Slams Johnson's claim of 'decades of disinvestment' by past mayors
When Richard M. Daley, became mayor, he “understood more than anybody ... that he had to address what was called Beirut-on-the-Lake at the time because of the racial divide,” his brother Bill Daley told the Sun-Times.
By Fran Spielman 
Bill Daley is interviewed by reporter Fran Spielman in the Sun-Times newsroom in 2018, during his campaign for mayor.
Sun-Times file
Mayor Brandon Johnson has blamed “decades of disinvestment and deliberate neglect” for the violence plaguing Chicago. He has accused his predecessors of “tolerating Black death” and “running this city into the ground” financially and ignoring the long-festering pension crisis.
The blame game doesn’t sit well with Bill Daley, brother of Richard M. Daley, Chicago’s longest-serving mayor and son of the city’s second-longest-serving mayor, Richard J. Daley.
That’s because the “decades of disinvestment” Johnson refers to includes both Daleys, who between them held office for 43 years.
“Any politician can say anything they want and not based upon any facts. When you look at the investments over 22 years that Rich made throughout this city and then you look at how he did in his election results across the city — getting 2% in his first election in the Black community and, the last time he ran, probably getting 70 or 80% in the Black community — that was a statement about the fairness,” Bill Daley said.
“Rich understood more than anybody when he became mayor that he had to address what was called Beirut-on-the-Lake at the time because of the racial divide. And he did everything in his words and his actions to address that. Not with great hyperbole. Not with accusations. Not with statements that are meaningless except for the words expressed through the air that comes out of the politician’s mouth.”
After winning the 1989 special election for the right to serve out the remainder of Harold Washington’s term, Richard M. Daley “didn’t spend time blaming Harold Washington or Eugene Sawyer for the problems he inherited. He rolled up his sleeves and got to work to solve those problems,” Bill Daley said.
“Rich kept the rhetoric fairly low, understanding the sensitivity in the city at the time. That the words get you nowhere. It’s the actions that you do and the progress you make…That’s all the voters care about. They don’t care about the air that comes out of politicians’ mouths,” Bill Daley said.
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Johnson likes to say that he expects to be mayor long enough to become Chicago’s longest-serving mayor.
Bill Daley essentially said, “We’ll see.”
“If Mayor Johnson is there for 22 years, then people will make a judgment as to whether or not he was fair to every community in this city and whether or not he understood that the city is not just one section of the city or one race or demographic of the city, but is a myriad of communities and people trying to live together and move forward. And that’s a big challenge for any mayor,” he said.
In April 2018, long-simmering tensions between then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Richard M. Daley boiled over when Bill Daley rose to the defense of his older brother.
The final straw was Emanuel’s decision to blame his predecessor and political mentor for the avalanche of tax increases needed to solve Chicago’s pension crisis.
“It’s unseemly to keep blaming the previous administration, which has been gone seven years,” Bill Daley, who followed Emanuel as White House chief of staff under former President Barack Obama, told the Chicago Sun-Times on that day. “ Come on. Put the big-boy pants on, and move on. It’s kind of sad.”
Compared to that emotional outburst, Bill Daley’s response to Johnson’s more pointed criticism of the Daley era was more dispassionate.
That was particularly true when he was asked to respond to Johnson’s June 20 claim: “When a 7-year-old is stepping outside their home and is gunned down, it’s an indication of the failures of previous administrations who have been intentional about leaving our communities behind.”
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Johnson continued: “These are the same communities whose schools have been closed, public housing has been shuttered. These are the same communities in which gross disinvestment has been the prevailing form of politics in this city for decades. … This crisis did not show up with simply a bullet. This crisis showed up when previous administrations decided to give up on these communities,” Johnson said.
CPD Supt. Larry Snelling and Mayor Brandon Johnson walk into a news conference on Monday at CPD headquarters, 3510 S. Michigan Ave., to address the high number of shootings and killings over the long Fourth of July weekend in Chicago.
Daley fired back.
“How ‘bout responsibility for the people who are committing the crimes? ... How about people being held responsible for their actions — whether it’s a 15-year-old child or whether it’s the parents of that 15-year-old child,” Bill Daley said.
After a four-day Fourth of July weekend during which more than 100 people were shot, 21 of them fatally, Johnson finally shifted, declaring Chicagoans have “had enough of it and vowed that “there will be consequences” for those responsible for “wreaking havoc on my streets.”
Daley essentially said it’s about time.
