BLUE CITY BLUES: Chicago’s Bloody Christmas Weekend.

Jim Geraghty:

For all of our complaining, every now and then the national media notices. The New York Times did a lengthy, in-depth piece in June — albeit one that mentioned Mayor Rahm Emanuel exactly once. Maybe there’s a hesitation to spotlight the ugly side of Chicago, or Emanuel’s tenure, or the city’s legendarily heavily Democratic leadership over the past century, or Obama’s hometown. Maybe it’s the glaring evidence that having really strict gun-control laws has had little effect on gang violence. In August, the state passed a law toughening penalties for penalty on anyone without a gun-owner identification card who brings a gun into the state of Illinois to sell. So far, there’s not much sign that that new law is having much effect, either.

The problems of Chicago’s violent neighborhoods — poverty, lack of education, lack of opportunity, family breakdown, drug abuse and addiction — exist to varying degrees in every other big city in America as well. So why is the gang violence in Chicago so much worse?

Good question. My initial answer is that Chicago is the Las Vegas of bad governance — a sort-of destination city for everything gone wrong with the Blue Model. And while that’s certainly too glib, there’s also some truth to it.