Heard in the Hall

Philadelphia has gotten to this point because it has politicians and citizens who view criminals as victims of the larger capitalist and racist society. They associate poverty with criminality as if most people in this country were born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Most Americans are descendants of immigrants who came here with just the clothes on their back and a dream for a better life. They didn't become thugs but instead worked hard and valued family and community and helped make America a superpower. Communities of color like the one in Philadelphia and its extreme left supporters view America as a horrible place of oppression and pass along this pessimistic view, in addition to bad family values and moral deficit, to their youth.
Full of misconstrued victimhood and negative values these young people are terrorizing our cities and are killing innocent people. Moral values, a strong work ethic and a love of family and country are absent in many of our cities and both political parties are not addressing this core problem, but are instead wasting our time talking about more social programs, more police, and more government intervention. Nutter is not going to save Philly, just as Street didn't- the people of Philadelphia need to correct their own course and start taking responsibility for their own lives.

"Nutter scolded Philadelphia as a whole for not allowing the violence to continue."

Am I missing something in that sentence or is that a typo?

"WE. WILL. FIND YOU," he thundered.

Who's this "we", bond salesman?

I think that people in Phila. need to come together: the politicians, church leaders, peace activists, other activists, community leaders, and people of all ethnic backgrounds. All of these folks need to come together and not worry about political points of view but about solutions. We all know that there are problems, violence, etc. Talk is cheap let us create programs in schools that teach conflict resolution, build more playgrounds, drastically improve the education in schools, and everyone start doing something. I live in New England now but when I attended Ben Franklin High at Broad and Green streets 35 years ago about 5 of us in my school formed a group to tow away abandoned cars called "Operation Clean Sweep" and I alone had 20 cars towed away in one week by writing info. down and making calls. Then within a few days all 20 cars were gone. The other members of my group also had many cars towed. Now I am a counselor and pastor and in schools I counseled kids many years and taught conflict resolution as well. If me and my classmates did it when I was at Franklin than why can't the whole city stand up and remember that song that says "Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me." Let us unite and organize so that when I go visit my parents in the city again this year I can hear about how things are changing toward peace, unity, and justice.
thank you for hearing me out.

I think that people in Phila. need to come together: the politicians, church leaders, peace activists, other activists, community leaders, and people of all ethnic backgrounds. All of these folks need to come together and not worry about political points of view but about solutions. We all know that there are problems, violence, etc. Talk is cheap let us create programs in schools that teach conflict resolution, build more playgrounds, drastically improve the education in schools, and everyone start doing something. I live in New England now but when I attended Ben Franklin High at Broad and Green streets 35 years ago about 5 of us in my school formed a group to tow away abandoned cars called "Operation Clean Sweep" and I alone had 20 cars towed away in one week by writing info. down and making calls. Then within a few days all 20 cars were gone. The other members of my group also had many cars towed. Now I am a counselor and pastor and in schools I counseled kids many years and taught conflict resolution as well. If me and my classmates did it when I was at Franklin than why can't the whole city stand up and remember that song that says "Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me." Let us unite and organize so that when I go visit my parents in the city again this year I can hear about how things are changing toward peace, unity, and justice.
thank you for hearing me out.

I think that people in Phila. need to come together: the politicians, church leaders, peace activists, other activists, community leaders, and people of all ethnic backgrounds. All of these folks need to come together and not worry about political points of view but about solutions. We all know that there are problems, violence, etc. Talk is cheap let us create programs in schools that teach conflict resolution, build more playgrounds, drastically improve the education in schools, and everyone start doing something. I live in New England now but when I attended Ben Franklin High at Broad and Green streets 35 years ago about 5 of us in my school formed a group to tow away abandoned cars called "Operation Clean Sweep" and I alone had 20 cars towed away in one week by writing info. down and making calls. Then within a few days all 20 cars were gone. The other members of my group also had many cars towed. Now I am a counselor and pastor and in schools I counseled kids many years and taught conflict resolution as well. If me and my classmates did it when I was at Franklin than why can't the whole city stand up and remember that song that says "Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me." Let us unite and organize so that when I go visit my parents in the city again this year I can hear about how things are changing toward peace, unity, and justice.
thank you for hearing me out.

