Going back to the height of THE pandemic, polling by Gallup showed public confidence in key institutions was low. Even as the news media has pushed narratives focusing on other institutions, the public held the media in very low regard. Like trust in Congress low. There are many reasons to hold the media in low regard. A leading choice since 2020, THE pandemic excuse. That excuse was a favorite for the Associated Press (AP) and others in the media. While ridiculous, the beyond simplistic cover story was used to explain away huge problems caused by horrible public policies. Issues like a crushed economy. Well sure. But also rising violence and even reckless driving. But, this week National Public Radio (NPR) read from a new script. Rising traffic deaths just may have more to do with the consequences from lessened traffic enforcement by the police than Covid. Shocking. Well not really. [Click the link below to read more.]
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At Secure 1776 we waited a week to issue our New Year’s post to make a point. There is no special magic at the stroke of midnight ending the last day of any December. Not with the dropping of a ball in Times Square, nor with the dropping of a musical note in Nashville. Not with the flipping of the calendar to any January 1st. As far as holidays go, New Years commemorates little more than Ground Hog Day does. Time passes. It is true that most of us seek more time. Time to get things right. Many hope to achieve significant accomplishments, and have more time for enjoyment. Yet, individually and as a society we tend to waste a lot of time. We tend not to spend enough of it seeking truth. Such is the case with the public safety crisis that continues in far too many communities. [Click the link below to read more.]
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The Manhattan Institute and its City Journal are premier resources relative to understanding crime and social issues impacting the nation. This is particularly true relative to the struggles of urban life in New York City. On 21 December 2022, City Journal posted an insightful discussion about crime and crime control. What works and what does not work. The exchange is from the 2022 George L. Kelling Lecture hosted by the Manhattan Institute. The lecture featured Raymond Kelly, an impressive leader in the police profession. Kelly served twice as the Commissioner of the New York City Police Department (NYPD). He was among the NYPD leaders that helped to bring about the turnaround in crime in New York City during the 1990s. The lecture should be required learning for all politicians, before they are allowed to tinker with the laws and procedures that are essential to public safety. [Click the link below to read more.]
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The Associated Press (AP) continues to publish stories suggesting a causation link between THE pandemic and crime. No, not investigative journalism seeking to examine whether a virus was created through banned gain of function research. Not journalism suggesting the use of a biological weapon as a war crime. Simply, crime and violence on our streets. AP continues to cite THE pandemic as a key explanation for the continuing lawlessness that exploded in 2020 across America. As we all know, the spark of that explosion occurred in May 2020 in Minneapolis. Yet, let us not forget, that just days before that spark, the news media was citing THE pandemic as the reason why crime in America was declining. It is beyond time to stop using THE pandemic as a bogeyman to gloss over the lawlessness issue that persists in far too much of our nation. [Click the link below to read more.]
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It has long been said, “knowledge is power.” It is important to note that the pronouncement is not “information is power.” In the “Bizzaro World” of the news media, so much of what passes as the “news” is little more than information. The rise of 24-hour cable news has provided more time to pass more information. But, often the platform simply passes the same information in a mind-numbing extended loop whose output does not foster actual knowledge. Pseudo-knowledge is advanced through the frequent use of split-screen commentators and political operatives advancing their own narratives. These often competing narratives generally distort true factual analysis, and they often end in an incomprehensible mash of over-talking and shouting. This phenomenon crosses the spectrum of political, social, and daily-life topics, particularly when there is an overlap into politics. Lawlessness is one of these topics. Even the local – allegedly straight news – news programming runs a steady flow of lawless incident-of-the-day segments, particularly when the incidents are violent with shock-seeking video. These segments are generally little more than sensationalized information, and rarely is their presentation one that advances knowledge. Secure 1776 offers this “cops ask questions” question in Latin: “Cui bono?” Translation: “Who benefits?” [Click the link below to read more.]
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Last November we posted an editorial on how the City of Chicago, under the administration of Mayor Lori Lightfoot, closed its only Juvenile Intervention and Support Center (JISC). In December, Secure 1776 followed up with an analysis of carjackings and the connections to juvenile crime. Carjackings have spiked across the country since 2020. An escalating carjacking problem has been particularly noteworthy in urban areas. Many cities have experienced a continuing surge. But the problem is particularly evident in Chicago. Yesterday, 7 February 2022, Mayor Lightfoot held a press conference with Chicago Police Department (CPD) Superintendent David Brown, a representative from the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office and other officials. In the press conference, Mayor Lightfoot indicated that half of those arrested in connection to Chicago’s carjackings are juveniles. She also made an interesting statement on the cause of the rising juvenile crime connection – “remote learning.” [Click the link below to read more.]
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Journalism and politics are supposed to be two professions comprised of smart people. Smart people that have the ability to correctly connect the dots. However, a divided political landscape has encouraged a deliberate blindness. The result, some of the smart people do connect the dots, but they don’t want you to do so. Instead they rely on the old magician’s trick of distractions. For example, their most recent go to: “it’s the pandemic.” An answer big enough to cover nearly every failure. Failing schools. The pandemic. A crashed economy. The pandemic. But, even with these issues it would be more accurate to say the failures were the response to the pandemic, not the pandemic. Covid didn’t, month after month, close schools or lockdown the economy for most Americans (lest we forget, big pharma and Amazon did great). Politicians, unelected bureaucrats (one in government for 50-plus years), and a complicit media led that charge. To say Covid is the cause for the rise in gun violence AND reckless driving? Please. Even a magician would be embarrassed by that sleight of hand. No, the dots to be connected there do not end at “the pandemic.” The “connect the dots” answer is that our political elites and the media have sought to blame a virus for their increasing acceptance of lawlessness. [Click the link below to read more.]
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