Rush Limbaugh: Detroit Went Bankrupt Because Blacks Drove Out Whites. Economists are attributing Detroit’s recent bankruptcy filing to problems facing the entire Rust Belt region: a shrinking tax base, high health and pension costs, sprawl, and general dysfunction. But on Tuesday, Rush Limbaugh added another cause to the long list of factors that have contributed to the city’s downfall: black people. During an appearance on Fox News’ On The Record with Greta Van Susteren on Tuesday, Limbaugh claimed that “unchecked” Democratic rule “since the last Republican mayor [in] 1957” created a lazy and bloated culture of out-of-control spending and corruption.
“You’ve had that — that town has been a petri dish of everything the Democrat Party stands for, everything the Democrat Party loves — massive unions, massive pensions, pay people pensions and health care long after they’ve stopped working,” he said, before arguing that the city’s first black mayor exacerbated the city’s spending and sparked racial riots that chased white people into the suburbs: Detroit’s Bankruptcy Reflects a History of Racism.
This is black history month. It is also the month that the Emergency Manager who took political power and control from the mostly African American residents of Detroit has presented his plan to bring the city out of the bankruptcy he steered it into. This is black history in the making, and I hope the nation will pay attention to who wins and who loses from the Emergency Manager’s plan. Black people are by far the largest racial or ethnic population in Detroit, which has the highest percentage of black residents of any American city with a population over 100,000. Eighty-three percent of the city’s 701,000 residents are black. It continues to be an underreported story that a white state legislature and white governor took over the city and forced it to file for bankruptcy against the will of its elected representatives. It’s important to view what is happening to Detroit and its public employees through a racial lens.
Government was involved at a more micro level as well. Everything You Need To Know About Detroit's Bankruptcy Settlement. A judge gave final approval to Detroit’s plan for emerging from bankruptcy on Friday, closing the courtroom chapter of the insolvent city’s recovery after 16 months of formal bankruptcy proceedings. For city retirees and workers, the final deal is far better than what observers anticipated last fall and a significant improvement over what the city’s lawyers initially offered.
Large financial companies with significant claims on the destitute city are walking away with less to show for their investments than they had hoped. In that sense, then, working people got a better deal from the city than faceless financial firms. Friday’s ruling brings that dealmaking to a close and marks the beginning of the next stage of Detroit’s redevelopment. The deal allows the city to begin restoring public services that have lapsed almost entirely in recent years, tearing down blighted properties, and retrofitting itself for an economic future that may not look at all like the Motor City’s past.
Detroit’s Bankruptcy Reflects a History of Racism. Marilyn Salenger: ‘White flight’ and Detroit’s decline. By Marilyn Salenger By Marilyn Salenger July 21, 2013 Marilyn Salenger is president of Strategic Communications Services and a former correspondent and news anchor for several CBS stations. An almost palpable sadness has swept across the country at the news that the city of Detroit has filed for bankruptcy. While the possibility of this had been discussed, the reality of what was once the fourth-largest city in the United States sinking to such depths is disheartening, a moment people will remember for years to come. To understand that the decline and bankruptcy represent so much more than dollars and cents requires a step back to a time that many would prefer to forget but remains unforgettable.
In the late 1960s,racial tensions engulfed parts of our country, at the cost of lost lives and abject destruction. Such was the case in Detroit during the summer of 1967, when one of the worst race riots our country had seen took place. Opinions Orlando Shooting Updates post_newsletter348 true false. Report Shows Real Factors Behind Detroit Crisis: Revenue Decline, Wall Street Deals Play Largest Role. Modest Pension Benefits Play Little Role in Financial Crisis DETROIT — In their push for bankruptcy, Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr and other public figures are incorrectly looking at Detroit’s long-term debt—figures generated using aggressive and in some cases inaccurate assumptions—to the detriment of solving the City’s immediate cash-flow crisis and its long-term structural challenges, according to a report released Wednesday by Demos.
Detroit is not a corporation, it’s a city, and its bankruptcy proceedings have been focused on the wrong numbers. The Detroit Bankruptcy shows how the current bankruptcy filing is the result of a severe decline in revenue, caused by the 2008 financial crisis, and cuts in annual state revenue sharing starting in 2011. Risky Wall Street deals further jeopardized the city’s public finances by threatening immediate payments that the city could not afford. Detroit’s crisis was caused by multiple factors: City spending and pensions are not the culprit.