Death Toll Rises
Friday, September 5th, 2008 at
12:08 pm
An estimated 123 people were shot and killed over the summer. That’s nearly double the number of soldiers killed in Iraq over the same time period.
Waiting for Obama to call for the troops police to pull out. It’s lost, right?
Filed under: Democrats • Doug • Politics • War
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Doug,
A fairer comparison actually would be either the total number killed in Iraq in the period or police vs soldiers killed.
But the overarching point that the “numbers” from Iraq are seen as high while ignoring local death causes and rates is ignored is valid.
On 65 killed in Iraq, according to the story. Perhaps Chicago needs its own surge.
You think invading Chicago and bombing suspected “bad guy” hang outs is justified, then? And, if a few innocent people get killed as we invade in order to “save them,” then it’s all good?
THAT would be the comparison, it seems to me.
We stop criminals by using police, not by engaging in war.
Hmm… Isn’t Obama a former community organizer from Chicago? I’d say
Obama wasn’t much of a community organizer if this is what is going on in
his own community.
Isn’t he a former State legislator from Chicago? I’d say he didn’t
do a
very good job ensuring adequate crime prevention funding to the City of
Chicago while he was a legislator.
Doesn’t he represent the people of Illinois, including Chicago, in the US
Senate? Oh, he was only there 160 or so days before he got distracted by
his ambitions for the Presidencey.
Again, sounds like more blindly partisan attacks, not based on reality but on blind support for political entity.
Do you have facts to support these charges or is this merely hypothetical slander?
Dan,
You doubt that Obama was in office for half a year before beginning his campaign for the Presidency?
The blind partisan attacks I’m referring to are the charges that
IF Obama was an organizer and then representative in/for Chicago, and
IF there is violence in Chicago,
therefore Obama is a bad leader.
Bad logic, driven by partisanship, seems to me.
There really needs to be an HTML tag for satire.
Dan, no, I’m not suggesting we go to war with Chicago. I didn’t think I needed make that statement. Looks like I got that wrong.
What I am saying is that the death toll in Iraq (which, I’m apparently obliged to say, is a tragedy) seems to bring out more ire from the Left than almost twice as many deaths in a Democratic stronghold. The references to the Iraq war (pulling out, surge) were there to emphasize this point. It makes it more difficult to take the anti-war Left seriously when they complain about deaths. Even this, it seems, is more political than anything else.
“The Left” (as well as a goodly number of ALL people everywhere) deplore the deaths in Iraq because it is the US gov’t making the decision to invade a nation wrongly or at least questionably in many, many people’s opinions.
IF the violence in Chicago was due to US policy, you can bet that the Left would be similarly appalled.
You’re comparing apples and oranges and, it sounds like, you’re doing so for partisan reasons – to suggest hypocrisy on the part of “the Left” when no hypocrisy exists.
Ah, so since the deaths in Chicago are simply a result of local policies, not US policies, then it’s no big deal to the Left. They’re not “similarly appalled”. Gotcha.
I’d suggest that US welfare policy and the nanny state complex the Left has built are major factors that lead to fatherless families in the inner cites, but that would be partisan.
Ah, so Chicago has implemented policies designed to create/implement/encourage more murders?
Gotcha.
You can suggest that US welfare policies (which have nothing to do with crime control) and the so-called (by you) “nanny state” (which policies specifically ARE those?) are the cause of murders in Chicago, but with no data to support that charge, it comes across as mere guess work.
How about this: It is my hunch that invading nations unprovoked has established the righteousness of solving problems with violence, hence resulting in a greater murder rate in Chicago.
It’s just a hunch, but certainly as valid as your hunch.
So clearly, then, the murders in Chicago can be laid at the feet of George W Bush and his policies.
As I said, you can make such baseless charges, but doing so tends to paint you as one who is playing politics with facts, instead of addressing the problem with actual concern for the lives lost.