No wonder the criminals are winning

 

I was startled to see these figures.

A retired Chicago Police Department Chief of Detectives, Eugene Roy, describes the situation.

... police in Chicago are understaffed and under supported by leadership, which has led to plummeting morale and skyrocketing anxiety.

"The suicides and the current climate go hand in hand," Roy said, explaining that police officers are no longer viewed like they were in Norman Rockwell’s iconic 1958 "The Runaway," the painting of a young boy and a police officer that has become synonymous with the "protect and serve" aspect of law enforcement. 

"We’ve gone from that vision to the police being vilified at every turn," Roy said. "Officers are the subject of vilification, disrespect, false claims, and they’re not being supported by the government agencies that employ them."

The police staffing situation in Chicago is dire, Roy said, and the hostile climate has resulted in a mass exodus of police officers, including 2,600 who have retired over the last four calendar years. 

"What’s really telling is that during the same time period, 632 officers have resigned," Roy said. "That means they’ve left the Chicago Police Department before they’re eligible for a pension. The vast majority of them are being employed by other police agencies and they are leaving the Chicago Police Department in droves."

The mass retirements and resignations, which the city has not replaced as part of a plan Roy calls a "stealth defunding," has created a nightmare scenario for officers patrolling the streets.

"They're canceling days off and putting people on 12-hour shifts to make up for this personnel shortfall," Roy said. "You have people that are working through horror stories like 18 straight days without a day off. You can’t function that way."

There's more at the link.

It's the same in almost every big "blue" (i.e. Democrat-controlled) city these days.  Crime is increasingly out of control, the police are increasingly blamed by their political bosses for being part of the problem rather than the solution, and the people of the city are left in the lurch, to endure rising crime, violence and anti-social behavior.  The politicians don't care.  They're marching to the beat of their own politically-correct, progressive, quasi-socialist drummer.

I can only repeat what I and many others have said for many years:  Get out of big cities.  Now.  It's your only way to protect yourself from these problems.  If you've been fortunate enough to have been insulated from them until now, be very sure that won't last.  Sooner or later, the social breakdown in our country is going to get to the point where they come after you, too.

The numbers don't lie.  Mathematics is inexorable, and undeniable, and unavoidable.  Reduce your law enforcement numbers, and your criminal numbers will go up.  Vice versa also applies . . . but nobody's willing to do that today.  Our so-called "leaders" will make sure they have enough police in protective details to be spared the consequences of their failures.  The rest of us won't have that luxury.

Peter