DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Palus Politicus Mass Shootings part... I've lost count...

Often times people get offended and feel attacked when they are held accountable for their unlawful behavior. Somehow even those not involved in such actions feel that since you called out the acts of their coworkers, you are calling them out as well. And when it comes to the fringes on both sides, that's true. But that's where we're at now. People acting like the fringes represent everyone that votes with their political party.

You see, I understand the difference between an extremist and people who don't present themselves as an extremist on both sides. I don't rail just against far right or far left extremists. It would be nice to see more people understand and present things that way.

Eve, no policies get people shot by idiots with guns. Idiots with guns do the shooting all on their own. But if you want to compare apples to apples, right-wing rhetoric and propaganda is responsible for the majority of mass shootings. Facts.

Left wing policies (defund the police, let criminals walk, let drug dealers walk, let junkies shoot up in public, dont crackdown on looting and theft etc) directly affect the crime rates in libtard cities. To say otherwise is like lying to yourself. The loony left is directly reponsible for those 53 people being shot, and all the other crimes that happen in libtard-run citiies. Do I need to draw it in crayons for you.

No, you need to seek help. You’ve lost or have a bad connection to the reality signal. You’re mired in BS and it’s seeping into your mind. The 2A’ers, the NRA, and ridiculous gun worship has caused all of this. The left’s weak ass responses are not the cause, but I will agree that MORE MUST BE DONE, and strong gun restrictions or elimination is just a start.

No, I see reality for what it is and what it is not. Libtard policies are destroying our country, starting with our cities being overrun with gangs, drugs, murders, and crime. Why dont you take some responsibility for your failed policies instead of watching the decay and collapse happen?

We could also talk about all the long range nuclear capable missies lil Kim has and there hasn’t been any outbreaks of Nuclear war…..

Can you make any point without using libtard? Where's Memphis when you need him to bring a sense of morality and point out favoritism?

As if many of these cities you speak of aren’t in Goper states run by Goper lawmakers and politicians. Take some responsibility for your own s. Pfft.

LIBTARD? OK,, all the libtard policies that are destroying this country,, List them ALL please...

Here are some relevant to this conversation.

Many of the same problems in Goper red states and cities. Take responsibility of your own s.

Please provide examples. What right wing policies increase the crime rate? And where?

Republicans are telling three lies. They involve crime, inflation, and taxes. Here’s what Republicans are claiming, followed by the facts.

1. They claim that crime is rising because Democrats have been “soft” on crime
This is pure rubbish. Rising crime rates are due to the proliferation of guns, which Republicans refuse to control.

Here are the facts:

While violent crime rose 28% from 2019 to 2020, gun homicides rose 35%. States that have weakened gun laws have seen gun crime surge. Clearly, a major driver of the national increase in violence is the easy availability of guns.

The violence can’t be explained by any of the Republican talking points about “soft-on-crime” Democrats.

Lack of police funding? Baloney. Democratic-run major cities spend 38% more on policing per person than Republican-run cities, and 80% of the largest cities increased police funding from 2019 to 2022.

Criminal justice reforms? Wrong. Data shows that wherever bail reforms have been implemented, re-arrest rates remain stable. Data from major cities shows no connection between the policies of progressive prosecutors and changes in crime rates.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...can-talking-points-midterms-robert-reich

Wrong. Illinois has some of the toughest gun laws in the nation and Chicago STILL has rampant crime and murder. Your soft on crime laws are a FAIL.

Ok sis.

Why? Well I’ve never had a failed policy. Nor have I seen a progressive president pass a progressive agenda. Please stop projecting and seek help.

There is a Babylon Bee meme for that?

Youre the one who needs psych help. You post like someone with delusions.

I post like somebody who doesn’t take the right seriously. I troll the trolls. I fight hate with hateful rhetoric. And I chuckle to myself when I make a GOPer mad. Then I make weed tea with their tears and sip it like a frog. A smirking frog.

