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Eminentoes
The Legacy of Kwame Kilpatrick
Detroit’s former mayor made history by destroying it.
Disgraced former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick carries himself a bit like a cool teacher, and for a time in the 1990s he was just that. He reveals in his new memoir Surrendered!: The Rise, Fall, and Revelation of Kwame Kilpatrick that he smoked pot while teaching at Marcus Garvey Academy in Detroit, but he was good at his job and the kids liked him. Yeah, he was spuriously taking food stamps as a young man, but, come on, he was getting himself through Florida A&M and actually graduating. Even in his mugshot (which, in the media, is often cropped side-by-side with that of his chief of staff/mistress Christine Beatty) Kwame looks like he’s about to remind you to get that C-average up so you can go out for varsity this year, man.
Kilpatrick was released this week from the G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility in Jackson, Michigan after serving fifteen months for “failing to disclose assets and surrender funds that could have reduced his $1 million restitution to the city.” He’s free for the moment, but still will face trial on various other corruption charges stemming from his mayoralty, and may likely end up back behind bars.
The gregarious son of former Michigan congresswoman Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, Kwame, 41, writes in the book that what “brought him down” — i.e. encouraged certain people to dig up his corruption scandals — was a March 2007 Saviour’s Day event at Ford Field, at which he warmly greeted Louis Farrakhan. He’s way off. This isn’t the mid-Nineties, when people thought Farrakhan was a serious threat to the country. Nowadays, most people view the Bowtied One much as they view Castro — with their fear and loathing preserved safely in memory, and without too much outrage should celebrities choose to hang out with him.
If Kwame feels like he harmed his standing among Detroit old-timers and marshaled the city’s influential families against him, then he might have done it a year later, when he tore down Tiger Stadium. Built in 1912 and opened the same day as Fenway Park, Tiger Stadium was a cramped “cigar box” ballpark conducive to high-scoring games and an authentic experience for fans, with all those quirky “obstructed view” seats. Over the years it grew into a city landmark, a paternal touchstone among Detroit’s white working class, tended over by great Tiger owners like railroad tycoon Walter Briggs Sr. (1935-52) and his son Walter Briggs Jr. (1952-56), radio executive John Fetzer (1956-83) and beloved Domino’s Pizza founder and Catholic philanthropist Tom Monaghan (1983-92).
When Monaghan sold the team to Little Caesars Pizza founder Mike Ilitch (a laissez-faire baseball owner merely interested in consolidating his local sports empire, which includes the Detroit Red Wings) in 1992, the organization took a left turn. Like a true Democrat (Ilitch is a major Chuck Schumer and Harry Reid contributor) Ilitch increased spending and drove his organization into debt. By 2005, the Tigers carried one of the biggest payrolls in baseball despite embarrassing ticket-revenue results, and showed a debt-to-value rate of 84% (third-worst in MLB). Ballpark security was gutted and sportswriters started observing homeless people sleeping on the premises. Though Kilpatrick’s predecessor, Mayor Dennis Archer, proposed a popular $200 million plan to preserve the stadium, with new lofts, shops, and a swimming pool, Illitch bristled at the idea, chased off interested developers and hinted that he’d move the team elsewhere unless he got a new stadium. After the 1999 season, Illitch’s Tigers moved out of Tiger Stadium and into newly-built Comerica Park (with Illitch splitting the new stadium’s $350 million tab with taxpayers and federal grants).
So Tiger Stadium — the house that Ty Cobb built — sat there empty and unused in the historic Corktown neighborhood: Detroit’s onetime west-side depository for Irish potato-famine victims and later, as the auto-industry provided surrounding merchant jobs, for the city’s German Jews (few moments in the Ken Burns Baseball documentary were as funny or moving as when two old men recalled listening to Hank Greenberg’s Tigers on the radio during synagogue). Tiger loyalists petitioned the city to at least find another use for it, and the municipal government seemed receptive. Archer opened talks with various developers, who pitched plans for mixed-use condominiums, dog racing, boxing, off-road racing, professional soccer, and live concerts. Archer also entertained local entrepreneur Peter Comstock Riley’s plan to lease the field for his new Frontier League franchise, and thus keep baseball at Tiger Stadium alive. Peter Zeiler, the business development representative for the Detroit Economic Growth Corporation (DEGC) and a major advocate of Tiger Stadium preservation, told ESPN, “Nobody wants to shoot Old Yeller.”
Then, in 2001, Detroit elected 31-year-old Kwame Kilpatrick: America’s first “hip-hop mayor.” Not yet born when Denny McLain pitched the Tigers into the ‘68 World Series against the Cardinals, Kwame ignored Zeiler, tabled Comstock Riley’s plan, and set about demolishing Tiger Stadium. He may have started listening to Cleveland State urban affairs professor Mark Rosentraub, who publicly argued that no ballpark had ever been redeveloped after a new stadium was built, that demolishing the park would cost only $4.5 million (according to John Adamo Jr. of Adamo Demolition) and that the city could make quick money auctioning off seats, lockers, and dirt from the playing field. “The nostalgia market — you can do very well” Rosentraub said. So Kilpatrick traveled to Las Vegas in 2003, and again in 2004, to pitch the Tiger Stadium lot to retailers like Wal-Mart and Kohl’s. Though Tiger Stadium preservation movements intensified, and despite the park’s listing on the National Register of Historic Places, Kilpatrick continued to pursue demolition plans.
