Years ago, the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping case brought attention to a fact of which social scientists have long been aware, but which the high priests of political correctness have attempted to conceal from the public: Homeless people are dangerous.
Brian David Mitchell, the perverted self-proclaimed “prophet” who kidnapped Elizabeth Smart, had been a homeless panhandler for years. Like many other homeless people, Mitchell had a history of drug abuse, crime and mental illness. But because of political correctness in the media, this point was obscured in the coverage of the story. Now, we have further evidence of the problem. Miley Cyrus decided to have a homeless man as her “date” to the MTV Video Music Awards. An aspiring model, Jesse Helt accepted Miley’s VMA trophy and lectured the national television audience:
“My name is Jesse and I am accepting this award on behalf of 1.6 million runaway and homeless youth in the United States, who are starving, lost, and scared for their lives right now. I know this because I am one of these people. . . .
“I’ve survived in shelters all over this city. I’ve cleaned your hotel rooms. I’ve been an extra in your movies. I’ve been an extra in your life. Though I may have been invisible to you on the streets, I have a lot of the same dreams that brought many of you here tonight.”
He forgot to add, “Oops.”
Miley Cyrus’s homeless VMAs date Jesse
turns himself in after being sought
by police for violating his probation
Miley Cyrus’ homeless VMA date finally turned himself in to police Thursday night and was formally arrested for violating the conditions of his probation.
Jesse Helt walked in to Polk County Jail in Dallas, Oregon just before 8pm and was booked in by duty officers.
Helt had been on the run from the authorities for three years and lived homeless on the streets of Los Angeles before he shot to fame at the MTV Video Music Awards last Sunday.
Martin Silbernagel, Polk County Director of Community Corrections, said the 22-year-old is expected to post $2,500 bail and will be released within hours.
‘He turned himself in and was arrested, we expect a court date in two weeks,’ he said.
Homeless Helt has been on the run from police since moving to Los Angeles, where he lived on the streets after breaking probation following a drugs test back in 2011.
A judge in his home state of Oregon issued a warrant for his arrest for repeatedly violating the terms of his probation. . . .
Larry O’Connor at the Free Beacon:
So Jesse has a criminal record, an open warrant for his arrest, a drug problem, and is homeless because he took the brilliant career path into the safe and secure world of modeling. . . .
The fact is, Jesse deserves to be homeless. I don’t care if that sounds cold-hearted or mean-spirited, it’s the truth.
Instead of propagandizing young people with the fear-mongering lie how a homeless person is just the same as anyone else but for a few bad breaks, Miley would have done our culture a greater service by having her prop (let’s be real, he wasn’t really her date) admit to all of the awful life choices he made that led him to living on the streets.
That’s pretty harsh, but it does point to a larger issue that has long been neglected in discussions of “homelessness.” Back in the 1980s, this became an “issue” because Democrats wanted to leverage homelessness as a way to impugn Ronald Reagan’s policies. But the problem had nothing to do with Reagan and everything to do with a series of court decisions that had made it more difficult to lock up insane people in lunatic asylums, and nearly impossible to enforce laws against vagrancy. The so-called “deinstitutionalization” of the mentally ill was a policy that had been pursued by the American Civil Liberties Union and other liberals during the 1970s. This coincided with other trends — including rising rates of divorce and drug abuse — that had the combined effect of creating a population of dopeheads, alcoholics and crazies who had no families to take care of them, and no place to go.
Furthermore, once the media jumped on the bandwagon of hyping the “homeless crisis,” ginning up lots of ignorant public sympathy, bums and petty criminals realized they could cash in on this, panhandling on the streets, often falsely claiming to be Vietnam War veterans. State and local governments started throwing money at the problem, and non-profit agencies reaped a bonanza of grant money to help deal with the “homeless crisis.” This created what was in effect an industry of professional activists — Homelessness, Inc. — who made their living from the misperceptions of the problem, misperceptions that the activists themselves helped create in order to gain the political clout necessary to shake down government agencies for more money.
It was a racket, one of the most shameless hoaxes ever imposed on the American public, and the media still refuse to tell the truth about the problem. Everything you need to know about homelessness, you can learn from reading Thomas Sowell’s The Vision of the Anointed, Fred Siegel’s The Future Once Happened Here and Myron Magnet’s The Dream and the Nightmare. You might also want to read P.J. O’Rourke’s Parliament of Whores, which has an excellent (and hilarious) chapter on how the “homeless crisis” was invented. That’s four books — just four — and if you read what they have to say about homelessness, you’ll know more about the reality of this problem than do 99% of reporters and editors in the liberal media.
