Trump Is Wrong, And So Are We

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This is America. Where a President can insult a city of 600,000 residents over his own conflicts with Representative Elijah Cummings. The truth is, our border is being run with wild incompetence and cruelty. The harder truth is, so is the city of Baltimore. Don’t all jump at once – I am a firm supporter of Baltimore, but the city has been left behind time and time again. It has seen its share of scandals and – wait, am I talking about Baltimore or our president? Truth is there are gross similarities here. And let’s get one thing straight, Washington, DC, where Trump calls home, is experiencing a historic rat infestation all over the city. Like, real rats, not the folks cycling in and out of the White house tearing our democracy apart and then running to the hills when they realize the president is Master Shredder. 

As a very wise Facebooker recently said, “Baltimore deserves our own AOC or Ilhan Omar.” It is time for someone to FIGHT for the people of Baltimore and challenge the status quo. Cummings has retained support by relying on voters in Baltimore being uninformed and voting against their own self-interests. This is also how our president maintains a 40% approval rating on average – it has been reported that the educational level of Trump’s supporters averages an 8th-grade reading level. Our democracy is no longer based on facts, truth, and real issues. And Trump attacking Cummings because he has not been a strong enough advocate for Baltimore is interesting considering our country is the laughing stock of the developed world. 

So what can we do? Well, we need to get informed. Those that are informed need to take an Each One, Teach Twenty-One approach. We don’t have time to just hope for the best. It is time that we as a nation get the facts, learn the issues, and challenge those who we vote into office to DO WHAT WE NEED THEM TO DO. This includes every level of elected office starting with the school PTA, city and county council, state legislatures, and our national elected officials. You want to stop having to deal with Trump and Cummings? VOTE THEM OUT. We have a rat infestation. Not just in Baltimore, not just in DC or New York – we have an infestation of rats who have pimped all of us into electing them so they can do as they please with the power we hand them. Trump is dead wrong. And now that we know better, we are dead wrong if we do nothing to change the fabric of our nation, including Baltimore.  

Similar Read: War Taxes And Other Radical Ideas From the Left

The Maybach Music of Policing

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“A bad police department is much like a bad sports team. The first victory is won in the front office. The first sign of a good police department is in city hall.” – Trae Lewis, a former Baltimore City Police Officer

In previous articles for The LCR, I promised to never use another Training Day reference. I wished I hadn’t, for this article centers around police misconduct and corruption; and what better movie to highlight police misconduct and corruption than Training Day. However, I was actually a cop for possibly the most profiled police department in recent memory for all the wrong reasons, the Baltimore City Police Department. Yes, I was a real cop for Baltimore City. To quote Rick Ross, “I knew Noriega, the real the Noriega,” for Rick Ross his emphasis was on the validity of his drug connects. I know – bad example to highlight police corruption especially when a lot of their recent corruption centers around drugs being planted on people. Well, Rick Ross is currently under critical medical care, and I’m wishing him well. Plus it’s just a cool line.



Anyway, as opposed to those who speak on police misconduct, corruption, and brutality via the voice of an observer or an unfortunate victim, I can speak on the subject from the experience of being a cop for more than five years.

 To quote another Rick Ross line, “It’s deeper than rap.” 

Historically speaking, the face of police corruption is a white male cop wrongfully beating, arresting, or doing anything you can think of to mistreat a person. This is very true. The business end of police corruption has been black people, largely young black males. The doer of the business has been white males; however, many principles came into play before that outcome. 

Get ready for a very complicated explanation. Just like how Rick Ross somehow was a major drug pusher, yet his previous job before becoming a successful rapper was one of a correctional officer. ? 

People question the abuse of police against citizens, especially young black males. The answer begins with the entity that empowers the police, for they themselves mistreat citizens, especially young black males. From lack of funding for proper education, carelessness for environmental standards (cough Flint, Michigan), gross gentrification, and countless other traits of a badly ran town, city, state, and federal government including the administration. Furthermore, find me a municipality with government corruption, mismanagement of resources, etc., and I’ll bet dollars to donuts that their police department is responsible for many of the notable negative incidents in its past.

