ONE WEEKEND – AT 10:57 A.M. ET:  One of the great accomplishments within the United States in recent decades has been the successful assault on crime in some of our large cities, inspired by the work of Rudy Giuliani and his police officials in New York.

The murder rate in New York in the years since Rudy took office in the early 90s is down 80%.  New York has become a remarkably safe city, and a successful one.  This has driven the left crazy, as the success came without groveling to every ethnic leader or pandering to the "socio-economic problems of inner-city peoples."  (I hope I have the lingo right.) 

But now we're having setbacks.  This has been one of the bloodiest weekends in recent New York history.  From the New York Post:

In one of the bloodiest weekends in recent city history, 31 people were brutally shot in roughly 48 hours this weekend -- including three kids at a house party-turned-shooting gallery in The Bronx.

25 people had been shot as of Sunday night, but by early Monday morning, six more people were shot in three separate incidents in Brooklyn.

Four people were shot at 12:45 a.m. at what appeared to be a barbecue on East 54th Street. One of the victims, 18-year-old Tyrief Gary, has died. The other three are in stable condition.

A man and a woman were each shot in the chest at 4:24 a.m. and 6 a.m., the first at Linden Boulevard and Nostrand Ave and the second at 57 Empire Boulevard. Both victims were taken to Kings County hospital where they're in critical condition.

Police sources believe the three shootings this morning are connected to the pre-dawn festivities leading up to today's West Indian Day parade. The traditional celebration, known as J'ouvert, has been the scene of numerous shootings in the past, although cops have had it under control in recent years.

New York's self-indulgent mayor, who's become more liberal with every passing hour, is not Rudy Giuliani.  He has the usual prescription to end the violence.

Calling the chilling violence "just unconscionable," Mayor Bloomberg demanded that the feds step up their efforts to get illegal weapons off the streets.

"We just cannot continue to have these guns in the hands of kids who don't understand the value of human life," he said.

No kidding, Bloomie.  But we know exactly where you're going – the next step will be to blame the gun manufacturers.  The fact is that the same gun manufacturers supply legal weapons to states with high gun ownership, like Vermont and New Hampshire, where the murder rate is tiny. 

Two dozen of the victims were shot in 13 incidents between 6 a.m. Saturday and 6 a.m. yesterday, authorities said.

More than half of those were wounded -- one fatally -- within a five-hour stretch, from 3 to 8 a.m. yesterday.
The 25th victim was shot at 9 a.m. yesterday.

The issue is culture.  We still have too many in this society, and especially in liberal cities like New York, who indulge the worst elements, who insist that their "culture" be "respected," instead of teaching these young people the right values. 

Yes, it is certainly true that illegal guns must be swept from the streets.  But the guns aren't firing themselves.

By the way, we not only have had this horrible weekend in New York, we've seen flash mobs in cities around the country, where gangs of "youths" invade stores, stealing anything they wish.  Please notice the silence from the White House and the Justice Department.  But DOJ had plenty of resources to raid a guitar company which may have been using improperly imported wood. 

I hope this weekend won't provide a vision of things to come.  But if it does, the man at the top, in Washington, who held a beer summit at the White House when one of his professorial friends felt insulted, had better start speaking up.

September 5, 2011