George Soros takes to the opinion page of the Wall Street Journal to explain why he supports and will continue to support “reform” prosecutors:
Like most of us, I’m concerned about crime. One of government’s most important roles is to ensure public safety. I have been involved in efforts to reform the criminal-justice system for the more than 30 years I have been a philanthropist.
Yet our system is rife with injustices that make us all less safe. The idea that we need to choose between justice and safety is false. They reinforce each other: If people trust the justice system, it will work. And if the system works, public safety will improve.
I think most of us support more justice in the criminal justice system. Maybe that’s naive of me. My definition of justice is that in a just system when two different people commit comparable crimes they face comparable likelihoods of arrest, trial, conviction, and punishment with regard to race, creed, gender, or national origin. Mr. Soros’s is somewhat different:
We need to acknowledge that black people in the U.S. are five times as likely to be sent to jail as white people. That is an injustice that undermines our democracy.
Note that there is no room for the prevalence of crime in Mr. Soros’s formulation. Just to take one example the rate of gun homicides in majority black neighborhoods is higher than in majority white neighborhoods regardless of the socioeconomic level of the neighborhood. Homicides are a good example because they are less likely than robbery or rape to go unreported or unnoticed. According to the FBI blacks are arrested for nearly every class of crime at a rate disproportionate to their numbers in society as a whole. The overwhelming preponderance of the victims of those crimes are black as well. Presumably, Mr. Soros’s conclusion would be that blacks are arrested at too high a rate. Keep in mind that those who will be injured by criminals going free will be disproportionately black.
That is not my idea of the system working. Perhaps it is Mr. Soros’s. I would genuinely like to see evidence supporting the claim that fewer arrests results in less crime.
You might think Soros’, and others, intentions are pure. That’s your nature. But you subsequently trash Soros’ logic. I just think he’s a snake. Look at the Hunter Biden situation. Merrick Garland is unfit for public office.
Anyway, the experiment with easy or no bail etc is a profound failure. And it is hurting most those who are crime victims. I note that steve, as usual, defaults to diversionary tactics. The crime rate here in Bluffton is apparently sky high. People are afraid to go out. While NYC, DC and San Francisco are devoid of shootings, car jackings, robberies……..
I especially like steves repeated citation of Tulsa. He conveniently does not note that the area of N Tulsa, isolated after the build of a highway, is an ultra high crime cesspool that drags the overall per capita crime rates into the toilet. To use Chicago as an analog, it would be like failing to observe that the astronomical west and south side crime statistics, diluted by central and north/NW Chicago make Chicago seem safe. But liars are gonna use statistics anyway they can. I bet steve will not be seen in Lawndale at night anytime soon.
Soros’s reasoning is backwards, based more on blind ideology and the bent of his own life-long destructive politics. At the center of most chaotic events you will find the hand of Soros funding it – from bankrolling massive illegal caravans to targeting and funding AGs and SOSs, around the country, in order to embed his personal tenets into the public policy of the cities and states in which his selected candidates are planted. Crime and malfeasance, consequently, are dismissed by the likes Soros, in lieu of the open society agenda he has promoted and pushed for many years.
As I see it, if Mr. Soros’s objective is for arrests of black suspects to approximate the rate of white suspects, there are several ways of accomplishing it. One would be to increase the arrest rate of white suspects and another would be to reduce the arrest rate of black suspects.
My experience of government is that what is easier is likely to be what happens. Obviously, arresting fewer people is easier than arresting more so that’s the likely candidate.
Another way would be for there to be fewer young black men committing crimes. That’s my preference but IMO it’s much, much harder nut to crack than arrests and convictions. I think there are some basic cultural issues involved (street gangs, out-of-wedlock births, single parent heads of household, etc.) but talking about those is racist or something.
If you ask the people of Englewood or Austin what they want, they’ll tell you they want more law enforcement not less. Could law enforcement be better? Definitely. But that’s different than the argument Mr. Soros is making.
Over half of gun crimes and three-quarters of mass shootings are committed by young black (some Hispanic) males. Soros and other reformers ignore that. More importantly, they ignore the fact that the overwhelming majority, over 90%, of the victims are poor blacks. No Progressive cares anything about poor blacks, regardless of what they say. Even the grifter leaders of BLM do not care about poor blacks.
