Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Elvis knew .. "In The Ghetto"

As the snow flies
On a cold and gray Chicago mornin'
A poor little baby child is born
In the ghetto
And his mama cries
'cause if there's one thing that she don't need
it's another hungry mouth to feed
In the ghetto

People, don't you understand
the child needs a helping hand
or he'll grow to be an angry young man some day
Take a look at you and me,
are we too blind to see,
do we simply turn our heads
and look the other way

Well the world turns
and a hungry little boy with a runny nose
plays in the street as the cold wind blows
In the ghetto

And his hunger burns
so he starts to roam the streets at night
and he learns how to steal
and he learns how to fight
In the ghetto

Then one night in desperation
a young man breaks away
He buys a gun, steals a car,
tries to run, but he don't get far
And his mama cries

As a crowd gathers 'round an angry young man
face down on the street with a gun in his hand
In the ghetto

As her young man dies,
on a cold and gray Chicago mornin',
another little baby child is born
In the ghetto
.. lyric source .. http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/elvispresley/intheghetto.html

Hurdles are many .. some are suggested by Susan Jacoby here ..

Dumb and Dumber: Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge? .. bits ..

Not only are citizens ignorant about essential scientific, civic and cultural knowledge, she said, but they also don’t think it matters.
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that bit is true of most any country i'd say .. i am a bit thingy about her suggesting children know less today, as i think it's more that more children of a bigger range of intellectual ability spend more time in school today than back whenever .. children overall no doubt i believe are better educated .. the history of racism in America should be in every school curriculum i think .. don't know if it is ..

i agree with all you say in yours .. on the ghettos .. historically a move north by blacks to escape southern racism, then a move by whites out of inner cities .. all as you described and more here ..

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Urban areas in the U.S. can often be classified as "black" or "white", with the inhabitants primarily belonging to a homogenous racial grouping. Forty years after the African-American civil rights era (1955–1968), most of the United States remains a residentially segregated society in which blacks and whites inhabit different neighborhoods of significantly different quality.

Many of these neighborhoods are located in Northern cities where African Americans moved during The Great Migration (1914–1950) a period when over a million African Americans moved out of the rural Southern United States to escape the widespread racism of the South, to seek out employment opportunities in urban environments, and to pursue what was widely perceived to be a better quality of life in the North.

Two main factors ensured further separation between races and classes, and ultimately the development of contemporary ghettos: the relocation of industrial enterprises and the movement of middle to upper class residents into suburban neighborhoods. Between 1967 and 1987, economic restructuring resulted in a dramatic decline of manufacturing jobs. The once thriving northern industrial cities directed a shift to service occupations and in combination with the movement of middle-class families and other businesses to the suburbs, left much economic devastation in the inner cities. Consequently, African Americans were disproportionately affected and became either unemployed or underemployed with little wage and reduced benefits. Accordingly, a concentration of African Americans was established in the inner city neighbourhoods of places such as New York, Chicago and Detroit. .. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghetto#United_States
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On Ferguson i had a look some time ago .. racial composition has moved from 73.8% white in 1990 to 2010 census 67.4% African American and 29.3% White
.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferguson,_Missouri#Demographics .. so many whites would have some difficulty 'coping' with that .. also some common police activities lend much to be desired ..

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Blacks plainly still suffer prejudice across America: they account for 86% of the vehicle stops made by police in Ferguson. But America’s race problem is increasingly one of class. Blacks’ biggest problem is now poverty, which is most visible in places such as Ferguson. Like many post-war suburbs across America, Ferguson is stuck between the prosperous white exurbs of St Louis and the city’s somewhat revitalised centre. In 1990 its population was three-quarters white; by 2010, it had become two-thirds black. The sub-prime mortgage crisis hit it hard. Many of its homeowners still owe more than they own.

Solving the problems of places like Ferguson is less about passing more anti-discrimination laws than about rekindling economic growth and spreading the proceeds. But there are also ways of making politics and policing work better that would contribute greatly to racial harmony in America.

The police are not an army

Ferguson’s political institutions have not kept up with its demography. Of the city’s six-member council, five are white. The hapless mayor, James Knowles, is a white Republican who was re-elected in 2013 in an election in which fewer than one in eight eligible voters turned out. He is in charge of the police force, in which three out of 53 officers are black. Such disparities feed the belief—held by blacks across the country—that both justice and law-enforcement systems are racist.

Police brutality reinforces that belief. If there was one lesson from the attack on Rodney King, it was that police officers should behave like civilians, not an occupying army. Around 500 people were killed last year by the police—though since nobody counts, nobody really knows.

In Ferguson, bad policies help to explain why distrust turns to anger. Take, for example, the way the town is financed. In 2013 a fifth of Ferguson’s general revenues—some $2.6m, in a city of 21,000 people—were derived from fines and asset confiscation. That is equivalent to $124 a year for every man, woman and child in the city. Paying fines, even for minor traffic offences, can involve queuing for hours. Those who miss court dates can be jailed until they pay, accumulating more fines along the way. Slowly but surely, the justice system has become an elaborate mechanism for criminalising poverty.

Smaller cities should stop using their police forces and courts as tax-collectors.
More: http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21635012-race-americas-deepest-problem-multiple-small-changes-can-mitigate-it-fury-ferguson
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As you say much of the blame for the unhappiness in Ferguson arises from bad policies by people in charge.

Just one more example of how important it is for everyone to vote as intelligently as they can, and whenever and wherever they can.

Then you have Republican efforts to make it harder for minorities to vote.

See also:

How Much Racial Profiling Happens in Ferguson?
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