Detroit

[Fisherking]

The City filed bankruptcy under Chapter 9. Municipality Bankruptcy.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Yeah I'm having trouble with this as well.

Is Detroit literally bankrupt?

It's because we live in First World countries.

[Lemur]

Yeah I'm having trouble with this as well.

Is Detroit literally bankrupt?

Yeah, doing a little reading over the weekend, looks like filing for bankruptcy was the only way to re-negotiate their bonds. Apparently Detroit already had some sort of exemption from the weird state law (which says you cannot re-negotiate a pension) for re-negotiating their pension obligations. But the bondholders weren't willing to take a haircut. Hence the bankruptcy.

I'd also like to point out that according to every respectable military figure ever, the most difficult maneuver to pull off is a fighting retreat. Detroit tried and failed. Look at the numbers:

"In 1950 there were 1.85 million people in Detroit. In 1970, it was 1.5 million. In 1990, it was a million flat. By 2010, it was down to 710,000. When your city is shrinking like that, you end up with a tax base that's inadequate to maintain the fixed infrastructure or to pay off pension costs that were incurred in more prosperous times."

[ReluctantSamurai]

Detroit is not the only city in Michigan or in the US to file for bankruptcy (just the most visible, at the moment):

http://www.governing.com/gov-data/mu...-defaults.html

Or the only Michigan city in dire financial straits:

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/...ontiac-detroit

And for those of you who think the suburbs here are much better off financially should look into the situations of Lincoln Park and Allen Park...one has already disbanded its' full-time fire department and the other is considering it. Both are beset by financial difficulties that also has them closing schools and considering bankruptcy.

A previous poster noted that Michigan is basically a one-trick pony, the auto industry, and there-in lies a huge reason for Detroit's and Michigan's problems as a whole. When the US auto industry gets decimated by international competition, and moves plants (and thereby jobs) out-of-state, the trickle-down effect on the local economy (steel, chemical, plastics, etc) is fatal.

And for those who think that the entire city of Detroit is one huge war-zone...you need to spend some time with Google Maps. I just bought a home on the east side (East English Village), in a predominantly black neighborhood, and I can tell you that this neighborhood is as well maintained as any Downriver neighborhood I have seen or the one I currently live in.

Using race as the scapegoat for ALL of Detroit's problems is short-sighted and out of touch with reality.

[rvg]

And for those who think that the entire city of Detroit is one huge war-zone...you need to spend some time with Google Maps.

Last year when I was bussed to Belle Isle for the Indy Race, the neighborhoods we drove through looked very war-zony to me: skeletons of abandoned buildings, entire neighborhoods boarded up, parking lots fenced in with barbed wire, brrr... Let's just say I'm glad I live in the burbs.

I just bought a home on the east side (East Indian Village), in a predominantly black neighborhood, and I can tell you that this neighborhood is as well maintained as any Downriver neighborhood I have seen or the one I currently live in.

Oh, I'm sure there are well maintained neighborhoods beside the Grosse Point, but they are the exception, not the rule.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Oh, I'm sure there are well maintained neighborhoods beside the Grosse Point, but they are the exception, not the rule.

I would differ with that, based on the two months I just spent driving through Detroit neighborhoods while looking at homes. Yes, there certainly are areas that could be used as sets for any of the new post-apocalypse shows now on TV (is there any major metro area in the world that doesn't have areas like this?), but there are many where folks care about their homes and their neighborhood.

[rvg]

Just sayin', Detroit is NOT an example of a thriving successful city. It's anything but. One can find a few healthy grains of wheat in that pile of manure, but it's still mostly manure.

[ReluctantSamurai]

....and manure makes great fertilizer when planted with new seeds

And just out of curiosity, why don't any of these cities get a topic?

http://alizul2.blogspot.de/2012/11/1...-in-world.html

[Fisherking]

They are lumped together here: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...?144866-1-in-7 1 in 7 down the page some where.

I posted that same link a couple of days ago. But they actually refer to neighborhoods rather than the whole city.

