Wow. I mean, wow.

The new Miss Philadelphia, when asked about Philadelphia's 100+ murders on the year:

It was a development the 23-year-old resident of Richboro did not attempt to sugarcoat or dodge. Rogers said she considered Philadelphia's murder milestone "an exciting challenge" that is "pertinent" to her platform: preventing and eliminating depression among young people.

The city's homicide rate "gives me the inspiration to work harder and make a difference," said Rogers, a pharmaceutical marketing consultant for TargetRx in Horsham.

Gosh, I know they tell pageant contestants to stay positive, but "exciting"? What about hundreds of murders is exciting? And I'm all about combatting childhood depression, but come on. Depression leads to anger, pickpocketing, maybe. Teen crimes. Mostly it leads to a lot of sleeping and not wanting to go outside. The people who commit these crimes are not sullen loners, Raskolnikovs who want to feel something, anything. They're mostly drug dealers. I guess, in their own way, so is Rogers' empoyer. Puts another meaning to the phrase "Big Pharma."

"There are many children out there that just don't express their feelings," said Rogers, a graduate of Princeton University, where she majored in molecular biology. Leaving dire feelings unaddressed, she said, "leads to crime."

Princeton, folks. So we can assume that Ms. Rogers knows better, but the combination of pageantry and marketing are constraining her critical faculties.

In her role as Miss Philadelphia, Rogers said she would meet soon with Mayor Street, and she intends to "tell him I'm committed to serving the city and making the biggest positive impact I can." She will also have the opportunity to speak to community groups and schools.

This part really did it for me. The mayor won't meet with the District Attorney to talk about the murder rate, because the two of them are political enemies. But he's going to meet with Miss Philadelphia?

The title of the article is "Substance Behind the Smile."

By the way, for the year, Philadelphia is ahead of New York in absolute number of murders, not just per capita, even though NYC has about six times the population. And nobody seems to know exactly why.