# Why has the government lost prestige since 1964? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 24, 2012, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937 "2012-05-24T11:17:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/121 "2012-05-26T17:29:21Z")
> **[Britain the most violent country in Europe and even worse than South Africa...](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html)** > > The figures from EC and UN reports come on the day new Home Secretary Alan Johnson makes his first major speech on crime, promising to be tough on loutish behaviour. Sensationalist, but not too far off the mark. > [@](#): > > Britain’s violent crime record is worse than any other country in the European union, it has been revealed. > > Official crime figures show the UK also has a worse rate for all types of violence than the U.S. and even South Africa - widely considered one of the world’s most dangerous countries. > > -snip - > > Britain has an even worse violence rate than South Africa (file picture) > > The Tories said Labour had presided over a decade of spiralling violence. > > In the decade following the party’s election in 1997, the number of recorded violent attacks soared by 77 per cent to 1.158million - or more than two every minute. > > The figures, compiled from reports released by the European Commission and United Nations, also show: > > ``` > The UK has the second highest overall crime rate in the EU. > It has a higher homicide rate than most of our western European neighbours, including France, Germany, Italy and Spain. > The UK has the fifth highest robbery rate in the EU. > It has the fourth highest burglary rate and the highest absolute number of burglaries in the EU, with double the number of offences than recorded in Germany and France. > > ``` > > But it is the naming of Britain as the most violent country in the EU that is most shocking. The analysis is based on the number of crimes per 100,000 residents. > > In the UK, there are 2,034 offences per 100,000 people, way ahead of second-placed Austria with a rate of 1,677. Read more: [The most violent country in Europe: Britain is also worse than South Africa and U.S. | Daily Mail Online](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html#ixzz1vzvTHbGU) ---
**Author:** ![David42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@David42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David42)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/122 "2012-05-26T17:34:41Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Actually, it is much more likely that we can thank the aging of the population. Given the enormous numbers of people incarcerated for fairly innocuous drug crimes _vs_ the fact that crime rates tend to follow the population trends of 15 - 35 year old males, the incerceration rates are merely an indictment of a hostile and fearful society and have nothing to do with actually lowering crime. While I’m not buying \*\*New Deal Democrat’s \*\* assertion that it is only the incarceration rate that it is lowering the crime rate, this assertion is far far worse. The idea that higher incarceration rates couldn’t possibly have anything to do with a lesser crime rate is just plain silly. It’s called prevention. A little thing called recidivism. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/123 "2012-05-26T17:36:21Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > No. > > Russia has the largest white population in the world, and the largest population of Northern European white folks in the world. > > Russians have an astronomically high murder rate, as high as the black American murder rate. The major cities of Russia are rife with violent crime. Huge areas of St Petersburg, Vladivostok, etc are no go areas where tourists and foreign businessmen are advised to avoid. > > Is Russia really the outlier here with regard to Europeans, or are the exceptions the prosperous, stable countries of Western Europe? > > Remember, if you use environment to explain the crime problem in Russia, then you have to use it everywhere. If not environment, then what? Why isn’t Russia as stable and prosperous as China? Why are you much more likely to be robbed, raped, or murdered in Moscow than you are in Shanghai? The abrupt fall of the Soviet Union was bad for the Russians. I have read that during the 1990s the standard of living of 80 percent of the Russian population declined, often to subsistence levels. Russian would be better off if Mikhail Gorbachev’s efforts at gradual reform had succeeded. Those efforts would have had a better chance if Ronald Reagan had not provoked an arms race with the Soviets. That arms race doubled the national debt in the United States, but it was more damaging to the Soviet Union. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/124 "2012-05-26T17:38:12Z")
> [@David42](#): > > I’m not buying \*\*New Deal Democrat’s \*\* assertion that it is only the incarceration rate that it is lowering the crime rate. On several occasions in this thread I have acknowledged that the decline in the youth population was also a factor. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/125 "2012-05-26T17:40:24Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > [The most violent country in Europe: Britain is also worse than South Africa and U.S. | Daily Mail Online](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html#ixzz1B3ZRInlg) > > Sensationalist, but not too far off the mark. > > Read more: [The most violent country in Europe: Britain is also worse than South Africa and U.S. | Daily Mail Online](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html#ixzz1vzvTHbGU) A factor in the rising crime rate in the UK is the rising black population. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/126 "2012-05-26T17:43:01Z")
> [@David42](#): > > The idea that higher incarceration rates couldn’t possibly have anything to do with a lesser crime rate is just plain silly. > > It’s called prevention. A little thing called recidivism. The only thing that reliably reduces recidivism is age. This is an argument in favor of longer prison sentences. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/127 "2012-05-26T18:03:06Z")
