''Pointing towards Chicago, and Chicago specifically, as the exemplar of the crisis of urban violence, is also problematic because there are places that are worse, and arguably need more immediate help of the sort that national concern might bring: East St. Louis, Illinois, if you want to again mix domestic and foreign policy, is as close to a "failed state" as anywhere in America that I can think of. (In fact, Pat Quinn was there today trying to bring increased oversight to the city's police force.)
It's a small city of 27,000, about half what it was in 1980. Half the under-18 population is below the poverty line. 40 percent of families are led by a single female parent. The school district is almost broke and is delaying classes because they don't know how many teachers they need. The murder rate in 2010 was 77.8 per
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