Gruesome-ville.

President Obama plans a farewell speech next week in Chicago, and perhaps he’ll notice that while he’s been in Washington his hometown has become the nation’s murder capital and largest gang war zone. Worth reflecting on is the city’s upswell in violence last year that followed political protests against law enforcement and a pullback in policing.

I am reminded of the punk, celebrated as protest leader, who showboated in the cop’s face during one such protest/blocking of rights of way for vehicles and pedestrians.

Am reminded also that one candidate talked (more than once) about the plight of the law-abiding in black ‘hoods. The other bristled at the idea that there’s a problem. She lost, he won.

Meanwhile, Chicago politics is full of hand-wringing about “violence” and the victims and hearts going out etc. but nothing about LAW ENFORCEMENT, which (can you imagine?) is the heart of the problem.

. . . who is trying get at what’s not available.

Or shouldn’t be in any well-run operation in which important decisions are in the offing.

Response to her when she pressed for said information — in effect what will you decide? — might have been, “You’re kidding?”

McCarthy breaks through the see-no-evil civil libertarians-induced no-guns party line.

CHICAGO — Chicago police officers are “under attack” and doing the bare minimum to avoid accusations of wrongdoing, former top cop Garry McCarthy and a former Chicago officer said on “60 Minutes” this weekend.
The nationally broadcast CBS news program did a segment called, “Crisis In Chicago,” spending three days here and witnessing how murder has become a “normal” part of everyday life. They also point out how investigative stops in the city are down more than 80 percent despite a massive spike in shootings and murders.

It’s really an attack on the blue-statism that infects everything.

. . . invites diplomats’ kids to a party!

. . . rather than deporting diplomats in tit-for-tat retaliation, [Putin] instead invited the children of U.S. envoys to a New Year celebration for kids held at a concert hall on the grounds of the Kremlin.

Peeved president stumbles again.

via Russia Threatens to Expel Diplomats, Then Backs Off – WSJ

Let’s hear it for the  wise longshoreman, medaled by LBJ:

Quotation by Eric Hoffer: The central task of education is to implant a will and facility for learning; it should produce not learned but learning people.

The truly human society is a learning society, where grandparents, parents, and children are students together.

Not bad, eh?

Source: Eric Hoffer Quote – Liberty Quotes Blog

NY version, that is:

In my view, the guilty party here isn’t so much either President Obama or Prime Minister Netanyahu, but the New York Times.

The UN vote — “disgraceful,” as Israeli Ambassador Danny Danon put it — was in fact the culmination of a successful, year-long editorial campaign by that newspaper.

It was a campaign aimed precisely at taking Israel’s security decisions out of the hands of Israel’s democratically elected leaders and placing those decisions, instead, in the custody of a council whose members include Vladimir Putin’s Russia, Communist China and Venezuela.

Not a good replacement, no, no, no.

Source: Blame the New York Times for the Disgraceful Anti-Israel UN Security Council Vote | Jewish & Israel News Algemeiner.com

 

Namely D. Axelrod on how Trump can govern in view of his cabinet picks’ differing with him on “some key issues”:

“This is a great, unanswered question,” said David Axelrod, who was a top adviser to Mr. Obama. “It seems that Trump does not come to this with a well-developed philosophy so much as a well-conceived marketing strategy.

“Now there will be a behind-the-scenes battle to fill in the void that will mirror the battle between factions of the Republican Party. It is not clear how these disputes in the battle to define Trump will be decided.”

Wuxtry, wuxtry. Pot just called kettle black. To put it another way, substitute his onetime boss, as that it seems Obama came without “well-developed philosophy so much as a well-conceived marketing strategy.”

A strategy, it should be noted, devised by D.A. himself.

Source: Donald Trump’s Cabinet Picks Disagree With President-Elect on Some Key Issues – WSJ

More from Boff, this time objecting to Cardinal Burke and four other cardinals’ quizzing Francis on what he said in “Amoris Laetitia,” about communion to the divorced and remarried:

The pope cannot be judged, that is the teaching of the Church.

He’s a purist, I guess.

Source: Liberation Theologian Boff: “Francis is One of Us” – OnePeterFive

=====================

A clarification: Time was when Boff lived off criticizing the pope, as a commenter noted:

Kevin Aldrich  9 hours ago

“The pope cannot be judged” unless the Pope is John Paul II and the judge is Boff.

The poor earth!

Whoever speaks today of the poor, also has to speak of the earth, because it, too, is now being plundered and abused. “To hear the cry of the poor,” that means to hear the cry of the animals, the forests, of the whole tortured creation. The whole earth cries.

Source: Liberation Theologian Boff: “Francis is One of Us” – OnePeterFive

Yuck.