This is the best explanation of the end of the New Deal coalition I have read. Thomas Edsall expanded his ideas into a book. * * * The Atlantic May 1991 When the official subject is presidential politics, taxes, welfare, crime, rights, or values the real subject is Race… In particular, busing, affirmative action, and much of the rights revolution in behalf of criminal defendants, prisoners, homosexuals, welfare recipients, and a host of other previously marginalized groups have, for many voters, converted the government from ally to adversary… George Herbert Walker Bush. Conservative populism has permitted the Republican Party to replace in the minds of many voters the idea of an “establishment” ruled by business interests with a hated new liberal establishment, adversarial to the common man: an elite–of judges, bureaucrats, newspaper editors, ACLU lawyers, academics, Democratic politicians, civil-rights and feminist leaders–determined to enact racially and socially redistributive policies demanding the largest sacrifices from the white working and lower-middle classes… The contact between whites and the black underclass has routinely violated every standard necessary for the breakdown of racial stereotypes. Most white contact with the underclass is through personal experience of crime and urban squalor, through such experience related by friends and family, or through the daily reports about crime, drugs, and violence which appear on television and in newspapers… “The stereotype is not a stereotype anymore,” says Kenneth S. Tollett, a black professor of education at Howard University. “The behavior pattern in the underclass is not stereotypical in the pejorative sense, but it is a statement of fact. A stereotype is an overgeneralization, ‘This is the way people are,’ and then we say all are like that. The behavior of black males in the underclass is now beginning to look like the black stereotype. The statements we have called stereotypes in the past have become true.”… The sea change in American presidential politics–the replacement of a liberal majority with a conservative majority–involved the conversion of a relatively small proportion of voters: the roughly five to ten percent of the electorate, made up primarily of white working-class voters, empowered to give majority status to either political party. > **[Race - 91.05](https://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/politics/race/edsall.htm)** > > Atlantic Unbound: The Atlantic Monthly Magazine Online ---
**Author:** ![David42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@David42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David42)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/128 "2012-05-26T18:25:56Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > On several occasions in this thread I have acknowledged that the decline in the youth population was also a factor. My apologies if I missed such a statement. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/129 "2012-05-26T19:23:48Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > The abrupt fall of the Soviet Union was bad for the Russians. I have read that during the 1990s the standard of living of 80 percent of the Russian population declined, often to subsistence levels. > > Russian would be better off if Mikhail Gorbachev’s efforts at gradual reform had succeeded. Those efforts would have had a better chance if Ronald Reagan had not provoked an arms race with the Soviets. That arms race doubled the national debt in the United States, but it was more damaging to the Soviet Union. \*Remember, if you use environment to explain the crime problem in Russia, then you have to use it everywhere. If not environment, then what? Why isn’t Russia as stable and prosperous as China? Why are you much more likely to be robbed, raped, or murdered in Moscow than you are in Shanghai? \* > [@](#): > > A factor in the rising crime rate in the UK is the rising black population. A minor factor at best. There aren’t enough black people in Britain to have such a large effect. The explosion in crime in the UK is almost entirely a function of the social decay in the white working / welfare classes. Theodore Dalrymple is probably the foremost examiner of this phenomenon: [Life at the Bottom - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_at_the_Bottom:_The_Worldview_That_Makes_the_Underclass) We’ve established that the classic American dodge, “blame it all on black people,” doesn’t work in a global context. It’s a very persistent local phenomenon here in the States. It may be getting worse, as a greater and and greater proportion of the black American population are born in poverty to never married mothers. Would you feel better getting beaten and mugged by black American thugs on the DC subway, or Slavic Russian thugs on the Moscow subway? Is it really because Slavs are an inferior race, the way that Hitler and a number of other Teutonic supremacists have claimed over the years? Or maybe, things are more complicated than simple metrics like “race”. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/130 "2012-05-26T19:37:58Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > We’ve established that the classic American dodge, “blame it all on black people,” doesn’t work in a global context. Predominantly black countries nearly always have higher murder rates than countries that are predominately white or Oriental. > **[List of countries by intentional homicide rate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate)** > > The list of countries by homicide rate is derived from United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) data, and is expressed in number of deaths per 100,000 population per year. For example, a homicide rate of 30 out of 100,000 is presented in the table as "30", and corresponds to 0.03% of the population dying by homicide. The reliability of underlying national murder rate data may vary. Only UNODC-vetted data is used in the main table to maintain consistency. In some cases, i Homicide rates ... In the United States blacks have a murder rate that is over seven times the white rate. [http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/homicide/race.cfm](http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/homicide/race.cfm) ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/131 "2012-05-26T19:46:47Z")
There’s still that little factor of the biggest white country in the world having an astronomically high murder rate for an industrialized country. Is Russia the outlier, or is this typical of what Europeans are capable of when they don’t have Western Europe’s historical advantages? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/132 "2012-05-26T20:06:58Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > The only thing that reliably reduces recidivism is age. This is an argument in favor of longer prison sentences. [False](http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/europe/08/02/vbs.norwegian.prisons/index.html) ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/133 "2012-05-26T20:07:40Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > There’s still that little factor of the biggest white country in the world having an astronomically high murder rate for an industrialized country. > > Is Russia the outlier, or is this typical of what Europeans are capable of when they don’t have Western Europe’s historical advantages? In 2011 the murder rate in Russia per 100,000 was 12. That is high for a Caucasian country, but most black or Hispanic countries have higher rates. > **[List of countries by intentional homicide rate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate)** > > The list of countries by homicide rate is derived from United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) data, and is expressed in number of deaths per 100,000 population per year. For example, a homicide rate of 30 out of 100,000 is presented in the table as "30", and corresponds to 0.03% of the population dying by homicide. The reliability of underlying national murder rate data may vary. Only UNODC-vetted data is used in the main table to maintain consistency. In some cases, i Homicide rates ... I do not know what the murder rate in Russia was under Communism, but I have read accounts by visitors to the Soviet Union that described a country that was fairly safe from crime. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/134 "2012-05-26T20:11:00Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > There’s still that little factor of the biggest white country in the world having an astronomically high murder rate for an industrialized country. > > Is Russia the outlier, or is this typical of what Europeans are capable of when they don’t have Western Europe’s historical advantages? Hitler, and Nazi Germany were European. The terrifying thing is the evil potential that lurks everywhere, in every single person and population, just waiting for the right time. It is for fear of this evil that we must fight bigotry and oppression. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/135 "2012-05-26T20:12:44Z")
> [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](#): > > [False](http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/europe/08/02/vbs.norwegian.prisons/index.html) What works in Norway is unlikely to work as well in the U.S. because of the different racial compositions of the populations. Also, in Norway there is more of a safety net. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/136 "2012-05-26T20:13:19Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > In 2011 the murder rate in Russia per 100,000 was 12. That is high for a Caucasian country, but most black or Hispanic countries have higher rates. > > [List of countries by intentional homicide rate - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate) > > I do not know what the murder rate in Russia was under Communism, but I have read accounts by visitors to the Soviet Union that described a country that was fairly safe from crime. Your wiki cite isn’t accurate. Russia’s murder rate is higher. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/137 "2012-05-26T20:14:51Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > What works in Norway is unlikely to work as well in the U.S. because of the different racial compositions of the populations. Also, in Norway there is more of a safety net. You have not demonstrated your bigoted, racist, hateful assertions. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/138 "2012-05-26T20:23:12Z")
> [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](#): > > You have not demonstrated your bigoted, racist, hateful assertions. I have documented that blacks have a significantly higher crime rate than whites and that the overall crime rate has declined declined by one third since 1980 when the prison population tripled. It is also worthy of note that in 1960, which is to say before the civil rights laws were signed during the 1960s, the overall crime rate was lower than it has been since, although the murder rate was slightly higher. > **[United States Crime Rates 1960 t0 2019](https://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm)** > > United States crime statistics, United States , United States rape, United States murder, United States property crime, United States crime index, United States violent crime, violent crime in State, United States burglary, United States vehicle... A major reason for the decline in the prestige of the government since 1964 is that most of the white majority stopped seeing the government as a organization that advanced their interests. Instead they saw the government as an organization that advanced the interests of blacks at their expense. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/139 "2012-05-26T20:31:11Z")
[http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/\_ajc-portrait\_of\_the\_poor.htm](http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/_ajc-portrait_of_the_poor.htm) > [@](#): > > But almost all of Dalrymple’s subjects are white. Without the immediate and automatic risk of being called a racist, he is freer to explore the birth of the mind-set that makes and sustains members of the underclass. > > “This is a way of life that doesn’t really have much to do with race,” he tells me. “It’s not a racial problem. That’s a very important lesson for Americans, I think.” By all means, keep pushing the racial angle. Make it easy for concerns about the unlimited immigration of marginally literate poor people, violent crime, the proliferation of never married mothers, and the resulting social decay, to be dismissed as simple racism. Keep at it, and one day very soon, the US establishment will repeal civil rights laws and bring back Jim Crow. Then all will be well. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937/140 "2012-05-26T20:40:45Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > By all means, keep pushing the racial angle. Make it easy for concerns about the unlimited immigration of marginally literate poor people, violent crime, the proliferation of never married mothers, and the resulting social decay, to be dismissed as simple racism. > > Keep at it, and one day very soon, the US establishment will repeal civil rights laws and bring back Jim Crow. Then all will be well. I see little chance for repealing the civil rights legislation. I do not advocate that it be repealed. What I do advocate is that it be narrowly interpreted. The burden of proof should be on those who claim that they have been discriminated against because of race. Public schools are frequently accused of discriminating against black students because they are more likely to be disciplined. They are also more likely to be discipline problems. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-the-government-lost-prestige-since-1964/622937.md?page=8)