[ReluctantSamurai]

I know...I read through the topic...that's where I copied your link from

My point is...Detroit because it's easy to rant about unions, racism, etc., and because Detroit's bankruptcy is headline news, at the moment.

But most of the cities in that list look to me to be much, much worse

[Greyblades]

Why do Blacks tend to vote Democrat - doesn't make a whole lot of sense, really.

Because the republicans are worse, and the american first past the post voting system means the two main parties are the only show in town.

[HoreTore]

The City filed bankruptcy under Chapter 9. Municipality Bankruptcy.

And how does that differ from a normal bankruptcy?

It's because we live in First World countries.

I'm no stranger to mismanaged towns, I've lived most of my life in such a town. What happens here is that they're put on the finance department
-list, meaning that they will oversee business until things are in balance again. But a bankruptcy? Absurd.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Because the republicans are worse, and the american first past the post voting system means the two main parties are the only show in town.

Two Republican Black Secretaries of State - one Democrat Black President. Republicans are, historically, more equal-rights than Dems - Dems just offer poor people more money.

There's no racial element to the Republican party any more, except that they get vilified.

[Fisherking]

Oh please. Republican immigration policy is a huge racist magnet, and republicans know they have the white supremacist vote which is not insignificant.

There's more than one reason fewer blacks vote republican.

That sounds like party line hyperbole. Statements like that need something to show they are true.

Blacks didn’t leave the Republican party over racism and the KKK was part of the Democratic power base for about 60 or 70 years.

You need to support those statement, not just toss them out as fact.

[Major Robert Dump]

Daddy does this mean we don't get Christmas?

Hey, Detroit and Donald Trump finally have something in common!

I really hope the courts respect Mr Detroit. This one time I was in court for a misdemeanor public urination charge, and a clerk came out and started calling out names for bankruptcy filings and I was thinking "man that's embarrassing to have your name called out like that for bankruptcy they should respect their privacy" but then I remembered that it was my tax dollars that would be buying their foodstamps and obamaphone so then I stopped feeling bad, anyway, my point is that when Detroit goes to court I really hope he gets some privacy and the clerk doesn't come out and yell "Detroit Bankruptcy" man that would be embarrassing.

[Fisherking]

Its a basic fact of American life. Or do you think the idea to build a fence came from sound judgement and consideration? Pure racially motivated policy. Not because the Republican party is racist, but because they know they can count on the racist vote. It is no less valid a thing to say than "Most blacks vote Democrat." Because most racists do, in fact, vote Republican. Politics is marketing, and both parties know their target demographics.

Racial tensions keep the circus going.

I'm sure there are stats out there, or maybe there aren't, I really don't know. When I was in the Army I was surrounded by racist white people who thought democrats should go die and that republicans were the one true party, all the damned time. I speak from experience. But you don't have to care what I say, so don't if you don't want to.

I am as skeptical of political motives for doing anything as anyone can be but to me the Republicans glommed onto this more as a law and order issue than a racial one.

Now, that doesn’t mean that the Democrats wouldn’t find it politically expedient to call it proof of racism.

You are going to have to show me the demographics on this huge white racist vote. Is this something you see as a defacto white southern vote? Do you just think being southern makes you a racist?

In the army you get exposed to a lot of young testosterone pumped men that think killing thing, and people, and destroying stuff is really cool. They don’t do a lot of heavy thinking, but most grow out of it. Their allegiance to the Republican party is because, usually, the Republicans want to spend more on their toys than the Democrats do.

In the army or any other large group of people, individuals tend to gravitate to people they have more in common with. You see black groups, white groups, Hispanic groups, and a few mixed groups, but they are more the exception. Most of these guy are actually young and insecure and tend to be xenophobic.

Did you run into many racist officers and NCOs, what ever their color?

[Lemur]

Well, two problems here: (1) Calling anyone racist is handing them a loaded weapon. Hell, I could tell the Grand Dragon of the KKK that he's a racist dirtbag, and he could very easily do the same maneuver that the Republicans have perfected over the last ten years, namely: "I am not a racist, I just have pride in my culture; YOU are the racist for saying I might be racist, you dirty self-hating white person." Which is pretty much the reflexive response these days.