Right. Youre a legend in your own mind.

I wouldn’t say a legend, but I would agree with I make me laugh, in my own mind. Sorry that angers you. I know that’s all you have is the personal attacks. I laugh at those too, but not the way you want me to.

Dear Lord. This has been shown many times but for the hard of reading I'll post it yet again. When you have states with lax gun laws people will leave a city like Chicago and a state like Illinois to purchase guns in states where it's easier to get them. Your easy to get gun laws are the actual problem here.....

Less than half the guns used in Illinois crime come from Illinois, data analysis shows

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Every day and night in metro Chicago there is a behind-the-scenes gun battle underway between law enforcement and criminals to trace the flow of illegal guns, track and arrest people who use them, and ultimately interrupt one supply chain that authorities wish would slow down.

New data analyzed by the ABC I-Team answers a question about where all of the guns coming into Chicago are from. Less than half of all guns used in crimes in Illinois came from Illinois.

ATF Trace data shows the top five states where guns recovered in Illinois were originally purchased from are Illinois (49.8%), Indiana (16.7%), Missouri (5.4%), Wisconsin (3.9%) and Kentucky (2.6%). Federal agents at the ATF identified the source state of 11,708 traced firearms in 2020.

The numbers prove the need for authorities to cast a wide net while trying to stop the shootings and murders, especially in Chicago.

Christian Hoffman, Assistant Special Agent in Charge for ATF-Chicago, helped run a day-long training session in Aurora Tuesday with nearly three dozen suburban police departments instructing on the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network, also known as NIBIN.

The specialized computer network helps compare guns and casings found at crime scenes to see if they've turned up in other crimes and who might have been responsible. Hoffman said it illustrates the growing partnerships between ATF and law enforcement agencies.

"Basically in layman's terms, it's the shell casings DNA compared to another shell casings to see if there's a similarity or comparison between one crime scene and another. So if you use a firearm in one scene in another city, compared to a scene in South Bend or Aurora, it will compare and show that the same firearm was used on those two crime scenes," said Hoffman.

The day long instruction program also included federal and state prosecutors, as firearm statutes, case procedures and investigative tips were also on the menu.

Kane County Assistant State's Attorney Lori Anderson told the I-Team the evidence is effective.

"This is how we're actually catching some of the suspects who have gotten away, who were not caught, and the only thing they leave behind is the evidence of their fire shell casings," she said. "And so we are and the more and more departments that connect and put this in-- the more and more chances there are that we're going to catch these people and find them."

The Aurora Police Department houses the ballistic equipment that's available for use by law enforcement agencies from most of Chicago's collar counties, including DuPage, Kane, Kendall, Grundy, Lake, LaSalle and Will.

Alvin Soto is the NIBIN site coordinator in Aurora. It's his job to study what is basically the fingerprint left on the spent shell casings and flag what appears to be a match.

"So six months from now, a year from now, five years from now, that casings' in the system. So if that gun pops up, months from now-- years from now, and gets testified and answered like it should be, there will be a match to that casing," said Soto.

As effective as these tools are in tracking down shooters, connecting crimes and cracking unsolved killings, prosecutors and investigators admit they are still responses to violence.

A magic solution to preventing gun crimes in the first place is still to be determined and the vexing challenge of solving the problem with guns in America and guns in Chicago.

https://abc7chicago.com/chicago-crime-shooting-guns-illinois-gun-laws/11937013/

In many states you still have the gun show loophole where any private gun owner can sell to anyone else with no background check at all gun shows. You live in a state where it's very hard to purchase a gun? Just cross state lines and go to a gun show. It's still legal in many of those states for any private gun owner to sell to anyone with not only no background check but not even an ID needed. And then you make a bunch of noise about how strict gun laws don't work? They don't work because it's easy to go outside their jurisdiction to purchase guns where GOP states make them so easy to get.

