Category Archives: Crime

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Killadelphia Philadelphia ties 2013's homicide totals, with more than half of the year remaining.

Congratulations for Philadelphia’s Mayor, Jim Kenney, District Attorney, Larry Krasner, and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw! As of 11:59 PM EDT on Wednesday, June 22, 2022, under their leadership the City of Brotherly Love has, with 246 homicides this year, tied the total number of murders for the entire year of 2013.

I will admit it: I hadn’t previously thought much of former Mayor Michael Nutter. He was a liberal Democrat in a line of liberal Democrats — Philadelphia’s last Republican mayor left office while Harry Truman was still President! — and, in following John Street, I didn’t really see reason to hope that he’d be any better than Mr Street. But, under Mr Nutter, District Attorney Seth Williams — who wound up with legal problems of his own, and served 2½ years in federal prison — and Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey, murders in the City of Brotherly Love steadily declined, from 391 in 2007, the year before Messrs Nutter and Ramsey took office — Mr Williams was elected in 2009, succeeding Lynne Abraham — down to 246 in 2013. There was an increase to 248 in 2014, and then 280 in 2015, Messrs Nutter’s and Ramsey’s final year in office.

But nothing like the increases under Mayor Kenney! 2016 saw 277 killings, but then they jumped to 315, then 353, 356, 499 and 562 last year. It was only by pure, dumb luck that 2020 finished below 500 homicides, given that there were two more on New Year’s Day of 2021, and the Philadelphia Police Department actually stated that there had been 502 homicides in 2020, before ‘correcting’ that down to 499. I fouled up and didn’t take a screen capture of that when it was up, so you’ll have to take my word for it.

Were it not for the previous record of 500 homicides in 1990, under Mayor Wilson Goode, he of MOVE bombing fame, Mayor Kenney would have both first and second place in the homicide numbers.

But, not to worry: although this year’s homicide numbers are down slightly, 5.75%, the city is still on track for between 519 and 530 homicides, easily good for second place.[1]Methodology: I divided the total homicides by June 22nd of this year by 261, the number of murders on the same date in 2021, yielding 0.9425287356321839, then multiplied that number by 562, the … Continue reading

The chart to the right? That includes only those years in which homicides were at least 400; Mayor Kenney ought to break into that chart again, for this year, sometime between and October 2nd and 8th.

Whatever Messrs Kenney and Krasner, and Miss Outlaw, are doing, doesn’t work!

References

References
↑1 Methodology: I divided the total homicides by June 22nd of this year by 261, the number of murders on the same date in 2021, yielding 0.9425287356321839, then multiplied that number by 562, the number of homicides in 2021 to get 529.70. I use this method to account for the fact that there are more warm months ahead than behind, and homicides normally increase in summer and fall. Another method, dividing 246, the number of homicides, by 173, June 22nd being the 173rd day of the year, yielding a figure of 1.421965317919075 killings per day, then multiplying that by 365, yields 519.02 homicides for the year.
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Suspected murderer captured in Lexington

The Lexington Police Department has captured the suspect in a seven-month-old homicide; better late than never!

Lexington murder suspect arrested 7 months after deadly shooting, records show

by Christopher Leach | Tuesday, June 21, 2022 | 7:12 AM EDT | Updated: 1:04 PM EDT

Robert Okorley. Photo from Fayette County Detention Center, and is a public record.

A Lexington murder suspect was arrested Monday evening in connection to a 2021 killing on Main Street, according to court documents.

Robert Okorley, 40, is facing charges of murder, attempted murder, second degree assault, criminal mischief and possessing a handgun as a convicted felon, according to his arrest citation. He’s accused of killing Jesse Jimenez, 32, and shooting another on Nov. 5, 2021.

He’s being held at the Fayette County Detention Center on an $885,000 bond, according to court records.

Lexington police said they initially responded to a call of shots fired in the area around Main Street and Oliver Lewis Way early in the morning, but they didn’t find anything unusual. Not long after, a man showed up at the University of Kentucky Chandler Hospital suffering from a gunshot wound, Lexington police Lt. Chris Van Brackel said at the time.