By early 2008, demolition was a foregone conclusion, and
it came time for the city to hand out a contract. By then, insiders
noticed that most big-money city contracts were going to Bobby
Ferguson, the son of legendary Detroit contractor Homer Ferguson,
and a family friend to Mayor Kilpatrick. Kwame had recently held up
a $50 million sewer-lining contract until the winning bidder agreed
to pay Ferguson, and then inflated the contract to a ridiculous
$137 million so that Ferguson — who did no work on the project —
could walk away with a $24.7 million cut. Everyone knew that Tiger
Stadium was going down, and that Bobby Ferguson was getting the
demolition contract. So when a lone, still-unnamed official at the
DEGC spoke up against the burgeoning plan — citing the fact that
Ferguson was not low bidder on the demolition project —
Kwame Kilpatrick tried to get the official fired. The official
stood his ground, prompting Kilpatrick to send
his staffer Kandia Milton to the DEGC office to ask for that
official’s resignation. Ferguson lost the contract, but demolition
went forward — after the new contractors agreed to finance the
project by selling Tiger Stadium scrap metal.
The wrecking ball hit on June 30, 2008, and demolition concluded the following September. The opening scene in the HBO series Hung painfully depicted the process, and Detroit’s own Mitch Albom played Philip Roth-on-Newark in the pages of Jewish World Review. Comstock Riley publicly mourned: “Tiger Stadium deserved better.” It did. If Red Sox fans suffered an 86-year curse merely because owner Harry Frazee sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees to finance his Broadway show No No, Nanette, then “Kwame’s Curse,” borne of crooked dealings and blatant disregard for tradition, will likely be much worse. In a sense, Kwame’s destruction of Tiger Stadium marked the defining moment of his mayoralty, the day that Detroit officially changed forever.
Beginning from the city’s industrialization, Detroit’s political machine — like Philadelphia’s — was Republican, and the mayor was usually a nationally-prominent businessman, like entrepreneur Oscar Marx (1913-1918), railroad-tycoon James Couzens (1919-1922) or Albert Cobo (1950-57) a Burroughs Corporation executive who the company “loaned” to the city of Detroit for mayoral duties. Everyone was somebody’s son or nephew, and everybody was a Republican. With the auto industry booming, Detroit’s GOP machine governed with firm popular support.
The machine broke down with progressive crusader Jerome Cavanaugh’s historic 1961 election as a Democrat, his marches with Martin Luther King Jr., and the devastating 1967 race riots. As the North Side Irish of Chicago drifted out to the suburbs of Evanston and Oak Park and started commuting to Wrigley Field, so too did vast numbers of Detroit’s conservative city-Irish leave Detroit, and Tiger Stadium with it. All of Detroit’s past seven mayors starting with Cavanaugh have been Democrats.
Kwame Kilpatrick — the son of two Baby Boomer Detroit politicians — was the first second-generation leader of Detroit’s Democrat political machine. His six-year mayoralty, then, holds historic significance. With his cool-teacher antics and sappy business dealings, mediocre Kwame — his funny little grin usually plastered on his chubby little face — proved, simply by occupying the mayor’s office, the existence of a relatively-young postwar political machine. His demolition of Tiger Stadium made perfect sense. Kwame was the living embodiment of New Detroit, and so naturally he tore the symbol of Old Detroit to the ground.
Kwame will return to U.S. District Court in Detroit next summer to face further public corruption indictments in an ongoing, taxpayer-funded legal saga. “Assault” even appears in the litany of charges against him (apparently he shoved an investigator delivering his friend a perjury subpoena). Regardless of the outcome, Kilpatrick will be impossible to ignore in the annals of city history (though not for his criminality, for which he’ll stand out like “Waldo”). Little Kwame bridged the influence of Detroit’s liberal political machine into a new generation, and burned the last proud vestige of prosperous, conservative middle-class Detroit.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (78) | Leave a comment
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RJ| 8.5.11 @ 6:57AM
A thug is a thug no matter how hard he tries and his fellow thugs try to hide it. This little big man thought his physical size matched his intellect, when in fact it only mirrored his malignant narcissism.
massmile | 8.5.11 @ 9:50AM
It was Mayor Young who stood at the helm of what became "Our City" to the blacks in Detroit. It was Mayor Young who brought the ways of Communism to Detroit (Young called himself a Communist), and its resultant demise.
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Alan Brooks| 8.5.11 @ 11:57AM
Kwame did nothing wrong compared to what Nixon did--but Nixon didn't spend one second in jail or prison.
pete66| 8.5.11 @ 12:42PM
well....you guys got your make up call with Bill Clinton Lying under oath About Monica. unless I'm mistaken if it would have been you or me lying, we would have gone to Jail.
Groad| 8.5.11 @ 4:27PM
Just what did Nixon do that would have justified your assinine comment??