Miley Cyrus’s stunt at the VMAs was a perfect example of how vastly ignorant liberals are about the real world. She seems to have actually believed Jesse Helt was a helpless victim, and she gave him a platform to insult Americans with his dishonest lecture.
Miley Cyrus should be ashamed of herself. But if liberals had any sense of shame, they wouldn’t be liberals, would they?
As I said: Start a business and hire whomever you want. You wish to impose upon others a risk you are unwilling or unable to take yourself.
As for your last question, the answer is, it depends upon what you want to do. Life is filled with choices. Those choices have consequences. One cannot be a nurse or doctor with a drug conviction. One cannot be a pharmacist. One cannot get a security clearance. Those are regulations which are on the books. You cannot drive a commercial truck with drug conviction. Indeed, any employer who hires someone with a single DWI conviction will see his/her insurance rates skyrocket and will open himself/herself up to tremendous liability if that employee does something stupid on the job which causes injury. But, N.B., you can be a politician.
There are real world issues with real world consequences. It is only the pathetically naive with no experience in it who feel compelled to demand that others assume burdens they themselves have never shouldered nor will ever shoulder.
And BTW, I know these things because I’ve owned a business for 30 years.
So true. I had an epiphany the first Xmas after my daughter died . One would have thought it would have been horrid but it wasn’t, because I didn’t go to my sisters house for the holiday It was pleasant even if somewhat melancholy.
The number of “professionally homeless” people is, I believe, vastly underestimated…
I’ve read that one can make a decent living out of panhandling, busking, and odd jobs whilst keeping living expenses down (and Homeless, Inc’s numbers up) by utilising the generous homeless services!
We had lot of former patients who were homeless as a result of those lawsuits just sleeping tin the alleys around the state psych hospital I worked at
Sorry, but not of the opinion that business, and property owners get the final say, especially when they are not the voting majority.
And thus, will people choose not to do business and hire people in that community. You may declare “victory” and rejoice, but in the meantime, all of the individuals without criminal pasts will not have any opportunity either. But that’s OK, provided you get to pat yourself on the back for being “compassionate.” As I said above, for Progressives, it’s all about the abstract. They never think about the real people who are being harmed by all their do-goodery.
You should see some of the stuff she posts on Facebook. Talk about airing dirty laundry. The big problem, of course, is that she manages to omit or outright change certain facts to make it seem like she’s the one being unfairly treated. And since there is already a lot of drama and craziness in my extended family anyways, there are those that believe her because they want to believe the worst about my dad and there are those who know she is full of shit (though those are few and far between). She knows better than to cross me when it comes to family; they all love me.
Miley Cyrus gets on a moral high horse about homelessness…
…while she constantly giggles about her drug use and encourages her young fans to get stoned…
…which is the very activity that puts most homeless people out on the streets.
Brilliant.
There has been an explosion of panhandlers in Salt Lake City in the past several years. They used to show up in force just around Temple Square during General Conference but they’re everywhere now. Once I saw one in an area of SLC called Sugarhouse panhandling at a parking lot exit talking on a cell phone. Drives me nuts people will still give these people money. KSL even did a story a few months ago and every panhandler they talked to had a criminal record and misrepresented themselves when they told their story to the reporter (yes, the reporter actually did their job and dug into the history of these people to fact-check them).
Sounds eerily familiar
Here’s the story: http://www.ksl.com/?sid=27782692
I bet we’re also vastly underestimating the number of professionally stupid. Present company excluded, of course.
It might be a viable idea for churches and other charity groups to start buying property out in the country and setting up “poor farms” for the salvageable people out there.
Even if they have mental health issues which make them unemployable in the usual sense, having them out in the country tending their own garden plots and away from most sources of drugs, alcohol and other temptations might be a far preferable way of dealing with the problem then letting them stay in urban areas.
IF, as mentioned in several places on this thread, about 1/3 of the homeless fall into this category, then we at least cut the problem by about 1/3 for the municipalities and citizens who deal with this problem.
It would be poetic justice to round up the remaining 2/3 of the homeless (the violent and heavy drug abusers) and turn them loose inside the gated communities of the liberal “elites” who created this problem in the first place. I wonder how fast they would be scrambling to reopen the institutions when that happened…
Of course…
Property owners and businesses don’t get the final say in how they do business?
You might want to think about that a bit.
If owners don’t control their property, then what is the point in owning business or property in the first place?