Doesnt change the fact that liberal soft on crime laws are a fail and your cities are decaying and crime is spiraling out of control.

My cities? Of course you don't think where all these guns are actually coming from makes any difference. That would be accepting a certain level of accountability that things aren't as cut and dry as you would like to present them to be. You're the one who brought up the failure of strict gun laws. I simply pointed out why they fail. It's because guns are then brought in from states where gun laws are lenient. I know that in your world that doesn't make any difference.

So you support these failed libtard policies then.

You mean that the extreme left yelled defund the police when it never happened? No, I don't support that the far left kept screaming defund the police. I do support that it never actually happened while people such as yourself keep acting like it did.

I support that we don't lock everyone up for non violent crimes but for more serious offenses I do not support low or no bonds.

I suggest that people who support locking everyone up explain where the money for more prisons and jails is to come from. You can only lock up as many people as you have cells to put them in.

Maybe if so many guns weren't brought in from states with relaxed gun laws there wouldn't be as many people getting murdered.

Gary gun shop sued for selling guns used in Chicago crimes

https://apnews.com/article/business-gary-chicago-crime-gun-politics-f66964005c1eea0c38940b4851c2df59

I see that whole accountability thing you posted about in the other thread is a selective thing with you.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/adaman...r-own-police-protection/?sh=cf4b12ad86b4

In 25 major U.S. cities across the country, officials have already cut – or have proposed cutting — funds from police budgets.

However, in as many as 20 of those same cities, mayors and other city officials enjoy the personal protection of a dedicated police security detail. In many cities, this security costs taxpayers millions of dollars per year.

We found that the defunding of police – coupled with taxpayer dollars spent on police security details protecting public officials– only occurred in cities run by Democratic mayors.

In mid-May, our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com filed Freedom of Information Act requests with these 25 cities, asking which city officials have police details, how many officers are assigned, and how much money it costs.


Chicago, Illinois

The city spent $17.3 million between 2015 and 2020 to guard “unnamed city officials.” That’s as Mayor Lori Lightfoot said she’s opposed to defunding police while – we found – 400 police officers positions were quietly cut during 2020.

Security detail cost peaked in 2020 – up $700,000 over five years: $2.7 million spent on 16 officers (2015); $2.9 million for 16 officers (2016); $2.7 million for 20 officers (2017); $2.8 million for 16 officers (2018); $2.8 million for 17 officers (2019); and $3.4 million for 22 officers (2020) – an all-time high.


San Francisco, California

The city spent $12.4 million between 2015 and 2020 to protect the mayor, London Breed. That’s as San Francisco officials promised to divest $120 million from police over two years and reallocate the money into health programs and workforce training.

The mayor’s police security detail cost spiked nearly $1 million over the past five-years.

The police department wouldn’t say how many officers were assigned. However, the city spent $1.7 million (2015); $417,489 (2016); $2.5 million (2017); $2.7 million (2018); $2.5 million (2019); and $2.6 million in 2020.



Forbes Business
00:38
01:12
Rafael Nadal’s Hip Surgery ‘Went Well,’ Faces 5-Month RecoveryHere’s How Americans Really Feel About LGBTQ IssuesAl-Hilal Reveal Date To Announce Lionel Messi Signing: ReportsChurchill Downs Goes Dark In The Wake Of A Dozen Equine Deaths In MayWWE SmackDown Results: Winners And Grades With New World Title Belt (Video)What Should We Do About Medicare?Other Airline Pilots Have Deals. United Pilots Will Have A Strike Authorization Vote
Overbooking Airline Seats Helps Everyone When Done CorrectlyBiden Praises GOP Leaders For ‘Acting Responsibly’ In Debt Ceiling Talks After Rocky NegotiationsThe 10 Best Movies Added To Netflix In June 2023Around 400 Grail Patients Mistakenly Told They Might Have Cancer—Company Blames VendorHow Stephen King Adaptation ‘The Boogeyman’ Scared Up A Hard PG-13
Other Airline Pilots HaveDeals. United Pilots Will Have A Strike Authorization Vote
In San Francisco, the police officers are called “peace officers.”