When police learned that the victim man was in the 700 block of West Main Street when he was injured, they went back to investigate further and found the man later identified as Jimenez dead in an apartment on the upper level of the building. The building is occupied on the lower level by a web design and marketing agency.

According to the report, Mr Okorley got into a fight with a third person, and after the fight was over, he pulled a gun and attempted to shoot the man, but hitting Mr Jimenez instead. After that, a fourth man ran out of the building and jumped into the bed of a moving pickup truck. Mr Okorley then fired at the departing vehicle, wounding the driver in the arm. If Mr Okorley is indeed the perpetrator, he’s apparently not a very nice person.

Video footage captured the entire incident and clearly identified Okorley as the suspect, court documents say. Okorley was also identified as the suspect by an eyewitness.

Well, if they’ve got the whole thing on tape, and it clearly identifies Mr Okorley as the perpetrator, Commonwealth’s Attorney Lou Anna Red Corn will probably agree to a plea bargain down to manslaughter that lets him out in ten years, because that’s the kind of thing she does.

According to the Fayette County Detention Center’s records, Mr Okorley is facing charges of murder, assault in the 2nd degree, criminal mischief in the first degree, and possession of a handgun by a convicted felon. I am shocked, of course, that Mr Okorley (allegedly) violated state gun control laws.

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Philadelphians are fighting back! When the city cannot protect the people, the people will protect themselves

We have previously noted that the law-abiding people in Philadelphia have been seeking concealed carry permits at a record pace. And we have seen stories about some of the bad guys in Philly being sent untimely to their eternal rewards.

Why are people in the City of Brotherly Love arming themselves? When there are innocent victims being gunned down for no apparent reason, when it’s not just the gang-bangers shooting other gang-bangers, and the city has a George Soros stooge ‘progressive’ District Attorney who likes to set the captives free, a whole lot of Philadelphians have gotten the message: you are on your own!

But today’s surprise is that The Philadelphia Inquirer has actually reported on it!

As more people get guns and carry permits, Philly sees a sharp rise in homicides ruled justified

More people in Philadelphia are legally arming themselves and shooting their armed attackers amid a violent crime spike.

by Mensah M Dean | Monday, June 20, 2022

In May, a South Philadelphia man stepped out of his house for a smoke when police said a gun-wielding man rode up on a bicycle and demanded money. The homeowner dropped his cigarette, pulled out his licensed gun, and fatally shot the would-be robber in the head.

In March, an assistant manager at a Dollar General store in North Philadelphia used his legal gun to shoot a man who police said burst into the store in a ski mask, demanded money, and threatened to kill the cashier. “I’m opening up the register for you, sir,” said the manager, who instead pulled his own handgun and shot the robber in the head, killing him.

The same month, a customer with a carry permit inside Max Food Market in the Yorktown section fatally shot a gunman who tried to rob him while he was playing a video poker machine. “You have to defend yourself,” said Maximo Torres Rodriquez, the store’s owner. “You have to do it.”

The three would-be assailants died from their injuries and in all three cases authorities brought no charges against the shooters. These sorts of deadly clashes in which the intended victims survive and assailants die are rare in Philadelphia, but are becoming more common as a growing number of people have legally armed themselves amid rising numbers of carjackings, shootings, and homicides.

Mr Rodriquez put it exactly right: sometimes “You have to defend yourself. You have to do it.”

Also read: Jennifer Stefano: The case for impeaching Larry Krasner

We’re not supposed to say it, but sometimes a homicide is a public service. When the Dollar General assistant manager shot and killed the would-be robber, perhaps the robber would have been satisfied with the cash and left without hurting anyone, but as crooks get successful, they are also emboldened, and the odds are extremely high that he’d have attempted to knock over another store and another store, and eventually someone would get shot, and possibly killed.

