But here's the truth
Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg never would utter such a thing in public, and his representatives reportedly attempted to block the release of footage of his remarks, but he recently told attendees at the Aspen Institute that "all the crime" is in minority neighborhoods.
"It's controversial," the liberal former city executive said on the audio of his remarks, "but first thing is all of your -- 95 percent of your murders and murderers, and murder victims fit one M.O. You can just take the description, Xerox it, and pass it out to all of the cops. They are male, minorities, 15 to 25. That's true in New York, it's true in virtually every city in America.
"That's where the real crime is," he added. "You've got to get the guns out of the hands of the people that are getting killed. First thing you can do to help that group is to keep them alive."
Chicago race's implications
America's political left would have its followers believe only the political right is at odds with each other, but the mayoral race in Chicago exposes the division that exists in today's Democratic Party. On one side is incumbent Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the former Clinton administration aide and former chief of staff for President Barack Obama, and candidate for the wealthiest 1 percent who have done well under Obama's administration. The other top contender is Cook County Commissioner Jesus Garcia, who is touting the economic populist line taken by U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.
Emanuel is expected to finish first in Tuesday's election, but some polls say he could fall short of a majority. The likely No. 2 finisher is Garcia, who would then meet Emanuel in a runoff election in six weeks.
"All across the country, particularly in cities," Ilya Sheyman, leader of a political group assisting Garcia, told The Washington Post, "we're seeing that the progressive economic populist agenda is gaining steam [with Democrats]."
Garcia, meanwhile, calls Emanuel "Mayor 1 Percent" and refers to himself as a potential "mayor for all of us."
Biden's mouth -- again
Vice President Joe Biden just can't help himself. He's a talker, and sometimes his mouth appears to get ahead of his brain. In the last week, he made one speech about how the middle class was "being killed" by the economy, and in another mentioned his "great relationships" with Somalis in his home state of Delaware because "an awful lot of them" drive cabs.
In the former reference, he was trying to promote President Obama's budgetary emphasis on infrastructure and how an investment in infrastructure would help the middle class, but he inadvertently swerved into the truth with his comment about the middle class, which along with the poor have suffered under the administration's policies, being in "worse shape than they've been any time since the [19]20s."
In the latter reference, at the extremism summit, Biden was comparing a Minnesota Somali community to his perceived one in Delaware, but The Washington Post Fact Checker said Census data do not back up his claim about a sizable Somali community in Delaware and gave the vice president Four Pinocchios for his claim.
'God Bless America' Is OK
The latest but certainly not the last attempt by atheists to remove all mention of God from public schools came last week in the Nassau County School District near Jacksonville, Fla., when a student closed his reading of the morning announcements with the phrase "God Bless America."
An atheist student took issue with the phrase often uttered at the end of speeches by politicians and went directly to the American Humanist Association, which sent a letter to the principal (who had not been contacted by the offended student) and the school district asking that such activity cease under threat of a lawsuit. The school district, in turn, "warned" the student against repeating any such action.
However, Liberty Institute attorney Jeremy Dys said the student was within his constitutional rights in using the phrase.
"Whether a student is being patriotic or engaging in religious speech," he said, "there is no law in this country forbidding a student from telling his or her classmates, 'God bless America,' and it is illegal for a school to censor a student for doing so."
In turn, the American Family Association sent an Action Alert, urging friends and supporters to contact Nassau County School District Superintendent Dr. John Ruis to urge him to correct the injustice against the student and to ask him to provide 'remedial training' to all staff, advising them of the First Amendment rights and freedoms of students under the Constitution.