[Kevin]

I think it puts too many innocent kids in unfair positions where success is next to impossible. The closest I've been to the ghetto was pulling off I-40, right after I got through downtown Memphis to get gas over at the MapCo at 4:30AM.

Within about 30 seconds, I'd had a rock of crack offered to me (at least I think that's what it was), been hit up for $5.00 by some guy that had "just gotten out of prison" and essentially had to flee the scene because about 12 people were coming up on my car pretty fast.

How could a child thrive in a community where that goes on? That kind of stuff sure as hell doesn't go on where I live.

Our inner-cities are bringing us down as a society. People from there are getting involved with gangs and drugs and then filling up our prisons, costing us tax dollars. Not to mention the fact that folks that learn this lifestyle really don't have any viable options as far as honest work goes. Drugs and crime and prostitution are all that they can really depend on to survive.

If I want to think about someone that is in an absolutely hopeless situation, I think about the lady that offered me that crack rock at 4:30AM. Toothless, had a speech impediment, totally unemployable. Does she bear some of the responsibility for being where she is today? Hell yes. But to some degree we are a product of our surroundings. Had she grown up where I did, there's basically ZERO chance she would have ended up the way she did.

I don't claim to be an expert on the situation because of my 'brush with death in the ghetto' but it did open my eyes to the fact that a place like that can exist in America. I'm one of the few people that claim to be 'conservative' that also believes that something must be done to repair these areas and reduce the gang lifestyle a choice and not a necessity for survival.