Justified homicides jumped 67% from 2020 to 2021 ― from 12 to 20 according to the Philadelphia Police Department. An additional six have been ruled justified by the department but are awaiting the District Attorney’s Office to sign off. In 2019, there were 10 justified killings, six in 2018 and eight in 2017, the department said.

So far in 2022, victims have shot at least eight armed assailants to death, with more than seven months remaining in the year.

“The total number of shootings and the climate of gun violence has gotten more severe,” said District Attorney Larry Krasner. “So I would expect that there would be more situations involving self-defense.”

As Krasner said, the surge in justified shootings reflects the general rise in gun violence in the city. With unjustified homicides hitting a record total last year, with 562 victims, self-defense killings climbed too, though only slightly as a percentage of all homicides.

Let’s do the math:

  • 2017: 315 murders + 8 justified homicides = 323 total, 2.48% justified.
  • 2018: 353 murders + 6 justified homicides = 361 total, 1.66% justified.
  • 2019: 356 murders + 10 justified homicides = 366 total, 2.73% justified.
  • 2020: 499 murders + 12 justified homicides = 511 total, 2.35% justified.
  • 2021: 562 murders + 26 justified homicides = 588 total, 4.42% justified.
  • 2022: 230 murders + 8 justified homicides = 238 total, 3.48% justified.

The trend worries some analysts and gun-control advocates, who say civilians who buy guns for protection may be putting themselves and others at more risk, not less. They cite studies showing that legally purchased guns are more likely to be fired in accidental shootings, during domestic disputes, and in suicides than in self-defense.

721 West Butler Street. Click to enlarge.

Of course, the Inquirer article let us know that more law-abiding people obtaining weapons is a bad thing, stating that they are more likely to be discharged in accidents, domestic disputes and suicides, offering several paragraphs of statistics.

There is one thing that the article did not include, perhaps because it simply isn’t quantifiable. We have previously published several street scene photographs of Philadelphia, showing how many residents have put themselves in jail, barring up their porches and windows, to try to defend themselves from the thugs. There is an attitude of fear, fear! permeating the city, a fear that at any time your number could come up, and that is due to the city not protecting innocent people. When you have a district attorney like Larry Krasner who largely refuses to prosecute illegal firearm possession cases, who doesn’t like to enforce the laws already on the books, who metes out slaps on the wrists for even violent crimes, coupled with a homicide rate higher than Chicago’s, of course people are going to be worried. People are buying firearms for the protection of their families and themselves because it has become blatantly obvious: the city isn’t protecting them.

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The abomination of ‘red flag’ laws It's OK if we suspend your constitutional rights for just a little while, right?

Governor Tom Wolf (D-PA), who will be leaving office at the end of the year, tweeted out a nice little graphic of what happens under the so-called “red flag” laws. Due process of law, he tells us, is part of it.

But look at the graphic.

Jane’s social media contact, Randy, posts photos of guns & cryptic messages.

Followed by:

Jane calls the police to report the posts.

What does “cryptic” mean?

adjective Also cryp·ti·cal.

  1. mysterious in meaning; puzzling; ambiguous: a cryptic message.
  2. abrupt; terse; short:
  3. a cryptic note. secret; occult:
  4. a cryptic writing. involving or using cipher, code, etc.

So, if Jane simply doesn’t understand Randy’s message, Governor Wolf wants her to call the cops!

Then follow the next steps:

The police petition in court to temporarily remove Randy’s guns.

Police provide evidence that Randy is a danger to himself/others.

The court agrees to a temporary removal of Randy’s weapons.

You know what you don’t see in there? You don’t see any notification to Randy, and presumably Randy’s attorney, that he is under investigation to see if he “is a danger to himself/others,” because, just like any search warrant, the court and the police do not want the subject of the warrant to know the police are coming to enter his home and seize evidence. Due to Jane’s puzzlement over Randy’s message, the police show up, enter his home, possibly forcibly, and seize his property, all without Randy having had a chance to defend himself before the court.

