The Head of the Snake

The street gangs of Chicago battle each other every day for power and control of drugs. Innocent people, including children, have died in the crossfire. City police, the Feds, politicians, and neighborhood leaders have tried to fight and shut down the gangs in a variety of ways, but nothing has solved the problem. The inattention at all levels of government to the roots of the street violence is drawing wide criticism; racially biased zoning discriminatory lending and insurance policies,  police discrimination, “ghettoized” communities, generate a cycle of poverty and organized gang crime, rendering the neighborhoods dysfunctional. The gangs are just symptoms of a more serious social disease.