Redstateboy| 8.5.11 @ 4:37PM
congratulations Alan Brooks.. you've made many brain dead Liber-ul blatherings here.. but this was one of your more goofy ones.
emo| 8.5.11 @ 7:01PM
Youre right Kwame never took us off the gold standard or passed a ton of leftist economic regulations...Detroit was already ruined when Kwame got there
Joseph| 8.7.11 @ 4:05PM
Brooks, you are the biggest idiot.
Jeff R| 8.5.11 @ 7:28AM
Kwame - a complete lightweight and idiot. No, make that a corrupt lightweight and idiot.
With leaders like Kwame, any wonder why Detroit - not just Tiger Stadium - has been wrecked?
Michael Tomlinson| 8.5.11 @ 7:42AM
Just like Obama is trying to destroy America.
Melvin| 8.5.11 @ 7:45AM
Like his brethren in Chicago, Rahm Emanual, Richard, "The King," Daley have made small kingdoms from their corruption.
I guess a person could say that corruption is the most bipartisan and diverse part of politicians there is.
Political corruption and graft doesn't care what color or gender a person is, and doesn't care what political party that person belongs to.
Corruption is a siren song to those of whom are weak minded, no morals, and a lack of shame. Kwame Kilpatrick was a affirmative action mayor, who through his entire life been told how Black Americans have been held back from the economic prosperity that this Country offered Whites. Through his college years he had this economic disparity reinforced and when he become Mayor of Detroit by God, he was going to implement Social Economic Justice,...and....make.... things....right.
But unfortunately on the way to the affirmative action pedestal to be idolized by Liberals and Progressives, something happened. Kwame Kilpatrick realized, "Hey, what about me and mine yo." Whose is going to look out for me. Little corruption nymphs sat upon Kwame's shoulders and whispered into his ears. "Damn brother no ones going to look out for you, you need to skim what rightfully belongs to you." "Kwame they all do it, so why shouldn't you." "Kwame, damn brother, you da mayor of Detroit, you just take what you think is yours."
But the thing is Kwame didn't factor in the old money of Detroit. They of the ruling political class operate under a much more refined set of corruption rules. Skim off the customary percentage to pay cronies, and keep a percentage for your self. Kwame was probably told, "Mr. Mayor, you don't go in and take all the fruit off the tree, you just take some of it, and it won't be noticed."
But Kwame figured he was the next Richard Daley Mayor of Chicag, and no one ever accused Richard of being corrupt rigt?
So Kwame Kilpatrick went in to Detroit as Mayor and whistled the tune from Queen, " I want it all. I want it all. I want it all.....and I want it now."
So the old money of Detroit turned on Kwame Kilpatrick and fed him to the masses to appease the anti corruption Gods.
Old Kwame might have left Old Tiger Statidium alone and rehabilitaed it his name might have been circulated for a seat as Congressmen or Senator Kilpatrick. Now, he will know by his new name Inmate Kilpatrick, only if he had just left alone Tiger Stadium.
PCP Smoker| 8.5.11 @ 8:00AM
A little muddled. Kwame is the product of affirmative action policies. He never had to be good. He never had to abide by the rules, or have any self restraint.
The best thing about a creep like this is that it exposes all of the enablers that allow his behavior to flourish. Fuck Detroit and fuck the people of Detroit.
Redstateboy| 8.5.11 @ 8:23AM
I have to agree with Smoker.. affirmative action is just a substitute phrase for "reperations"
it's too bad they don't teach History anymore.. if they did - people would know that Slavery didn't begin and end with Blacks in America but that it goes much farther back and was Never exclusive to the Black Race.
Occam's Tool| 8.5.11 @ 12:52PM
Detroit is just eating the promises of Liberalism---and it's a shit sandwich.
RCV| 8.5.11 @ 1:41PM
Detroit is what it is because of the collapse of the US auto industry, along with the collapse of the major steel towns. It is a victim of industrial evolution, which vultures like this low-life mayor simply fed upon as it lay dying.
Doctor Right| 8.5.11 @ 2:57PM
Well...why exactly did the US auto industry "collapse"?
Did it just happen all of a sudden?
Or was the industry unable to sustain itself due to:
a) Poor product, and
b) Exhorbitant labor costs, and
c) Over-generous pension demands
And which political Party supports points b and c?
Hmmmmmmmm..????
Redstateboy| 8.5.11 @ 3:17PM
Oh.... nothing to do with Unions eh?? I grew up in Buffalo.. the 3 Trico Wiperblade plants, the Chevy Delavan Ave. plant, the Westinghouse plant, the multiple oil refineries, Worthington compressor, Bethlehem Steel, Buffalo Steel and on and on and on... they're all GONE!!! and the common denominator??!! ALL UNIONIZED!!! but it blows my mind.. a Liber-ul...?? like RCV there... will never... Can never admit - Union wages drove these companies out of business or forced them to relocate somewhere else.
John Navratil| 8.5.11 @ 5:30PM
RCV,
There was no auto industry in New Orleans and it has been failed for decades before Katrina.
RCV| 8.5.11 @ 7:20PM
So have all the meth-ridden towns throughout the midwest, and they don't even have Democrats there to blame.