Where do you think the jobs come from? Look around you. Government is the only “industry” that’s growing and it can only get it’s money from taxpayers.
I’m all for letting someone earn a second chance, but not if it’s forced on people in the name of a “greater good.”
I am so sorry.
“Professional Homeless” is a completely different issue. Those people, generally at busy intersections in affluent communities, are often not homeless. It is what they do for a living and they do surprisingly well.
I like the farm idea a lot. I think it would be good for Society and merciful.
However, anybody who proposed it would be subjected to Dickensonian outrage, cranked to eleven.
Evi L, who is very smart for a cow, makes a good point about group homes. Tons of people could be helped by a combination of group homes, and the Christian community helping to normalize them to a degree, in the sense of job/work opportunities. There are so many people who could function in a sense, if they had not only proper supervision, but most importantly, a schedule and routine. Am I right, Jeanette? People who have functional mental illness need a routine, just as toddlers need a routine. We could, as a society, actually have such people performing routine tasks quite successfully under supervision, but oh no. We have to use our money instead to fund works of “art” like “Piss Christ” and the Occupant’s many vacations, among many, many other things. Don’t get me started. Cripes, I already got started.
Please don’t take this wrong, but I believe you have said before that you are Mormon, but evil is as evil does. Not all are called by God. And we all have morons in our family, I might add.
By the way, QM, completely and utterly off-topic, and I apologize to others about this, but I love your weiner-dog avatar. When I was growing up, we had a dachshund, and when we sent her papers in, her name was officially her breeder with her “name”, which was Great Pines Tara. However, this was in the day when such things were done manually on a typewriter, so her name came back as Great Pines Tuna. My Mom was going to return it and have it fixed, but we kids loved the name Tuna, and our sweet little Doxie was called Tuna Dog from then on. LOL!
RKae, logic such as yours prevents celebrity leftists from excusing away the laziness and irresponsibility of entitlement whores. Shame on you.
I certainly support it. It would be beneficial and ultimately profitable for the country, which means we’ll never do it. The IRS, at the very least, won’t allow it.
I swear to you, if I were president, I’d have to surround myself 24×7 with hand-picked Navy Seals and Krav Maga blackbelts, because I’d so change this country for the better. And the forces of evil, of which there are many, would hate it.
Wow. Not sure how I’m not supposed to take being called evil wrong.
What I mean is, I was making a blatantly religious statement, and didn’t want to offend someone not religious. Sorry if that didn’t come out right.
I think I get what you were saying. As a rule I try not to be testy when it comes to people giving me crap about being LDS (it’s a fact of life *shrug*), but it bothers me when people I enjoy engaging with basically tell me they think I’m going to Hell.
And yes, my sister is a moron. And my willingness to point that out to her is, in her mind, the reason she is fat (which is apparently not at all her own fault for overeating and sitting on her ass).
Heh…I have enough problems judging myself through God’s eyes, let alone judging others. The Bible does say that “by their fruits you shall know them”, so I feel confident that evil fruits expose evil people.
Evil is such a strong word to we humans, but through the eyes of a holy and righteous God, we are all corrupt. Which is, again, why I mainly try to focus on my own sins, and let others worry about themselves. With all I’ve done, especially in my pre-Christian past, who am I to judge.
p.s. Sorry in advance for future times when you’ll read me judging others, LOL!
It started with an ACLU lawsuit and black robed shysters when Jerry Brown’s daddy was governor in the 1960s.
Wanna blame “emigration from Kalifornia” for Portlandia’s idiocies? Go ahead, and send all those high-tech jobs from California back home to the Golden State. I dare you.
Yes, how DARE you make people feel bad for making bad decisions? This is supposed to be a more enlightened time, where people are allowed to do and say whatever they want consequence-free. You’re totally being a buzzkill. And a big meanie. /sarc (just in case :p)
I used to a part of eh great commentariat at Neptunus Lex before he was killed at Fallon in March 2012. Another guy, from Wisconsin, called himself “Scott The Badger” as he was from Wisconsin. I sent him a Badger Avatar, and a bit before that I had adopted a Dachshund Avatar. I used to play with him and he once playfully complained that he was being persecuted by a Dachshund.
Germans bred Dachshunds for Badger hunting. I used to have two of them and they are tough little dogs.
What’s to send? I’ve made an observation. I no longer live there and have no plans to live in a state that is increasingly noted for the same sort of idiocy Kalifornia is noted for.
Humane doesn’t mean what you pretend it to mean, douchebag.
