IGX

2013 List Of America’s Most Miserable Cities:

1. Detroit, Mich.
2. Flint, Mich
3. Rockford, Ill.
4. Chicago, Ill.
5. Modesto, Calif.
6. Vallejo, Calif.
7. Warren, Mich.
8. Stockton, Calif.
9. Lake County, Ill.
10. New York, N.Y.
11. Toledo, Ohio
12. St. Louis, Mo.
13. Camden, N.J.
14. Milwaukee, Wisc.
15. Atlantic City, NJ
16. Atlanta, Ga.
17. Cleveland, Ohio
18. Poughkeepsie, N.Y.
19. Gary, Ind.
20. Youngstown, Ohio

Kazuya Mishima wrote:The only question that remains...who runs Bartertown?

Kazuya Mishima wrote:Well, bankruptcy is coming, and it will either be a federal intervention or police and fire protection will go to shit. No po-po, no fire trucks, no schools...nothing left but squatting nigras and their bastard kids moving from one hovel to the next. The only question that remains...who runs Bartertown?

We keep hearing that the car industry in Detroit is “on the rebound” or that “Detroit is back.” In fact, the city itself is on its back, and it’s bounding toward bankruptcy or a state takeover. How did one of America’s most storied cities land in this predicament? While the city population has shrunk (from a peak population of 1.8 million in 1950 to 714,000 in the last census), it has hardly reduced the government that serves it. All you really need to know about Detroit, which is facing a $327 million budget gap, is that last year it was discovered to still be paying for a “horseshoer” (or farrier) on the Detroit Water & Sewer Department (DWSD) payroll. This individual costs some $56,000 in pay and benefits, despite the city not having any horses to shoe in his department.

Union bosses insisted the DWSD (average compensation: $86,000) needs more, not fewer, such unionized employees, a view associated with a broad spectrum of thinkers from Jimmy Hoffa to the Keynesians running the United States. The DWSD has more than twice as many employees per gallon of water pumped as that other paragon of Midwestern governance, Chicago. An independent report said four out of five employees in the bloated department were redundant and discovered a thicket of union regulations driving up costs. Plumbers complained that, due to union work rules, they had to wait to fix pipes until duly authorized “operators” came along first to shut them off....What Detroit does is give unions the keys to the treasury until nothing is left. That day has come, and their own success is killing unions. What can save Detroit? Nothing, probably, though a group of waggish libertarians proposed buying the Detroit river’s dilapidated park Belle Isle for $1 billion (goodbye, budget deficit! For a couple of years, at least) and turning it into a lightly-regulated capitalist wonderland: Macau of Michigan. The New York Times predictably mocked the scheme (because, obviously, Hong Kong and Singapore are doing so badly) but what other plan could make Detroit safe for capitalism again? Detroit is already a union wasteland. It could hardly do any worse if it became home to Galt’s Gulch.

DrDonkeyLove wrote:

Kazuya Mishima wrote:Well, bankruptcy is coming, and it will either be a federal intervention or police and fire protection will go to shit. No po-po, no fire trucks, no schools...nothing left but squatting nigras and their bastard kids moving from one hovel to the next. The only question that remains...who runs Bartertown?

Don't be judging Detroit so harshly. There is a group of people who are doing just fine.

Shafpocalypse Now wrote:Under Coleman Young, it became de rigeur for Detroit's elected officials to be criminals.

The Spingarn of Medal is awarded annually by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) for outstanding achievement by an African American.

CHICAGO—Having tallied a “very promising” 41 murders so far in 2013, police officials confirmed Tuesday that the annual Chicago Homicide Drive was off to its fastest start in more than a decade and was already well on its way to reaching this year’s goal for violent slayings. “It’s still January, but we’ve already seen an astounding number of contributions to this year’s murder drive,” Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy told reporters as he raised the red progress line on the Homicide Drive’s Murdometer, a 15-foot plywood silhouette of a gunned-down body that stands outside City Hall. “I don’t think anyone dreamed it would be possible to break last year’s staggering total of 506 murders, but with so many people chipping in all across the city, we may just do it. There’s a tremendous community-wide level of interest and participation in this yearly event, which is quickly becoming a treasured part of Chicago culture.” While McCarthy said he remained confident that Chicagoans would set a new Homicide Drive record this year, he cautioned that the city was beginning to face a shortage of potential victims in many of its highest-contributing neighborhoods.