Anyone who knows even the least little bit about guns knows that even the lowly, tiny .22 caliber bullet travels at a high velocity and is DANGEROUS, able to cause injury, within at least a mile, and sometimes more, if it's a .22 LR (Long Rifle) cartridge!
Is this the type of "meaningful dialogue" Michael J. Harrington spoke of recently? Is HE out on the streets tonight convincing these people that it is DANGEROUS to fire weapons indiscriminately? Or, is he, too, hiding in his "safe and secure" home?
The manner in which these THUGS obtain the guns is what should be determined, then STOPPED! Please...don't tell me they're out there tonight firing weapons to PROTECT themselves, that they even OWN the guns to protect themselves.
This silly, DANGROUS tradition must be ended! Maybe Joe would like to "step up to the plate" and address this issue. Joe, oh Joe Moore, where art thou?
Happy New Year to you too, Craig! Anyway, I see it's crazy already up in Rogers Park. There's too many stuff to actually cover down here. I hope you have a safe night and be careful.
Is your comment here about me witty, snide, or just snarky? I can't figure it out. It sounds like you're expressing some frustration, but it's misdirected when you target me for abuse.
Maybe I'd come up short in your estimation, but I'd be willing to meet you and compare my bio with yours anytime. I'll share any info you want about my years of Rogers Park activism and advocacy, both as a tenant and now as a homeowner. There are many current examples I can cite regarding my own investment of time, energy, and $$ to help improve our community.
Also, you may have forgotten or just don't know, fighting crime on our streets and understanding its linkage to community development were prominent themes of the two hard fought 49th Ward Aldermanic campaigns I've managed here: in 2003, with myself as the candidate for alderman, and then in 2007 as the campaign manager for aldermanic candidate Don Gordon.
I proudly worked for and supported Gordon because, among other things, we agreed on the need for (a) aggressive responses to daily criminal behavior and (b) comprehensive planning for long-term crime prevention regarding youth at-risk. We still need both. We can't expect to be effective if we tackle only one side of the coin and ignore the other. Unfortunately, this important point seems lost on a lot of folks who post on this blog.
Whatever the intent of your "hiding" comment about me, it surely seems at odds with the positive sentiments you expressed on New Year's Eve. You concluded your comments with, "Let's decide, for once and for all, to be CIVILIZED and move toward the future--only WE can create it for ourselves."
I am happy to meet for coffee whenever you (or anyone else) wants to talk face2face. You can email me at michaelharring@gmail.com, and rest assured that our discussion will be kept confidential.
Happy New Year and all the best to you and all our neighbors!
A photo was posted recently of a young man flashing gang signs while standing in front of 7653 N Ashland. This young man was a suspect in the murder of the young man on Jarvis.
Multiple shots were fired last night from 7653 N Ashland.
Finally we are getting to the heart of the matter. From MJH's previous post "(a) aggressive responses to daily criminal behavior and (b) comprehensive planning for long-term crime prevention regarding youth at-risk..." Mr. Harrington, the frustration that folks like Grammar Gal and myself express (and I agree that it's harsh...my apologies...I will try to tone it down) is that (b) seems to overshadow (a). Or rather any perceived failure or deficiency in (b) is an excuse to tolerate (a). The teen thugs (sorry "at-risk youth") even use that excuse all the time, just read their posts from last week. Personally I feel that there is already plenty of (b) and things aren't getting better.
Also Mr. Harrington, I'm curious to know your thoughts as to what types of "comprehensive planning for crime prevention" programs you suggest are NOT currently used? Educate us.
The "comprehensive planning for crime prevention" that is not being used is rigorous screening of tenants by landlords in this area, which is the dumping ground of choice for the unplaceable tenants from the defunct projects, who no one else wants because of their rap sheets, or their overly large families. The good tenants of the projects were placed elsewhere. Our alderman and his slumlord buddies have signalled that Rogers Park will accommodate any number of bad landlords and problem tenants as long as the property owners are good contributors and friends of Joe's.
Another Crime Prevention tactic that is underused is control of the sales of weapons. While you can't buy one in Chicago, you can go right over the city line and buy your choice from scores of gun dealers. Please don't tell me that these places qualify their buyers, or work aggressively to prevent "straw buyers" from buying for convicted thugs. They will sell to anyone who walks in the door, who presents appropriate ID and passes a background check, like a local thug's girlfriend. It amuses the hell out of me that so many right-wingers scream about our right to bear arms but can't understand for the life of them why our streets are flooded with so many weapons, in the hands of people who clearly should not have access to them.