New York City, New York

The city slashed $1 billion from its $6 billion police budget in 2021, reallocating $354 million to mental health, homelessness and education services. The cuts mostly haven’t yet materialized.


That’s while Mayor Bill de Blasio sports a NYPD security detail. However, the NYPD has not yet responded to our open records request with more detailed cost information.

While de Blasio traveled the country during his failed 2020 presidential campaign, his police detail reportedly cost taxpayers $358,000. His wife and son also have security details, while his daughter canceled her protection a few years ago.

Forbes Daily: Get our best stories, exclusive reporting and essential analysis of the day’s news in your inbox every weekday.

Sign Up
By signing up, you accept and agree to our Terms of Service (including the class action waiver and arbitration provisions), and Privacy Statement.
Baltimore, Maryland

The city spent $3.6 million in 2020 for 14 police to cover the Mayor, Brendon Scott; the States Attorney, Marilyn Mosby; and the Police Commissioner, Michael Harrison. Yet, Baltimore has eliminated about $22 million from its police budget. This story first aired on Fox Baltimore.

Protection for the mayor included six officers and one sergeant, costing almost $2 million.

The state’s attorney has three officers and one sergeant, costing $1.3 million. The police commissioner’s security detail included two officers and one sergeant, costing $464,948.


San Diego, California

The city budgeted for 2021, $2.6 million for 12 full time officers to protect the mayor, Todd Gloria; the city council during meetings; and for city administration building security.

However, the mayor’s budget calls for cutting $4.3 million from the police overtime budget, and spending more than $1 million to set up the new police oversight body, the Commission on Police Practices.


Denver, Colorado

The mayor frequently argues against defunding the police. However, the national media highlights Denver’s policy as a prototype “defund the police” model. The city is beta testing the use of healthcare workers to respond to domestic mental health calls instead of police.

Mayor Michael Hancock’s security detail is comprised of one sergeant and six detectives. In the last six years, the security cost taxpayers nearly $4.2 million: $621,399 (2015); $643,092 (2016); $716,262 (2017); $716,487 (2018); $740,737 (2019); and $746,743 (2020).

MORE FROMFORBES ADVISOR
Best Travel Insurance Companies
ByAmy DaniseEditor
Best Covid-19 Travel Insurance Plans
ByAmy DaniseEditor
Other cities around the country

City spokespeople in St. Louis, MO; Durham, NC; Madison, WI; Rochester, NY and Norman, OK said their officials don’t have a police detail.

In the remaining 20 cities, spokespeople either confirmed that they have police details and included expenditures, or have not yet responded in detail to our open records request. Only one city (Salt Lake) rejected our request.


Our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com continue to follow up with these cities:

In Minneapolis, MN where George Floyd was killed, the city cut $8 million from the police budget to launch a mental health team to respond to certain 911 calls.

In Oakland, CA the city council cut the police budget by $14.6 million, while considering larger cuts down the road.


Portland, OR, cut $15 million from its budget and disbanded a gun violence reduction unit and transit team that had been accused of over-policing Black communities, among other cuts.

The mayor’s 2021 budget for Milwaukee, WI, cut 120 police officers, mostly through attrition and not hiring new officers, cutting about $430,000 from the overall budget. That followed 60 police jobs cut in 2020.


Atlanta, GA, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms said her city has already reallocated around 50% of their corrections budgets to social services and community enhancement initiatives over the past several years, instead of those services being led by police officers.

Georgia banned defunding police – which it defined as cutting budgets by more than 5% in one year or cumulatively across five years.


In Seattle, WA, councilmembers initially pledged to meet activists’ demands and cut the police budget by 50%, but ultimately backtracked, passing a reduction of about 20%. They left vacancies unfilled and moved certain functions, like parking enforcement, out of the police budget.

