Via Dan Halper, here’s a clip of Vice President Joe Biden ominously suggesting to a Flint, Michigan audience that Obama’s jobs plan is the only thing standing between them and a downward spiral into violent lawlessness. The relevant comments from the video:
“In 2008, when Flint had 265 sworn officers on their police force, there were 35 murders and 91 rapes in this city. In 2010, when Flint had only 144 police officers, the murder rate climbed to 65 and rapes – just to pick two categories – climbed to 229. In 2011, you now only have 125 shields. God only knows what the numbers will be this year for Flint if we don’t rectify it…And God only knows what that number would have been had we not been able to get a little bit of help.”
What Biden doesn’t mention is that the layoffs in Flint didn’t need to happen. While the city was struggling financially – and putting 60 percent of its budget toward police and firefighters – the mayor tried to negotiate spending reductions with the unions in order to forestall the layoffs. But the unions rejected pay or benefit concessions.
Biden’s comments mimic the Flint unions’ argument that lack of spending – not massive debt and mismanagement of funds – is the problem in the city. That might work to help these police officers get hired again for now. But Flint has long-term financial issues that aren’t going to be solved by a temporary band-aid like Obama’s jobs bill. And what happens to the newly-rehired officers once the new stimulus fund runs out?
[...] question via Alana Goodman: Since preventing horrible crimes is everyone’s top priority, how come the Flint police union [...]