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The collapse of Detroit. De-industrialization, racism, stagnation — is the Motor City our future?
Los Angeles Times ^ | 03/28/2011 | Scott Martelle

Posted on 03/28/2011 7:06:20 AM PDT by SeekAndFind

Imagine for a moment that every single person living in the city of San Jose, plus another 150,000 or so, just up and left. Vanished. Poof. Gone. Leaving their homes, business buildings and factories behind.

That is, in effect, what has happened to the city of Detroit, according to 2010 U.S. Census data released this week. The city that boasted 1.8 million residents in 1950, and was the nation's economic engine for most of the 20th century, now is home to 714,000 people, a population loss of some 1.1 million — with a 25% drop in the last decade alone.

It's an unprecedented collapse of a major American city. It's not as if the population was dropping nationwide; it's going up. Just not in Detroit. It's closest "outmigration" rival is Chicago, a five-hour drive to the west, which has lost about 964,000 people since 1950 but still holds about 2.7 million people, down 25% from its peak of 3.62 million in 1950.

In Detroit, the loss amounts to a staggering 60% of the city's peak population. It is now smaller than Charlotte, N.C., and Fort Worth. More people have left Detroit than live in San Francisco; more people have left in the last decade than live in St. Petersburg, Fla.

There are all sorts of implications here, both for Detroit and for the nation. The 2010 census counts for Detroit (and Chicago) were much lower than local officials, and earlier census estimates, had predicted. That raises the question of whether there were problems with the count last year or in 2000, setting false benchmarks. Detroit officials say they plan to challenge the numbers, and Mayor David Bing announced he wants to find 40,000 Detroiters who were missed to try to push the count above the 750,000 mark,

(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Front Page News; Government; News/Current Events; US: Michigan
KEYWORDS: bluezones; corruption; deindustrialization; democrats; detroit; economy; fraud; la; liberals; obamavoters; progressives; unemployment; unions
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To: Damifino
YES - I pointed out, to my wife, the socialist "art" (clenched fist statue) also featured in the ad.

The socialist "clenched first" is raised over one's head. The clenched fist in the ad is horizontal and located on chains so it can be swung back and forth. It's like a puncher's fist, not a radicals.

Which it is, because it sits outside the Joe Louis arena. Joe Louis was the great Heavyweight champion of the world, and was from Detroit.

61 posted on 03/28/2011 11:22:16 AM PDT by Jack Black ( Whatever is left of American patriotism is now identical with counter-revolution.)
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To: Carley

“The left hasn’t figured that out yet, but in the meantime, America is becoming a third or fourth world country.”

The ultimate irony is, that if America does fall ot Third World levels of strength, these leftists will be the ones who will fail to survive. The one key feature of leftism is a lack of pragmatism and a lack of realism. The people who amke up the left (entertainers, hippies, ‘artists,’) are ones who are unwilling ot dirty their hands and learn a basic skill to not just survive, but succeed. The welfare cases in Detroit and those who are on it for longer than five years, are the ones who want to live like aristocrats, treating our treasury as a source of income so they can live nicely enough without working. They live better than the working classes (all levels, not just blue collar) and keep demanding more while running wild.

I hope that self correction happens before the country falls, I am hopeful about that.


62 posted on 03/28/2011 11:26:04 AM PDT by Niuhuru (The Internet is the digital AIDS; adapting and successfully destroying the MSM host.)
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To: triumphant values
Yeah, that's why nobody goes to Milan anymore.

You mean Milan, Michigan (pronounced my-lin), pop ~5,000?

63 posted on 03/28/2011 11:26:28 AM PDT by mvpel (Michael Pelletier)
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To: logician2u
Many parts of Detroit remain just as they were after the 1967 riots; other areas have been leveled with no plans to rebuild.

Call it "rural renewal."

64 posted on 03/28/2011 11:28:40 AM PDT by mvpel (Michael Pelletier)
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To: MeganC
There are lots of Democrat run cities in the USA that are nce. Portland, Oregon is nice. Seattle is pretty nice. There are lots of unionistas in Dearborn, just down the road, and all over the state of Michigan still -- and the cities their factories are in are not disaster zones.

I'm sorry I have to bring up this uncomfortable fact, but I grew up and lived in Detroit through the era of it's fall and it's simply a coverup to pretend that the UAW, Democrats or Socialists were the main instrument of it. Many of the people who screwed up Detroit couldn't even spell Socialism, much less tell you what it is.

The Detroit Riots, the key act in the death of the city, were not labor riots, or Democratic riots, or Communist riots.

