Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnR
i think it is a shame and feel sorry for the current & former people from Detroit.
Years of bad management, industry, me me me constituencies, graft, and politicians (could group them as one) have brought on this sorrow - in more places than just Detroit.
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Yes, we can look at the many pieces that make a great city and point out how this that and the other caused the downfall. But we can also look at the whole. In totality, the city is the people. The people determine the greatness or poorness of the city. It is the people who must ultimately decide who will manage and in what way, whether industry and the entire market will be free to operate in a profitable and competitive way or be strapped with constrictive regulations, burdensome taxes, and crony partnerships with politicians that drive out competitors and entrap the citizens in one-dimensional and shrinking choices. It is the people who must build safe communities with common values rather than divisive tactics which drive out the productive who don't fit majority cultural norms. And it is the people who must ultimately take the blame for the destruction of one of the greatest cities in the world.
But when the people are persuaded to follow an agenda that promises to free them of the responsibility to be great, or even adequate, then all is turned upside down. They then choose to follow a path which not only strips them of responsibility, but herds them into a dependency which cannot sustain itself.
And when the people of a country does the same, it will suffer the same fate.