(2) Difficult to get reliable statistics and polling on attitudes that subjects are likely to deny.

But to sidle in with Gelatinous Cube's anecdotal evidence, all of the white people I know who are, shall we say, subject to identity politics? Every single one of them is a Republican. The ones who use derogatory terms for non-whites? All Republicans. The folks who give credence to the Birther nonsense (which has a racial subtext you'd have to be blind and stupid to miss)? Republicans.

But an interesting thing has been happening: My really hard-core rightwing friends have been shifting their hate away from the darkies and the browns lately. If you talk to them, or read their FB posts, it's much more generalized now, about the Communist-Socialist Democrat America-Hating Liberal Traitors. Their public language is increasingly strident, increasingly angry, and (most interesting) increasingly broad. They hate RINOs, they hate Democrats, they hate rich liberals (limousine liberals), they hate middle-class liberals (kool aid drinkers), and they hate all poors (welfare mamas, leeches, parasites, etc.).

And they hate all forms of compromise, because any compromise is a betrayal of principles. Besides, if everyone you're opposed to is basically Satan, how can you compromise without handing Satan a win? You can't.

I don't even know how you would get the stats on self-admitted racists and their voting preferences.

If you want some empirical data to back this up (and when isn't that welcome?), I'd say look at the birther polls, since that's a question a genuine racist will answer honestly. (I.E., "No way am I racist ... but that Obama was probably born in Kenya ... despite a total lack of evidence for this hypothesis ...") If we look at where the birthers are, the data completely supports GC's and my contention, that most of the racists we know personally are wearing the R hat, not the D hat.

A whopping 64 percent of Republicans think it’s “probably true” that President Obama is hiding important information about his background and early life, including his possible birthplace, according to a new nationwide survey of registered voters from Fairleigh Dickinson University’s PublicMind project examining Americans’ belief in political conspiracy theories. [...]

Moreover, researchers noted: “Generally, the more people know about current events, the less likely they are to believe in conspiracy theories — but not among Republicans, where more knowledge leads to greater belief in political conspiracies.”

“There are several possible explanations for this,” said Fairleigh Dickinson political scientist Dan Cassino, who helped conduct the poll. “It could be that more conspiracy-minded Republicans seek out more information, or that the information some Republicans seek out just tends to reinforce these myths.”

[Major Robert Dump]

If building a fence is racist, then we have a lot more racists in this country than I ever thought. Tear down those fences, Mr Obama!

[Fisherking]

@Lemur

Obviously you are referencing white racist as all being Republican. I really don’t know, but throwing out the term usually taints everyone. I know of a few Democrat politicians that were formerly of the KKK. But of course they must have reformed. And no I don’t mean the late Robert Byrd. These guys were local and state.

As for face book, the political verbiage there is of the lowest order. It is right up there with “Give me a million likes for being a dufus“.

Birthers! What ever, they are right along side, the Bush= skull and bones= illuminati people. Has anyone done a study on them? Or on the Cheney is the devil bunch?

I am sure there are more than enough political wing nuts to go around.

These people are just like those who watch the evening news. They don’t do it to become informed, they do it to seek validation of their ideas. There is just not much you can trust coming over TV News.


On conspiracy in general, I don’t mind people looking. Conspiracies have existed and may again form time to time. One worked to involve us in WWI and a second was on its way to dragging us into WWII before the Japanese finally attacked. One could even argue that the “Weapons of Mass Destruction” was a conspiracy. Or that any government cover-up fit’s the definition, or any cover-up for that matter.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/conspiracy

Conspiracy: 5. any concurrence in action; combination in bringing about a given result.

But when we use the synonyms, like: collusion, plot, intrigue, cabal, or scheme, it makes it all better.

[Lemur]

Obviously you are referencing white racist as all being Republican.

