THE QUOTE OF THE DAY

Today\’s quote comes to us from Jason Riley, Wall Street Journal columnist and member of its editorial board.

Here is Mr. Riley\’s take on the claim that there is an epidemic of police killing innocent young Black men, and the riots/looting/arson we have seen after several such alleged police killings this year:

“When the Watts riots happened, Watts had a substantial and growing Black middle class. When the Detroit riots happened, Black unemployment in Detroit was lower than the national average for Whites. Again, a big Black middle class. Those populations then fled after the riots and the economic deprivation set in.

“…I agree that we have underlying problems here, and the underlying problem is a false narrative that continues to be pushed, not only by the prosecutor but by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama and the protesters and all of the rest who are pretending that we have an epidemic of Black men dying at the hands of police. That is not an epidemic. That is exceptional. That is rare. What is normal is young Black men dying at the hands of other Black men, and they do not want to talk about that.

Is Mr. Riley correct?  Well, I better agree with him since I have written literally dozens of blogs making the same point about Black on Black crime that he is making.

At this point, let me repost a quote from Dennis Prager on this subject, which I originally put up about two weeks ago:

The problem with the mantra and the hysteria is not that no Blacks are ever killed unjustifiably by police. The problem is that it is so rare as to constitute a libel.

 

In 2013, of America\’s 6,261 Black homicide victims, more than 6,000 of them – 97 percent – were killed by people other than police. About 3 percent of Black homicide victims were killed by police. And of that 3 percent, nearly every one was armed and dangerous. To label that an epidemic of police racism is a libel.

 

In addition, more than nine out of every ten Blacks murdered were murdered by another Black person. Now that is an epidemic – an epidemic of Black murderers. (In response, it is pointed out that about 83 percent of Whites are murdered by Whites. But there is no equivalency here. Blacks murder at nearly eight times the rate Whites do – 34.4 per 100,000 versus 4.5 per 100,000.)

There are the numbers.  There are the facts.  Do they coincide with the “epidemic of police killing innocent young Black men” meme we have heard so many times since the Michael Brown shooting, through Freddie Gray\’s death?

We are experiencing a true racial disaster in this country.  But not one brought on by police.  The racial disaster in this country is largely (not exclusively, but largely) brought on by decades of treating Black citizens as second class inferior beings who cannot succeed on their own or be expected to take responsibility for their actions, and therefore have to be given things – more and more things – to keep them going. 

This has decimated the Black middle class that, in the face of ugly racism, nonetheless existed decades ago.  And, by paying money/financially rewarding out-of-wedlock births, has facilitated the 72% out-of-wedlock rate among Black citizens.

Is this something that is indigenous to Black people generally?  Absolutely, emphatically not.  Black people can, and do, function perfectly well, and some excel.  Just as non-Blacks do.

But that does not change the fact that endless handout programs which do not work, coupled with politicians demanding that there be more and more such programs anyway, as if they are a desirable end in themselves, have gone a long way toward destroying Black families and Black neighborhoods.

And which political party is the one pushing these “solutions” – that have resulted in the situations you see in cities like Baltimore, and so many others, throughout the United States?  The party which now reaps the political benefit of promising to give more and more to the people it has helped to make so dependent that they cling to it like abused children to their parents?

I won\’t bother to write the answer, since we both know it.

I award Jason Riley Quote Of The Day honors for speaking truthfully about something that, especially for a man in his position, it is such a third rail to speak truthfully about.  It takes a lot of courage to do that, and people who have that level of courage deserve to be honored.

Congratulations, Mr. Riley.  I am sure I join you in wishing that you were wrong.