“Many politicians — they like to look backwards and talk about what wasn’t done. Yes, the pension situation wasn’t solved by Richard J. Daley or Jane Byrne or Mike Bilandic or Harold Washington or Gene Sawyer or Rich Daley or Rahm Emanuel or Lori Lightfoot or Brandon Johnson, yet. That’s true. And it’s still not solved,” he said.
“You can go back and blame all of those people. But, what are you doing today? What is happening today that’s gonna change that?”
Mayor Johnson has to encourage parents to do a better job of raising their children and accept the responsibility for their negative behavior.
ReplyDeleteAll of us must work together to make Chicago a great place for all people. All of us must self educate to prevent serious health problems that’s causing the high rate of cancer and heart disease among young adults. Use technology to become medically expertise. Ask the computer to list the foods to prevent certain illnesses and write them down because food is medicine.
All of us must do our part to help the young mayor to make the city safe for all people.
If you see something suspicious, call the police. If you know goods are stolen, don’t buy them. Teach your children right from wrong and how to avoid violence.
Work together to keep the neighborhoods a great place to live.
Reward children and teenagers for good behavior and success in school. Give them a reason to be good. Teach them how to avoid being a victim of violence. Teach them how to use YouTube to teach themselves math, programming languages, crafts, sewing clothing, music lessons, nutrition, and whatever of interest for self improvement and employment.
There are millions of great black people in America and only a few bad black people. Therefore the mayor must stop focusing on the negativity of the few black people who have turned to drugs, alcohol, and gun violence that makes all of us look bad. A mayor is elected to serve all people.
Johnson is just plain incompetent and has no idea what he is doing.
ReplyDeleteDemocrats are like crackheads who can’t control their spending, they sell off their assets for a fraction of the true value to feed their spending addiction.
ReplyDeleteI am from the generation of black people that celebrates age 88 today and worked with elderly Mayor Daley to make Chicago a great city. We arrived in Chicago at age 17 during the great migration from New Orleans and joined all of the newcomers from the south and worked together as we completed our education and worked part time to support ourselves. We also lived in little kitchenettes and allowed the unemployed friends to sleep on the sofas or the floors.
ReplyDeleteThe Jews reached out to help us by giving advice on how to self-educate, how to eat healthy to be able to learn, how to become medical, legal, and business professionals. We also had the YMCA and the YWCA helping us in every direction. The Irish and Italians also reached out to help us to build our communities by offering employment in their businesses.
City Council members had an easy job because we were upstanding citizens who were proud to live in their wards and would never commit wrongful acts to cause any embarrassments.
We never played the blame game because we were too busy employed, owning a business, getting college degrees, becoming doctors, nurses, lawyers, teachers, college professionals, social workers, and so on. We wanted to be able to help our people to move up to success.
Today, as I celebrate age 88, I find it difficult to understand why black people are continuing to complain about pettiness when every thing they need to know is taught on the internet. They also have artificial intelligence. In addition, there are numerous jobs that can be created to provide extra income to prevent poverty.
Those blacks were ambitious and self motivated to succeed.
DeleteThey were ambitious because their parents were great role models with Christian values.
DeleteMayor Johnson has to concentrate on what is best for Chicago instead of trying to please certain black
ReplyDeletepeople who refuse to get an education, job skills, earn adequate income, obey laws, respect each other, raise their children properly, and so on.
The influx of illegals allowed to walk into this country has added to the problems that are turning America into a third world country and cities into nightmares. I blame that issue on the president and city leaders who want sanctuary status. We are suffering and change must come.
A black mayor has a difficult time managing a large city like Chicago because too many black youngsters are not accustomed to believing that black people are qualified and capable of getting a complicated job done. As a result, there is usually a high crime rate and lack of respect for authority to make the leader look bad. In addition, the mayor is a member of the most disrespected and high crime areas of Chicago. He is considered to be out of his league.
ReplyDeleteBlack schools are considered inferior by many black people because too many of their teachers are uncertified and not able to pass required exams because of their inadequate educational background and uneducated parents who have not been able to help them.
Black doctors do not receive the same respect as white doctors because of the negative reputation of blacks receiving an inadequate education and medical training. Many black patients refuse to trust black and non white doctors.
Whites from the Appalachian mountains have a difficult time moving up to top political positions because of their reputation of negative lifestyles and education.
Welcome to America!
Most Americans are not ready to pass the torch to an Asian Indian -Jamaican to replace Biden because she does not know America. There are blacks who have experienced living in this country that dates back to their arrival before 1619 according to a large sign posted in Virginia, and should have been selected as the first black Vice President instead of vp Harris.