I'm pretty careful to avoid saying "all" in reference to the population at large, because absolutes tend to self-fulfilling fallacies. But in my personal experience, all of the white people I know who are into/subject to identity politics have been either Republican or Libertarian. By the same token (pun intended), the few Hate Whitey black people I've known personally have been either nominal Democrats or (more commonly) apolitical.

I know of a few Democrat politicians that were formerly of the KKK.

If you're going to reference Robert Byrd, why not do so by name? Do you not know American history? The Dems were the party of the South and segregation until the late 1960s. Then there was a realignment. Please do a little reading on the Southern Strategy. Your take on the parties is approximately half a century out of date. Did it ever occur to you to wonder why, for example, David Duke chose to run for and serve elected office as a Republican?

Birthers! What ever, they are right along side, the Bush= skull and bones= illuminati people.

Read the survey I linked. They polled for four major conspiracy theories. Yes, there were nutjobs on the left who believed that George W. orchestrated the 9/11 attacks, and other such nonsense. But nothing—nothing—came close to the percentages of Republicans who gave credence to Birtherism. Different order of magnitude. I wonder why?

[Fisherking]

The birther bit is easy to explain. Though the Obama staff didn’t help things much.

It is just like any political nugget. You have those who want to believe and will except any or even no explanation, and you have those who don’t want to believe and no explanation will be sufficient.

The rumor started and no evidence was immediately published giving the appearance of something wrong. Past that point nothing was going to matter anyway. Facts no longer matter.

Think of trying to convince rvg that pot is no a danger to the world. Who was interested in Bush’s military service record and what became of that?

[Lemur]

The birther bit is easy to explain. [...] The rumor started and no evidence was immediately published giving the appearance of something wrong.

100% incorrect. State of Hawaii (with a Republican governor) confirmed birth and citizenship immediately, and the BC was released to the public in June of 2008. At that point anyone not motivated by insanity, blind partisanship, or racism, should have been done with the subject. Had the candidate been white, that would have probably been the end of things.

Oh hell, read for yourself.

The survey I linked was from 2012, long after any sane person should have been done with the issue. I think it's an inexact but useful proxy for identity politics.

[Kadagar_AV]

Uh... Did an USAnian city just go bankrupt?

This might be the wrong thread for this... but...

[Xiahou]

Thinking that you can build a physical fence across the entire border that would actually keep people out is idiotic. However, there are certain places where fence sections have proved effective. In other locations, sensors, drones, or good old fashioned patrols could work.

I believe that any way you look at it, the US has the right and duty to have control of its borders. From an immigration perspective, you have people all over the world that would love to be able to live and work in the US. Giving illegal immigrants a pass is fundamentally unfair to the would-be immigrants who respect our laws and go thru the proper channels. In the case of Mexico, it also gives a very corrupt & incompetent government a safety valve that allows it to continue being corrupt and incompetent.

Then there are the sovereignty and national security issues....

What's this got to do with Detroit?

[Major Robert Dump]

You're smart enough to get the subtlety here, man. Building a fence has been shown in study after to study to be not cost effective, and in fact not really effective at all, yet the Republicans push for it because a portion of their constituency includes people who have an irrational fear and hatred for latinos, illegal or otherwise.

The fact that so many Republicans in Arizona consider Sheriff Arpaio to be a genuine American hero, for example...

So no fence on the southern border? Worked for the Chinese. Until the Japanese invaded. Maybe we could fence in Detroit?

[Papewaio]

This argument is droning on and becoming offensive. Not all issues are black and white.

[Major Robert Dump]

Well to be fair, the fence on their northern border didn't keep out the Mongols either.

How dare you say that about Canadians.

Despite what you may think with your liberal sensibilities, I have it on good sourcing that the southern border fence with Mexico is not about keeping Mexicans out, but about keeping Americans from escaping. So, if the fence is racist, it is racist against Americans. Facts.

[HopAlongBunny]

They do have a rodent as their national symbol...

[Papewaio]

They do have a rodent as their national symbol...

Rabbit is it rodents that are the problem or is it you don't like beaver?

[HopAlongBunny]

Well, if it walks like a rat...