Nick| 8.5.11 @ 5:54PM
RCV,
Sorry, but that is just not true.
50 years of democrat administrations infected, and then killed Detroit. And, it was the UAW that killed the U.S. auto industry, along with CAFE standards.
Steven Crowder made a great video about this a year and a half ago.
RCV| 8.5.11 @ 7:19PM
I don't buy it, Nick. Until very recently, Detroit made cars that were designed crappily, built worse, and were always three steps behind Japan in innovation. That's started to change, but that's what drove American buyers to Japanese and German vehicles.
PCP Smoker| 8.5.11 @ 7:33PM
You are way off. Small midwest cities are not dying anymore since they were in the 1930's. Living here is fine, thank you.
As far as the steel industry, it is thriving in non-union states such as Texas. Loop up Nucore Steel.
As far as American cars, their quality has improved since the mid 70's, but when you are paying Viagra for 1 million retirees and health insurance for people who no longer produce anything, in addition to paying for the infamous, and union mandated, "job banks" (sit idle in an office at 90% of your wage while the right position opens), you won't be able to cut it at any price. It's unsustainable, that is until the government steps in and bails you out, of course.
Nick| 8.6.11 @ 11:11AM
RCV,
Buy it, or don't. I lived it. I was born and raised in the Detroit area. I know many people who worked for the Big Three.
The reason that car designs were, and still are, so bad, was because of CAFE standards. In order for their fleet efficiency numbers to remain low, the auto companies had to shrink almost all of their cars by 1978.
My dad bought Lincolns in the '70s and '80s. We had the longest car ever produced, the '78 Lincoln Town Car, or, the boat as me and my friends called it. Then we had an '84 Town Car. By the '90s, the Town Car was a shadow of its former glory.
The '77 Monte Carlo, Cutlass Supreme, Grand Prix, etc., were the last of the big mid-size cars. CAFE and emissions also killed the muscle car industry.
This also explains why the SUV market exploded. People wanted bigger cars with personality. SUVs were classified as "trucks," therefore they didn't have to meet the higher CAFE numbers required for cars.
If CAFE standards were removed, car designers would have the freedom that their grandfathers had in the '50s and '60s, when great cars were made.
Union rules ensured that the cars were made inferiorly. Craftsmanship and pride in one's work were replaced by the two joint coffee break, to quote George Carlin. This tradition is still alive and well, practiced by both union auto workers and Detroit city employees, as anyone who watches Fox News is well aware.
The union mentality that it takes two or three people to change a light bulb, because the union rules say that this is the required number, and, only an electrician can do the job; this attitude killed innovation in the auto industry, as well as many others.
RCV| 8.6.11 @ 2:48PM
Well, US automakers have finally now begun to produce again well-made, well- designed vehicles, and people are buying them. The management changes were long overdue.
Nick| 8.6.11 @ 6:39PM
RCV,
You must be referring to the Chevy Volt, huh? Ha-ha!
Occam's Tool| 8.6.11 @ 12:06AM
The collapse of the US auto industry did not just "happen"---the Unions brought it on, and on---supported by one political party. Guess which one?
Reprobate Charlatan Vomitus| 8.6.11 @ 1:12PM
I don't bother with silly Occam's Tool, Doctor Right, Redstateboy, John Navratil, PCP Smoker, and Nick, a specific allstar ensemble representing AmSpec posters in general, immediately and effortlessly exposing the lack of intellectual honesty to acknowledge the party sanctimoniously espoused ad infinitum ad nauseum that led to Detroit's and every other major city's problems on just not understanding why these insightful posts ad infinitum ad nauseum are always ridiculed for being the pathetic, despicable, stupid lies of drivel, dreck, and treacle they really are ad infinitum ad nauseum matterz.
RCV| 8.6.11 @ 2:49PM
Nick's posts are coherent. Yours are not. Zzzzzzzzzzz.....
Reprobate Charlatan Vomitus| 8.7.11 @ 11:39AM
I don't bother with silly coherence of posts grammatically mocking the words used of the one who posted the eminently coherent quotation "I abhor santimonious conservatism of the tea party brand, an ideology wholly lacking in intelligence or a shred of real Christian love and compassion - It espouses policies that are dangerous, damaging, and detrimental to our country and it's future - It will have a lifespan much like its intellectual forebearer, Know-Nothingism", on zanctimoniouz both zilly pot and zilly kettle lacking, az iz alwayz the caze, pozt, after pozt, after pozt, after pozt, a zhred of coherenz, matterz.
llkatlanta| 8.7.11 @ 1:14PM
Honestly, RCV, your comments boggle the mind. Exactly what do you mean?
John Navratil| 8.7.11 @ 5:20PM
Reprobate Charlatan Vomitus,
I am honoured to be included with such a group as you listed. After that, I didn't understand of word of it.
Bob Grant| 8.5.11 @ 8:32AM
Before the article I knew little about the man other than stories of him putting the final nail in the coffin of Detroit...
....As a member of the Protected Class, I suppose he felt untouchable as mayor, but as we see time and time again, that deadly combination of narcissism, mediocrity, and corruption will seal your fate.
Protected Class or no.
