New Orleans

[BigRedBuster]

OK...so, Tyrann Mathieu is scared to go into his own home town of New Orleans.

 

LINK

 

I used to love NO. But, since Katrina, the city has become more and more dangerous.

So...if you were the mayor of NO, how would you handle it? Boost police and crack down on criminals causing more incarcerated people? Hand out more welfare?

 

What would you do?

[cm husker]

First, you have to look at what is driving the violence. It isn't like people are killing directly for food and shelter. It's the drug profit incentives, and all the welfare and police presence in the world isn't going to dissuade a meaningful number of people from pursuing that money.

 

So, I'd consider what options I have to legalize drugs. Because if you take the money out of illegal trafficking, you'll seriously reduce the number of participants and the incentives to kill for money.

 

And you free up all sorts of resources to help kids and to police and jail the criminals who do continue.

[krc1995]

We live 100 hundred miles from NOLA and use to go 1x per month. We haven't been in a year and a half. I've been for work but no longer will take my children. Nola's always been violent if in the wrong neighborhood but now tourists are at a real risk. It's not really even random anymore.

[BigRedBuster]

I guess a lot of people don't have an answer.

 

Mass incarceration is a dirty word right now. So....I'm assuming a large number of people would not be in favor of ramping up the police force and patrolling the streets in a manner that takes these criminals and locks them up.

[cm husker]

Definitely not in favor of throwing more resources at that losing strategy.

 

No one who is caught committing violent crimes is being let off. The question is, how do we reduce the motives to commit violent crime. More police doesn't do that.

[BigRedBuster]

So...what's your solution?

[cm husker]

So...what's your solution?

I already posted a first step.

 

Eliminate as many incentives to engage in violent crime as possible. The primary incentive is drug money, so drain the profit out of that black market by legalization.

[84HuskerLaw]

Legalizing drugs will only turn a violent drug culture/community into a 'stoned' violent drug culture/community in my view. Making anything cheaper and more plentiful will increase its availability and usage in almost every case for any type of product or thing. Basic supply and demand econ 101.

 

Making drugs free and unlimited in supply will drive the 'profit' out of the drug culture certainly but will also dramatically increase the use and addiction and negative social consequences of drug use and abuse.

 

Massive increase in police presence and control of drugs will help but drugs are not the only source or root cause of crime certainly. People commit lots of crimes for lots of different reasons (money, lust, hate, greed, envy, hunger, habit, social and cultural factors, etc.).

[cm husker]

That's not how supply and demand works, even in Econ 101.

 

And I would trade current levels of violence and costs of enforcement for some more use, if that's even true, considering there's a ton of use already... We just source suburban demand in urban centers.

 

About 95% of the perceived social ills associated with drug use are directly attributable to our misguided prohibition policies. Make drugs cheap, and people won't be stealing to support the habit. Use resources to reduce use rather than incarcerate users and nonviolent suppliers. Eliminate violent suppliers by destroying their market share.

 

We could incarcerate every single drug supply participant tomorrow, and by the end of the year, the streams of drug commerce will be flowing again. That's Econ 101.

 

And I've seen the futility of this "war" when I was on the side of law enforcement in overseas interdiction operations. It's a waste of resources and is destroying other nations and our poorer communities.

[cm husker]

As to the other crimes, yes, they will exist, as they do in all societies, but unless you're a believer in racial immutable characteristics (maybe you are based on your "cultural and social" characteristics comment), an increase in opportunity coupled with a decrease in incentives to make money through violence will lead to less overall crime.

 

Then, you've freed up resources to prevent, detect, arrest, prosecute and incarcerate those truly bad people who commit crimes for other reasons than drug money motives.

[BigRedBuster]

That's not how supply and demand works, even in Econ 101.

 

And I would trade current levels of violence and costs of enforcement for some more use, if that's even true, considering there's a ton of use already... We just source suburban demand in urban centers.

 

About 95% of the perceived social ills associated with drug use are directly attributable to our misguided prohibition policies. Make drugs cheap, and people won't be stealing to support the habit. Use resources to reduce use rather than incarcerate users and nonviolent suppliers. Eliminate violent suppliers by destroying their market share.

 

We could incarcerate every single drug supply participant tomorrow, and by the end of the year, the streams of drug commerce will be flowing again. That's Econ 101.

 

And I've seen the futility of this "war" when I was on the side of law enforcement in overseas interdiction operations. It's a waste of resources and is destroying other nations and our poorer communities.

Any link on that 95% stat?

[cm husker]

Yep.

 

 

Any other response?

[krc1995]

It's poverty. Find a cure for that and then there will be hope.

[cm husker]

It's poverty. Find a cure for that and then there will be hope.

Eliminate the ties that are keeping people down. Cut out things like minimum wage and minimum age requirements. Let 16 year olds start their careers in labor and services at a price that makes them competitive with older, unionized workers, for example.

[krc1995]

That's a nice text book answer but it will never work in Nola. Poverty there is generational-4, 5, even six generations have never known anything but government housing, welfare, public assistance and they are probably actually quite happy. It's their normal. The question is, why now are the crime boundaries bleeding over to the middle class and tourist areas? If poverty crimes could be contained to their right boundaries, Nola could be ok again.