In the final blog post, I
have decided to draw comparisons between fictional Mayor/Governor Tommy
Carcetti with real-life Mayor/Governor Martin O’Malley. While David Simon
argues O’Malley was only 'one
of several inspirations' for Carcetti’s character, O’Malley rejects
entirely the idea of links between himself and Carcetti, arguing 'I'm
the antidote to The Wire.' Such cockiness, bordering on arrogance, is a
line befitting of the fictional character Carcetti – perhaps this underlines
the very link between the two hinted at by Peter Beilenson.
As real-life Mayor, O’Malley
was responsible for the introduction of ‘stats culture’ to Baltimore Police
Department. He was, in fact, widely praised for the ‘Compstat’ model he
introduced, and for the accompanying statistical decreases in crime invoked (a 3,000
decrease in violent crimes in O'Malley's first year in office, for
example). However, this is precisely the sort of policy David Simon seeks to
criticize through The Wire. The culture of statistics is ultimately
self-reinforcing, and sees Carcetti move from Mayor to Governor, with the same
trajectory for O’Malley. Ultimately, O’Malley and his statistics can be seen as
the embodiment of all that is wrong with society, in David Simon’s view.
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