Boston’s insanity is shown by the idiotic way it votes. Portland, Maine is a place I can’t speak to. I do know that the population trend in Maine is downward because of its liberalism, so it’s quite possible you are right.
There is plenty of help and opportunities out there for the homeless, but the fact is that many of them choose that life style. (because of the mental illness and drug use).
Another thing occurred to me while thinking about the criteria you mentioned in your comment….
It would shocked me and I would put it past them to include a majority of our active duty military service members in their numbers.
Anyone who has ever lived in a barracks or aboard ship will tell you that 350sq.ft. of “living space” would be a welcomed luxury!
If we spent as much money actually helping the homeless as we spend feeding the bureaucracy of the homeless industry it would be problem solved, even if only that the more unfortunate of them that need it could be institutionalized in comfortable humane conditions.
I can assure you that some homeless people do come from stable happy homes, but something inside them makes them turn to drugs and criminal behavior, or else they are uncontrollably mentally ill. My own brother is a case in point, and what’s left of my family (including me) will have nothing to do with him.
Your sister, my brother. I understand completely.
100% correct, Stacy. The MFM has been pushing this for years, that there are large numbers of ordinary middle-class and working-class people who lose their jobs and then find themselves in the street. The idea is to make us feel ashamed of capitalism and free enterprise. A friend of mine worked in a soup kitchen serving meals to the homeless and said it was obvious that nearly all of them had drug and/or mental problems.
After giving this story some more thought, it occurred to me, Miley is probably doing this at the behest of her publicist, who has probably advised her to pick a cause (any cause) to advocate in favor of. It could have easily been animal rights, the environment, pro-choice, or any number of other issues, but for whatever reason Miley decided to go with homelessness.
Having come to this conclusion, one thing I can almost promise you is, this guy did not write the speech he gave. It was more than likely written for him, and he studied it and delivered it.
Another thing I would almost be willing to bet is that Miley and this guy were never in proximity with each other before the show, nor afterwards. Probably the most contact they had was. introduced to each other backstage right before his appearance-if that.
Finally, what would you think is the possibility that this guy was promised that somebody would use their influence to make sure this guy got the most favorable possible outcome to his pending charges if he played along with this nonsense?
I think it’s all very amusing, but I don’t see any need for any great concern here.
You forgot one other problem caused by the liberals that helped create this homeless crisis. For years there were places where those down on the their luck could sleep, shower and perhaps get a hot meal all for a portion of what they panhandled or legitimately earn doing unskilled labor.
Of course these places were often crowded and dirty and bathrooms were shared by many but they were someplace that these men could safely get a nights sleep and shower.
As we started upping the standards for housing, the cost of to keep of the regulations basically priced the rooms out of the range of these men. An unintended consequence of laws that were meant to help by not addressing real economic laws.
The manorial system of medieval Europe is a good start.
Then why do you not hire them.
And you’re an obnoxious troll. Bye now.
Working on it. I’d respond a lot faster if people e-mailed me about this stuff, you know…
The downside with deleting comments to which some of us respond, is that the trolls’ lunacy is lost to the casual reader. I appreciate that there are things which cross the line and should be removed. However, by the same token, certain arguments must be met head-on. Deleting the patent absurdities, leaves the counterpoints hanging in limbo.
Not criticism, BTW. Just an observation.
I’ll keep that in mind.
I recall one time when I was in Tampa, FL. I had stopped at a convenience store to get some gas when a guy approached me to ask if I had some loose change for a cup of coffee.
I said I didn’t have any change, so he asked for a dollar so he could get something to eat. Nope, no singles either.
So I went into the store to pay for my gas and spent about about four or five bucks for a large coffee and a Pimiento Cheese sandwich to give to the guy.
I handed it to him and he asked me WTF is this and started to throw it away? I told him that he said he was thirsty and hungry and I would strongly suggest he start eating the generously offered food.
My friend who I was visiting down there at the time laughed when I told him about it. He told me that the panhandler had a BMW and lived in a 100 grand condo a few blocks from the store.
In 2008 a report came from San Francisco that found that 75% of their homeless weren’t homeless. http://primordialslack.com/?p=441
My next rant will be about the “1 in 6 children in the U.S. experience hunger” crap on the radio every 10 minutes.
We are fed a story.
In this day and age, you are homeless by choice.
Abusing substances is a choice, a matter of personal responsibility.
There is no State in the Union that doesn’t have programs to get people off of the street, but you have to follow purposely strict rules.
When I was 14, I left a dysfunctional home, and I lived in a tent for about 6 weeks, so technically I was homeless, but with my first paycheck, I changed that.