It has been argued that the entire civil rights movement and all the civil rights laws and court actions did nothing for poor blacks; that their condition today is worse off than 60 years ago. Only upper and upper middle class blacks, like the Obama’s and Jacksons’ have benefited.
Blacks and whites use and sell drugs at about the same rate, but blacks get arrested much more often for drug infractions. If arrested prosecuted more often. If prosecuted found guilty more often. If found guilty go to jail longer. There are other examples I believe. So if there are true differences then then blacks should go to jail more often but when they are not then we cant stay we have justice. Then there are all of the driving while black arrests.
I would recommend reading Cop In the Hood by Peter Moskos. He is a pro cop writer working at John Jay (writes for WSJ occasionally) who worked as a cop for a year before going off to professorship. Police have a lot of latitude about who they arrest. Some police almost never arrest anyone and others have competitions to see how many they can arrest. They sometimes use arrests just as a means to control people (and maybe to get overtime pay).
“but talking about those is racist or something.”
Really? People, black people, talk about it frequently.
Steve
Another way would be for there to be fewer young black men
There, fixed it for ya.
As I said above, my idea of justice is that people who commit the same offenses should be arrested, etc. at the same rates regardless of race. How can that be accomplished? I can see how arresting fewer people who are believed to have committed crimes can be accomplished.
I assume you are being facetious. For black people to talk about something is one thing. For a white man to talk about the same thing is something completely different. If you don’t recognize that you haven’t listened to black folk talk much.
Surely you are being facetious, or something. White people talk about it all of the time. If you can do it without being an ass about it you dont get called racist. Why bob does it all of the time. Who here has called him a racist?
Steve
†Why bob does it all of the time. Who here has called him a racist?â€
Hmmm. I missed such a slur from Bob. So, why don’t you repost one of his racist posts.
Speaking of justice, a woman has to wait until she is mostly dead in Texas before she can get an abortion to save her life, hoping they get to her before she is all dead. In the era of antibiotic resistance this is toying with someone’s life, but that is only just sine it meets the wishes of the religious right.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/07/26/1111280165/because-of-texas-abortion-law-her-wanted-pregnancy-became-a-medical-nightmare
Steve
Bob regularly claims that people of sub-Saharan African descent are genetically predisposed to lower IQ scores. My response to that was to cite the case of the burakumin in Japan who have many of the qualities attributed by some people to black folk, e.g. lower IQs, criminal activity, tendency to violence, etc. The burakumin are genetically indistinguishable from the other people in Japan. They belong to a hereditary caste of grave diggers, trash collectors, etc. They get lower test scores.
I have also made other counter-arguments. I don’t react by hurling epithets because I don’t believe it is productive. Furthermore I think that hurling epithets is wrong. And once I have made a counter-argument, I avoid repeating it.
Dave, you talk about gangs, out of wedlock births and all the stuff you mentioned and no one here has called you racist. Bob in this very chain says most gun crimes are committed by blacks and no one called him racist and he has said similar and even, gasp, mentioned gangs I am sure. Not going to bother to go back and look and if he in fact never use the word “gang” I am wrong and apologize, but dont think so. The fact remains that Dave’s claim is wrong. People talk about the stuff he mentioned all of the time without being called a racist.
jan- Effing learn to read. I never said he made a racist slur. I said that he talks about the stuff Dave mentioned and noted that no one calls him racist. (When he isn’t idolizing Putin.)
Steve
Steve, glad to hear you didn’t descend into the ideological rathole of arbitrarily calling someone a racist just for the effect of demeaning their POV. However, you just can’t seem to help yourself in delivering petty and patronizing responses ad hominem.
Punishment is ineffective.
Restrictions on freedom of action,
shame, and a path towards redemption by society are better methods of correction.
Most of the people we call hardened criminals ( exempting true sociopaths), simply believe that they are beyond the pale, and have no realizable course beyond mere violence to live their lives, they have no hope.
If Soros has a better plan for the rehabilitation of these, I for one, would be willing to listen.
But lives and property must be protected, if progressive cities don’t want the police to do it, society will continue to break down until a similar, less professional force is organized.
Nature will not tolerate a vacuum.