We get it from both sides. We have dozens of apartment buildings run by profiteering landlords who benefit from running slums via "liberal" housing programs like Section 8, and 60s-leftist "affordable housing" advocates who work in lockstep with slumlords to flood our neighborhood with convicted thugs and welfare mothers. We then get it from "conservatives" who don't even want to impose conditions such as a registration requirement and traceable ownership, a reasonable background check, a pre-purchase waiting period sufficient to do a thorough criminal record check, or a training requirement, on gun ownership.
Michael Harrington's statements are reasonable and in time. We DO need to reach "at risk" youth and we need to provide our local youth with alternatives to gangbanging, brawling, and shooting each other. We had better use every tool in our box to meet with the situation, especially rigorous law enforcement in combination with efforts to reach youth before they become enlisted in destructive lifestyles, because we are going to have many more such youth to deal with as this recession deepens and more and more people fall out of the middle class and the poor sink into deeper poverty.
NorthCoast, it may amuse you that so many of these "right wingers" scream about the right to bear arms but what amuses me is the need of some to label people who support the Constitution as anything. Why is a person who supports the 2nd a "right winger"? Why is that person anything other than a citizen who believes in the Constitution? Don't we all support the Constitution, left or right? While I won't define my political leanings, I can tell you that I support the entire Constitution including the 2nd. and I can hardly be called a "right winger". Stop blaming the object and start holding the person who commits the act accountable. Perhaps if we had a legitimate judicial system that did just that, the idea of firing a gun into the air on New Years eve would be less acceptable to some. All Americans should and do have the right to bear arms. It has nothing to do with leaning left or right. How can you possibly trust a government that denies you the right to defend yourself as they do here in the State of Illinois? How can you trust a government that denies you that right but yet feels that things are so dangerous that the same people that create those laws are surrounded by a small army of armed Police Officers. How can you trust those that create those laws but fail to abide by them themselves like Roland Burris who champions the denial of the right to self defense but yet keeps a firearm which he "forgot about" in his home?
Big Daddy, I believe we have the right to gun ownership. I'm the last person to prevent a law-abiding citizen from keeping a gun in his own home.
However, that should not preclude reasonable regulation requirements, such as a registration requirement and traceable ownership, a history of custody of the weapon, proof of financial responsibility, and certain restrictions on its use.
After all, we have the right to own real property, and we have the right to own a multitude of other things, like motor vehicles, or poisonous chemicals, that entail great responsibility and/or can cause great harm. Shall my right to own a car include the right to own one without registering it or displaying proof that I know how to operate it, or displaying unique identification such as a license plate so that if I run someone down in it, my vehicle can be traced?
I find it unbelievable that anyone could consider it a good idea for gun ownership and custody to be untraceable.
The pro-gun contingent in this country strenuously resists the reasonable regulation and restrictions on gun ownership, that have always applied to real property, motor vehicles, certain types of substances, and other items in this country. You have to produce more personal proofs to buy rat poison or spray paint in most cities, than you do to buy a powerful firearm at a gun show in out-state IL, or Texas, or St. Louis- a city where, you will note, the right to carry a concealed firearm has NOT contributed to a decline in murder rates, to say the least. That place has become more dangerous than ever since MO liberalized the carry laws.
As long as merchants are looking at steep fines for selling cigs to minors, and we are prosecuting people for abusing prescription painkillers, could we at least ride herd on gun dealers who sell these things to obvious straw buyers and otherwise help arm the gangs of Chicago? Could we have a long enough waiting period to do a thorough criminal background check on potential buyers? Could we have reasonable restrictions on the types of weapons the public is permitted to buy, or should anyone who can produce the cash be permitted to arm himself with any type of firepower he can afford, clear up to tanks and mines?
Laura, no reasonable man who respects and loves the Constitution is against REASONABLE registration measures. Nowhere in my post will you see anything mentioned regarding that. What we ARE against are phoney smoke and mirror, dog and pony shows whose only purpose is to make the public think that something is being done about the crime issue. Nobody wants to hold anybody accountable for what they do. It's easier for the local politicians to hold an OBJECT accountable rather than the person who USES that object. And as far as less restrictive gun laws having no difference in places where they have been enacted, do some more research. Honest rsearch not published by the Brady people. The only thing gun laws that exist inplaces like Chicago accomplish is to make criminals out of otherwise law abiding citizens. Rather than doing that, how about demanding a judicial system that punishes the criminal. Yesterday a man was arrested in my area that had a rap sheet that was 28 PAGES LONG! Why is he out and about preying on the community? Why is he not in jail? Why are we not demanding that people like him remain incarcerated? Why are we not marching and demanding that judges,parole and corrections departments do their jobs and keep these people off the street instead of giving them freedom?
