If New York had the murder rate that Baltimore does that would mean over 3000 people murdered in a year.
Baltimore has a serious violence problem no matter how you try to rationalize it.
What he said is:
> unless you are actively involved in [drug] trades or unfortunate enough to be caught up in it by proximity, it likely will never visit you.
Baltimore undoubtedly has a serious drug violence problem; much more serious than Boston and NYC. (Fortunately our government's Drug War is on the verge of eliminating that problem any day now!)
What Paul is saying, though, is that this problem has remarkably small collateral damage considering its severity; almost nobody who's not involved with the drug trade ends up in those murder statistics.
(I know it's not nobody, but I suspect that the rate of "unrelated to drug trade" murders in Baltimore is similar to that in Boston and NYC.)
My wife and I decided we wanted to raise our family in Boston and when we were looking for a place in 2004 I was shocked to find out there were only 39 murders in Boston in 2003.
The status quo in Baltimore is not acceptable and is not what is tolerated in other cities.
However, I will be applying and I would love to spend 3 months back in Baltimore.