Nancy in NC| 8.5.11 @ 9:03AM
We can only pray that Obeyme will have the same outcome. It's a crime what Kilpatrick did to Detroit. And it's a crime what Obeyme is doing to the USA.
Redstateboy| 8.5.11 @ 1:30PM
"Obeyme" ... that's great!! Up there with... "Obama is shovel ready."
PaulyD| 8.5.11 @ 9:04AM
It is difficult to describe to outsiders who've never seen it what a wasteland Detroit has become. It stands as a monument to what 50 years of Liberal governance can do to a place. It also stands as a warning of what the whole country will become if we don't take the reins away from Obama and other Liberal politicians.
Obama, Reid and Pelosi (when she had power) are following the same playbook that made Detroit what it is today.
Bob Grant| 8.5.11 @ 9:24AM
Yea. When you auction off the Silver Dome for a measly half a mil, you know things are a little screwy.
When I think of Detroit, Mad Max and Escape from New York comes to mind.
Jacobite| 8.5.11 @ 12:58PM
No, NYC is what 50 years of Leftists do to a city. Bad, but no Detroit. Detroit is what 50 years of black control does. Look at any sub-Saharan city since decolonialization. Google "Jo'berg".
Redstateboy| 8.5.11 @ 3:10PM
Yo! PaulyD! You must not've have been to Niagara Falls, USA or Buffalo, NY. - one looks like Mogedishu and the other like Beirut... Oh?! and the common denominator?? Both run by the Slave Party for the past 50 years.
MikeBee| 8.5.11 @ 9:10AM
Actually, the city of Detroit does not stand under Kwame's curse. Kwame simply operated under the curse under which the city already stood. The city of Detroit has stood under the curse of Coleman Young for over 40 years now. It is Mayor Young who brought immense corruption to the city dealings. He just never was caught at it. It was Mayor Young who publicly swore at Detroit's white citizens, causing them to relocate themselves to the suburbs. It was Mayor Young who stood at the helm of what became "Our City" to the blacks in Detroit. It was Mayor Young who brought the ways of Communism to Detroit (Young called himself a Communist), and its resultant demise.
Kwame simply operated under the curse. He, too, thought that he could get away with an extra-marital splurge, just as Young had his Ms. Ivory. Just as a previous mayor had taken down the old Hudson's building downtown, a building which white Detroiters very fondly remembered, and which stood as a symbol of Detroit's old prosperity, Kwame took down Tiger Stadium. And, Mayor Young got away with immense corruption for 30 years; why would Kwame think that he could be caught doing the same?
Today, even the blacks are leaving the city of Detroit. Realizing that "their city" has been destroyed by the communist and corrupt ways of Mayors Coleman Young and Kwame Kilpatrick, they leave for the suburbs, to the tune of 10,000 per year. Hopefully, the city of Detroit's curse will not last as long as Bobby Layne's curse of the Detroit Lions.
Nick| 8.5.11 @ 12:01PM
MikeBee,
You are correct, sir!
It was Coleman the Corrupt whom the people of Detroit kept on electing for 20 years. If he could have stole Tiger Stadium, he would have.
His name-sake, Coleman Young, Jr., is currently serving in the Michigan Senate. Young, Jr., was born Joel Loving, and is the bastard child of Young, Sr.
It was Coleman the Corrupt who steered the S.S. Detroit into the iceberg. Archer tried, timidly, to stop the flooding. Kwame the Commie struck-up the band in the ballroom and partied, while he attempted to steal all of the silver.
Now, we have Mayor Dave Bing, former Piston star. So far, his tenure has been lackluster, to say the least. That's okay, the greens are going to turn Detroit into a farming co-op!
I would've called them the watermelon greens (you know, green on the outside, red on the inside) as I usually do, but, I'm sure the bleeding hearts would have sprained their fingers angrily typing: RAAAAACIST!!! (This way, I got it in anyway! Ha-ha!)
Ron| 8.5.11 @ 8:54PM
You are right I was there too. I watched the riot but Detroit was beginning to recover then Coleman was elected. The white middle class was told to hit 8 mile rd. 40 years later a great city is as close to a 3rd world nation as you can find in America. It hurts me to see what happened.
Fist of the Fleet| 8.5.11 @ 10:02AM
Change the city and it could be Buffalo N.Y. Only our mayor has not been to prison. Yet.
Doctor Right| 8.5.11 @ 10:34AM
Why single-out Kwame Kilpatrick?
Kilpatrick is just another in a long line of utterly corrupt, totally unqualified, 100% leftwing, 100% Democrat (and sorry, folks...most black) Mayors who have looted, pillaged, and destroyed America's inner cities since the 1960's.
Detroit...Baltimore...Washington DC...Philadelphia...Newark, NJ...New York in the 1990's...all were once thriving, prosperous, and safe cities. Now they're dangerous cesspools.
The problem we face in America is that Barack Obama is the PERFECT archetype of big-city black Democrat Mayor...
...Except he's been given the keys to the entire Kingdom.
The looting and pillaging began in earnest in January, 2009. He must be stopped, or America's future will look a lot like today's Detroit.
Bob Grant| 8.5.11 @ 12:04PM
Cool. I want to place a bid in for Yankee Stadium - $400,000.
