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Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best sees it coming---many cities are already experiencing it.
As smug, misinformed, virtue-signaling Pharisees serving as mayors and on city councils across the nation continue to show their "virtue" by severely defunding police departments---or even discussing doing so, crime is already surging in those cities.
Seattle's Police Chief Carmen Best says Seattle is moving forward on a 50% reduction of the police force without even the benefit of any kind of planning.
Some cities are already experiencing massive increases in shootings, while police are backing away.
The perfect storm for those who seek to "remake America."
Be informed, not misled.
An explosion of violent crime.
The Wall Street Journal editorial staff expressed deep concern this weekend as crime, particularly shootings, are surging in a number of cities as they take action to defund the police departments.
The Journal says:
"Law-enforcement officials in several large US cities are wrestling with the sharp rise in violent crime amid a national debate over the role of police, calls to reduce police-department budgets and growing fiscal troubles."
"Some cities," WSJ says, "are on track to have their most violent summers in years."
Indeed they are. In Milwaukee, for example, homicides are up 37% so far this year, on pace to break an all-time record of 167 in 1991, which included 16 murders by convicted serial murderer Jeffery Dahmer.
Homicides so far this year in Chicago are ahead of the pace of 2016, which marked the city's highest number since 1996.
New York and Los Angles have seen falling numbers of homicides for years, killings this year is up 23% and 11.6% respectively.
Kansas City, Mo. has recorded 99 killings since January, far outpacing any record in their history for the first 6 months.
Milwaukee Police Chief Morales says: "We had a series of events that many of us probably never experienced in our time"---calling it "a perfect storm."
The Journal identifies a number of other cities experiencing the same surge in violent crimes---Chicago had 27 homicides over the 4th of July weekend representing a 125% increase fro a year earlier.
In Philadelphia, the number of gunshot victims had been steadily increasing since 2014 when 1,047 people were shot. However, at the current rate, the city could have it's highest total since 2007.
This pattern is developing in cities across the nation. One constant is that the cities experiencing the greatest crime surge are led by leftist politicians, and to a one, they are either discussing or moving forward to substantially defund the police departments.
The effect of de-funding the police is measurable and predictable.
While crime rates are soaring in these cities, the morale of police officers is plummeting, as you can imagine.
Ray Kelly, New York City's former long-standing police commissioner, says what we're seeing is a "backing away" by police.
Law enforcement officials say they are weighing the risks of aggressively enforcing the law, concerned that a backlash from activists protesters and residents could trigger attacks on police.
Kelly says, "It's a lot more dangerous to become a police officer."
Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best said Friday that the proposed 50% cut in the police budget will result in the loss of 1100 employees which is 50% of the total workforce---the reason being that most of the police budget is personnel.
The Chief says there will be hundreds of fewer officers responding to the calls.
She says of the city's plan,
"I think ...plan is rather loose here. They haven't got a plan"---"all they've shown is that they want to reduce the budget by 50%....I think that is the height of recklessness for them to decimate public safety for the city of Seattle without being thoughtful and encouraging public engagement on the issue."
Milwaukee police chief says they are now trying to enlist church groups to help fight crime.
The spirit of lawlessness.
Enlisting church groups to help with fight crime is probably not a bad idea, but what we are seeing in our culture today cannot be cured by "church groups" per se, but only by the message church groups are supposed to be preaching to the world.
Paul's letter to the Thessalonians is an explanation. The church had been misinformed. Misled. Some, claiming to be speaking for Paul and other church leaders, had told the Christians the Lord had already returned and they were experiencing the Great Tribulation.
In explaining the Truth to the Christians of Thessalonica, he explains to all of us the "mystery of lawlessness" that is already at work in the church and the culture---a culture acting without law or restraint.
What we are seeing today is not merely a rebellion against the laws of man---although it is that----it is a rebellion against the law of God.
I'll be talking more about that on our radio program today. Please join me. Here's how.
Be Informed. Be Discerning. Be Vigilant. Be Prayerful. Be Bold.