I am in Chicago, my hometown, to celebrate my mother’s 90th birthday. I always love coming home to his city, but which is beautiful in the summer. I took the kids swimming in Lake Michigan with huge waves and a perfect day. However, the city is reeling from an ever-rising murder rate. Just four years ago, the city passed 400 homicides around Thanksgiving. We just passed that mark in July in what could be a record bloody year in the Windy City.
President Trump of course has made the Chicago crime levels a running theme. The statistics can be a bit misleading in terms of the image of a crime ridden city. The terrible fact is that most of the murders are concentrated on the South and West sides. Northside City, where Wrigley is located and my family home is located, has not seen as much of this lethal uptick.
The murder rate was declining but began to rise last year again. This year 16.5 percent of the 2,150 people shot have died. When added to those dying from other homicidal causes like strangulations and stabbings, the number of homicides reached 400 on Thursday.
For the first six months of 2017, more than 90 percent of Chicago homicide victims were slain by gunfire, according to Police Department records.
It is obviously a great concern among Chicagoans but the rate seems undiminished.
We will be holding our celebration of Angela Piazza Turley’s 90th Birthday (and my daughter’s birthday on the same day) this afternoon with Italian beef, Italian cookies and cannolis in the backyard of our home near Wrigley and the lake. We have relatives from all over the country who have come in for the event.
Chicago has worked hard, traded for high picks, and of late has had some of the best criminal draft choices the NCL (National Criminal League) has seen in years. Bravo! That’s how you move to #1!
Hey, JT, how’s that gun control program working out in Chicago? Not so good, huh? In fact, pretty disastrous, right?
Now compare the shooting rate in Honolulu. Much safer, correct? But they have much more freedom for gun owners, don’t they?
I rest my case. (But JT won’t address the facts. Leftists HATE facts, logic, common sense, and plain old decency. They abhor those things.)
Let’s also have lots more Democratic Party social programs throughout the USA since they have been proven to work so wonderfully in Chicago. Leftist engineered neighborhoods are always the best! Right, JT? (Except you won’t dare live in one, will you, JT? Leftist NIMBYs have their own places to live.)
https://youtu.be/1AX7kROlQ0U
As usual , the above replies illustrate how very often, Black Lives only Matter when ideological points are at stake..
Black lives matter more to Wm. Bratton than they do to Marilyn Mosby.
If you want to understand the reason for the high homicide rates in big cities, read Kevin Baker’s fact driven thoughts on Quora in answer to a question about saturation of the problem:
https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-the-US-homicide-rate-is-among-the-worlds-lowest-when-you-discount-certain-major-cities
The chances of any particular black person being murdered in Chicago in a given year (based on current numbers) is about 1 in 1000. Is that a high number? Yes. Is it so high it justifies Chicago being called a “war zone”? No.
Second, outsiders talk about the “south side” as if it were darkest Africa. There are several hundred thousand non blacks that live on the south side of Chicago, most of them in perfectly respectable neighborhoods.
The question is should or shouldn’t all of Chicago be like those “perfectly respectable neighborhoods”? If not, why not? 1/1000 represents averages that are near meaningless. For reality see the map.
https://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150707/downtown/where-shootings-have-occurred-chicago-since-2010-map
We can close our eyes to the truth or we can accept the truth and try to end the slaughter. Look at the ages of many of these young people.
good article
Reblogged this on PINAP.
Actually , there have been 411 homicides in Chicago YTD. The web site Hey Jackass keeps a more accurate count than the City which consistently under reports the homicide numbers. However , while we may have reached this number earlier than last year, the daily homicide rate still remains behind last year’s rate of 2.2 homicides per day . YTD , the homicide rate is about 1.95 per day, although the daily rate has seen a sharp jump in the last two months. One unscientific observation: every time Trump tweets about Chicago violence , there seems to be a drop off in shootings and homicides .
Chicago has the most depraved neighborhoods I’ve ever worked in or visited. Add the fact that Chicago, because of logistics and a very corruptible police force, has become the hub for Mexican cartel drugs to be shipped throughout the country. And you have homicides @ a record rate.
The Dem monopoly, which has run Chicago for generations, make sure white neighborhoods are safe. So, there is little complaint from white people.
Up until about 3 years ago, the homicide rate in Chicago was 1/3 of what it is in Detroit or St. Louis.