The response from those city’s defenders was swift. One was Gretchen Whitmer, the Michigan governor, who said: “Michiganders know better.”
Detroit has been a punching bag of the right for decades. Said Rush Limbaugh in 2013: “The town has been a Petri dish of everything the Democrat party stands for. You have massive welfare states where citizens are given things left and right in order to buy their votes. You have no opposition whatsoever.”
The city, like many others, has definite problems, to be sure, but the attacks on Detroit are often chock full of bad faith. The fact Detroit is a majority-Black city is part of that bad faith attack. Notice that when Trump mentions problem cities he doesn’t talk about high crime rates in red states.
One of the things you heard constantly from Lions players after the franchise won its first playoff game in 32 years by beating the Rams was how happy players were for the city. You heard it from them over and over and over again.
It means a whole lot to this city,” quarterback Jared Goff said. “We knew what it meant when this season started to get into the playoffs and then to get this win. And, you know, it’s just the beginning for us. We’ve got some run left.”
You have to fully understand what’s happening here. It’s not just the win on the field that makes this story so incredible. It’s what the win stands for. Part of it, in essence, is a middle finger to the people who have disparaged Detroit. Not just the Lions but the city. Detroit has, again, produced something special after constantly being told how incapable it was of doing that.
