Leid Stories - 08/20/13

Detroit: The Killing of A City; Extreme Urban Warfare

A contentious legal battle over whether the City of Detroit legally can declare bankruptcy will become even more so in the coming weeks. Aug. 19 was the bankruptcy court’s deadline for objections, and Judge Steven Rhodes will hear arguments on the city’s right to file bankruptcy on Oct. 23.

Leid Stories contends that Detroit’s dire money woes are to be seen in the context of an extreme kind of urban warfare, the principal aim of which is to kill a city in order to “reinvent” it under social, political and economic paradigms designed by a confluence of interests that envision a “different” America.

We get the discussion started with an orientation by Dr. Thomas Sugrue, David Boies Professor of History and Sociology, and director of the Penn Social Science and Policy Forum at the University of Pennsylvania, and contributions from listeners.