Now, up to this point, Randy has committed no crime! Rather, because Jane is worried about him, she has sicced the cops on him, and don’t fool yourself: while police officers are normally more politically conservative than liberal, there’s nothing the police, or at least police chiefs, like more than a disarmed public. As they view Jane’s complaint, if they are going to err, they are more likely to err on the side of wanting Randy’s guns removed.

There’s even an incentive there: if they don’t try to have Randy’s firearms taken away, and it turns out that he does commit a crime, or even suicide, with his weapons, and it comes out that the police had Jane’s complaint and didn’t try to take Randy’s guns, they, or their city or jurisdiction, could be held liable in a civil suit. But Jane, doubtlessly, will be shielded from legal action for calling in a genuine concern, and I can see the red flag laws the left want passed keeping her identity confidential.

The police are not the only ones who do not like an armed citizenry; prosecutors don’t care for it much, either, so persuading the prosecutor or city attorney or whomever needs to petition the judge for the removal order might not be difficult. Judges, though not liable for the consequences of their decisions, might well feel their own internal pressure to prevent a tragedy.

So, what’s missing in all of this? As Jane, and the police, and the city attorneys, and the judges, several people, are all at least somewhat motivated by the idea that they could prevent a tragedy, there’s no one involved to protect Randy’s rights.

Enter Jeff Goldstein, and Robert Stacy McCain’s story on his problems:

Crazy People Are Dangerous (and the Problem With ‘Red Flag’ Laws)

Saturday, June 18, 2022

You haven’t forgotten Deb Frisch, have you? In October 2018, Frisch — whose harassment of Protein Wisdom blogger Jeff Goldstein lasted a dozen years — was finally sentenced to four years in a Colorado prison. When last we heard about her, in August 2021, she had been denied parole after ranting insanely at her parole board hearing.

This morning, I noticed I’d gotten some extra traffic to one of my posts about Frisch, and investigation led to Not The Bee: If you need a reason to oppose“red flag” gun laws, this writer’s harrowing 12-year tale of terrifying stalking and harassment might just do the trick.

To cut a long story short, the lovely Miss Frisch became obsessed with Mr Goldstein for some insane reason or other, and when things didn’t go the way she wanted, she started attacking, online, of course, not physically, Mr Goldstein and his family, in particular his then two-year-old son. Miss Frisch made baseless accusations that Mr Goldstein was molesting his son, all of which had to get the attention of local law enforcement; allegations of child sexual abuse are always things which trigger law enforcement investigations.

Mr McCain concluded:

The way our legal system operates — the built-in prejudices of courts, based on decades of precedents intended to “protect” the rights of the mentally ill — it is very difficult to get a dangerously deranged person locked up. Whenever a mentally ill person commits an atrocity (or gets shot by the cops), you’ll see commentators saying that this shows problems with our nation’s mental health system, when in fact it was liberal judges in the 1970s and ’80s who decided it should be nearly impossible to keep crazy people locked up in lunatic asylums, where they belong. These same judges, however, will probably be willing to sign “red flag” orders based on unproven claims, without due process for those targeted by such orders.

According to Governor Wolf, the gun owners do receive due process, even though they don’t get any chance to defend themselves until after their homes have already been invaded by the police and their legally-owned firearms seized, all on the word of someone who doesn’t like a “cryptic” message.

Now, there’s a difference between Jane, who thought Randy’s social media posting had a “cryptic” message, and Miss Frisch, who accused Mr Goldstein of child sexual abuse, but the result is the same: without any actual evidence of a crime beyond someone’s stated ‘concern,’ both “Randy” and Mr Goldstein had to defend themselves through the legal system, costing them expensive attorney’s fees — Mr Goldstein specifically mentioned that he’d had attorneys — to regain their weapons. The fictional Jane in Governor Wolf’s tweet might have had motives as pure as the wind-driven snow, but Miss Frisch’s were wholly malevolent, and (seemingly) driven by obsession and mental illness.

But the police and the courts have no choice but to take allegations of child sexual abuse seriously, and the same will be true of “red flag” law accusations. How can anyone know, prior to an investigation, whether the accuser or ‘tipster’ is being either deliberately fraudulent or simply concerned, but they’ll have to act.