DeleteBiden has been suffering from dementia for a few years and used poor judgment when he selected Ms. Harris for his Vice President as well as endorsing her for presidency because she has not demonstrated the ability to bring about change to benefit all Americans. The border crisis is an example of her inadequate ability to get a job done. The guys would boot her out of office on day one as president.
While democrats are celebrating the promotion of vp Harris, thousands of illegals have crossed Mexico and entered into the open and unsecured southern border of the United States. According to the rumor, they are entering as fast as possible before Trump becomes president.
DeleteAsian Indians have followed the most pathetic and inhumane caste system on the planet. I am proud of the accomplishments of vp Harris, but I am afraid of what she will do to America that will cause more harm for black people because she does not know America. She needs the black vote, but she does not care about black people. She will look the other way while this country will become repopulated with people from all over the world without getting vetted and entering legally.
DeleteI don’t appreciate politicians encouraging black youngsters to support abortions because we believe that it is a plan to reduce the number of black people.
Politicians who support open borders and sanctuary cities are aiding in the demise of the type of America that we have enjoyed as the greatest place on earth. We should not have people sleeping in streets, killing each other, begging for food, destroying businesses, walking into cities from unknown place, and so on.
In short, we need to hear what type of president vp Harris will be for our vote. She is not a queen waiting for a crown.
Mayor Johnson mentioned the issue of closed schools and public housing in black communities. Perhaps he does not know that undercover teachers were sent to certain under- performing schools to teach and reported that black students were allowed to sit idle and receive passing grades while education did not take place. Passing grades were given to students who had dropped out after attending once or twice. Numerous students discussed how they were fed up with the negative quality of education they were receiving in their community schools. Those non performing schools were closed because they were empty.
ReplyDeleteStudents will stop attending schools as soon as they realize that they are being used to provide employment for unqualified teachers. Ask the students.
Black people have a high death rate because of the negative quality of science and health education taught in their schools. If you ask how many grams of protein they should eat each day, they have no idea. The same for grams of fiber to prevent colon cancer. The same for the amount of milligrams of potassium, calcium, magnesium, etc. They cannot name the foods to eat that contains those life saving vitamins and minerals.
They don’t know the metric system, yet they are going to become parents of babies. They don’t know the foods that contain vitamins that prevent blindness, heart disease, high blood pressure, and so on. Yet they are going to become parents and may enter college.
I asked a parent what would she do if her blood pressure dropped far lower than 90 over 60, and she said she knew nothing about blood pressure. Note that first aid, nutrition education, job prep, technology, and so on are a part of our educational system that all students should learn from K to 12 and beyond.
Students should be taught that food is medicine and how to research foods that contain the needed vitamins to remain healthy in order to stop relying on prescription drugs and costly vitamin pills.
Re public housing, it was a disaster to house hundreds of poor and uneducated people in unsupervised multi-unit apartments. They did not receive monthly housekeeping inspections for maintenance, nor monthly inspections and spraying for insects and rodents, inadequate vetting of residents, inadequate gang and crime prevention, and so on. The youngsters hated those buildings and were embarrassed to mention that they lived in those negative buildings.
In a few years, American cities will look like countries I visited where there will be thousands of low income people living in slums, thousands sitting on the streets playing checkers, eating junk and tossing trash in the streets, thousands of children dropping out of schools because of the teacher shortage, overcrowded hospital emergency rooms because of the shortage of nurses and doctors, increases in cancers, kidney disease, diabetes, heart attacks because of inadequate knowledge of nutrition, and so on. The cause of the aforementioned problems will be caused if Ms. Harris becomes the president because she prefers open borders, eliminating restrictions, overpopulation, and so on. Parts of India are in a state of poverty and chaos as they practice the caste system. Do the research. She was born in America, but her culture is that of an anti American foreigner.
ReplyDeleteMs Harris is calling on black sorority sisters, black fraternity brothers, and all people of color to vote for her to win as president of this great country. Shame on her for using black people to divide this nation and interfere with the democratic process. Black people will vote for the best candidate who will benefit all Americans and keep all of us safe. We are tired of being used for a vote.
ReplyDeleteWe will never hear a white candidate running for president asking all white organizations, fraternities, etc., to vote for them because that’s not the way we select our leaders in our democratic America. Shame on Ms Harris.
Note that Asian Indians don’t respect the intelligence of black Americans. However they will always use blacks to move up in America because they need our support to help them to become rich, rich, rich at any cost while they laugh all the way to the bank!