65 posted on 03/28/2011 11:32:06 AM PDT by Jack Black ( Whatever is left of American patriotism is now identical with counter-revolution.)
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To: bert

The problem is, that if you build a nice city in those areas, inevitably scum will want to move there and end up turning the nice apartments into Section Eight housing and fill them with druggies and single mothers who are on their ninth kid. Urban blight isn’t some ecological issue, which could be addressed, but it’s the people who see the gleaming new city and want a piece of it, without working for it. The underclass is spreading and moves into a new shiny place, takes it over, consumes, and then moves onto a newly built place. If I built a new small city and it ended up attracting the wealthy and hardwoking, inevitably there would be some welfare mooch who wants to live there without paying full rent and if I refuse, I would get sued into bankruptcy. Building a new place is a great idea, if not for the ones who want to come in and colonize it and then turn it into another slum, the only type of place they would be comfortable living at. Detroit and LA were great places to live, but got taken over by the worst sort of people and the problem comes from the fact that the majority of the people living there are not working or law abiding. You have to either change or keep the welfare types OUT.


66 posted on 03/28/2011 11:32:51 AM PDT by Niuhuru (The Internet is the digital AIDS; adapting and successfully destroying the MSM host.)
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To: Mr. Lucky
Downtown Detroit will be convenient to the high speed train to downtown Cleveland. What could be more popular than that?

LOL!

67 posted on 03/28/2011 11:38:02 AM PDT by SIDENET ("If that's your best, your best won't do." -Dee Snider)
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To: SeekAndFind

If you want to live high off the hog you have to produce what others want to buy plus you have to have intact families. You can’t be stoned and on drugs. Detroit fails all three and many other places in America are close behind.


68 posted on 03/28/2011 11:41:02 AM PDT by dennisw ( The early bird catches the worm)
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To: mvpel
Call it "rural renewal."

Actually, I believe someone did suggest planting food crops in the barren blocks.

The problem is, even the utilities have been removed so they'd have to rely on rainwater to keep things growing. (Not to mention, Detroit has cut its police force to the point they don't even investigate minor crimes like theft and burglary. It would be what the crooks call "easy pickin'.")

69 posted on 03/28/2011 11:42:15 AM PDT by logician2u
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To: mvpel
You mean Milan, Michigan (pronounced my-lin), pop ~5,000?

Of course not. I was talking about Milan, Georgia (pronounced my-lun), population 900.

70 posted on 03/28/2011 11:43:58 AM PDT by triumphant values (Never criticize that to your right.)
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To: logician2u; mvpel; triumphant values; Jack Black; MeganC; bert; CharacterCounts; uncle_ebenezer; ...

The problem is, that if you build a nice city in those areas, inevitably scum will want to move there and end up turning the nice apartments into Section Eight housing and fill them with druggies and single mothers who are on their ninth kid. Urban blight isn’t some ecological issue, which could be addressed, but it’s the people who see the gleaming new city and want a piece of it, without working for it. The underclass is spreading and moves into a new shiny place, takes it over, consumes, and then moves onto a newly built place. If I built a new small city and it ended up attracting the wealthy and hardwoking, inevitably there would be some welfare mooch who wants to live there without paying full rent and if I refuse, I would get sued into bankruptcy. Building a new place is a great idea, if not for the ones who want to come in and colonize it and then turn it into another slum, the only type of place they would be comfortable living at. Detroit and LA were great places to live, but got taken over by the worst sort of people and the problem comes from the fact that the majority of the people living there are not working or law abiding. You have to either change or keep the welfare types OUT.

“The left hasn’t figured that out yet, but in the meantime, America is becoming a third or fourth world country.”

The ultimate irony is, that if America does fall ot Third World levels of strength, these leftists will be the ones who will fail to survive. The one key feature of leftism is a lack of pragmatism and a lack of realism. The people who amke up the left (entertainers, hippies, ‘artists,’) are ones who are unwilling ot dirty their hands and learn a basic skill to not just survive, but succeed. The welfare cases in Detroit and those who are on it for longer than five years, are the ones who want to live like aristocrats, treating our treasury as a source of income so they can live nicely enough without working. They live better than the working classes (all levels, not just blue collar) and keep demanding more while running wild.

I hope that self correction happens before the country falls, I am hopeful about that.

Things won’t change for the better unless we unload the welfare albatross that is dragging this country down. I’m all for help (I’m on SSD myself) and encourage people to get assistance, but this should be under a timeline and circumstances, not given freely to women who basically breed for money and then of course those who haven’t worked at all.

Detroit has shown that it hates whites and working class people, so the smart whites and working class people have left, they have not stayed to be a constant target. Detroit is like a failed civilization and an example what WILL happen to the rest of the ocuntry, if the rest of the country doesn’t man up and start pushing back and making cuts. Detroit should not force the hardworking to move back there and basically pay the way of other people. If it comes to it, God forbid, that the smart and hardworking simply leave, there will be no place for the underclass to spread to since after all, no other country will want them because of their very lack of skills. Britain is cutting back, France is taking meausres to reduce the immigration of the unskilled, and other countries are not interested in taking on dysfunctional immigrants since they have enough of their own. Chances are, America will fall because of the unsustainable welfare system, not because of any terrorist or traitor. It is becoming too expensive to make an honest living if after all, the only point of working is to support someone else who isn’t and doesn’t want to.