I think that people in Phila. need to come together: the politicians, church leaders, peace activists, other activists, community leaders, and people of all ethnic backgrounds. All of these folks need to come together and not worry about political points of view but about solutions. We all know that there are problems, violence, etc. Talk is cheap let us create programs in schools that teach conflict resolution, build more playgrounds, drastically improve the education in schools, and everyone start doing something. I live in New England now but when I attended Ben Franklin High at Broad and Green streets 35 years ago about 5 of us in my school formed a group to tow away abandoned cars called "Operation Clean Sweep" and I alone had 20 cars towed away in one week by writing info. down and making calls. Then within a few days all 20 cars were gone. The other members of my group also had many cars towed. Now I am a counselor and pastor and in schools I counseled kids many years and taught conflict resolution as well. If me and my classmates did it when I was at Franklin than why can't the whole city stand up and remember that song that says "Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me." Let us unite and organize so that when I go visit my parents in the city again this year I can hear about how things are changing toward peace, unity, and justice.
thank you for hearing me out.

I think that people in Phila. need to come together: the politicians, church leaders, peace activists, other activists, community leaders, and people of all ethnic backgrounds. All of these folks need to come together and not worry about political points of view but about solutions. We all know that there are problems, violence, etc. Talk is cheap let us create programs in schools that teach conflict resolution, build more playgrounds, drastically improve the education in schools, and everyone start doing something. I live in New England now but when I attended Ben Franklin High at Broad and Green streets 35 years ago about 5 of us in my school formed a group to tow away abandoned cars called "Operation Clean Sweep" and I alone had 20 cars towed away in one week by writing info. down and making calls. Then within a few days all 20 cars were gone. The other members of my group also had many cars towed. Now I am a counselor and pastor and in schools I counseled kids many years and taught conflict resolution as well. If me and my classmates did it when I was at Franklin than why can't the whole city stand up and remember that song that says "Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me." Let us unite and organize so that when I go visit my parents in the city again this year I can hear about how things are changing toward peace, unity, and justice.
thank you for hearing me out.

Haris,

you said

" Communities of color like the one in Philadelphia and its extreme left supporters view America as a horrible place of oppression and pass along this pessimistic view, in addition to bad family values and moral deficit, to their youth."

I am a person of color in this city and I don't think like that. No one I know thinks like that. Your right this IS America, so use your freedom of speech to speak for YOURSELF, and don't assume you know what I think without talking to me!

I can understand why this person wrote this blog(below) but I think it's incorrect because a lot of people think that way. However there are many others that do not, I see many color folks with strong values and faith and with out many of the worldly things like $200 sneakers. I amire these people and I'm not going to lot them together with the the others.
It's a big problem!

I am a person of color in this city and I don't think like that. No one I know thinks like that. Your right this IS America, so use your freedom of speech to speak for YOURSELF, and don't assume you know what I think without talking to me!

Nutter is chocking on his aproval ratings. Instead of finding anyone - he should be speaking about front end of the murder rates to begin with. Cause to Effect. Which is better? Fighting cancer after it has taken over your entire body, or taking steps like not smoking to make an attempt to prevent it. Or in these terms, helping to build and sustain a safe city as promised - or catching murderers in a city that I once thought was a safe bet to move to? Breath it in Philadelphia. I can move to Colorado or New Mexico - can you? You should calling for his resignation. I live in the city, but I will not allow my family to be brought up in this environment. Nutter must go, and 2 strike limits shall be imposed for all. To jail you go you damn criminals.

Nutter must go, and 2 strike limits shall be imposed for all. To jail you go you damn criminals.

hahah - does scerald even realize that Nutter isn't even Mayor of Philly yet??

Amen haris bassias. Thanks for being a person of color who's brave enough to "air the dirty laundry."

I seriously doubt that anyone in the USA doesn't know a person who doesn't devote their life to living the stereotype.