It could be an estranged husband or wife, trying to gain leverage in child custody or support. It could be someone who can’t stand the thought of Bambi getting killed who calls the cops on a guy just before deer season. It could be one gang trying to get another gang disarmed. Or it really could be a concerned citizen who believes he has seen something of legitimate concern. The trouble is that you can never know unless the police actually investigate, and that means records and trouble and quite possibly a suspension of his constitutional rights for an innocent civilian, along with possible attorney’s fees.

The real secret is actual law enforcement. Remember Nikolas Cruz, who killed 17 people and wounded 17 others in the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting? There were continual warnings about him, and at least 23 incidents where the Broward County Sheriff’s Department had calls about him, but nothing was done. Had the Sheriff’s deputies done something really radical like arrested him and charged him with crimes, he could have been convicted, and barred from buying a weapon. The Broward County schools knew of his behavioral problems, transferred him from school-to-school, but, in an effort to keep him out of the so-called ‘school-to-prison pipeline,’ did not notify law enforcement when he assaulted another student.

If law enforcement had done their job, Mr Cruz would not have been able to buy, legally, the weapons he did. If the school district had done their jobs, he would have been reported to law enforcement in a manner which could not be ignored.

So, because the people who are charged, under the law, with notifying law enforcement about someone like Mr Cruz haven’t been doing their jobs, Governor Wolf and the left want ordinary citizens like the fictitious “Jane” to do the job, and to create a system where Jane’s speculation and word have legal weight. After all, it’s for people’s safety, right?

Well, there are a lot of constitutional rights which could be ignored, to improve public safety! We could do away with the need to prove guilt, and just imprison, or execute, anyone we just “knew” was a bad guy. We could suspend the rights of free speech and free association, to keep the bad guys apart. Given that half the country seemed to think that the right of free association and assembly could be suspended over COVID-19, and a bunch of state governors got away with it, well surely that right isn’t really important, right?

Benjamin Franklin once said, “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” It seems that a whole lot of Americans have decided that they deserve neither liberty nor safety.

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In which Larry Krasner shows us just how much respect he has for the Philadelphia Police!

Sometimes, you just can’t make up this stuff!

Philadelphia’s George Soros stooge ‘progressive’ District Attorney, Larry Krasner, tweeted:

Ahead of Father’s Day, I challenge anyone thinking about picking up a gun unlawfully, think twice, and remember the families gun violence is wrecking. If you are caught by the @PPD, you will be held accountable. Have a peaceful Father’s Day weekend.

The image to the right is a screen capture of Mr Krasner’s original, because it’s highly likely that he’ll delete it. Why? @PPD is not the Philadelphia Police Department’s Twitter account, @PhillyPolice is. @PPD leads to a suspended account.

Mr Krasner’s recent tweet is very much at odds with what he has said before, that he does not believe that arresting people and convicting them for illegal gun possession is a viable strategy to reduce shootings. Perhaps I’m just not edumacated enough, but it seems to me that a guy who’s locked up can’t shoot anyone, that a guy who does not have a firearm cannot shoot someone.

That latter is what the gun grabbers argue, right, and Mr Krasner wants stronger gun control laws, but he won’t enforce the ones already on the books!

There’s a move in Harrisburg by the state House of Representatives to impeach and remove Mr Krasner, but it will fail: while the Republicans have majoritioes in both Houses of the General Assembly, they do not have the requisite 2/3 super majority to remove him from office.

And why should they? In his initial campaign in 2017, Mr Krasner told the voters what he would do, and he was elected by a wide margin. Then in 2021, with plenty of evidence that Mr Krasner was doing exactly what he said he would do, the good people of Philadelphia re-elected him, by a landslide margin. One thing is clear: Philadelphians want a district attorney who will not seriously prosecute criminals.