ReplyDeleteIn reference to black Americans, all of us blacks are immigrants and our people arrived in America before 1619. Millions of blacks are biracial because of slavery, and others by freedom of choice to marry the ones they loved.
ReplyDeleteMillions of blacks are highly educated, intelligent, wealthy, law abiding citizens, and the positive list goes on. Therefore any politician with the power of the president would have chosen a black female as the first black president of the United States of America instead of a female who was born to foreigners from India and Jamaica who visited America to attend college who is Indian-Jamaican and not a black American if we are selecting by color only. That child is not qualified to lead this country because her knowledge of running a country is based on the pathetic caste system of India where dark skin and kinky hair is inferior and her traumatic experience during American segregation when she decided to use black people to move up to the road to success while she will always view black Americans and the lowest caste of Asian Indians as an inferior race of people. I fear what will happen to America under her leadership.
Dementia Biden had a problem with Anita Hill during that era of selecting Clarence Thomas. He has a problem with black African American women who are descendants of slaves who have made many contributions to making America a great place. This year of 2024, he has had the chance to make our deceased slaves proud by naming a Black African American female with a Black African American male husband as president of the United States of America. That would be time for a great celebration. That would be progress!
ReplyDeleteAfrican Americans have been in America since before 1619. It is our turn to be President and not an Asian-Indian-Jamaican! Peace!
Abortion is the murder of the unborn and should not be supported by politicians. If women don’t want to get pregnant, methods of prevention should be used.
ReplyDeleteThere are numerous cases of teens performing self abortions and are found unconscious as a result of hemorrhages while alone in school washrooms.
There are cases of women entering hospital emergency rooms hemorrhaging because of performing self abortions that can be fatal because they may bleed to death or may cause severe harm that may cause infertility.
Many women have mental problems that result from aborting their babies.
If women never have babies, then we will no longer exist. How sad.
Black women are complaining about health problems during pregnancy that white women don’t experience. Please stop comparing white women to black women and health problems because white women have always been involved in health education along with their husbands and parents that control the health systems on earth. They read and write medical information, nutrition manuals, prenatal care, and all information necessary for good health.
ReplyDeleteBlack and all races would benefit health wise if all schools would teach students how the body works, nutrition education, food science because food is medicine, and blood types when planning families.
Prenatal care is supposed to educate women about methods to prevent major problems through nutrition, chemicals to avoid, weight management, exercise, less stress, knowledge of blood types before pregnancy, and so on.
Medicare would save billions if people have knowledge of how to eat to prevent numerous diseases and illnesses as well as how to avoid prescription drugs and their side effects. Knowledge is power!
The government should focus on saving life and disease prevention instead of aborting the unborn.
During the 1960s, Asian Indians stated that they were white. While working in computer programming at large Chicago corporations in the 1980s, Asian Indian men stated that they were white and were surprised to see a black employee in computer programming.
ReplyDeleteAn Asian Indian employee at Mayo Clinic of Minnesota made derogatory statements about the diet of black people that caused high blood pressure.
My point is that Asian Indians do not consider themselves as black Americans unless they want blacks support to move up economically.
Asian Indians have never called themselves black. Trump remembers those days when Asian Indians were listed as white years ago. Harris is black because she wants the black vote.
ReplyDeleteVice President Harris is called black because her mother is Asian Indian and her father is a black Jamaican. Therefore, most black people are biracial because millions of female slaves were impregnated by white slave owners and had many biracial children. Former President Obama is biracial as well.
ReplyDeleteTherefore, let us be specific about defining races in America. Both Vp Harris and President Obama are biracial black people of color.
We do not have the first black President, we have the first biracial black of color.
Ms Harris is biracial and joined the black sorority because the white sororities would not have accepted her as a member. She will be the first biracial Jamaican and Asian Indian woman to become president of America. That’s progress because America is the only country that refers to people according to race and color, and requires only white men to be president.
ReplyDeleteIt is time for America to start calling all citizens Americans instead of racist labels of skin color. All people born in Italy are called Italians. Those born in America should be called Americans. Females should be listed as American females, etc.
ReplyDeleteRe the police officer who killed Ms Massey, note that the parents should have notified the 911 operator that their daughter was mentally ill and needed special help to allow the paramedics to respond because the two police officers were not thinking clearly at after 1 AM in the morning, their brain was asleep. Training of humans for certain jobs is necessary to prevent serious problems. Some people are not capable of handling certain stressful positions.