The good people of color, middle class, educated, or blue collar hard working, loving, religious people, of course are the majority. No one says they're not, notice.

But what haris says is that "people need to take responsibility for their own lives." Who can disagree with that?

I DO see moral deficit, broken homes, no marriage, not even, no fathers in families, and bad family values being portrayed as somehow a "culture." Not by the good people of Philly, but by this criminal underclass. And the lefties do defend them with blame of this invisible miasma that blights only this group of people, in this city.

Meanwhile, people of color come from all over the world here and launch themselves, blast themselves and their families into better lives. Where's that horror, that miasma? If it sees race, why does it not infect immigrants of color? Why do you have to be born here, AND of African decent, even if only part, AND live in an urban environment with government subsidy from cradle to grave to be affected by this immutable force?

The liberal old concepts are just that: old. Mustafa Ali -- had a job and business. Jerome Whitaker -- had a job.

So this cry for easy to get jobs is meaningless. NOWHERE in the world is it as easy to get a job as it is here. Try living somewhere else for a while, and get back to us.

I'm sick of this pretense that if someone says something bad about you (who doesn't get that) that you will be unable to function. Idiots say things on the blog -- so what? Am I unable to function? Of course not.

It's no indication that you can't find a job or go to school, work hard, and make something of yourself in spite of obstacles or some people's views.

Jobs -- if you want to create them, lower taxes that are bizarre and obfuscationist. Wage taxes? BPT? Come on, what city does that?

Gun control -- we have it -- but we have to employ what we have now in full force and not wait for Harrisburg to be our nanny.

What gives with this generation of Street's and Johnson's that the big problems are for the state to solve for you and you just have to fatalistically wait for that to happen?

Bonkers.

Nutter is using the collective "we" as a city. We as a city have to do the right thing, together.

Where did this every man for himself mentality come from? What happened to communities of people looking out for each other? What can we do to make the community glue come out again? The answers are too tough for the extreme for the current politicians.

Answers are too tough, too extreme for the current pols.

Why? That's what I meant to say. I am asking the blog, why is that?

Scerald, if you have cancer, then it's too late for "preventative measures."

If you have cancer, you need the chemo and the radiation.

Philly needs the chemo, and the radiation. Yeah, it will be tough. But we need it to live.

Scerald is a liberal who thinks that if we give everyone a free house, they magically will stop smoking crack.

That experiment failed miserably, don't you agree?

Older folks seem to think that the poor are poor like they were when their family was coming up. It's really not the case -- the criminal class in Philly is not hardworking, religious, modest, or interested in bettering themselves.

They are not the merely poor. The merely poor pull themselves up out of welfare in about 2 years.

The criminal class is just that. You can give them a house, a car, a check every month, and they'll still rob you and sell drugs to your community.

Philly created, for some reason, a significant criminal class, or the virtuous poor moved out as soon as possible in large enough droves to create a larger concentration of a criminal class.

It's not wise to romanticize the criminal class as just "hustlers" who did what "hustlers" did when you were a kid in the city. They're not benign. And they have way more options.

How much more can you do for someone who has a job, a business, children, a wife, a family? If those things won't keep them straight, then no "program," no "law" above what we have now, will.

If anything, the recent cop killings deeply underscore that there is a hardcore criminal type in Philly that is a poor candidate for early release, parole, or any release.

Three strikes or mandatory minimums worked in NY and Illinois. It reduced crime in CA, but was expensive as employed, with little room for judges.

There is a way to do it well, just like there is a way to do stop and frisk appropriately, fairly, and respectfully.

Anyone who wants a safe neighborhood will thank a cop for stopping them, not feel threatened by it. It sounds like scerald would agree, even.

My heart is broken over all of these cop shootings. To see Decoatesworth's young face bandaged up, his mother ghastly pale by his side, to see the unknown spider web tattoo assailant pulling the gun from the holster of Officer Cassidy, mortally wounded on the ground -- it's too hard.