This, of course, does not excuse the acts of blatant wrongdoing of some police officers. However, it’s hard to expect an efficient and properly managed police force when their city hall is messed up from the floor up. 

A department like Baltimore City police is tasked with “cleaning up the city” with none of the underbelly social structures needed to help neighborhoods. A major lack of planning from city hall. So the result, as we saw in the early 2000s with Baltimore, was a war of attrition. The city thought it could literally arrest itself out of its problems. In the mid-2000s, Baltimore police arrested over a 100,000 people yearly and the city only had a little over 600,000 citizens to begin with. The theory of arresting as many people as possible to stop the wrongdoing obviously had no merit, most arrests were bogus. The arrests stretched the boundaries of what’s considered lawful – like the arrest of Freddie Grey, and the result is… well, everything from planted guns and drugs on people to officers on the take.

As Rick Ross said, “God forgives and I don’t,” and though I don’t forgive the acts of wrongdoing by police officers, I do think of the Magnificent (a Rick Ross song) job countless cops do a daily basis. And more importantly, I know in order to get a workplace truly right you don’t just go after the workers, you go after the boss (of course, in my Rick Ross voice).  

Want to learn more about Trae? Check out… traelewis.com

Remove Confederate Statues? The LCR Responds…

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The descendants of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson have stated that confederate statues should be removed. Yet, many American’s still have mixed feelings about the statues and their place in society. Municipalities and institutions are scrambling trying to figure out what to do. Last week, the City of Baltimore and the University of Texas decided to remove their confederate statues overnight. Our contributors share their thoughts about the meaning of the statues, and what we should do with them…

“They say the victor writes history; however, when it comes to the Civil War, the monuments tell a different story. We need to stop paying homage to men who inspired the hate we saw in Charlottesville. If we keep the monuments in place, it creates the impression that we pay homage to those men that represented oppression and hate. If we look to move past history to a state of respect and equality, we need to remove them, acknowledge the facts of slavery and the negative effects we still see today.” – Center Single Mom

“We’ve been holding on to the past for way too long. It’s time to remove those statues so that there isn’t a constant reminder of the ugly times of our past. Instead of holding on to those statues, we should be examining why they mean so much in the first place. Why are some people so intent on holding on to symbols of oppression from the past? Is it because they aren’t ready for that time to be over? If that’s not it, then why the resistance? It should be understood that those statues and monuments represent an ugly period of time in our country’s history. Those statues are the manifestation of hate for a disenfranchised group of people that never deserved the ire to begin with. If we truly want to move past that time, the statues need to go. No one needs that constant reminder of a time charged with hate. It’s time to let it go.” – Center Left HR

“Union North won the American Civil War, slavery ended, and the USA attempted to move forward together with the Confederate South even after unspeakable violence. Imagine continuing to exist in a country where your ideas are not just rejected, but physically beaten out of existence. It can’t be easy for the surviving losers. Consequently, the Confederate monuments were probably meant to be pacifiers for the defeated Southerners and their “way of life” (heavily built around slavery). However, none of those Confederates are still alive (even if their grandchildren are), and slavery is an abhorrent idea rejected entirely by more than 99% of the population. Now these monuments only stand to encourage racism and antagonize black Americans who share the same rights as everyone else to pursue life, liberty, and happiness.” – Unaffiliated Humanist Musician

“Confederate statues belong in museums not public squares. The difference between statues of George Washington or Thomas Jefferson and statues of Robert E. Lee or Jefferson Davis is that the former never waged war against the United States. It’s also important to remember that many of these statues are not meant to be historic monuments – they were erected to intimidate African Americans. There is an important distinction between remembering the dark parts of our history and glorifying them.” – Center Left College Student

When Trump held his press conference after the Charlottesville incident, in a facetious tone he hinted towards removing statues of George Washington as well. An important question – is the fight to maintain confederate monuments rooted only in reminding black people of their ancestors being enslaved? I’m not sure, but that seems to be reason they were erected in first place. Perhaps a better question – will the inability of our political leaders to listen and understand the perspectives of all Americans, and not just their voting base, cause us to one day extol another in stone, despite great ambivalence amongst our citizens?” – Independent Atlanta Teacher 

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