10 comments:
Anyone who knows even the least little bit about guns knows that even the lowly, tiny .22 caliber bullet travels at a high velocity and is DANGEROUS, able to cause injury, within at least a mile, and sometimes more, if it's a .22 LR (Long Rifle) cartridge!
Is this the type of "meaningful dialogue" Michael J. Harrington spoke of recently? Is HE out on the streets tonight convincing these people that it is DANGEROUS to fire weapons indiscriminately? Or, is he, too, hiding in his "safe and secure" home?
The manner in which these THUGS obtain the guns is what should be determined, then STOPPED! Please...don't tell me they're out there tonight firing weapons to PROTECT themselves, that they even OWN the guns to protect themselves.
This silly, DANGROUS tradition must be ended! Maybe Joe would like to "step up to the plate" and address this issue. Joe, oh Joe Moore, where art thou?
Happy New Year to you too, Craig! Anyway, I see it's crazy already up in Rogers Park. There's too many stuff to actually cover down here. I hope you have a safe night and be careful.
Dear Neighbor Grammar Gal,
Is your comment here about me witty, snide, or just snarky? I can't figure it out. It sounds like you're expressing some frustration, but it's misdirected when you target me for abuse.
Maybe I'd come up short in your estimation, but I'd be willing to meet you and compare my bio with yours anytime. I'll share any info you want about my years of Rogers Park activism and advocacy, both as a tenant and now as a homeowner. There are many current examples I can cite regarding my own investment of time, energy, and $$ to help improve our community.
Also, you may have forgotten or just don't know, fighting crime on our streets and understanding its linkage to community development were prominent themes of the two hard fought 49th Ward Aldermanic campaigns I've managed here: in 2003, with myself as the candidate for alderman, and then in 2007 as the campaign manager for aldermanic candidate Don Gordon.
I proudly worked for and supported Gordon because, among other things, we agreed on the need for (a) aggressive responses to daily criminal behavior and (b) comprehensive planning for long-term crime prevention regarding youth at-risk. We still need both. We can't expect to be effective if we tackle only one side of the coin and ignore the other. Unfortunately, this important point seems lost on a lot of folks who post on this blog.
Whatever the intent of your "hiding" comment about me, it surely seems at odds with the positive sentiments you expressed on New Year's Eve. You concluded your comments with, "Let's decide, for once and for all, to be CIVILIZED and move toward the future--only WE can create it for ourselves."
I am happy to meet for coffee whenever you (or anyone else) wants to talk face2face. You can email me at michaelharring@gmail.com, and rest assured that our discussion will be kept confidential.
Happy New Year and all the best to you and all our neighbors!
A photo was posted recently of a young man flashing gang signs while standing in front of 7653 N Ashland. This young man was a suspect in the murder of the young man on Jarvis.
Multiple shots were fired last night from 7653 N Ashland.
Is this a coincidence?
Finally we are getting to the heart of the matter. From MJH's previous post "(a) aggressive responses to daily criminal behavior and (b) comprehensive planning for long-term crime prevention regarding youth at-risk..." Mr. Harrington, the frustration that folks like Grammar Gal and myself express (and I agree that it's harsh...my apologies...I will try to tone it down) is that (b) seems to overshadow (a). Or rather any perceived failure or deficiency in (b) is an excuse to tolerate (a). The teen thugs (sorry "at-risk youth") even use that excuse all the time, just read their posts from last week. Personally I feel that there is already plenty of (b) and things aren't getting better.
Also Mr. Harrington, I'm curious to know your thoughts as to what types of "comprehensive planning for crime prevention" programs you suggest are NOT currently used? Educate us.
The "comprehensive planning for crime prevention" that is not being used is rigorous screening of tenants by landlords in this area, which is the dumping ground of choice for the unplaceable tenants from the defunct projects, who no one else wants because of their rap sheets, or their overly large families. The good tenants of the projects were placed elsewhere. Our alderman and his slumlord buddies have signalled that Rogers Park will accommodate any number of bad landlords and problem tenants as long as the property owners are good contributors and friends of Joe's.
Another Crime Prevention tactic that is underused is control of the sales of weapons. While you can't buy one in Chicago, you can go right over the city line and buy your choice from scores of gun dealers. Please don't tell me that these places qualify their buyers, or work aggressively to prevent "straw buyers" from buying for convicted thugs. They will sell to anyone who walks in the door, who presents appropriate ID and passes a background check, like a local thug's girlfriend. It amuses the hell out of me that so many right-wingers scream about our right to bear arms but can't understand for the life of them why our streets are flooded with so many weapons, in the hands of people who clearly should not have access to them.
