of friends from people who look just like me. So that’s the problem and I would like to know what you believe is the true source of the violence and what is one solution to an extreme problem.”
Obama said there is no one answer but four things that need to be addressed to improve conditions in neighborhoods such as the ones to which the question referred. Those four steps are: fighting the drug trade, gun control, better education and communities stepping up.
Then he did what has become a common trend for him these days. He blamed the police and said that the federal government is the solution.
“Government has to act. We have to have effective policing, which means policing that is actually protecting, as opposed to some of the things we’ve been seeing of late in the United States and I’m sure is true of other countries,” Obama said.
He indicated that bad cops have something to do with the genocide that is occurring daily in Chicago. Not that he believes that, I'm sure. But blaming cops is easier for him than blaming the people that are actually doing the killing.
“Police have an extraordinary difficult job,” Obama continued. “The overwhelming majority do a great job under severe circumstances. But there has got to be trust built between the communities. I had to put a task force together that put together excellent reports in the wake of Ferguson as to how we can do that.”
That's not how I remember him talking about police during the Ferguson fiasco. He said racism is inherent in our society and he blamed Darren Wilson and the Ferguson PD for Michael Brown being shot. I guess finding out that Wilson was justified caused him to change his rhetoric a little.
Then he went on to gun control.
“It is a mistake that we do not do a better job of putting in place common sense gun safety regulations that would keep guns out of the hands of criminals,” Obama said. “But apparently a majority of Congress doesn’t agree with me, even after six-year-olds were viciously gunned down in their classroom.”
President Obama likes to conveniently ignore the fact that Chicago has the toughest gun control laws in the country - and the highest murder rate, mostly of young black men. After more murders in that town just last weekend, Mayor Rahm Emmanuel declared it was time to add more gun control. Do they not understand that gun control only controls law abiding gun owners and that states where people legally carry weapons have less violence than those with strict gun control? Of course they do. Reducing gun violence is not the agenda. Taking weapons away from law abiding citizens in the agenda.
Then he went on to gun control.
“It is a mistake that we do not do a better job of putting in place common sense gun safety regulations that would keep guns out of the hands of criminals,” Obama said. “But apparently a majority of Congress doesn’t agree with me, even after six-year-olds were viciously gunned down in their classroom.”
President Obama likes to conveniently ignore the fact that Chicago has the toughest gun control laws in the country - and the highest murder rate, mostly of young black men. After more murders in that town just last weekend, Mayor Rahm Emmanuel declared it was time to add more gun control. Do they not understand that gun control only controls law abiding gun owners and that states where people legally carry weapons have less violence than those with strict gun control? Of course they do. Reducing gun violence is not the agenda. Taking weapons away from law abiding citizens in the agenda.
The illegal drug trade is the cause of most of the violence, Obama said. He says the war on drugs has been a failure. I guess that means he believes the violence will stop if we legalize drugs? He didn't say it but that seems to be his insinuation.
The fourth solution, he said, is “our own responsibility. We have control in our own community,” referring to individuals and local governments. Those are great word but he doesn't propose what people are to do.
“There are a whole bunch of folks who have really tough backgrounds, that come from terrible circumstances, and are really poor, but they don’t go around shooting somebody,” Obama said. “They don’t beat somebody over the head for sneakers or because they looked at them the wrong way.”
The fourth solution, he said, is “our own responsibility. We have control in our own community,” referring to individuals and local governments. Those are great word but he doesn't propose what people are to do.
“There are a whole bunch of folks who have really tough backgrounds, that come from terrible circumstances, and are really poor, but they don’t go around shooting somebody,” Obama said. “They don’t beat somebody over the head for sneakers or because they looked at them the wrong way.”
He didn't mention what people were using to beat somebody over the head but I'm sure if he can narrow it down he'll put controls on it as well. It's about government control rather than ending the violence, after all.
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