Posted on 07/19/2013 10:26:39 PM PDT by neverdem
It took only six decades of progressive policies to bring a great city to its knees.
By the time Detroit declared bankruptcy, Americans were so inured to the throbbing dirge of Motowns Greatest Hits 40 percent of its streetlamps dont work; 210 of its 317 public parks have been permanently closed; it takes an hour for police to respond to a 9-1-1 call; only a third of its ambulances are driveable; one-third of the city has been abandoned; the local realtor offers houses on sale for a buck and still finds no takers; etc., etc. Americans were so inured that the formal confirmation of a great citys downfall was greeted with little more than a fatalistic shrug.
But it shouldnt be. To achieve this level of devastation, you usually have to be invaded by a foreign power. In the War of 1812, when Detroit was taken by a remarkably small number of British troops without a shot being fired, Michigans Governor Hull was said to have been panicked into surrender after drinking heavily. Two centuries later, after an almighty 50-year bender, the city surrendered to itself. The tunnel from Windsor, Ontario, to Detroit, Michigan, is now a border between the First World and the Third World or, if you prefer, the developed world and the post-developed world. To any American time-transported from the mid 20th century, the citys implosion would be literally incredible: Were he to compare photographs of todays Hiroshima with todays Detroit, he would assume Japan won the Second World War after nuking Michigan. Detroit was the industrial powerhouse of America, the arsenal of democracy, and in 1960 the city with the highest per capita income in the land. Half a century on, Detroits population has fallen by two-thirds, and in terms of...
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
If Obama had a city, it would look like Detroit!
It is shocking. They are like from a SciFi movie of a dystopian future.
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