Rio makes Chicago look like Mayberry
It's spectacular in areas, but city marred by widespread violence
An hour or so after Chicago didn't even win the Miss Congeniality portion of the Olympics pageant, I was walking through O'Hare, past all those signs identifying Chicago as a candidate city, with the slogan, "Let friendship shine."
Maybe not so much.
At a news kiosk, the New Yorker, with this lead headline on the cover:
Gangs of Rio. "Neglected by government, ruled by drug lords, and devastated by violence, Rio de Janeiro's shantytowns are becoming free-fire zones in a war between cops and criminals."
The article by Jon Lee Anderson is a movie in the making. A fascinating, brave, in-depth report from a correspondent who took great risks and embedded himself in the world of favelas -- collections of "slapped-up houses of corrugated tin and unpainted brick, dread-locked tangles of pilfered electrical wiring, and graffiti-covered walls and alleyways . . . guarded by armed young men." There are more than a thousand of these makeshift neighborhoods, "housing perhaps 3 million of Rio's 14 million inhabitants."
According to Anderson's piece, "The state is almost completely absent in the favelas. The drug gangs impose their own system of justice, law and order, and taxation -- all by force of arms."
Some mind-numbing stats for you:
There were just under 5,000 murders in Rio last year. That figure does not include incidents such as "rape resulting in death" or "riots resulting in death."
Twenty-two Rio police officers were killed last year. Rio police killed 1,188 people who were "resisting arrest." Anderson notes that by comparison, there were 371 justifiable homicides by police officers in the entire United States of America last year.
I'm not sour-graping here. I'm still equal parts disappointed and relieved the Olympics aren't coming to Chicago. To me the overriding factor is the loss of possible jobs for Chicago-area residents. That hurts a lot more than the whole "international showcase" routine.
In the last 35 years, the Summer and Winter Olympics have been held in North America numerous times: Montreal, Lake Placid, Los Angeles, Calgary, Atlanta, Salt Lake City. Vancouver in 2010. Seeing as how there's never been an Olympics in South America, we should have seen this coming. It was time.
We all know there are sections of Rio that are beyond gorgeous -- and we know there are other sections that are insanely poor and dangerous. Still, the New Yorker article is a must-read. You feel as if you're reading about life on another planet.
I'm equal parts fascinated and repulsed by the ongoing Jon & Kate Litigate debacle. Every time I think she's the more odious one, he does something even more ridiculous. And then she tops him.
Now that Jon has been handed a smaller role on the reality show, he's saying it's bad for the kids to be exploited, I mean, filmed, for a TV series. Ya think?
Check out this reaction from Kate, in a statement released to People:
"I'm saddened and confused by Jon's . . . statements. Jon has never expressed any concerns to me about our children being involved in the show. . . . I check in regularly with each of the kids to be sure they want to participate in and continue to do the show. . . . I do the show . . . because I believe it provides us opportunities we wouldn't otherwise have. . . . My priority remains our children and their well-being."
Right. Which is why you're releasing statements about your family business. As for those "opportunities," apparently that's how Kate spells the word "money."
The twins are 8 years old. The sextuplets are 5. And you're checking in with them to see if they still want to do the show, as if they're your business partners, which I guess they are on some level?
Once again: They're kids. If you asked them if they'd like to take a rocket ship to the moon, eat ice cream for breakfast every day and be on a TV show, their answers to all of the above would be "Yay!" As a mom, you're supposed to be the one who says no. It's not a great idea to turn the wee ones into a walking/talking ATMs.
A traveling salesman from Westmont is charged with illegally filming ESPN's Erin Andrews with a cell phone camera multiple times through an altered peephole in a hotel in Nashville.
A. Why in God's name would the hotel tell this guy which room Andrews was occupying?
B. Didn't anybody ever walk by and see this alleged pervo standing outside a hotel door, holding his cell phone to a peephole?
C. Why are some people still saying Andrews has benefitted from this sordid saga? In what way has it helped her career?