* Lynn Sweet…
At a meeting Wednesday with members of the African American community, President Donald Trump again talked about Chicago violence saying if city officials don’t take steps,”we’re going to solve the problem for them.”
“Because we’re going to have to do something… What’s happening in Chicago should not be happening in this country,” Trump said.
Trump said violence in the city was ‘totally out of control.” […]
[Darrell Scott, an Ohio pastor who campaigned for Trump] said he was talking to members of “top gangs” in Chicago – he did not identify who – who wanted a “sit down” to discuss how to “get that body count down” in return for “social programs.”
“It’s a great idea,” Trump said about a possible meeting involving gang leaders and social programs.
…Adding… Video…
- OkComputer - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:17 am:
“It’s a great idea … what’s a social program?”
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:19 am:
Of course pastor Scott could handle the budget for the programs. /s
- Gone, but not forgotten - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:19 am:
Mo Money
- My New Handle - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:20 am:
Maybe something like CeaseFire would work…if it were funded.
- Cubs in '16 - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:22 am:
It would be interesting to hear which “social programs” the gangs want and what they ultimately hope to achieve. Gang leaders acknowledging the problem and being willing to discuss solutions is a good first step.
- don the legend - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:23 am:
You give us something, i.e. social programs and we will kill fewer people. This sounds like something right out of the Governor’s playbook.
- Ducky LaMoore - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:23 am:
Get violent, get stuff for nothing. Can someone tell me how this doesn’t just subsidize violence?
- Big Joe - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:23 am:
It’s a great idea. Don’t be holding your breath until he gets around to it, though. He has a little bit of a situation with immigration to work on right now.
- Anon221 - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:24 am:
Rauner’s gonna get “Trumped” if he’s not careful.
- Bulbous1 - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:27 am:
Hello, I’m from the government…I’m here to help.
- wordslinger - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:27 am:
What b-s.
The days of Jeff Fort, Willie Lloyd, Larry Hoover and “leaders” of hierarchial Chicago gangs are long gone. Too much heat.
It’s more of a block-by-block terrorist cell model. And not all Chicago violence is “gang-related.” That’s way too simple-minded.
Why hasn’t Trump brought in that “top guy” who told him last August that he could end the violence in a week?
Was he lying about that, do you think?
http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20160823/BLOGS02/160829962/getting-tough-will-end-chicagos-crime-wave-in-one-week-says-trump
- Arsenal - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:30 am:
There needs to be a LOT of fleshing that out, and a lot of political bases will need a LOT of care and feeding, but there’s very few ideas I’d write off right away.
- The Way I See It - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:31 am:
I believe that the Ohio pastor has been in touch with the “top gangs” in Chicago like I believe in the tooth fairy.
On the other hand Trump deals with only the best, the biggest, the yugest in their fields.
Maybe this is where he can put his famed negotiation skills to work.
- Last Bull Moose - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:32 am:
“Once you pay the Danegeld, you never get rid of the Dane.”Kipling
- Will Caskey - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:34 am:
What…does that even mean
- Downstate - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:37 am:
Last Bull Moose,
Had to look that up. Spot on!
- West Side the Best Side - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:41 am:
Agree with wordslinger. I also think the pastor meeting with “top gang” (the People or the Folks?) is about as believeable as Trump’s claim of meeting with any top guys in CPD. Back in the days of the Blackstone Rangers and Jeff Fort Pres. Nixon met with Chicago gangbangers. That didn’t seem to do much good.
- Bigtwich - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:42 am:
Wait! Wait! Didn’t I see this on Hill Street Blues! The station prepares for the president’s visit, calling a summit of the various gang leader’s . . . . . . .
- Pawn - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:44 am:
Hilarious. I love how the “top gangs” are confiding in an Ohio pastor. The hyperbole with the trump world is too funny — of course these are the “top gangs.” Only the best for trump, only the best.
- Downstate - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:46 am:
Pawn,
Great point. How does one define “top gang” these days. Is it based on gang signs, tatts, elegant killings, attire? Like the Oscars, we’re probably going to need some sub-categories.
- walker - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 11:56 am:
Maybe the pastor from Ohio can get the “top gangs” together with Trump’s own unnamed “top Chicago cop” who knows how to end the violence.