Los Angeles, CA, approved a $150 million budget cut from its $1.86 billion proposed budget.


A $15 million police budget cut hit Washington D.C., where the Defund the Police movement became a hot button issue in the run-up to the 2020 election.

Philadelphia, PA slashed police funding by $33 million; Hartford, CT cut $1 million from its $40 million budget; and Salt Lake City, UT reduced its police budget by $5.3 million and denied our Freedom of Information Act request.


Austin, TX cut about $20 million from the police department, and moved another $80 million by shifting certain services out of law enforcement.

In Dallas, TX the city council kept the budget mostly intact but cut $7 million from the $24 million overtime budget and reallocated for other uses the in department.


Camden, NJ, was ahead of the curve, disbanding its police force in 2013, laying off all its police and handing its policing over to the county.

CRUCIAL QUOTE

As the New York City Council voted to support a 2021 budget that cuts $1 billion from the NYPD, Council Member Daniel Dromm, chair of the Finance Committee, said,


“We recognize that the City must move away from failed racist policing [policies] of the past. This budget significantly scales back funding for law enforcement at [a] time when crime is at an all-time low and redirects those dollars towards services that uplift our communities during this time of great hardship.”

That statement was made on June 30, 2020, when there was a 130% increase in the number of shooting incidents as compared to the same period the year before. Murders were up 30%, burglaries were up 118% and auto thefts were up 51%, according to NYPD crime stats.

Cuckoo Goper policies on gun control causes more violence in major cities than any liberal policy ever will.

That is a poorly written article written at the time of the George Floyd riots and not really topic relevant.

Yeah, looking at the difference between then and now paint a much different picture..........................

Despite 'defunding' claims, police funding has increased in many US cities

Of 109 budgets analyzed, 91 agencies have upped police funding by at least 2%.

In Los Angeles, the county sheriff says local residents are in danger because "defunding has consequences" -- even though his agency's budget is up more than $250 million since 2019.

Sheriff Alex Villanueva is not alone in suggesting to voters that crime is up because Democrats defunded police agencies after nationwide protests following the 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.

Politicians, pundits and police leaders across the country are repeating the accusation as they address concerns about crime heading toward Election Day.

Yet in many communities, defunding never happened.

ABC Owned Television Stations examined the budgets of more than 100 cities and counties and found that 83% are spending at least 2% more on police in 2022 than in 2019.

Of the 109 budgets analyzed, only eight agencies cut police funds by more than 2%, while 91 agencies increased law enforcement funding by at least 2%.

In 49 cities or counties, police funding has increased by more than 10%.
An 'outbreak of crime'

Despite what the public record shows, an analysis of broadcast transcripts shows that candidates, law enforcement leaders and television hosts discussed the impact of "defunding the police" more than 10,000 times over the last two years, according to the Internet Archive's TV news transcripts dating back to June 2020 -- and the mentions aren't subsiding during this campaign season.

"In communities across the country, like in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Chicago, so many other places, it is this remarkable, incredible, outbreak of crime," Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said in a video posted on Twitter in August by the Republican Governors Association.

"You typically see where these crimes are taking place, there has been a de-emphasis of the role that law enforcement plays. It could be defunding law enforcement. It could be a reduction in law enforcement," Abbott said.

Dr. Rashawn Ray, a sociologist and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told KABC in Los Angeles that this false narrative has persisted due to repetition by public officials.

"Overwhelmingly, cities, counties, police departments across the country are not being defunded in any way," Ray said. "In fact, many of them have increased their budgets. Part of the reason why the 'defund the police' narrative has stayed around is because police officers say it and elected officials say it."

ABC's analysis of police budget data shows police spending has increased in some of the very cities frequently cited by conservative politicians and pundits as places where Democrats' defunding has fueled violent crime waves.

