We talked about Teen Suicide last week and many responded with dramatic personal tales and observations.
Let’s talk the Heartland of America, I know Omaha pretty well.
I lived in Omaha off and on from 1963 until 1980–attended Creighton U undergrad, med and law and was on the medical, nursing and pharmacy faculty. My father practiced medicine in Omaha from 63 to his retirement in 91. You would expect that Omaha would be a peaceful and orderly place, populated and dominated by God Fearing middle of the road basically conservative folks. NOPE. The Good Folks of Omaha have a cultural cancer growing in their city, like so many other cities of America.
I was on the faculty and practiced medicine in the Omaha ghetto at an outreach Creighton Med office and then my private office for 6 years. I saw some problems in the 60s as a student, then in the 70s as a physician, but it’s worse now, by a bunch.
All is not well in Omaha. It has suffered from gang violence for 20 years and more.
Omaha is the home of the 2 year old who made news last week for an obscenity laced You tube video,
but that’s not the half of it–the child is living in a barbarian household and gang violence is a major factor, along with drugs and just a plain savage home environment, by any measure.
We are so in trouble in America.
You think Omaha is worse than Detroit, Chicago, Philly, or DC? 92 million eligible able bodied members of the work force are unemployed and we are experimenting with legalizing drugs and expanding the welfare freebie dependent state?
http://www.omaha.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20140109/NEWS/140108837
I have addressed this before as a continuing problem with the libertarian victimless crime argument and referenced the insightful writing of Anthony Daniels who writes as Theodore Dalrymple, psychiatrist, author, essayist, who wrote two penetrating analyses about the criminal class, Life at the Bottom and Romancing Opiates, but that’s just part of his prodigious output.
Lookee here, the books are many and extraordinary work, for some reason Alibris didn’t include Romancing Opiates, which nailed the opiate culture mythology pretty damn well.
http://www.alibris.com/booksearch?S=R&wauth=Theodore+Dalrymple&cm_mmc=sem-_-Google-_-authors-_-na&device=c&network=s&matchtype=e&gclid=CKSIy8WR_rsCFQbl7Aodri0Afw
Down and Out
Romancing Opiates
I agree with you that expanding the welfare state is a terrible idea. But, I disagree with you that legalizing drugs will be worse for the inner cities than the war on drugs has been.
You’ll probably end up with more users but you won’t have near as much gang violence which is far more destructive to communities.
From the state you will always get less than what you pay for — or, take your pick — you will always pay for more than you get from the state. Interestingly enough, you will think you are paying for personal and household goods and services when you are “paying more” for the state. Your payments just flow right through the production/distribution supply chains with amounts being squirted out the side of the supply chains in the form of various taxes and fees being paid to various local, state and federal governments. When the dealin’s done, more than half of what you paid will have squirted out the side of the typical supply chain in payments of some kind that are made to governments somewhere. If it is medical care or medical insurance that you paid for, it is likely that each dollar paid for about 35 cents direct cost of medical care and about 65 cents of each dollar that you paid was squirted out from somewhere to help pay for a government — or “state” — somewhere.
The big trend is to outsource parenting, and even individual conscience, to the state. You get what you pay for. And, conversely, pay for what you get.
I have put some stuff on the opinions of Anthony Daniels who writes as Theodore Dalrymple–a very insightful man.
The Book you are thinking of is Life at the Bottom but I also recommend his book Romancing Opiates that demystifies opiates.
Apparently such feral humans are the expected result of the welfare state. UK psychiatrist Dalrymple’s books, including “Life at the Bottom” depict the same situation in the UK as seen in US ghettos. He was a doctor at both a clinic and a prison, and his interest led him to ask a lot of questions. He states these people have no sense of being responsible for their own behavior. Interesting….but tragic…
It’s what any intelligent government planner could have expected. First, we subsidize the family whose father leaves home. The next step is to remove the ability of the remaining parent to discipline the children. Last of all; we let them learn morals, class and discipline from the public schools. The result is a group of children without any concept of control until they are 18 and in jail.