The LuLac Edition #2120, July 10th, 2012
VIOLENCE IN THE VALLEY
Last weekend, four young people were shot to death in a surreal video game type atmosphere that unfortunately had morbid consequences. Naturally questions were asked, why and how did this happen? If anything, these questions need to be answered not in a public arena but in homes all across this area with young people who need to be guided to make the right choices. But know this:As long as there are people who use drugs, there will be a market to sell them.
As long as people are selling drugs, there will be a potential for violence. Cal it the mini Sopranos version of life here in NEPA. Except this is not a TV show.
As long as there are guns available to teenagers, there will be violence.
As long as there re parents who characterize their child who is selling drugs as “rough around the edges”, there will be violence.
As long as there are parents who might think it would be better for their child to hang out with kids from Nanticoke High (and this is not meant to disparage the majority of good kids there) rather than kids from Scranton Prep in the summer time, there will be violence.
As long as there are parents who want to be their kid’s friend, there will be bad choices.
As long as the local police remain one cop towns on the weekends and we resist a regionalization of a police effort, the little towns will be over matched and over run.
As silly as it sounds, Nancy Reagan had it right. Kids, parents and communities have to start to just say NO.
Then we have to say to the criminal element, GET OUT.
And if they don’t, we have to run them out of town.
If we don’t, this once peaceful area will have a new economy of illegal drugs, guns, violence and candles for all the pointless vigils that will be held for the dead.
posted by David Yonki @ 7:53 PM
3 comments
3 Comments:
Easier said than done Yonk.
1. The old-timers own, homes, have kids, send them away to college. Kids move on to greener pastures. Old timers die.
2. Kids want nothing to do with old houses back in NEPA. Sell them to folks who are buying up properties to rent them as government-subsidized Section 8 housing.
3. But there aren't enough poor people to fill the houses! What to do? Easy: import them from Philadelphia, New York, New Jersey.
4. Imports bring big-city crime and drugs with them - and also a guaranteed revenue stream from the federal government, resulting in taxes being paid to municipalities on properties that would otherwise be vacant.
5. Municipalities could bust residents of section 8 housing for crimes and drugs, maybe even pull the landlords' licenses. And then the revenue stream from the federal government to municipalities dries up.
6. So municipalities turn the other way and continue to pocket tax revenue from Section 8 rental properties.
What to do?
In 1989 George HW Bush made a televised speech to the nation declaring war on drugs. In the infamous address he displayed a bag of crack cocaine and spoke of the problem of addiction.
How'd that all turn out?
As far as I know, his was the last Administration to address drug abuse seriously.
It is not a popular notion, but the only true way to arrest drug abuse is to make the sales legal. If we did not learn anything from the Prohibition era, then we are doomed to repeat the crime and violence of it.
The last thing the scumbags who infiltrate our area with their product would want is for it to become legal. If it is legal and can therefore be regulated and taxed. Perhaps the tax money collected can go to rehab programs. Ask anyone who know someone addicted and they will tell you that most of the rehab centers are makeshift stop and go operations. The truly good ones cost $$$ and lots of it. Many insurances do not even cover the costs.
TO truly believe there is another solution is ludicrous. This problem has been with us for decades and is not lessening but growing. We have a far better chance of balancing our nations budget than curing the ills of drug abuse under present circumstances.
Anyone who believes otherwise is just whistlin' Dixie.
Bless You All
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