The Los Angeles Police Department's budget is up by 9.4% since 2019. San Francisco's police budget is up by 4% and Philadelphia's is up by 3%.

In Chicago, police spending is up 15%, representing almost a quarter billion dollars in new police spending since 2019.

In Houston, where the homicide rate nearly doubled in both 2020 and 2021 before starting to subside this year, local government officials have increased police spending by nearly 9% -- almost $80 million -- from 2019 to 2022.

President Joe Biden heralded this movement in his 2022 State of the Union address, saying, "The answer is not to defund the police. It's to fund the police. Fund them!" -- a line that drew bipartisan applause.
Perception versus reality

A few cities did try to reallocate police spending following concerns from advocacy groups in the wake of the George Floyd protests.

In Austin, Texas, leaders cut the police budget by about 30% in 2021, proposing to instead spend that money on programs like family violence prevention, mental health responders, and police oversight.

But that lasted only one year. The Texas legislature voted to bar cities in the state from decreasing police budgets, so Austin boosted police spending by 50% in 2022.

In Los Angeles County, where Sheriff Villanueva is engaged in a tight re-election battle, he's been outspoken for months about the impacts of what he describes as the defunding of his agency, claiming that his budget is being "cannibalized."

Yet records show his agency's budget is up about 8% percent -- more than $259 million -- from 2019 to 2022.

"While the perception may be that defunding is taking place, in fact, the sheriff's budget has increased," County Supervisor Kathryn Barger said.

When asked by KABC about his defunding claims, Villanueva acknowledged that his budget is higher -- but not enough to cover rising costs. He said that if day-to-day costs grow faster than his budget, that is "direct defunding, of course."

Barger, in response, said that cost increases impact many county departments and are not unique to the sheriff's department.

"He plays as though he's being targeted," Barger said of Villanueva. "And he's not."

In fact, Los Angeles County's 2023 budget will increase the sheriff's department budget by another quarter of a billion dollars.
An 'impossible environment'

Some in law enforcement say that even more than budget cuts, what's really hurt police departments is anti-police rhetoric.

Following Floyd's murder in 2020, protesters in New York clashed with NYPD officers for days on end. Officers arrested hundreds of protesters each night, and the department says more than 300 officers were among those hurt.

Seeking accountability, some politicians called for $1 billion to be cut from the NYPD's budget.

But the billion-dollar cut never happened. The NYPD's budget fell by just 2.8%, dropping from $5.6 billion in 2019 to $5.4 billion in 2022.

Nevertheless, Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Lynch said the defund movement hurt officer morale.

"More than any budget cut, the greatest damage from the 'Defund the Police' movement was done by its anti-police, anti-public safety message," Lynch told WABC in New York. "It has created an impossible environment on the streets, one where even the simplest interactions turn into a confrontation."

The result was a massive NYPD exodus. Retirements in 2020 skyrocketed 72% from the previous year, and this year the NYPD lost more employees through the month of August than it had during that same time period in any previous year.

"As more cops quit, the workload becomes more crushing for those who remain," Lynch said. "Public safety ultimately suffers."
Being 'all things to everybody'

Criminal justice experts say that even if the cuts were real, the premise that lower police spending leads to increased crime -- or vice versa -- is counter to decades of evidence, according to public data.

An ABC analysis of state and local police funding and overall violent crime data in the U.S. between 1985 and 2020 found no relationship between year-to-year police spending and crime rates. An analysis by the Washington Post found similar results from 1960 to 2018.

Further ABC analysis of Los Angeles County's own crime data shows that, over the last decade, violent crime numbers haven't moved up or down in relation to the amount of money spent on law enforcement or the number of officers on patrol.

Kimberly Dodson, a retired law enforcement officer who is now a criminologist at the University of Houston-Clear Lake, said that's because police largely respond to crime instead of deter it.

"Crime happens. Somebody calls the police, and they come and take a report. Then they try to solve the crime after the fact," Dodson told KTRK in Houston. "So saying that the police deter crime is not actually accurate, because they're more of a reactive agency."