71 posted on 03/28/2011 11:46:39 AM PDT by Niuhuru (The Internet is the digital AIDS; adapting and successfully destroying the MSM host.)
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To: Carry_Okie
Robots and slaves make our goods. There is precious little need for "value added" and more people than jobs to fill. Capital has replaced people. 

This is why "productivity" is a cruel hoax. It used to be we needed slaves and child labor to keep America humming. We also wanted immigrants to come here and work and settle the West

The wealthy don't need any more than a few servants, "sex workers," and entertainers. Two of out of three of those can be simulated. So, what they want is for the rest of us not to breed so that they can have it all.

I would give incentives to inner city welfare types to move out to Obama-collective farms. Cities should be reserved for workers

 

72 posted on 03/28/2011 11:47:21 AM PDT by dennisw ( The early bird catches the worm)
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To: SeekAndFind

alot of stuff on You Tube you can watch about Detroit. The politicians wanted to make it the progressive utopia and this is the end result. This should be the model city of what happens when you have a society dependant on the govt for everything. You can buy property there for around 5k dollars in some places. The crime rate is extraordinary though so good luck. Alot of areas are either ghost towns or riddled with homeless, gangs and drug addicts.


73 posted on 03/28/2011 11:58:51 AM PDT by eak3
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To: mvpel
Call it "rural renewal."

You left out the all-important "vibrant".

74 posted on 03/28/2011 11:59:15 AM PDT by SIDENET ("If that's your best, your best won't do." -Dee Snider)
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To: Moleman
Let's support our own industry!

You do know that Chrysler is an operating subsidiary of Fiat, right?

75 posted on 03/28/2011 12:01:46 PM PDT by Mr. Lucky
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To: Last Dakotan

I guess no one saw that demographic change coming. /s


76 posted on 03/28/2011 12:05:27 PM PDT by Gene Eric (*** Jesus ***)
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To: Niuhuru

Amen.....


77 posted on 03/28/2011 12:12:46 PM PDT by bert (K.E. N.P. N.C. D.E. +12 ....( History is a process, not an event ))
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To: Sacajaweau
yup, my house was built in 1850 and with a little care will last another 100 years...

of course i have insulated the place inside and out and from top to bottom

78 posted on 03/28/2011 12:14:32 PM PDT by Chode (American Hedonist - *DTOM* -ww- NO Pity for the LAZY)
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To: SeekAndFind
"The collapse of Detroit [the USA]. De-industrialization,..."

Call.


79 posted on 03/28/2011 1:01:36 PM PDT by familyop ("Don't worry, they'll row for a month before they figure out I'm fakin' it." --Deacon, "Waterworld")
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To: Sacajaweau; MeganC; triumphant values; Travis McGee
Plenty of old cities that are thriving..Zurich..Boston...I was just in St Augustine

Londonium...Rome...Kyoto...even Bogota or Lima..both damned older than Detroit and with crime problems but hardly dying...teeming actually

I mean please..you can't possibly think that is the reason...”cities get old and folks leave”

that is nonsensical

Detroit died because the folks that live there as a rule cannot manage governance very well..and it sucks for the few of them whom can.

and when it gets bad enough those who can leave

and this issue has a common thread worldwide..it's the emperor's new clothes to a tee

until we deal with it head on...we deserve to deal with the consequences

we stick our head in the sand with this issue (race..yes I will say it) same as we do Islam...just pretend it's all equal and sameness and whistle past the graveyard

what has happened in Detroit is spreading..black culture has basically collapsed when you have an 80% illegitimacy rate..and now where white trash lives in proximity they have joined forces and will bear the same fruit

in 1960 white illegitimacy was less than 1% and black was only around 19%..black is up nearly 4 fold..more in some really tough areas and white rate is up 20 fold..imagine that

hispanic rate is around 50 percent, oriental less than white rate

we already know how black culture has fared and now their curse has spread thru a culture that never had the courage to condemn it when they did it so now everyone does it

Detroit now...inner Atlanta soon...and so forth..just sit back and watch

I live rural..bucolic but it gives no pleasure to see how far we've fallen yet no one says anything for fear of being called racist
\
fear of being called racist will damage this nation far more than segregation or discrimination ever did

look at black culture in days of discrimination and segregation and look now..you tell me...I'd really like to have someone explain it to me with something besides canards and platitudes about Democrats or Unions...it is far more than something that simple I can tell you...I was there I lived it and watched it and not just in the US.

What the hell happened. Guilt about being so successful killed western (white) civilization is my take..crazy as it sounds.

80 posted on 03/28/2011 4:38:24 PM PDT by wardaddy (FUHB)
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