Maybe Trump can shame Chicago and Illinois movers and shakers to fund and support effective programs, by spouting such nonsense.
- Roman - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:06 pm:
Word and Pawn are right! Total B.S. There are no “top” gang leaders for this pastor to talk to.
Though, this wouldn’t be the first time a law-and-order Republican president gave funding to Chicago street gangs. Nixon gave Jeff Fort’s Blackstone Ranger federal cash to run Head Start and other “social program.”
- AlfondoGonz - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:07 pm:
Pawn-
The “top gangs” are in cahoots with the “tremendous terrorists” Trump kept telling us about during his ABC interview.
- Lincoln Lad - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:07 pm:
An Ohio pastor is on point, meeting with the top gang leaders in Chicago. Sure he is. The Trump administration has no clue on what’s going on in Chicago, and even less of an idea on what to do about it. It all sounds right in Kansas I guess…
They won’t know the difference.
- CLJ - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:11 pm:
Rahm should just tweet a link to the new Fox show APB and say that the city has the crime problem under control. Deploying the best technology around. http://www.fox.com/watch/852111427872/7833704448
I’m sure Trump would believe its real.
- Visitor - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:20 pm:
Wish I could watch the video. But I have Apple, and Adobe Flash Player doesn’t work on it. Please, Rich, take out all of your Adobe Flash Players and embed HTML5’s instead - more secure, uses less power, and more people can use it.
- Illinois O'Malley - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:22 pm:
@Bulbous, remember that comment next time you or someone you knows calls 911…
- Rocky Rosi - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:24 pm:
Why does this remind me of a scene from the Apprentice?
- Honeybear - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:30 pm:
Someone go let the President out so he can chase squirrels. He’s been inside too long.
- Stark - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:32 pm:
Here’s an idea. Maybe bring economic development to the community and watch the body count decrease instead of tying statistics to social programs? What is this, the runaground agenda for Chicago? /s
- Amalia - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:32 pm:
well, the motto of Chicago is, according to Royko, Ubi est mea?
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:33 pm:
Maybe if the Ohio pastor would throw out some “Alternative Facts” C.P.D could pick and choose what to implement.
- facts are stubborn things - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:35 pm:
I have an idea. How about from this day forward, we only have children into 2 parent intact loving homes. I know, things happen, but this should return to the norm and we need to realize that it does matter. Dad’s are needed in homes and like it or not it is the woman that hold the key. They should never give their precious gifts to a man without a ring and a date. Wow how old school and silly is this. Some how code for “judging others” or “woman’s rights” etc. No, it is just common sense that we all know deep down is true. Political correctness is killing us. The current problem is a law and order problem. The rule of law must return to Chicago. Oh I know it is really very complex with many moving parts and elements. I am sure it is really because of all kinds of things but not the fact that people are at the end of day accountable for their decisions.
- NorthsideNoMore - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:38 pm:
I hope part of the plan is to take some of that money and beef up the PD, get the drugs and the thugs of the streets, take back the neighborhoods. Community needs to be ALL in! Implementing social programs for dealers and bangers better come with some serious cha ching $$$$, their not giving up the corners for minimum wage and midnight basketball programs.
- Honeybear - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:40 pm:
Facts- wow, just wow. Can’t even……..do you……. nope….not even going to try.
Disappointed
- CLJ - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:41 pm:
= How about from this day forward, we only have children into 2 parent intact loving homes.=
Is that code for government sponsored infanticide for children conceived by unmarried individuals? Now that is an extreme position! I guess you can criminalize sex outside of marriage.
Amazing!
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:42 pm:
Trump want to meet out of curiousity. He thought he had the corner on ‘Art of the Shakedown’ moves nailed.
- Sox Fan - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:44 pm:
===How about from this day forward, we only have children into 2 parent intact loving homes.===
I agree. And since you came up with the idea, how about you figure out how to make it happen.
- Keyser Soze - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:45 pm:
What might help is more employment, i.e.,improve the economy, and a sufficiently educated work force to man the jobs, i.e., fix the schools/parents. This is, in short, a pretty tall order.
