Detroit

Detroit is an interesting but sad city, I've never been there, I wanted to go, it was on my 'to do' list when we were in the States but it didn't happen. Detroit is a very culturally significant city for the western world. Obviously, the Motown tradition still has an impact - the White Stripes come from the famous Cass corridor in downtown Detroit and as we all know the White Stripes are cool. But not many people realise that despite still having a strong cultural influence worldwide, Detroit is a city in sharp decline. Let's say Detroit is an aeroplane - it's in a flat spin, the fuel tanks are bone dry but it doesn't matter because the engines have cut out and the pilots are too busy putting on their parachutes to care anyway. I don't think this is a good thing, it's a really bad thing, it's a tragic situation. Motown , is fast becoming a ghost metropolis. Some leaders in the global warming community like to declare that certain cities are on the brink of becoming ghost towns because of a changing climate. Like Australia's Tim Flannery who has declared Perth the prime candidate for becoming the world's first 'ghost metropolis'from global warming. Well, Perth is doing fine, just fine. But in the case of Detroit, policies used to address so-called global warming will be like a point blank shot to the head in a gangland hit. The CSI will look at Detroit's head and see the carbon tatooing around the wound, whip off his sun glasses and say: "Carbon taxes - point blank."

Being America's most liberal city makes Detroit one of America's most socialist cities. It votes something like 87% Democrat and the Democrats they vote to represent them aren't garden variety Democrats, they're the hard left Democrats that want to nationalise just about everything and make you pay taxes on your levies. In the past 40 years Detroit has had many successes mixed with some failures. It has had its share of political scandals, had colourful industrial relations scandals and some very embarrassing car design scandals (Ford Edsel anyone?). But in the past 10 years it seems it has had almost the reverse - many failures, some successes. Within a decade Detroit has acquired the 3rd highest crime rate in America which has 'perfect stormed' with the 2nd highest unemployment figures. The overall population has dropped sharply for the first time in its history. Forbes magazine, famous for its lists, has declared Detroit to be the most miserable city in the United States. Mind you, Forbes didn't just go on gut instinct with its declaration, it used a sophisticated measurement tool which looked at unemployment rates, personal tax rates, commute times, weather, crime rates and the proximity of 'Superfund' sites (federally controlled toxic cleanup sites).

Detroit has become an unfortunate American monument to the stupidity of socialism and the corruption that goes with it; in the same way Crozny Chechnya is the Soviet monument to the same, the only difference is that Detroit has much better music and more violence.

But we shouldn't just blame socialism, we can also blame car designers, check out these babies:

I only put a couple up - for health reasons, the yellow one is quite recent, it's called the Chevy Aztec and it's a perfect example of the many things that are wrong with the US car industry. First of all, it's a classic 'design by committee' and in this case the committee was stoned, each member spoke a different language and all seem to have suffered from vertigo.

I'd argue that badly designed cars are still the result of socialism though. America has made some of the greatest cars ever to hit the road, all with celebrated designers. And in case you think they have never been able to cut it against European design, keep in mind that Porsche has employed Americans to design some of its most famous cars (like the 928). But design by committee means no design at all, like a mirror that's been broken into little pieces, design by committee reflects everything, but shows nothing. Design by committee, after all, is a socialist type thing, and socialism likewise, is a broken mirror (with the associated bad luck). Under socialism everybody is kept 'equal' and nobody excels, not because they cannot, but because they are not allowed to. An individual is not allowed to be responsible for a successful enterprise, the collective must be elevated. It's not a 'team effort' either, even that's too individualistic. It's the collective, the faceless, nameless but somehow wonderful collective that got the job done. But it wasn't the collective who got the job done. When the job was done well it was usually because somebody with talent and ambition stepped up and had a go. Under socialism those with talent and ambition (except politics) soon learn there's little point in stepping up and having a go. Topic for dinner party discussion: could the iPod have been designed in 21st century Detroit? I'll kick things off by suggesting it would be baby poo brown, have a big handle and double as a can opener/stapler/electric pencil sharpener. And it would be clad in vinyl.

But, while the Chevy Aztec is a crime against design, literal criminality, mostly in the form of elected officials has seen Detroit's backward slide accelerate like a Ford Mustang (which incidentally was designed by two great individuals, David Ash and John Oros).

Kwame Kilpatrick, the former Mayor of Detroit, recently stood before a court of law and admitted to channeling every pimp, gangster, rap-producer, boxing promoter and corrupt official created by Hollywood in the last half century. With the pin stripe suit and the bling, Kilpatrick won over the people of Detroit and became their Mayor in 2002.He took certain oaths in high office from day one, but then he took advantage of his high office from day one as well. I mean this guy is a real piece of work, in fact, never mind the channeling idea, you couldn't make him up if you tried.

Kwame Kilpatrick was an awful mayor; he used taxpayer money to throw wild parties (complete with strippers) in the Mayor's mansion. He used his power to get his friends jobs with the city, he used taxpayer funds to buy himself and members of his family cars, and to get himself out of trouble. He even assaulted a Police officer and one of the strippers from one of his wild parties was allegedly going to go public - and had an accident (where somebody accidently shot her several times at close range). A lot of people in Detroit city, who are mostly poor and largely disenfranchised, were understandably upset at the obvious corruption of Kilpatrick and his cronies and called for his resignation early on.

Kilpatrick is in jail now, serving time for, amongst other things, perjury, because he and his chief of staff, Christine Beatty (pictured next to Kilpatrick) lied under oath about having an affair. Yes, they had an affair, then denied it under oath and were caught out when investigators intercepted SMS messages between the two lovebirds. In March 2008, the Wayne County prosecutor charged the Mayor with misconduct in office, obstruction of justice, conspiracy to commit obstruction of justice and perjury (see above). He also went down for two felony counts of assaulting and obstructing police. He plea-bargained and agreed to surrender his law licence, to forfeit his state pension to the city and be barred from elective office for 5 years. He also has to pay $1 million restitution to the city of Detroit and serve 120 days in Wayne County jail, with a period of 5 years probation after that.

In August last year, before starting the above prison sentence, Kilpatrick was arrested for a bond violation. He had to ask the court for permission to leave the County, but because he's apparently above the law, he went to Canada for a 'business' meeting. But when he got back he had to appear before a District Judge who threw the book at him. And so he should have, I mean, the guy is, is... he's a git.

So Detroit's pimped out Democrat is in jail now, but not all is well with dear old Detroit. Detroit didn't need a Mayor like that, but then perhaps it got what it asked for. I'd like to say there's hope for Detroit, certainly Obama's bail outs won't help. They just need to re-discover what made Detroit such a great city when it was at its commercial and cultural peak in the 1950s - I think you'll find there were hard working industrious, individuals making cool stuff and who didn't expect a handout.

Oh, here's a video you might find interesting from Barack 'Bailout' Obama himself:

Go on, defend him, I dare you...