Ted| 8.5.11 @ 12:07PM
You hit that nail right on the head....
Dano1001| 8.5.11 @ 10:34AM
@MikeBee
Dano1001| 8.5.11 @ 10:36AM
@mikeBee
"Today, even the blacks are leaving the city of Detroit. Realizing that "their city" has been destroyed by the communist and corrupt ways of Mayors Coleman Young and Kwame Kilpatrick, they leave for the suburbs, to the tune of 10,000 per year."
But even the Blacks leaving for the suburbs will still vote for Obama - just because he is Black and a Democrat, that is what is pathetic, the Cancer is spreading........
MikeBee| 8.5.11 @ 11:56AM
Dan,
Black voting Democrat will continue to happen, until Republicans begin campaigning again where they are. Blacks were reliably Republican votes, once upon a time. Today, I don't know a single white Republican who has the cojones to campaign where Blacks live. If you read some of what's written by black Republicans, they will tell you that, personally, most blacks are further Right than the Tea Party.
Just the fact that so many are leaving Detroit is a sign of their common sense taking over. And, when Common Sense takes over, usually Republicans win.................
Doctor Right| 8.5.11 @ 3:09PM
Ya' know, I hear this a lot, and I think it's bull-crap.
Are you telling me that blacks ONLY vote Democrat because the Democrats come to their neighborhoods?
Go sell crazy someplace, else, please...
If I were running for office (and I'd run as a Republican) , I don't think I'd waste my time trying to court black voters.
It's not a matter of respect. It's about return-on-investment. And the amount of time one would have to spend winning over enough black voters to sway the overall vote simply isn't worth the effort.
Black Americans have proven repeatedly that they will reflexively pull the lever for Democrats no matter what. And despite this habitual behavior, the overall situation in black communities is still bleak.
The Conservative message of Constitutional freedom, capitalism, and opportunity TRANSCENDS race and ethnicity. If any particular group doesn't understand that...Well, that's their problem, and I say "tough crap."
The REAL irony is that the Democrats are the one who DON'T respect black voters, because they know they don't have to! No matter what they do, >90% of black Americans vote for them no matter what!
The Democrats have convinced blacks that real power lies in constant, unswerving allegiance to the Democrat Party, when in fact, the opposite is true! If blacks voted 50/50 Democrat/Republican, then that would be REAL power!
At each and every election cycle, both parties would be falling all over each other to swing the needed 1-2% of this demographic segment. But as it stands now, one Party doesn't bother because they know it doesn't matter, while then other Party makes one promise after another that they have no intention of ever fulfilling because...they know it doesn't matter.
MikeBee| 8.5.11 @ 5:30PM
Dr. Right,
No, I'm not saying that Blacks vote Democrat because Republicans won't come into their neighborhoods. They vote Democrat because Democrats have lied to them for too many years. You should hear what Democrat candidates say to them; often, it's very common sense and conservative stuff. "Vote for me, and we will give you the choice of what schools to send your kids to, just like rich Whitey has." Democrat candidates will openly decry the nonsensical laws and liberal stuff that's out there, that THEY (Dems) are responsible for, all the while snowing them, or making them think that Republicans are responsible for these crazy things. Blacks don't know that it's Democrats who are in favor of placing abortion mills predominantly in black communities, to cut down on THEIR numbers (Dems don't want one of THOSE in their backyard). Blacks don't know the many ways in which Democrats have held them down through the years. Blacks don't know this stuff, though, because Republicans don't have the balls to go to them and tell them.
The only way to change things back to the way they once were, with most blacks voting Republican, is to put our message right in front of them, and to tell them how the Dems have been lying to them for years. If you write the black vote off, then you deserve what you get. If you fight to change things, then you'll also get what you deserve.
I'll tell you one thing: black people are NOT stupid. And another thing: more than most people I've met in my life, they do not like leaders who are cowards.
Pat| 8.5.11 @ 7:12PM
Mike, with all due respect, you’ve been hitting the Strohs laager (made with pure Detroit River water) pretty hard. Blacks in Detroit never voted Republican – you’re thinking of some other Detroit, no doubt. And sending Republicans into the old Jewish neighborhoods of Oak Park and Southfield wouldn’t have convinced the Jews to vote Republican either. The Democrats wailed their siren call of “entitlement” and the magic took its hold on the populace. Their Top 40 hit single, “We Know What You Need, We Know What You Want, Baby”, is a perennial chart breaker within the Rust Belt inner cities. And their song retains its widespread appeal, whether you’re a modern day scion of the ancient tribe of Abraham or the unemployed great grandson of a poor Alabama sharecropper, its allure never seems to diminish.
Detroit was a Lyndon Johnson Great Society test laboratory where the Democratic machine experimented in controlling their vast urban base of voters. Detroit’s Jewish Democrats proudly pointed to their NAACP Lifetime Membership certificates hanging on the wall of their retail establishments and contentedly munched their bagels while exploiting Detroit’s blacks for all they were worth. Detroit’s educated blacks, in turn, exploited their own people while clawing their way up the ladder to buy homes in those neighborhoods where the Jewish merchants and professional people hung out, eventually forcing them across 8 mile road into their upscale Jewish enclaves. Detroit was never a happy community of humble auto workers living in peaceful harmony. And this “Do Unto Others Before They Can Do It To You” philosophy is Detroit’s only legacy to its children.