Not to mention the Officer shot in the leg and club Bozo, senseless to have to have 10 officers to do crowd control when a nightclub lets out in a highly residential neighborhood. Street was right to look into pulling their operating credentials -- I hope he follows through.

And Officer Santiago, running while shot, calling for backup, a nurse running to his aid. What kind of city is this?

I noticed more tagging in Center City, and it's been a long time since I've seen that. That jibes with the theory that the 15th and Sansom shootings were drug related.

Why do we not have enough police to address the problem as it exists? Why not enough prison space? Why not enough modernization?

Why are we so far behind, when other cities are calm, green, pleasant, and much much safer?

Why have we gone backwards?

comments like haris bissias' and others like it here just demonstrate who he is and how racist he thinks. and what's going wrong in America.

i agree that these thugs need to be taken out, in fact no need for jail, just shoot 'em! don't waste my tax dollars that could go to better health care, affordable housing, and more jobs. the elements of these problems are actually in these issues and similar one.

whose fault is that? well, there's plenty to go around. the black community, who needs to take more adult responsibility. the white community, who needs to stop abandoning and corralling themselves off from the city, who are at the root of the racism the black community experiences everyday in lack of jobs, money, opportunity that leads to these problems. this "immigrant" bullshit always ignores that blacks were slaves while they had a chance, that blacks were redlined while they get preferential loans and housing and jobs. blame the middle-class black community, who tries to distance themselves off from their poorer brothers and sister. the business community, who is the prime perpetrator and beneficiary of this morass, denying jobs and opportunity to these citizens while taking jobs offshore or harboring illegal immigration to line their own pockets. the politicians, like Street, Fumo, and many others, who rip off the community while lining their pockets with money and power.

there's plenty of blame to go around. it's time all the responsible parties take the blame and face the truth. as for the thugs? they need community intervention, they need to be disiplined, and they need real opportunity for another alternative from the poverty and hopelessness that spawns them. if that doesn't work then dammit LET'S ALL TAKE THEM OUT!

I find abosolutely nothing racist in Haris Bissias' comments whatsoever.

Again, it's the old mantra that the recent cop killers disprove in "your fault's" post above.

1. "lack of jobs" -- Mustafa Ali -- had a job and a business. Jerome Whitaker -- had a job that he was working up until the day he committed the crime.

2. "lack of money, opportunity" and "ignores that blacks were slaves" "blacks were redlined." -- again, in the US the African American of today have more wealth than any other county. Like the Irish, like the Sicilians, etc., those whose ancestors were forced to come to the US to work as slaves or wage slaves had children who inherited the free public education and opportunities of our economy. This is historic fact. Where other ethnic groups were robbed of land and assets, they started over here.

Redlining occurred during the Depression. The Community Reinvestment Act and other legislation made that illegal. Now, if anything, the black community suffers from TOO much credit available. Redlining created the boundaries of what is considered traditionally black neighborhoods in Philly, but the practice has not existed for generations -- proof is that middle class blacks have been voting with their feet and moving out of these areas.

This creates a concentration of a criminal underclass that does not value the middle class African American ideals of hard work, religion, and intact families.

If anything, the argument is substantial that blacks who "stayed behind" in war-torn nations suffered more conflict, worse economies, no social support systems of any kind for any reason whether old age, disability, unemployment, or TANF, food stamps, or any type of welfare.

Let's remember that slavery ended in 1865. Civil rights legislation passed in the late 60s. What has happened in that nearly 50 years since MLK passed?

Philly has a huge number of black homeowners. This points to the intact rich income diverse neighborhoods that were the unintentional result of segregation.

Integration provided new opportunities outside the city. This left those remaining without the tapestry of stores, banks, etc. used previously, but as this happened. blacks made equal rights the law of the land.

We won.

Yet the old ideas that you can give someone a house and that will make them good citizens like magic still persists. That really is not likely when working with a criminal underclass of any race or creed.