We get it from both sides. We have dozens of apartment buildings run by profiteering landlords who benefit from running slums via "liberal" housing programs like Section 8, and 60s-leftist "affordable housing" advocates who work in lockstep with slumlords to flood our neighborhood with convicted thugs and welfare mothers. We then get it from "conservatives" who don't even want to impose conditions such as a registration requirement and traceable ownership, a reasonable background check, a pre-purchase waiting period sufficient to do a thorough criminal record check, or a training requirement, on gun ownership.
Michael Harrington's statements are reasonable and in time. We DO need to reach "at risk" youth and we need to provide our local youth with alternatives to gangbanging, brawling, and shooting each other. We had better use every tool in our box to meet with the situation, especially rigorous law enforcement in combination with efforts to reach youth before they become enlisted in destructive lifestyles, because we are going to have many more such youth to deal with as this recession deepens and more and more people fall out of the middle class and the poor sink into deeper poverty.
NorthCoast, it may amuse you that so many of these "right wingers" scream about the right to bear arms but what amuses me is the need of some to label people who support the Constitution as anything. Why is a person who supports the 2nd a "right winger"? Why is that person anything other than a citizen who believes in the Constitution? Don't we all support the Constitution, left or right? While I won't define my political leanings, I can tell you that I support the entire Constitution including the 2nd. and I can hardly be called a "right winger". Stop blaming the object and start holding the person who commits the act accountable. Perhaps if we had a legitimate judicial system that did just that, the idea of firing a gun into the air on New Years eve would be less acceptable to some. All Americans should and do have the right to bear arms. It has nothing to do with leaning left or right. How can you possibly trust a government that denies you the right to defend yourself as they do here in the State of Illinois? How can you trust a government that denies you that right but yet feels that things are so dangerous that the same people that create those laws are surrounded by a small army of armed Police Officers. How can you trust those that create those laws but fail to abide by them themselves like Roland Burris who champions the denial of the right to self defense but yet keeps a firearm which he "forgot about" in his home?
Big Daddy, I believe we have the right to gun ownership. I'm the last person to prevent a law-abiding citizen from keeping a gun in his own home.
However, that should not preclude reasonable regulation requirements, such as a registration requirement and traceable ownership, a history of custody of the weapon, proof of financial responsibility, and certain restrictions on its use.
After all, we have the right to own real property, and we have the right to own a multitude of other things, like motor vehicles, or poisonous chemicals, that entail great responsibility and/or can cause great harm. Shall my right to own a car include the right to own one without registering it or displaying proof that I know how to operate it, or displaying unique identification such as a license plate so that if I run someone down in it, my vehicle can be traced?
I find it unbelievable that anyone could consider it a good idea for gun ownership and custody to be untraceable.
The pro-gun contingent in this country strenuously resists the reasonable regulation and restrictions on gun ownership, that have always applied to real property, motor vehicles, certain types of substances, and other items in this country. You have to produce more personal proofs to buy rat poison or spray paint in most cities, than you do to buy a powerful firearm at a gun show in out-state IL, or Texas, or St. Louis- a city where, you will note, the right to carry a concealed firearm has NOT contributed to a decline in murder rates, to say the least. That place has become more dangerous than ever since MO liberalized the carry laws.
As long as merchants are looking at steep fines for selling cigs to minors, and we are prosecuting people for abusing prescription painkillers, could we at least ride herd on gun dealers who sell these things to obvious straw buyers and otherwise help arm the gangs of Chicago? Could we have a long enough waiting period to do a thorough criminal background check on potential buyers? Could we have reasonable restrictions on the types of weapons the public is permitted to buy, or should anyone who can produce the cash be permitted to arm himself with any type of firepower he can afford, clear up to tanks and mines?
Laura, no reasonable man who respects and loves the Constitution is against REASONABLE registration measures. Nowhere in my post will you see anything mentioned regarding that. What we ARE against are phoney smoke and mirror, dog and pony shows whose only purpose is to make the public think that something is being done about the crime issue. Nobody wants to hold anybody accountable for what they do. It's easier for the local politicians to hold an OBJECT accountable rather than the person who USES that object. And as far as less restrictive gun laws having no difference in places where they have been enacted, do some more research. Honest rsearch not published by the Brady people. The only thing gun laws that exist inplaces like Chicago accomplish is to make criminals out of otherwise law abiding citizens. Rather than doing that, how about demanding a judicial system that punishes the criminal. Yesterday a man was arrested in my area that had a rap sheet that was 28 PAGES LONG! Why is he out and about preying on the community? Why is he not in jail? Why are we not demanding that people like him remain incarcerated? Why are we not marching and demanding that judges,parole and corrections departments do their jobs and keep these people off the street instead of giving them freedom?
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