- Rod - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:50 pm:
I am sure the top drug crews and street gang leaders in Chicago researched Darrell Scott and found out he was just the guy they needed to fix things up here because of his support for Trump. The entire discussion between Trump and the Pastor was insane.
I am sure that Trump will provide money by the ton to pay off gangs and drug crews here in Chicago to stop killing each other. Really was that a comedy video?
- Rabid - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:50 pm:
Can you dig it?
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:51 pm:
Trump’s reality show: “Meet the President - Gangland Survivor’. Idea is to rent out Soldiers Field to all gang members. Only one weapon per participant. Lock down the stadium and let em go at each other for 12 hours. The survivor gets to meet Trump and become Steve Bannon’s security.
- wordslinger - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:59 pm:
–I have an idea. How about from this day forward, we only have children into 2 parent intact loving homes.–
I wonder, do all families that you know where the Old Man isn’t around at-risk for the levels of violence seen on the South and West Sides?
I seem to recall many when I was a kid growing up long ago. My kids have had a lot of friends in that boat. None were at-risk for any violence at all.
If it makes you feel better to tut-tut on some perceived moral high horse like there’s a single simple solution, go ahead. But you’re not advancing the ball.
- West Side the Best Side - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 12:59 pm:
Agree with wordslinger that the chance the pastor met with gang members is as likely as Trump meeting with some top guy at CPD. Back in the days of the Blackstone Rangers Pres. Nixon met with Chicago gangbangers. That didn’t seem to settle anything about Chicago violence. (Hope I’m not repeating myself. Don’t think my tablet sends stuff.)
- Signal and Noise - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 1:03 pm:
Let me guess Pastor, you have some ideas on where that social program money could be spent?
- Thoughts Matter - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 1:05 pm:
Facts… there are these crimes called rape and incest. There are men who commit adultery and/or abandon families. Married women who waited for that ring and a date only to be abandoned. We have to deal with reality. My step grandmother had a ‘premature( wink, wink)’ baby in 1914.
- Grandpa - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 1:09 pm:
Since when does America negotiate with criminals to stop being violent for anything? I heard Donnie utter the beginning of the words “I lov” at the end of that clip? Donnie loves gang members for trying to bribe the president?? I am all for opening lines of dialogue with gangs to end violence, by local law enforcement officials not the president of the United States. Who in the heck is this pastor form Ohio, and how does he know Chicago gangs?? I call BS!
- Bill F. - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 1:39 pm:
I see what you have going on there, Rabid.
The future is ours… if you can count.
- OldIllini - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 1:50 pm:
Why so many partisan comments here which are, in effect, defending the status quo?
- Nothin Gonna Change - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 1:58 pm:
There has to be a foundational premise that all peoples life has meaning and value. That Starts in the home or any other educational facility Churches School etc. The Darwinian survival of the fittest garbage has to stop (which is really he who can shoot straighter than the next guy). Figure out how to get that mentality eradicated first (Its at least one generation away). Then you have a chance to get the situation under control. Oh and stem the drug tide too while your at it they go hand in hand.
- Carhartt Representative - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:08 pm:
Didn’t Chicago do this in the late 60s? Jeff Fort was running a jobs program if I remember correctly.
- Retired cop - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:19 pm:
Playa’s gonna play!
How do you get a 17 to 20 something year old kid that has never had structure in his life, carries a gun and has the power of life and death over his rivals and friends, which lifestyle is glorified in his culture and expect him to be “satisfied” with working a regular job. I spent many hours interviewing these kids as suspects, victims and witnesses and they are what a normal world would call hopeless. Most expect to die young or go to prison. Not that they want that, but that is what they expect. Punching a time clock for minimum wage, are you serious?
“Providing” jobs sounds great in the normal world but this isn’t a normal world. This goes way deeper than jobs.
I don’t have the answers, not sure anyone does or even can come up with the solutions needed.
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:21 pm:
So they’ll only stop killing people if they get what they want? And this tactic is being taken serious? If those are their demands, charge them with extortion. ….Oh, right, I forgot who the Cook County States Attorney is now…..Whatever happened to “we don’t negotiate with terrorists”?
