In response to the pandemic of deadly violence that has engulfed our major cities, President Biden has announced his “Strike Force.” Under the auspices of the Department of Justice, the program will put federal law enforcement personnel in five major cities to interdict the flow of illegal guns from sources in and beyond the target cities. This means gun shops selling guns illegally, straw buyers who pass them on to the criminals and anyone who simply sells their gun illegally.
The Strike Force will attempt to shut down the source of illegal guns. It will focus on Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington D.C. as the hot spots of the current crime surge.
On the surface, that all sounds good … BUT
This is not actually a new program. In interviewing Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, who is in charge of the program, CNN’s Brianna Keilar (no friend of Trump) asked how this differed from President Trump’s program to cut off the supply of illegal guns. Monaco stammered a bit, saying that Biden was devoting more personnel to the program. It would be more focused. It would develop new techniques. After figuratively wiping the sweat off her brow, Monaco conceded Biden’s plan for guns was more or less an expansion of the former President’s program. Doesn’t that take away the high drama of Biden’s announcement?
Keilar caught Monaco off guard a second time when she inquired why those five cities were selected. The CNN host noted that they get the most publicity as centers of crime. But the murder rate is much higher in places like Detroit, St. Louis and Memphis. Who would have thought?
Again, Monaco stammered. The program, she said, will have residual benefits for all those cities since some of the illegal guns may flow to those communities as well. That was not a good answer – but then there is not a good answer. Apparently, the crafting of the expanded program followed the news reports and not the statistics.
Given the crisis level of crime in our Democrat-run cities (I just had to note that), one would think that even an almost new program would focus on the criminals – and the 600,000 illegal guns currently in use. But that puts the leftwing Democrats in a bit of a conundrum.
Ever since the backlash against Biden’s 1990’s crime legislation – that put a lot of black males in prison – the Democratic Party has been desperately trying to NOT put black criminals in jail. It is not just the defund the police movement — and don’t tell me they just meant reform. They meant defund. We know that because progressive Democrat administrations across the nation took money away from the police. They did it in Seattle, New York, Los Angeles and Washington, etc., etc., etc. –ironically the high crime cities.
If you want to address the reasons for the high crime rates in our segregated minority communities, you need to address a few of the causes. But again, Democrats are loath to put black criminals in jail – and keep them there.
After the shooting in Washington D.C., Police Chief Robert Contee went on a bit of a frustration-triggered rage. He blamed the courts, the prosecutors and even the Covid Pandemic for the number of hardened criminals roaming the streets of the nation’s capital. Contee said that they – the courts and prosecutors — emptied the prisons because of Covid. “Those people are now walking around our community today,” he said.
Contee also cited the no bail release programs – and passing laws that actually make some criminal laws unenforceable. And of course, he had harsh words about the defunding. He said that Washington is 200 officer short of what is minimally necessary to maintain law and order.
Contee was spot on in his criticism. While Biden blames guns and the failure to regulate them – and others blame poverty — Contee points to the primary problem – the politicians and officeholders in charge of the cities with large populations of segregated minorities. One my wonder if there is a common thread that binds all these administrations together. Oh yeah! Longstanding Democrat political machines.
We have seen what Contee describes in cities across the nation. How many of the looters and arsonists wound up in jail in Minneapolis, Seattle, Portland, etc., etc.? Biden is not focusing on any of that. He is taking the leftwing position that the gun is the problem.
He should know that unless you stop the criminal, you will NOT stop crime. That was the clear message from the Washington police chief.
First of all, there are potentially hundreds of thousands of illegal guns in our crime-ridden cities already. The efforts of past Democrat administrations to seize those guns and prosecute their owners was ineffective to non-existent. Confiscation and buy-back programs have produced nice photographs of piles of guns and ammunition, but that is minuscule compared to the problem. It had been discovered that some of those selling their guns to authorities were criminals using the money to purchase upgraded guns – illegally.
By far, not all guns come from dealers or straw buyers. A large percentage are stolen or sold in private transactions. If you cut off one source, the criminals will just secure the guns from other sources – and the potential number of sources is virtually unlimited. That has been proven over and over again.
Once again, Democrats are proposing a symbolic action to make themselves look like they are actually fighting crime – while in reality they are diverting attention from the core problem of Democratic Party leadership and culpability in the crimes that are ravaging their cities. Nothing will change – just as nothing has changed for generations despite all the plans, proposals and programs – and the billions of dollars — that has already flowed over the damn in the name of fighting crime.
There is one obvious answer to reducing crime in our inner cities. Massive police presence. Arrests. Indictments. Convictions. And booting out the long-established Democrat machine politicians who have no interest in really solving the problem. Biden’s approach may arrest a few gun dealers and straw buyers but will do nothing to get guns off the streets – and more importantly, absolutely nothing to get those using illegal guns off the streets. So, which should be the top priority?
So, there ‘tis.