For those sons and daughters who were forced to flee Detroit for all points of the compass, much bitterness remains. But the Detroit of their nostalgia was never the real Detroit. The real Detroit was always a dirty factory town, not a garden of Eden and today it is an urban wasteland of completely deserted neighborhoods where deer graze among the rusty swing sets resting in empty backyards and the weeds grow a little more each year to cover the roofs of former two bedroom tract homes. There are good places to live in America, Detroit isn’t now, and never was, one of those. The people of Detroit made it what it is today, the Democrats enthusiastically helped at each step along the way, but in the end it was Detroiters who willingly trashed their city.
And by the way, J. L. Hudson’s original store was torn down long after the suburban Detroiters - with their happy memories of the Thanksgiving Day parade and Santa Claus accepting the key to the city on Hudson’s Woodward Ave. balcony - had deserted the downtown store to shop in their suburban equivalents. In its waning days, the Dayton-Hudson company gave up on their downtown store, more of their merchandise was leaving the store in the pockets of shoplifters than with paying customers, not to mention the small fortune it cost to heat this antiquated and immense building. Giving the building free to the City of Detroit was no great favor on their part. And Detroit had no better luck with the shoplifters and graffiti artists after they rented parts of it out to small merchants. But you are correct that finally demolishing Hudson’s made it painfully clear to everyone that the old Detroit of bygone years was dead and soon to be forgotten.
Occam's Tool| 8.6.11 @ 12:07AM
Unfortunately, that's true of Jewish voters too---note Obama and Israel.
emo| 8.5.11 @ 7:03PM
What good would it do?
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 8.5.11 @ 10:36AM
He's a convicted felon. The city of Detroit is still going down the toilet. The city is the poster child of all that is wrong with left wing politics. Kwame is just another victim.
On another note if you want your children to fail Kwame ranks high on the list of names to give them.
Cromulent| 8.5.11 @ 11:01AM
Mr. Howley, sir, you might consider changing your name to "Howler". You used the following description
"great Tiger owners"
in the same sentence with Tom Monaghan. Its going to be hard getting thru the rest of your piece with the odor from this steaming pile wafting thru the office.
ray bob| 8.5.11 @ 11:39AM
like many american cities, when the black majority finally gets the keys, they believe it is there time to get 'there' piece of the rock ... typically the actions defies the causes which got them elected in the first place, to bring there people up, but alas, most are all as corrupt as those they replaced, and are quite frankly so arrogant in their place they see no fault in keeping the folks who elected them down, on the plantation so to speak ... keep the natives restless so you can continue to drink from the well .. a sorry state indeed
Groad| 8.5.11 @ 3:53PM
In Philuffya it started with Wilson Goode. It culminated officially when John Street announced, " The Brothuhs and Sistuhs run this city." Street interestingly is the son of a white German immigrant who married a black woman. He and O have something in common besides corruption. Street is an unindicted co-conspiritor. They wouldn't prosecute him. It goes on as the city crumbles under Mayor Nutcase.
Ginger| 8.5.11 @ 12:00PM
Kwame's book is a farce. I still hear people saying he was, "talented". At what??? Hiring hookers? Dragging Detroit down the pooper? Being corrupt? Stealing money for his family's, "charity"? What a jerk!
Bob Grant| 8.5.11 @ 12:08PM
As we've come to realize, especially in the past 2 1/2 years, describing someone from the Protected Class as "talented" means well spoken. That it!!!
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 8.5.11 @ 1:59PM
If that's the case he's qualified to be President.
Bill S| 8.5.11 @ 12:07PM
With all the corruption stories to choose from it seemed like a waste of space to complain about Tiger Stadium being torn down.
RichTex| 8.5.11 @ 12:45PM
In case anyone was really interested in this character, the Dallas Morning News reports that he is moving back to the Dallas area following his release. He had moved here when he was released the first time and moved into what has been described as a million dollar mansion in Southlake, a ritzy suburb lying between Dallas and Ft. Worth. But times are hard, even on Democrat pols, and this time he is moving into a much cheaper, much smaller house in Grand Prairie. Going from Southlake to Grand Prairie is a significant come-down.
Bob Grant| 8.5.11 @ 1:16PM
Maybe he'll run into Ray Nagin. He also fled to Dallas after creating mayhem in the city he was tasked to lead.
These liberal big city mayors seem to have the exact same story. The problem is they never stay and clean up the mess they created.
cicero| 8.5.11 @ 1:49PM
You guys have it almost right. However, it was neither the stadium or Hudsons that paint the picture. The final demise of the once great City of Detroit began with the election of Coleman Young as mayor. Prior to that, corrupt mayors went to jail. Louis Mariani spent time behind bars for tax evasion, and I believe that they were pursuing Jerome Cavanaugh at the time of his death. However, Coleman Young was black at a time when that alone gave immunity. Everyone knew that he was the biggest herion dealer in the city, and had the Detroit Police Dept. escorting drugs from DTX into the city. The plundering of the city went on unabated, with Coleman laughing all the way to the Jamaican banks.
