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Posted on 05/22/2014 5:05:02 AM PDT by SJackson
Just off of the James C. Lodge Freeway in Detroit is Eight Mile Road. The stretch near the freeway is just east of the famed area that provided the basis for the Eminem film of the same name. To its north lie predominantly white suburbs — over 77 percent of those who live in Oakland County are white — with median family income in excess of $65,000. Married couples comprise approximately half of households, with fewer than 15 percent of households led by a single female. Since 1990, the population of Oakland County has jumped from 1.083 million to 1.202 million.
South of Eight Mile Road lies the city of Detroit, with a nearly 83 percent black population and a median household income of under $27,000. Almost 74 percent of households in Detroit are led by single parents, nearly all women. The population of the city has dropped from 1.027 million in that same period to approximately 713,000.
Eight Mile Road itself paints a bleak picture. In the middle of a weekday, the streets are sparsely populated; old, solid-structure brick houses with rotten roofs dot the side streets; beaten-up Pontiacs from the early 1990s sitting forlornly in driveways. Hair salons, liquors stores and rim stores are open for business, but they’re located between defunct hair stores, liquor stores and rim stores.
What happened in Detroit? Horrific governance destroyed the industrial infrastructure that created the growing mixed-population base of the city; it centralized employment in the government while devastating the business and tax base. Businesses fled to the suburbs, as did whites. The bulk of the black population, trapped in a cycle of poverty and government dependence, sold a bill of goods by Detroit’s politicians, stayed behind.
Those politicians covered their mismanagement with racially charged rhetoric, from former Mayor Coleman Young to jailed former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. When Detroit went bankrupt in 2013, it was the final result of decades of failed policy decisions based on central planning.
When financial analysts look at Eight Mile Road, they see the tragedy of a once-proud city separated. On one side of the road, Detroit; on the other side, Detroit without the mismanagement. To fix the situation would require good governance — slashing regulations, lowering taxes, attracting business, creating jobs.
Instead, politicians offer more of the same. This week, Attorney General Eric Holder stated that America’s racial disparities are a result of continued racism and suggested that neutral laws had reinforced an enduring “subtle racism” throughout the country. Holder cited particular disciplinary practices in schools and sentencing guidelines as repositories of racism.
None of this will heal Detroit or places like it. Economic health requires a dedicated workforce, a free entrepreneurial climate, protection against crime. Those, in turn, require solid two-parent families, a competitive educational environment and a dedication to equal application of the law rather than equal results under it.
Eight Mile Road is a blot on a once-beautiful city. It will remain a dividing line so long as America’s politicians continue to use it as one.
NO ONE practices more ‘racism’ than Eric Holder ......
Majority of Large Manufacturers Are Now Planning or Considering ‘Reshoring’ from China to the U.S.
Looks like the manufacturing IS coming back... just not the jobs. Hooray automation!
The race baiter has spoken! He is nothing but a political whore. Keeping the race issue burning and not doing anything about it.
white kids that embrace black culture
So, kids seeking to rebel from God’s given morality will embrace “black culture”.
it would be racist for them to do farm work. It would bring back images of sharecroppers in the old south, so asking them to do farm work is a non starter.
There it is. Plain as day.
Now, let's talk some more about how conservatives "don't reach out to black people." Let's hear again how Republicans need to "address the needs of the black community."
If you're a member of said community, just read that paragraph and consider yourself reached out to.
Shall we guess how many will say "thanks, sounds like a plan" and how many will curse and call us names??? Shall we guess what complaints Detroit (and nearly every other city population) will have next year, and the next, and the next....?
Detroit’s Subtle Racism was caused by the choice of car colors.
They painted white and black (and in between and two-tones), and you could choose.
So it is the Capitalists’ fault.
Got to get over choice.
Henry Ford was right. You can have any color you want as long as it is black.
“Get over race. Focus on real problems for a change.”
Ok, I’m over race. But, do need your help focusing on the real problems. So, how about you telling me what those real problems are - so I can focus on them.....
The people that built and maintained Detriot were violently displaced by a Third world people with Third world ways and Third world problems. These Third people don't have the drive or capacity to build or maintain First world cities. Hence Detriot has become a Third world city of beggars. Without constant infusions of cash confiscated from people outside the city it would collapse completely and revert back to wilderness.
Detroit was too long controlled by DemiKKKraps and Racism is built in.
1. Thinking about it, actually.
2. I don't feel safe anywhere. In Detroit I can carry a gun.
Only getting rid of the DummiCRAPS everywhere will.
After Spike Lee’s racist rant about Brooklyn I really don’t care about these neighborhoods anymore.
They apparently like things just the way they are.
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Both sides are in the same city, right? So the same management then?Soooo maybe it's the cultures of the people that are on each side that made the difference.
I don't think so. As I understood the article, "the other side" is over the county line, outside the city limits of Detroit.
“Both sides are in the same city, right?”
Detroit is south of the road,suburbs of Oakland County north.
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Thanks for clarifying FRiends.
Same county, but different cities. I think. Haven’t been there in about 30 years. Cultures, I think culture is important. And it may be different north of 8 mile than south. Particularly when it comes to issues like family (have a spouse before kids), education (more than sports and music), work. Self sufficiency. But I’m no expert. If I were I’d explore making the ruins a tourist attraction. What’s the saying, Rome didn’t fall in a day, something like that. Detroit did it in a generation. Raze the rest, grow vegies for the northerners. Better yet, legalize pot. Now, before other states. There’ll be an export market, legal or not. Let the out of state buyers take the risk. THen again, that’s a lot of work.
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