Harboring An Excuse

OpinionEditorials.com ^ | June 24, 2003 | Frank Salvato

[The Rant]

Residents in Benton Harbor, Michigan have been terrorizing their own community by rioting and looting to demonstrate their dismay with what they say is an on going racial profiling problem in their Police Department. It all started with one idiot, who had an extensive criminal record I might add, who decided he was above the law and took the police on a high-speed chase that ended with him crashing and burning. Obviously, this was the fault of the police…NOT!

Whether the community has a problem with their Police Department or not, running through the streets in anarchy, destroying and setting fire to property and looting is never, ever the answer to the problems. The death of the 28-year old who the police gave chase to only served as an excuse for this activity. If there is a problem within the Benton Harbor Police Department regarding their approach to diversity it would better serve the people to address the issue with the State of Michigan Attorney General’s Office in the form of an official complaint. With all the attention that Michigan is getting nationally regarding the affirmative action case filed against the University of Michigan, now before the Supreme Court, the chances of getting swift action and national attention are great. Instead, the people of Benton Harbor are getting national attention for acting like uneducated, Third World vagrants who know no better than to run haphazardly in the streets ineffectively and unimpressive.

"We're just tired, we're sick of them killing us," Bonita Bulger, 28, said as she stood on a typical street corner in this underachieving neighborhood. "Our backs are against the wall. The jobs are low. Our kids have nothing to do. You know what's the highlight of our day? Standing on the four corners right here." Well, Ms. Bulger, to you I say boo-hoo-hoo and I’ll tell you why.

The days of blaming everyone but yourself for your lack of social status and economic prosperity are all but up. Oh, I know you had a good ride under the Clinton Administration. That was a fun and furious time for the “it’s-not-my-fault” crowd, the same crowd that had tears running down their faces when Al Gore lost his election, fair and square. But the bald-faced reality of the matter is there have been many instances of people, people of all races mind you, taking themselves out of the mire and making something of themselves. It is not impossible to achieve the highest of goals if one puts their mind and efforts into making them a reality. In fact, it is just as easy to focus ones efforts on raising above the status quo and achieving goals as it is to play the blame game for one’s lack of positive motivation.

Benton Harbor, as under-achieving as they may want to make it sound, is nestled among a surfeit of economically healthy and prosperous towns villages. Chicago’s Mayor Richard M. Daley even has a summer home that is in the vicinity of Benton Harbor. It is on the lake and anyone who knows anything about Lake Michigan knows it almost defies logic not to be able to profit from being located on the lake. In fact, some of the most prosperous communities in Michigan, Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin are located on Lake Michigan. Michigan even does it twice with the Upper Peninsula. If Ms. Bulger and her friends, who can’t seem to find anything better to do than stand on street corners all day, would simply get together as a community, take a simple idea for something positive, forge a plan that is aimed toward success instead of blame, and initiate it in a manner that would be inoffensive, I have a feeling that Benton Harbor would be a pretty nice place. In fact, if they were to pursue the idea of bettering their communities and themselves perhaps they wouldn’t want some 28-year old with a wrap sheet three feet long cruising through their neighborhood at 100mph. Perhaps they would even call the police complaining about someone like that. Perhaps.

As for the idiot who died because he felt compelled to run from the police at 100mph, I have no sympathy for him. I have no sympathy for anyone who doesn’t obey a REASONABLE request from a law enforcement representative. Whether they are behind your car with lights and siren on or pulling you aside at the security checkpoints at the airport, when a law enforcement representative asks you to do something you should do it. You should do it without complaining and you should be as polite as you possibly can when doing what is asked of you. Yes, it can be an inconvenience and yes sometimes you get selected because of the way that you look. It’s a derivative of the world we live in; it isn’t racism an incredibly large portion of the time. The tolerance for law-breakers has become mainstream in this age and that is a very sad thing. It once was, to be jailed was a stigma not a badge of honor. Not anymore.

So, to the people of Benton Harbor, to those of you who are raging, destroying, looting and then trying to blame the aftermath on someone else I say stop it. Start taking responsibility for your own actions and start taking care of your own lives. There are quite a few of us who don’t complain as a rule and who work hard to try and make something of ourselves. From this point forward we are putting you on notice that we will no longer be your enablers.

Enough said. Now get to work.

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Frank Salvato is a political media consultant, a freelance writer from the Midwest and the Managing Editor for www.TheRant.us. He is a contributing writer to The Washington Dispatch. He has appeared as a guest panelist on The O’Reilly Factor and his pieces are featured at OpinionEditorials.com, Etherzone.com, and Townhall.com.

[The Rant]

Comments on the Op-Ed Content?

[SJSAMPLE]

Good column, but anybody who's ever been to "Benton Harlem" knows that it could use a good burning. We should have called the US Forest Service and started a "controlled burn" long ago.