“It was a very sobering trip for me to see the devastation that has taken place in the South Bronx in the last five years, But I’m encouraged in some ways by the strong effort of tenant groups to rebuild. I’m impressed by the spirit of hope and determination by the people to save what they have. I think they still have to know we care.”
The President before Jimmy Carter - Gerald Ford had refused federal aid to bailout NYC from their budget crisis resulting in a famous newspaper headline - "Ford to City: Drop Dead" An interesting fact you'll learn from the video is the city hired the Rand Corporation to help them find ways to pare the city budget. The eggheads at the think tank recommended getting rid of a bunch of fire departments in poor neighborhoods.
Gerald Ford was the replacement for the disgraced President Richard Nixon who had been forced to resign by Republicans in Congress. Nixon took the advice of a "liberal" Democratic Senator from New York by the name of Daniel Patrick Moynihan and ignored the economic structural inequalities that brown people, particularly those living in cities experienced. These trace back to the 1930's and federal housing policies that "redlined" areas with significant minority population. Redlining meant those areas were not eligible for home loans pr insurance and were designated "hazardous" for investors.
It might be enlightening to realize that the liberal Democratic Senator from New York Moynihan was on the wrong side of working people 50 years ago same as Chuck Shumer is today. It also might be useful to know the Heritage Foundation, the architect of the totalitarian blueprint for the U.S.- Project 2025 is a big fan of Moynihan's denial of structural problems caused by racist federal policies, in our so-called free market economy.
I think this video would be an excellent assignment for any high school or late grade school class or for that matter anyone interested in learning something about how systemic racism occurred and still occurs because of historical decisions that we still live with today.
On a side note, I started looking at fires in NYC in the 70's because I was curious what role slumlords played in paying people to burn buildings in order to collect insurance money. That interest came from a a recent slumlord case in Aurora Colorado. In that case CBZ Management owner Zev Baumgarten (the slumlord) who has a well-documented record of being a slumlord on the BBB in local newspapers and local TV stations said the reason he is a slumlord is not that he's a greedy creep but rather that a Venezuelan gang had taken over his slums making it impossible for him to perform required maintenance and security duties. Our President even went to Denver to spread the lore of the wronged slumlord. The real reason people don't like Zev is not that he's a crook who steals from poor people - but because he's Jewish. As Zev's defense attorney's stated (not under penalty of perjury) -
“During a phone call with Breezy Maynes, the Supervisor of the Aurora Code Enforcement Officers for the City, (Zev) Baumgarten pointedly asked Ms. Maynes to explain why she was being so hard on him,” lawyers for the defendant, Baumgarten, said in a court motion filed Friday. “Ms. Maynes retorted, ‘because you are an Orthodox Jew,’ an alarming and disturbing statement. Other City officials echoed these antisemitic sentiments.”
Right.
When you've got Murdoch entities like the NY Post spreading this billionaire-friendly propaganda about wronged slumlords and now that billionaire-owned CBS News is using the non-fact checked NY Post as a source, you can fool a lot of the people a lot of the time.
Dare to think for yourself!
