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Oh, Allen, you socialist engineer, you! Don't you know it's the capitalist profit motive and entrepeneurial spirit that makes this country great? Why would any developer spend his millions to attract "that" crowd? And if communities, good god-fearin', tax-payin' citizens all, want to ensure the "livability" of ftheir neighborhoods and even entire towns, isn't it their right as people who work hard for their money to exclude the riff-raff? After all, if someone built a less-than upper-middle class abode near them, it could endanger their property values!

I grew up in Connecticut, where this sort of thing is the rule, not the exception. The cities there have became a "dumping ground" and many families have to live ten or more to an apartment. The suburbs are lily white. I looked at some demographic maps yetserday, and I can predict which Greensboro neighborhoods would likely take the tack you describe in Wake county, if they could.

Of course, the vaunted "free market" has done it for them.

Off thread, but referencing your editorial today claiming higher a proportion of Hispanics involved in DWI's. Is it just me? Doesn't anyone else smell another Hayesian (Deena) conspiracy here to selectively persecute this group. We all know statistics lie and the man can make them show whatever the man wants them to show. And like the editorial said, it may be part of the macho latin culture in which case we need to understand why it occurs and be sensative to the differences that can cause this behavior. Police, teachers, principals- all the same racist thugs.

"To them, "poor" equals "criminally inclined".

The truth is a bitter pill to swallow,huh Allen?

JR, so you're suggesting that if you are poor you are more likely to break the law? And that it's morally defensible to keep the poor at more than arm's length based on that premise?

"You're suggesting that if you are poor that you are more likely to break the law."

Allen, who is more apt to be involved in neighborhood drug dealing, middle class or poor lower class? Who is more likely to be involved in robbery,(B&E , sticking up the local 7-ll etc) middle class or poor lower class? Who is more likely to steal your car, middle class or poor lower class? Who is more likely to be involved in gang violence, middle class or poor lower class?
Who is more likely to be involved in domestic disputes that lead to violence, middle class or poor, lower class. Now when you answer these questions, tell us who you want for your neighbor. Be sure to be tell the truth and not just give the politically correct answer.

Wait a minute, Mr. Produce. You're making these sweeping assertions, then you expect ME to document them?
I'll bounce it back to you. Show me your facts.

Recreational drug use and domestic abuse (physical and otherwise) are just as prevalent in middle class homes.

Breaking and entering can be balanced against white collar crime wiping out pensioners and small investors.

Gangs, I am sorry to say, are a creeping reality for young men from many economic strata. And, in its own way, "Skull & Bones" or whatever it's called at Yale, is a gang. Dick Cheney is a head honcho of his own private government, for pete's sake!

Some other questions Mr. Produce might consider pondering: Who is more likely to pilfer your retirement savings? Who is more likely to overcharge the government in military contracts? Who is more likely to cook the books to mislead investors?

I'm not sure any economic group has a corner on the crime market.

Allen you are comparing apples to oranges. I don't need to be afraid of the guy who trys to steal my stocks through stock market manipulation. He is not going to kill me or do me bodily harm.
Look at the stats Allen. Who commits most of the crimes I mentioned? You show me facts that say they are committed by mostly middle class folks and then you have an argument. I visit jails on a regular basis to get information for the benefit of the kids that the perp left stranded while he went off on a drug binge, robbed some liquor store or other place of opportunity. I have my facts first hand. I find less than 2% of the folks I see in jail are from middle class. Most are from the lower end of the lower class. Want to find out for yourself, go visit you local jail house and see who is there, who committed the crimes I described . Now answer the question. Who do you want living in your neighborhood. Of course being a good fence straddler you will find a way to squirm out of the question. Maybe you should run for politics Allen since you have the nack for avoiding the direct question down to a science.

Mr. Produce:
I don't mean to be difficult, but how do you know who's middle class and who's not from your jail visits? Do you ask for W2s?
You need firmer evidence than that if you're make such sweeping statements about a class of people.
You may well be right in your assertions, but I need to see some proof beyond your visits to jail.

Allen, when you are sent by the Dept of Social Services or another agency that serves the lower income or poor if you wish to put it that way, then you know who is from middle class and who is not. Families of middle class detainees cannot receive services from most organizations, unfortunately so I am seldom sent to obtain information from them. Occassionaly I will see a middle class "deadbeat dad" to obtain information for the courts so they can nail him for back pay and to see if I can find an organization to assist the family until the courts can get the money from him.
Allen , look at your statistics and see who commits the most crimes. Why should I cite you chapter and verse when you know that my statement rings true. Look em up Allen. You certainly have access to all those statistic as well as I do. Do your own home work Allen before questioning mine.

I would ask the same of you, old friend. You made the claim. Back it up.

There are many new and old mixed developments in North High Point.