Kwame thought he was the second coming of Coleman. The times had changed, and his skin color did not give him the same free pass. The city was no longer even arguably a political asset, and there was no longer any reason for him to be protectedd by either Lansing or Washington.
Perhaps with the election, and toleration, of Obama, the American public, black, white, yellow, and red, will have been innoculated against the desease of racism, and develope a resistance to being plundered by the political class, no matter what ethnicity is involved.
Carolyn| 8.5.11 @ 2:57PM
As a nurse years ago I took care of a retire Detroit cop. He told me his job was driving Colman Young around to pick up his graft from the different Detroit businesses Young was extorting. None of this surprised me as it was common knowledge that Young was totally corrupt what I couldn't quite get was how Detroiter's could keep reelecting this man. I was told the attitude was he was corrupt but that was OK because he was one of them. I guess we get what we deserve so what does that say about all of us and Obama???
danny| 8.5.11 @ 9:19PM
Carolyn, I don't know what that says about us, but we will know come nov. 2012. Won't we?
Strudwick Wickerwire| 8.5.11 @ 3:21PM
Another fine example of dysfunction. Good ole Kwame and Barack Hussein have much in common, although Obuckethead hasn't run afoul of the law, there be time. All these clowns, players, cool-cat-daddy's all seem to inhabit a world that enables them to embarrass themselves, while no one will notice them blush!!! They remain immaculate, allowing no one to prosper, while playing on collective guilt!!!
Bob Grant| 8.5.11 @ 5:29PM
Membership into the Protected Class will afford you all of those things and more.
Richard Baker| 8.5.11 @ 5:48PM
Detroit, my parents hometown, has been run by blacks since Coleman Young took office. Are black Detroiters capable of self-government? The whole world wonders.
Ron| 8.5.11 @ 9:01PM
Detroit continues to send John Conyers back to Congress no district in the Unites States has suffered as much as Detroit has. Yet they choose to reelect Conyers, his wife was convicted of accepting bribes. Mr Conyers who makes $165K did not provide an attorney for his wife. Taxpayers were stuck with that bill. People get the government they deserve.
ejp| 8.5.11 @ 9:05PM
"If Red Sox fans suffered an 86-year curse merely because owner Harry Frazee sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees to finance his Broadway show No No, Nanette....."
Um, they didn't because Frazee didn't sell Ruth for that reason. The show didn't open until years after the deal.
Shane| 8.6.11 @ 1:19AM
'92 LA riots+Sharpton's tirades inciting violence+ Wildings + Teen Mobs + Wisconsin State Fair + New Orleans+Distorted Media+Liberals+70% illegitimacy + 18% unemployed = you add it up
Rich Rostrom| 8.7.11 @ 12:39AM
"As the North Side Irish of Chicago drifted out to the suburbs of Evanston and Oak Park and started commuting to Wrigley Field..."
I don't know much about Detroit neighborhoods, but I've lived on the North Side of Chicago all my life, and that sentence is gibberish.
There were Irish neighborhoods scattered all across Chicago, but the large Irish centers were all on the South Side. Irish Chicagoans, like most whites, migrated out of the city, but in all directions. Very few moved to Evanston or Oak Park, which have not grown for decades. The Lakeview area around Wrigley Field was never an "Irish" area; it was and remains overwhelmingly white (and yuppie).
Darren| 8.7.11 @ 4:32PM
I have been hearing for decades now how blacks are a very conservative people. Yeah right!!! Give me a break. I have only known one black in my life who was conservative. They almost always vote for the pro abortion candidate.
S. Meyer| 8.8.11 @ 2:13AM
So, to be a part of Detroit's old political machine, you had to be someone's son or nephew? Isn't that called nepotism? I'm not knocking the Republican's. This occurred under the watch of Democrats, too. Kilpatrick was a known politician's son, too. More nepotism, more exclusion for those not "connected". So, I guess you can forget about being an entrepreneur in good 'ole Detroit if you're not someone's son or nephew.
WRTolkas| 8.16.11 @ 8:22AM
What loot did Mayor Kilpatrick walk away with? What is his net worth now?
25thcenturygirl | 8.19.11 @ 9:55PM
I don't understand why there's a reference to Mike Ilitch's campaign donations or political affiliation in the article.
Is the writer saying that Ilitch being a Democrat is the cause of his success with Little Caesars Pizza in addition to the reason why he rebuffed any proposals to revitalize Tiger Stadium?
Clarity would be helpful.
This is a worthwhile snapshot of how a political legacy's narcissism damaged a city. Kwame isn't the first nor will he be the last to value ego over duty. Why do so many voters still get scammed by such hucksters?
Steven | 1.18.12 @ 5:31PM
This is such a bullshit article. There is very little truth in it, and is written from other bogus newspaper articles. Kilpatrick had more positive progress in the City of Detroit than the 3 previous Mayors combined.
The Newspapers also said things would be better when he left office. But 72 shootings, 22 murders, no plan, no economic dev, no strategy, no hope and no energy say different.