The city’s last Republican mayor left office when Harry Truman was President of the United States. Seventy straight years of Democratic Party rule has helped turn the City of Brotherly Love into the [insert slang for feces here]hole city that it is today, but the voters simply can’t learn the obvious lesson, that Democratic policies simply do not work.

So, my friends in the state House of Representatives, leave Mr Krasner alone. He is exactly what the good people of Philadelphia want, and he is exactly what the people of Philadelphia deserve.

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Paying cash for crime tips

Murder in Lexington, Kentucky, is a far, far different thing than in Philadelphia, to which I’ve paid a lot more attention, but Lexington is the closest real city to where I live since I’ve retired. Lexington doesn’t have more than a murder a day, but has seen ‘only’ 22 so far this year, while the City of Brotherly Love has 227 as of 11:59 PM EDT on Monday, June 13th. In 2021, Lexington’s record 37 homicides, and a guesstimated population of 324,600, yields a murder rate of 11.40 per 100,000 population. Philadelphia’s 562 killings, and population estimated at 1,576,251, yields a homicide rate of 35.65 per 100,000 population, more than thrice Lexington’s.

Nevertheless, 22 homicides by June 14th is significant, because the city didn’t see its 22nd killing until July 20th last year. The statistics become less telling, and the math more uncertain when the city is seeing ‘just’ 22 murders in 165 days, but the city is on pace to see 48 murders this year. I would not, however, bet more than €10 on that number, and I think, or at least hope, that my estimate will be on the high side.

‘Money talks.’ Why Lexington investigators are offering more cash for tips on homicide cases

by Taylor Six | Monday, June 13, 2022 | 1:18 PM EDT

Bluegrass Crime Stoppers is using its “healthy budget” to offer more money for people who provide tips that lead to arrests in homicide investigations, officials announced Monday.

In a press conference, representatives with Bluegrass Crime Stoppers and Lexington police said they are increasing tip rewards to $2,500 for information which leads to the arrest and closure of a homicide case. The rewards apply to 2022 homicides and the initiative will carry on for the next three months.

Last year Crime Stoppers solved eight homicides with tips that came in through their anonymous hotline, according to Katina May, director of Bluegrass Crime Stoppers. Lexington police have nine open homicide investigations for 2022, according to police data. . . . .

“People are scared, we get that. People are scared to come forward. When they have seen something or know something, all of that information is pieces to the puzzles,” (Lexington police detective Anthony) Delimpo said. “We are trying to give more of an incentive for people to come forward.”

There’s more at the original.

Still, there’s something sad about this: a good citizen who has information about a homicide or a shooting ought to provide the information freely, on his own, especially when the city has an anonymous tip line he can use. But if that can getr more bad guys off the streets, it’s worth it.

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Pennsylvania Democrats always double down on policies that have failed in the past

Jennifer Stefano, from her Commonwealth Foundation biography page. Click to enlarge.

I will admit to some surprise that The Philadelphia Inquirer gave OpEd space to Jennifer Stefano, the executive vice president of the Commonwealth Foundation and a fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum. After all, Miss Stefano and the Commonwealth Foundation support “transforming free-market ideas into actionable public policies, we’re ensuring all people can flourish.”

Good luck taxing the rich when they’re gone

Pennsylvanians are moving to red states in search of smaller government, school choice, and lower taxes, writes Jennifer Stefano.

by Jennifer Stefano | Monday, June 13, 2022

Widespread shortages. Economic tumult. Disappearing businesses. When Ayn Rand released her magnum opus, Atlas Shrugged, in 1957, her critics considered it a work of fiction. She did not.

Her art is now imitating life in Pennsylvania. Fiction or not, Rand was prescient.

She predicted a world where government and “looters” (as she called them) exploited producers. A mysterious man named John Galt gets those business owners and workers to leave and recreate a free and fair society elsewhere.

In Pennsylvania, leaders like Gov. Tom Wolf and Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney demonize financially successful individuals, with promises that if the all-powerful government bureaucracy could just take more of their money, our problems would be solved. Wolf, Kenney, and their supporters operate under the misguided belief that bigger government will heal the Earth, defeat racism, and end poverty.

