Charlie Sykes: Sykes Writes

MONDAY HOT READ: A REALITY CHECK FOR MADISON

By Charlie Sykes

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The new editon of Wisconsin Interest is out. The cover story is Dave Blaska's  trenchant and hilarious analysis of liberal Madison's reality check on crime. Hard hitting and an outstanding read.

Denial, as the new senator from Minnesota would say, is not just a river in Egypt. It’s a liberal trait, tinged with paranoia.

A local bicycle advocate (two-wheelers are the most powerful pressure group in Madtown) offered this dark conspiracy theory:

“I am left wondering if this whole crime issue has been trumped up by Blaska et al. purely for the purpose of imposing some otherwise unneeded conservative ‘reforms’ on the city of Madison. Such a ruse would certainly be consistent....”

Wait a minute, I’m getting a tweet from Karl Rove.

Early this summer, an Isthmus columnist pooh-poohed our concerns with crime and quality-of-life issues, suggesting that they were overblown and that everybody needed to “take a deep breath.”

The irony was that five days after those words were published, 17-year-old Karamee Collins Jr. took his last breath, deep or otherwise, thanks to the bullet fired into his back.

The “Lord of the Flies” meeting had barely adjourned before young Karamee was gunned down on a nearby street corner shortly after 10 p.m. The lad managed to crawl to a nearby residence, ring the bell, and die in front of the horrified residents.
Three 16-year-old boys were soon taken into custody, two of them charged with first-degree murder as adults. Four lives ruined and a neighborhood traumatized.
Just the day before, police held a press conference in a neighborhood park appealing for help in solving a string of nine shootings up to that point that injured three people.

But it takes more than gunfire to stop the liberals.