ReplyDeleteNote that the human body is under the control of circadian rhythms of 24 hour cycles. Our bodies are in the sleep cycle at night shifts and the brain does not function as well. Police officers, airline pilots, medical surgeons, truck drivers, and all night shift workers have health problems caused by trying to work while the body is supposed to be asleep. Do the research. Thinking skills are affected. Many errors and mistakes are made.
Many police officers and others who work night shifts have heart problems, diabetes, depression, high blood pressure, cancer, and so on because of deprived sleep and certain chemicals. Do the research. There are growth hormones that appear when the body is in stage three deep REM sleep that make certain body repairs that night shift workers do not receive because they are at work instead of in deep REM sleep and miss the repairs made by those hormones.
Our bodies are controlled by hormones that arrive at various hours of the day to perform certain functions. Some hormones require us to be in certain body positions in order to perform their function. Hormone Aldosterone arrives early in the morning from the Adrenal glands to meet hormone Renin that provides Sodium Chloride that’s provided by the kidneys to control salt or Sodium Chloride for example. You have to visit a lab that opens before 7 AM to get blood work to test Aldosterone levels vs Renin ratio. All of this information should be taught to students in career education.
Night shift workers should be highly compensated with extra bonuses and early retirement benefits.
Ms Harris has to select a Vice President. Why not pick a qualified woman or man of any race? There are Blacks, Latino, Chinese, Italian, Greeks, Arabs, Asian Indians, Irish, African, Jamaican, American Indians, and so on who are qualified citizens who were born in America.
ReplyDeleteRacism must end!
Medical professionals and teachers are fed of with politicians supporting abortions because they cause too many problems among teens such as
ReplyDeleteencouraging youngsters to have unprotected sex because abortions will solve their problems of unwanted pregnancies instead of focusing on prevention of sexual diseases caused by not using protection.
Numerous teens are attending schools with a variety of sexual diseases including Syphilis , Gonorrhea, HPV, AIDS, pubic lice, and so on while requesting assistance with abortions.
Numerous babies are born with a variety of health problems caused by sexual transmitted diseases.
Politicians need to focus of promoting health education in schools to prevent diseases to save life instead of supporting laws to encourage unsafe sex and murder of the unborn. What are they thinking?
Note that people are complaining about costly grocery bills because they are buying unnecessary foods.
ReplyDeleteAccording to nutritionists, the human body needs grams of protein based on your body weight, 22 plus grams of fiber, about 1,021 milligrams of calcium foods, about 740 micrograms of vitamin A foods, at least 3,700 milligrams of potassium foods, and 310 milligrams of magnesium foods. If you study nutrition, you will learn that most foods have all of those nutrients and can be eaten before the end of sundown.
Re protein, a fillet salmon fish has 36 grams of protein in a serving which is a daily requirement of protein in a day for a 100 plus pound female. If that female eats two fillets of salmon in a day plus other protein foods, she will have kidney problems because too much protein harms the kidneys. The same applies to overeating all foods because they cause health problems like cancer, heart disease, liver failure, kidney failure, diabetes, obesity, early death, and so on.
Study nutrition and prevent serious health problems while saving your money at grocery stores. Buy what you need for nutrition. Don’t eat much. Stop buying junk and sweets. Eat real food.
Vice President Harris upsets me with the constant laughing at serious issues. She needs counseling to prepare herself to become presidential and professional or the younger generation will not respect her.
ReplyDeleteI am hearing lots of foreigners say that more illegals will continue to enter this country when she becomes president and America will reach a population of a billion like India.
Chicago will have a new health clinic near Michael Reese to focus on prevention of numerous health problems. That’s a great idea and it will be greater if nutrition education is taught to patients by a certified nutritionist or dietitian because knowledge of what you are putting in your body will save your life.
ReplyDeleteWomen of color who are medically illiterate and refuse to self educate by reading heath material and nutritional information have a higher death rate when having babies. They have high blood pressure (eclampsia) while pregnant, blood problems with clots that’s usually caused by eating too much vitamin K foods that thickens the blood to prevent hemorrhage in all humans. They may be obese because of their eating habits of overeating. They may be diabetic. They may be consuming alcohol and prescription drugs while pregnant, and so on.
ReplyDeleteThe blood type of the parents can cause problems for pregnant women. For example, if the mother is type O negative and the father is of a totally different blood type, problems will occur and require the newborn to receive an emergency supply of blood, and other care if the child survives.
Schools must focus on teaching students how the body works, how the body is controlled by hormones that arrive at different times of 24 hour days, how chemicals in foods cause or prevent health problems, and so on.