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I got robbed in Detroit this weekend. I wasn't hurt, but as you can imagine I felt incredibly violated. Some of my belongings were stolen because they happened to be at the bottom of a bag full of groceries that was in my car: Someone robbed me because they saw lettuce sticking out of a plastic bag in my car.
And while my first emotion was anger, it quickly turned into sadness as I looked up and down the street and saw the desperocity it takes to smash a car window in broad daylight reflected in the crumbling infrastructure. I was on Gratiot and McDougall surrounded by abandoned factories with broken glass and charred houses. Without moving a step, the only operating businesses I could see were KFC, a liquor store, a church, two gas stations a Coney Island and a pawn shop. It was pouring rain, and I was soaking in the apocalyptic scene that has overwhelmed large parts of Detroit.
I know other U.S cities suffer poverty and decay as well and if I lived there I'd be reporting that, too. But I live in Detroit and it's not just one section of the city that's rotting. It's all over. Except for a few pockets of wealth in communities like Sherwood Forest, Indian Village and Downtown.
When I turn on the news I don't want to hear my future presidents bickering over rhetoric. I want to know what they're going to do about the future of this great county that I am a citizen of. While the media obsess over "lipstick" comments and who said what, a major U.S. city is crumbling into the earth, abandoned in the wake of a crashing auto industry. I see these images driving to and from home every day.
The worst part is seeing kids living in it. All I can do when I see a kid playing on the corner by the liquor store is that I hope they make it to adulthood OK.
It's almost taboo to show these images from Detroit or bring up this disparity at all. Especially for GOP presidential pick Sen. John McCain who has yet to visit Detroit on any of his campaign stumps in Michigan. Detroit is the biggest city in the state, didn't he say he wanted to win Michigan? What is he scared of? If he really wants to put country first, then why isn't he showing that? Detroit is part of our beautiful country.
By the same token, if Sen. Barack Obama really wants to "change" the game in Washington, he has to prove it in his campaign. I don't want to know who to vote against. I want to know who to vote for. Last week when Obama did well when he pointed this out:
"These are serious times and they call for a serious debate about where we need to take the nation. [...] We keep on spending $10 billion a month in Iraq at a time when our own infrastructure here at home in crumbling. Spare me the phony outrage."
After living in an impoverished neighborhood in Detroit for a year now, this has never been clearer: When every other house, block after block, is either burnt to charcoal, abandoned, or has all the siding and shingles stripped off, there's a grave problem. When crime becomes part of the culture of a city, there's a grave problem.
Now I am confident that the robbery I experienced this weekend is just a symptom of a larger problem that is so painful to address that many, including me, try to ignore it. But when you are directly affected by the raw, harsh reality of poverty and you're looking at the broken glass of hunger and abandonment, it's a little harder to turn your head.
The situation is so bad in some of these neglected neighborhoods it seems almost surreal that a 15 minute drive north will take me to one of the most wealthy suburbs in the United States. I wish I were exaggerating.
These images not pretty to look at, but they're here. I didn't have to look hard to get these photographs. I hope that the politicians in Lansing and in Washington who are supposed to be representing us see these scenes. Maybe then it'll be a little harder to turn to ignore.
Despite the hardships I see and the crime I was a victim of, I want this to be clear: I'm staying in Detroit. I'm staying in Detroit because I love my neighbors, and my little community. I'm here to help. Almost everyone who gets a college degree takes the first ride out of here and it shows. Over time I will get another camera and continue to use it to rub these images in the face of a government that doesn't seem as outraged at what is happening to their own country as I am.
Sen. Barck Obama also said in his acceptance speech at the DNC:
"In Washington, they call this the Ownership Society, but what it really means is - you're on your own. Out of work? Tough luck. No health care? The market will fix it. Born into poverty? Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps - even if you don't have boots. You're on your own."
I would like John McCain to visit Detroit and look residents in the eyes and tell them why they should vote for him. Promise them he'll help. Maybe he could change my mind about him. I'm a very forgiving person. But since he has nothing to offer this certain demographic of voters, maybe his party feels they have to cheat to win.
There's no hippie like a Detroit hippie, I'll tell ya. As much as I've always leaned a bit towards the hippie side, I always thought the only true hippies left were people like my parents, who were hippies and still are, now they're just old hippies. And since the 60's my two sets of parents have a. left the country b. became a part of the American working class c. have random friends from their hippie past pop up now and then. 
