VP Joe Biden still thinks fewer police on the street will mean more rapes and murders, but he isn't holding Republicans personally responsible anymore.
From Beltway Confidential:
Vice President Joe Biden doubled down on his argument that rapes and murders will increase if Republicans block President Obama’s jobs proposals, although he did not hold opponents personally responsible for the crimes.The truth is there is no one-on-one link between the number of police and crime. NYC has had both declining number of police and declining crime.
“Is it your intention to say,” CNN’s Candy Crowley asked, “that if Republicans don’t pass the president’s jobs bill, they will be responsible for increases in rape and murder?” Biden replied, “Well, no . . . [but] when you drastically cut the number of police in cities, which is happening all across America, crime goes up. That is a fact.”
After Crowley noted that “the crime rate in 2010 was down 6 percent for serious crimes,” Biden seemed to contradict himself. “That’s true about the crime rate, but you didn’t have the emasculation,” he said, adding that “They’ve laid off over 15,000 cops, 10,000 in the last 18 months.” He didn’t attempt to explain why the crime rate fell in 2010 as municipalities laid off police officers.
Crowley asked if he thought the rhetoric of rape and murder qualified as “unfair politics,” but Biden denied that charge. ”It’s a little bit like saying, we had a major flood, we think we should go in and help people rebuild their homes,” the Vice President explained. “[Republicans] may say no, that’s not the federal government’s responsibility, or if you do that, we ought to cut their aid to education or something.”
I LOVE the picture accompanying this. it's perfect! would be better though if he was sticking his head in a toilet or something...
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