a city of brotherly shove

i haven’t ranted about philadephia’s crime in a while, but it is hard to avoid all the headlines our beloved city is making today.

in the past four days, three police officers have been shot. officer charles cassidy was shot in the head last night during an attempted robbery of a dunkin donuts in north philadelphia. the article made it to the front page of cnn. officer cassidy passed away a few hours ago at albert einstein medical center.

despite the occasional quips i make about police officers (9 parts hypocrite, 1 part bully), i actually deeply respect (non traffic enforcement) police officers. my worst day equates to their every day. the places in the city that i avoid are the places that they are assigned to patrol. they run into burning buildings and collapsed tunnels to save complete strangers. never in my wildest dreams would i ever oppose a police officer, let alone confront one head-on and shoot at one.

what sort of lawlessness has fallen over the city, that criminals have a mindset that killing cops is something they can do?

how can so much money be spent on fighting “terrorism” in iraq when there is still so much wrong with our own backyards?

as a result of all these shootings, capital punishment in pennslyvania is being re-examined, and i think that’s a jolly good idea.

1) prison doesn’t work to correcting criminals. if anything, criminals emerge hardened and with more connections to other murderers and pedophiles
2) punishments must fit crimes. if the crimes are getting worse, so should the punishments.
3) lets face it, lethal injections, electric chairs, and hangings are a much greater deterrent than spending a few months in prison. a few months in prison means free food and a chance to kick it back with your best mates. electrocution means that they’ll need a spatula to scrape your remains from the chair. the choice is easy, even for a thug with a 2nd grade level education.

the real solution to fix philadephia’s crime problem? better parents, a better school system, and God.