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:39 pm:
===Here’s an idea. Maybe bring economic development to the community===
If you have a viable plan for that - let’s hear it. Ideology isn’t a plan.
- Amalia - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:41 pm:
@Visitor, on mac, with the newest operating software, you have to indicate for every website that you visit your preference on things like AdobeFlash, Microsoft Silverlight, Quicktime. it’s confusing because I did indicate that for this site, with AdobeFlash, but the please install plug keeps popping up. I was able to watch here, however. (oh, for my own IT person…..) hope you can watch.
now to that ridiculous mess seen on the video. what I find really offensive is that prior to this video the President gave what he claimed to be a message re Black History month and it was pretty much just about him. not surprising. find it, read it, be disgusted.
the month has much more to do with actual history than what he said.
so it comes as no surprise that he has at the table a Rev. who talks about the gang leaders not respecting Pres. Obama and wanting things from Trump. it’s so disgusting.
- ok right - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:42 pm:
Top Chicago gang leaders believe in Trump, didn’t believe in Obama. Trump brings together all the greatest Americans. Urban gang leaders, KKK, white nationalists, they all love him. And they are NOT deplorables! Just the best Americans.
- Chicago Cynic - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:44 pm:
Bribing gang leaders to not kill each other - what could possibly go wrong?
- Rich Miller - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 2:45 pm:
=== How about from this day forward, we only have children into 2 parent intact loving homes===
Move to China.
- Henry Francis - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 3:05 pm:
I trust that anything that comes out of this meeting will be given the respect that comes out of any meeting headed by Donald Trump, flanked by Ben Carson and Omarosa.
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 3:42 pm:
Send Steve Bannon to the meeting. Gawd, that would be fun
- Former Hoosier - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 3:48 pm:
How do they come up with this stuff? Do I believe that gang “leaders” contacted this guy for a “sit down”, uh, no. It’s more theatre from trumpland. And, I resent it. We have real problems that need real solutions. And, the simple minded, sound bite solutions are not it!
- fed up - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 3:56 pm:
Trump “threatens” a solution to killings in Chicago? What is with all the suspense captain chaos? Please fill us in on your plan. Better yet, fix the problem!
Nothing to see here but a straw man spewing tough talk and opinions.
- Earnest - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 4:26 pm:
>No, it is just common sense that
I understand your sentiment, facts, but I don’t think it is common sense to someone who grew up in poverty, with a single mother absent much of the time trying to support her kids. If you don’t grow up in a home or even a neighborhood where you see what it’s like to be a part of a middle class family, it really isn’t common sense to imagine what it’s like or to think that is the way things should be.
And I must provide some snark: I think one way to achieve the two-parent household thing would be to give men vasectomies at puberty and birth control implants to girls. Then they can apply to have children when they can demonstrate they can financially support them and are in a stable relationship.
- Enviro - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 5:24 pm:
Bribing the enemy not to kill people is a show of desperation and weakness.
- denideni - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 5:26 pm:
Extortion. Pure and simple.
- Daniel Plainview - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 7:44 pm:
- How about from this day forward, we only have children into 2 parent intact loving homes -
Does that explain why Rauner’s son tried to rob a pharmacy for pills?
- striketoo - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 9:27 pm:
How about we raise the penalty for carrying an illegal gun in Chicago from a misdemeanor to a felony? Naw, that might work.
- Late to the Party - Thursday, Feb 2, 17 @ 8:02 am:
Some comments speak about bribing the enemy.
Isn’t that what England and France did with Germany in the 1930s? That worked out well.
- facts are stubborn things - Thursday, Feb 2, 17 @ 11:32 am:
@ Earnest - Wednesday, Feb 1, 17 @ 4:26 pm:
=I understand your sentiment, facts, but I don’t think it is common sense to someone who grew up in poverty, with a single mother absent much of the time trying to support her kids. If you don’t grow up in a home or even a neighborhood where you see what it’s like to be a part of a middle class family, it really isn’t common sense to imagine what it’s like or to think that is the way things should be.=
My point was not that it is common sense to the person that is embroiled in the situation, but rather that it is common sense. You saw the reaction to my statement on this forum, and so until society changes we certainly can not expect change within the communities where father less homes are the norm.