SOme people would have you think otherwise and case in point is Deena Hayes. She think North High Point is a quote "clicky white neighborhood".

She is one sad mixed up person.

I did and you choose to ignore experience, not only in this local jail but in many jails within this state and in State Pens within the State of NC as well. You as usual wish to ignore what you can't defend. Best of Luck Allen. Now back to hiding under your desk . Perhaps you will find the answer there.

Oh, I'm not hiding. I've visited jails and prisons over the years. In fact, I was a community volunteer for a year at Triangle Correctional Facility. But I don't think that qualifies me to make sweeping statements about class and crime.
With all due respect, nor do I think it qualifies you either.
Again, I'm not saying you're wrong. But you're basing your conclusions only on your experiences.

Another point: The N&O article also mentions that some communities are turning down not only affordable housing for the poor, but the lower middle class. And the elderly.

John Edwards had it about right when he spoke of "Two Americas". This won't become literal class warfare, though, because the working poor and poor have no ammunition.

If the goal be ever higher property values and granite countertops are de rigeur, there simply is no way to include the lower middle and elderly, never mind the poor. They may "be with us always", but they should be at arm's length, preferably the other side of the tracks.

As for the supposed paucity of middle class (is that upper or lower middle class?) in jail: the upper classes can afford bail and better lawyers (or ANY lawyers) to keep them out. Besides, Pres. Bush just laid off half the IRS auditors an dlawyers who specifically investigate outlandish corporate and wealthy taxpayers fraud. If you don't investigate, you can't prosecute.

And if you really aren't worried about the long-term effects of white-collar and corporate crime, you're an ostrich. It may not kill you today, but it takes its toll until you are just as dead. And even if you, Mr. Produce, escape the ravages of unfettered capitalist crime, the many, many working poor who aren't criminals, who live in constant fear of slipping into abject poverty and despair, hunger and bankruptcy, well, they will not be so lucky.

But who cares about them? Unless they are victims of direct violent crime or abuse or neglect by others "of their kind", let 'em rot.

But not near my house.

So, Freddy, too many blacks are in prison because President Bush deviously laid off the lawyers that were catching the "white criminals??"
My, what an imaginatively liberal extrapolation to blame everything on Bush and avoid personal responsibility. Your thoughts are laughably ludicrous.
More blacks are in prison because they commit more crimes. Period. They have a choice, as does everyone.

Allen, I am glad that you volunteer at the prison system.It is indeed a worthwhile undertaking. However your back ground is in journalism or I would suspect so and mine is psychology.
During my careerI have worked in many capacities for my dear Uncle Sam who was generous enough to pay for all my education and then hire me to work for him in order to recoup some of the cost. I have worked in many capacities for Uncle doing such jobs as counselor for military personnel and military dependents. I was also employed in the capacity of a Profiler. That is one who through either personal observation, investigative methods etc build a profile of an individual or class of individuals. It is used for various purposes within the intelligence community as well as law enforcement.
Since that was an integral part of my job I became very adept at studies of individuals and/or groups and was very accurate in my assessments.My ratings were consistently extremely high and well rewarded and recognized. So I suppose that I could say that I am much more qualified to make statements about individuals and/or classes of individuals based on observation and other study than you are. That would make my so-called sweeping observations very valid given my background. Wouldn't you agree?

Oh, I don't question your credentials, Mr. Produce. They are quite impressive. I simply asked you to back up your statement about crime with statistics.

No, no, no, jaycee (no surprise at the name). I am not excusing blacks who commit crimes. I agree there are too many. I deny, though, that their is a racial monopoly on criminality, in spirit if not in physical kind. I am saying the reason the number of blacks in jail is disproportionate to whites is because we don't jail the corporate robbers and sickeningly rich thieves who cheat on their taxes to the tune of $70 billion dollars a year by ferreting their money away in offshore accounts.

We don't jail them, even if the few IRS auditors left to investigate them catch them, because they throw layers of lawyers at the government and draw it out until maybe a fine is assessed, but almost never hard time.

Then there's the even pettier mass of average cheats and colluders, price-fixers and hypocrites, lobbyists and gluttons.
The real estate industry is one of the most disgusting of this coterie: the redlining, steering and predatory lending; the outright deception of the listing shell game; under-the-table agreements among appraisers and banks, realtors and contractors, even some inspectors; the sheer mendacity, as I have seen, of the born-to-the-manor and the mannered boring half-wits who peddle the "American Dream". Phooey, phooey, phooey!

See "Wall Street Versus America" by Gary Weiss. It's even easier to get away with life-savings robbery when there are few or no regulations/laws against the tactics. Again, it may not kill you instantly, but it will kill you eventually. Note the multitude of bank bailouts, insider and late-trading schemes, ad nauseum.