Worthy goals, wrong solutions — and Pennsylvanians know it. While some will wait for November to register their discontent at the ballot box, many are already voting with their feet.

Honestly, I wish I could reproduce the entire thing, but you can read it for yourself if you follow the embedded link. Alas! in my search to see if it had been published elsewhere, I could not find it, and the Inquirer’s articles are hidden behind a paywall; I pay for a subscription so that you don’t have to! However, the inquirer does allow people a few free articles a month, so if you haven’t followed too manty of my links, you might be able to read the whole thing.

Miss Stefano continues to document for us the strong net emigration from the Keystone State, and notes to where Pennsylvanians have been moving, Texas, Arizona and, especially, Florida, all states with lower state taxes and more business-friendly laws and regulations.

It is a familiar story for Philadelphia, where the nearly century-long run of one-party rule and unrealistic policies has sent people fleeing to the suburbs. Now it’s driving them into the waiting arms of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — and the rest of Pennsylvania is following.

Miss Stefano’s points are a bit too economic specific, not that they are not valid, but such ignores the rest of Philadelphia’s horrible mismanagement, as made plainly obvious by the city’s homicide rate. As of 11:59 PM EDT on Sunday, June 12th, 227 Philadelphians had been sent untimely to their eternal rewards, and if the South Street shootings made for big headlines, only three of those victims, at least one the criminal who shot the first bullets, actually died. In the week since then, nine more people were butchered in the city’s mean streets.

A poll by the Pew Charitable Trust found that 70% of Philadelphians believe that public safety is the most important issue facing the city, and also noted that in the very diverse overall, but internally highly segregated, black and Hispanic residents felt unsafe at significantly higher rates than whites.

The Inquirer’s Editorial Board was appalled, though seemingly more appalled that whites didn’t feel as unsafe as others:

What does it mean to be a segregated city in a gun violence crisis? According to the Controller’s Office’s gun violence mapping toll, the zip codes of Rittenhouse Square and Chestnut Hill, where about 70% of the population is white, haven’t experienced a fatal shooting since before 2015. Contrast that with nearly 200 fatal shootings in North Philadelphia-Strawberry Mansion, where more than 90% of the population is Black, or nearly 240 in the Kensington-Port Richmond area, with a Hispanic population of 50%.

From The Philadelphia Inquirer, August 12, 2021. Click to enlarge..

Given that white Americans are, in general, wealthier than black and Hispanic citizens, white Philadelphians have the greater ability to head for the Sunshine State. What that means as far as emigration is concerned, because white Philadelphians are simply safer, in general, than black or Hispanic residents, needed to be further explored.

We do know, however, that the white population of the city has dropped precipitously.

It’s easy to see why. Florida lawmakers have spent the last 22 years slashing government spending, zeroing out the income tax, lowering others, creating a vibrant school choice model with state education dollars, and fostering a business-friendly climate. . . . .

The key to righting the ship in Pennsylvania is simple and should be bipartisan. As the Commonwealth Foundation’s poll shows, a majority of voters across parties want what Florida has: low taxes, less government spending, school choice, and jobs and opportunity for themselves and their children.

The solution offered by Wolf and Kenney? Increase property taxes. Let crime run rampant. Stifle any opportunity to foster an education landscape that puts parents in the driver’s seat. Push endlessly for tax hikes against middle-to-upper-income earners.

It’s simple: Philadelphia is ruled by Democrats, has been for three generations, and Governor Wolf’s and Mayor Kenney’s plans fall right in line with standard Democratic Party tropes.

Going after people with money has become the one solution that unites Democrats. It’s a populist cause with devastating results. As Rand foretold, there will always be a Ron DeSantis (or John Galt) creating a place where all people can flourish. When wealthy people leave, those of us without the means or opportunity to follow are left behind. That means fewer tax dollars for government programs, fewer jobs, and less opportunity.

The wealthy should pay taxes just like everyone else. But good luck getting the money when they’re already gone.

