Reply #26: You and Captain Angry are so very wrong!! Have either of you even read Obama's platform

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

for Urban America? What do you know about the candidate that you plan to support? The plan is very long but worth the read...

Here:

http://www.barackobama.com/issues/pdf/UrbanFactSheet.pdf

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CRIME AND LAW ENFORCEMENT
Support Local Law Enforcement: The Bush administration has consistently cut funding for Community
Oriented Policing Services (COPS). Barack Obama is committed to fully funding the COPS program to combat
crime and help address police brutality and accountability issues in local communities. The COPS program
provides local law enforcement funding for: hiring and training law enforcement officers; procuring equipment
and support systems; paying officers to perform intelligence, anti-terror or homeland security duties; and
developing new technologies, including inter-operable communications and forensic technology. Obama also
supports efforts to encourage young people to enter the law enforcement profession, so that our local police
departments are not understaffed because of a dearth of qualified applicants.

Reduce Crime Recidivism by Providing Ex-Offender Supports: America is facing an incarceration and
post-incarceration crisis in urban communities. Today, nearly 2 million children have a parent in a correctional
facility. In the U.S. Senate, Obama has worked to provide job training, substance abuse and mental health
counseling, and employment opportunities to ex-offenders. In addition to signing these important programs into
law, Obama will create a prison-to-work incentive program, modeled on the successful Welfare-to-Work
Partnership, to create ties with employers and third-party agencies that provide training and support services to
ex-offenders, and to improve ex-offender employment and job retention rates. Obama will also work to reform
correctional systems to break down barriers for ex-offenders to find employment.

End the Dangerous Cycle of Youth Violence: Barack Obama is committed to ending youth violence. As a
resident and former community organizer on the South Side of Chicago, Barack Obama has witnessed firsthand
the destructive nature of youth violence and gang activity on our children and entire communities. As
president, Barack Obama will support innovative local programs, such as the CeaseFire program in Chicago,
that have been proven to work. Such programs implement a comprehensive public health approach that
investigates the causes of youth violence and implements a community-based strategy to prevent youth violence
by addressing both the symptoms and causes of neighborhood violence. He will also double funding for federal
afterschool programs and invest in 20 Promise Neighborhoods across the country to ensure that urban youth
have safe and meaningful opportunities to keep them off the streets after school.

Allow Effective Gun-Tracing: When law enforcement agencies operate in concert at the federal, state, and
local levels, the chances of solving a crime increases. Since 2003, the Tiahrt Amendment has restricted the
ability of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to share gun trace information with
members of state and local law enforcement. The ATF has a wide-ranging database of gun information, yet
Washington has threatened police officers with time in prison for attempting to access it. As president, Barack
Obama would repeal the Tiahrt Amendment and give police officers across the nation the tools they need to
solve gun crimes and fight the illegal arms trade. Obama also favors commonsense measures that respect the
Second Amendment rights of gun owners, while keeping guns away from children and from criminals who
shouldn’t have them. He supports closing the gun show loophole and making guns in this country childproof.
He also supports making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent, as such weapons belong on
foreign battlefields and not on our streets.

End Racial Profiling: Barack Obama cosponsored federal legislation to ban racial profiling and require
federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to take steps to eliminate the practice. He introduced and

passed a law in the Illinois State Senate requiring the Illinois Department of Transportation to record the race,
age, and gender of all drivers stopped for traffic violations so that bias could be detected and addressed.

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