Philly does a huge job to house its low income population. The PHA is the largest landlord in the state. Each property pays no property taxes, hurting schools. Yet, PHA's rents are ridiculously cheap even for the able bodied, nonsenior tenants. Far from teaching responsibility, it gives people the illusion that they can live for next to nothing.

PHA needs to do more to prepare people for transitioning to the private rental market.

Let's look at the suspect John Lewis Jordan, for example. He lived with his Mom, and when his choices became an issue, he lived with his grandmom. He didn't starve. He didn't get a high school diploma. He lived in a diverse community of white, black, latin, asian, etc.

The old assumptions really break down when you look at the reality.

John Jordan Lewis really illustrates more what Bill Cosby and the above blogger Haris Bissias are saying, more than the appropriately named "Your Fault" writer.

He didn't have a father in the house. Raised by a single mom. Sounds like he was spoiled rotten by Mom and Grandmom who have means they earned in a society that did not prevent them from having a daycare business or a good job.

There's really nothing about the "discrimination" assumed by "Your Fault" that appears to have touched John Lewis Jordan's life. He was able to try again for a high school diploma, taking GED classes. He lives in a city that likely paid for his rehab/detox (30 days free for every Philly resident by CBH).

And who pays for that? Everyone, of every race who pays wage and property taxes. Far from calling this a case of a victim of a society where nonblacks get "preferential loans, housing, and jobs" Jordan proves that he lives in the land of second chances.

One thing that the victimology school of thought forgets to mention is that there is a criminal class created that can't be fixed by medicine or therapy. That group experienced birth trauma, early birth, low birth weight, and other lower level birth defects that affect life long learning and behavior.

The causes are multiple: fetal exposure to alcohol and smoking top the list. Smoking during pregnancy appears to be the smoking gun in the dramatic increase in autism (not thimerosol as formerly thought). But after these exposures, which are severe enough, there is possible drug exposure -- crack cocaine, heroin, etc. that is still a big problem here.

Adding on to that are old neighborhoods where environmental toxins have never been addressed: estrogen or hormone mimicking chemicals, lead in soil, dust, and old factories, mercury and other heavy metals, etc.

Once this damage has been done, it is difficult to address the impulse control, reasoning and learning deficits, and other behavioral outcomes.

Sadly, John Lewis Jordan, even if innocent, appears to display a key initial diagnostic criteria in fetal alcohol effects or syndrome -- the bridge of his nose is almost absent, his ears are low set, his lips are disproportionate to each other while at the same time the lines connecting the nose to the upper lip are far apart. Taken together, the presentation suggests the need for further intervention. This will be useful to any medical personnel who work with him.

However, it wasn't caught soon enough.

That is the "fault" of both the lefties of both races who stick to the old explanations that are less and less the case as time goes on, as well as the fault of underfunded prisons, parole, probation, and contractors working to appropriately address the true deficits that make someone a risk to society.

We need to deal with the problem of fetal injury in adults head on, and until we have more research in the area, someone with a profound fetal behavioral syndrome such as FAS or FAE will likely be the least able to stop reoffending.

If Philly wants to create fewer criminals, it has to realize that the city itself is the worst place for a pregnant woman. Almost anywhere in the US poses less risk to the growth and development of a healthy baby during and after pregnancy.

That's why the call for more "housing" seems ill advised if alternatives to housing child bearing age women outside the city is not first considered.

I feel compelled to those who feel that housing must be created in the city for the underclass to consider that this poses a risk to them that is not insignificant.

The health of pregnant women goes hand in hand when trying to reduce crime. That means that state medicaid funding for abortions and prenatal care for all women in critical to reducing crime.

For those who are already grown adults with fetal brain injury from exposure to toxins, the only alternative is taking the level of their disability very seriously -- assuming that they can change their behavior because their brains will heal is not always correct. The best predictor for violent offending is a previous violent or high-injury violent weapons offense, or a drug offense that suggests a deep level involvement in the drug trade.

There really is a public safety requirement to sentence such crimes according to best practices in public safety.

I hope Philly's "let 'em loose" philosophy gets a top to bottom re-examination based on the data that criminals present us with about themselves now.