One thing has become painfully clear: Democratic policies simply do not work. Conservatives have been telling the left that for decades, but the response of the left has always been to claim that the only problems are that they just didn’t go far enough; Democrats always double down.

I stated that I was surprised that the Inquirer gave Miss Stefano the OpEd space, but, on the front page of the newspaper’s website, at least as of 7:45 PM EDT on Monday, June 13th, immediately below Miss Stefano’s article was another entitled “Too much property tax relief will put city schools at risk“. The Inquirer never misses an opportunity to advocate for the policies which have failed in the past.

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Weak-kneed Republicans are going to assist the Democrats in restricting our constitutional rights

They’re going after our constitutional rights again!

Senators strike bipartisan gun deal, heralding potential breakthrough

By Mike DeBonis and Leigh Ann Caldwell | Updated June 12, 2022 at 5:41 p.m. EDT | Published June 12, 2022 at 11:08 a.m. EDT

A bipartisan group of senators announced Sunday that it had reached a tentative agreement on legislation that would pair modest new gun restrictions with significant new mental health and school security investments — a deal that could put Congress on a path to enacting the most significant national response in decades to acts of mass gun violence.

Twenty senators — 10 Democrats and 10 Republicans — signed a statement announcing the framework deal. The move indicated that the agreement could have enough GOP support to defeat a filibuster, the Senate supermajority rule that has impeded previous gun legislation.

“Families are scared, and it is our duty to come together and get something done that will help restore their sense of safety and security in their communities,” the statement read in part. “Most importantly, our plan saves lives while also protecting the constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans.”

Under the tentative deal, a federal grant program would encourage states to implement red-flag laws that allow authorities to keep guns away from people found by a judge to represent a potential threat to themselves or others, while federal criminal background checks for gun buyers younger than 21 would include a mandatory search of juvenile justice and mental health records for the first time.

The only provision of this I can support is that prospective firearms buyers have their juvenile justice records checked as well. And I cannot see why such a provision would apply solely to prospective buyers ages 18-20; the juvenile record search should apply to everyone.

Other provisions would prevent gun sales to domestic violence offenders beyond just spouses, closing what is often called the “boyfriend loophole”; clarify which gun sellers are required to register as federal firearms dealers and, thus, run background checks on their customers; and establish new federal offenses related to gun trafficking.

“(D)omestic violence offenders”? If they have actually been convicted of a crime, that should already be part of their records, and prevent them from buying firearms. If they have only been accused by someone, and never have actually been charged and subject to normal bail restrictions, then no, we cannot and should not prohibit a free American citizen from exercising his rights just on someone’s say-so. The Johnny Depp-Amber Heard fiasco ought to demonstrate to us that disgruntled spouses and former spouses can and will say anything to get back at their exes.

The agreement does not include a provision supported by President Biden, congressional Democrats and a handful of Republicans that would raise the minimum age for the purchase of at least some rifles from 18 to 21. Handguns are already subject to a federal 21-and-older rule.

I suspect that our only hope is that the left try to festoon this ‘compromise’ with enough stupidity that it loses enough Republican support to allow it to be filibustered successfully.

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“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” — Albert Einstein

We have previously noted how Mayor Rudy Giuliani cleaned up New York City in the 1990s, with policies continued by his successor, Michael Bloomberg, and how my younger daughter, whom I have joked is the whitest white girl in town, and I were able to walk, in complete safety, from the lower borders of Harlem back toward downtown. Messrs Giuliani and Bloomberg focused on ‘quality of life’ crimes and ‘broken windows’ policing, trying to intercept the petty criminals before they became major thugs.

Philadelphia isn’t like that. Under Mayor Jim Kenney and District Attorney Larry Krasner, the ‘lesser’ offenses have been ignored, which have done nothing but embolden the ‘entry-level’ criminals, who see themselves as getting away with doing whatever they want, until they become really bad guys, and start killing people. Now it seems as though a lot of people in the City of Brotherly Love would like to see the Giuliani program! Continue reading →