Dodson said one reason police agencies feel stretched is because communities have been asking them to "be all things to everybody -- and that doesn't seem fair."

For example, said Dodson, police these days are asked to respond to problems caused by longstanding mental health issues, family conflicts, or issues related to entrenched poverty that's taken hold over decades.

"We always talked about, as police officers, we go out for 10 minutes and we fix something that's been wrong and put a Band-Aid on it, something that's been wrong for 10 years -- and it's just an impossible task," said the former officer.

Changing that would mean changing the way emergency calls get handled, says Ray.

The Brookings Institution senior fellow is researching ways to narrow the mission of police so they only handle crime and safety, allowing government resources to be reallocated so problems not requiring police intervention could be handled by others.

"Are there better ways by which to think about calls for service, whether that be with mental health responses, whether that be with different sort of traffic officers handling those particular issues?" he said.

Such an arrangement could provide police even more time to focus on solving crimes and protecting people.

"It could actually free them up," said Ray.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/defunding-claims-police-funding-increased-us-cities/story?id=91511971

It's actually true that if you repeat the same things over and over again eventually people will begin to believe it. The facts be damned at that point.

Pit said defunding of police didn’t happen. That article refutes that so it is relevant.

Defunding did take place in many cities. Since then some cities have reversed course. That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.

So none of what you posted actually reflects what has happened since the Floyd riots as of today. You think a snapshot of a situation tells the story. Thanks.

You do realize that Eve was speaking in terms of Democratic policies now, right? That's what I was responding to. She was sighting that as one of the policies that are currently partially responsible for the current crime rates in American cities. Context is very helpful. I'm sorry you lost sight of that.

And of course those claiming that defunding the police is a common occurrence in cities show no stats to prove their point. Just talking heads as usual.

Or drag into the discussion the mayors detail expenses.

They were not dragged into the discussion. They were not mentioned, except by you. The article also was about cities defunding police which was a point of contention.

Most of the people who post in these threads said it should happen. It did -- and it didn't work out. Now that most of the police have been "re-funded", they want to act like it never happened. It's like slight of hand, only at a magic show for third graders.

“We recognize that the City must move away from failed racist policing [policies] of the past. This budget significantly scales back funding for law enforcement at [a] time when crime is at an all-time low and redirects those dollars towards services that uplift our communities during this time of great hardship.”

That statement was made on June 30, 2020, when there was a 130% increase in the number of shooting incidents as compared to the same period the year before. Murders were up 30%, burglaries were up 118% and auto thefts were up 51%, according to NYPD crime stats.

This seems to be the most relevant two sentences from your article. This is plenty damning all by itself --- but the rest of the article seems to talk about how police forces were "defunded" but that money on security details for Mayors and their families was maintained. I'd have thought that would be expected right? If Biden cut the military budget or whichever branch pays for his security detail - the USA isn't going to suddenly reduce security on the POTUS? .... What the article COULD have done but does not - in every examples of where police funds were defunded - were additional funds appropriated to other services thereby reducing the workload of the police (which was the theory behind this). Services all of which were highly trained in a specialized area that the police were less suited and trained to deal with - like domestic disputes? In every example of where police funds were reduced - what happened to the crime numbers in each and every example? They gave us the stats for NYC - and they were really bad. It'd be easy to assume that similar results were experienced in every other example given ... but the fact the article omits to provide that data leads me to think they very deliberately left that data out of the article. Looks like, smells like a hatchet job to me. Selective use of 1 set of crime data while providing minimal data on a dozen or so other cities seems more than suspicious.

When someone starts claiming that's what is happening now as one of the reasons for rising crime rates in cities and it's not happening now, of course you would never suggest that's slight of hand. And actually it's not. It's plainly just a false claim.

Cool story.

Has nothing to do with my reply to someone else.