"Black votes matter to many politicians — more so than black lives. That is why such politicians must try to keep black voters fearful, angry and resentful. Racial harmony would be a political disaster for such politicians." Thomas Sowell (and an oft-cited tenet of Rebane Doctrine)
George Rebane
Well, given what we see in the streets, we can safely conclude that the pandemic lockdowns are over, and all business are open except those that have been boarded up or burned down.
Starting with local police departments, all fielded LE units/agencies are now conducting defensive operations to preserve themselves. They are no longer out there to protect persons or property. The compelling explanation for this kind of CYA behavior is that they don’t see support from their political leaders, the law-abiding public, and most certainly not from the protesters and rioters. Law enforcement today stands politically abandoned. They are indicted by a long history of law enforcement ‘mistakes’ that recently have culminated in the outrageous public murder (execution?) of George Floyd, a black petty criminal, by the Minneapolis police, and the killing of Breonna Taylor, an innocent black woman gunned down in her own home by Louisville Metro Police mistakenly raiding her house in the middle of the night. Both should be seen as preventable crimes by institutions that have lost sight of their reason for being.
No one has really determined the make-up of the legitimate protesters in the streets, nor if they are the same ones who turn into destructive rioters after the peaceful phase of their demonstrations are concluded. Does the non-violent cohort then go home to be replaced by the violent ones who mostly conduct themselves as Antifa members? (To my knowledge, Antifa is still a distributed national protest movement that shares literature, values, dress, street tactics, …, but having no common leadership, managed funding, or central control.) From the reports from the media and police on the scene, the non-violent protesters appear to morph into violent rioters at some point, mostly after the sun goes down. Today the violent are all masked (perhaps because of the pandemic) and therefore act with impunity because their anonymity is secure. In the meantime, the cities’ progressive political leaders are desperately looking for the illusive out-of-town white supremacists who are really the instigators of looting and burning.
Today’s street conflicts are also culturally confused and confusing. There is no common social contract in evidence among the street borne polyglot. Everyone is doing their own thing, milling from here to there or just idly standing by and watching the show. Some have come with prepared signs with the usual slogans demanding justice and change. But when interviewed, no one has a clue as to what exactly needs to be done to bring about the change and the new age of justice. Moreover, no one even thinks that there need be some deeper thought behind the demands on the displayed placards – their histrionics are sufficient unto themselves.
If really pressed for specifics, black leadership in the media can drill down no deeper than spout the Democratic Party talking points – ‘Shut down white supremacy and white privilege.’ This is the closest that any leftwinger can come to specifying what needs to be done to bring about the “change” that the protesters are demanding. What white supremacy should be shut down how? Which white privileges should be legislated into criminality? And their political party and political leadership are equally clueless as to what specific and feasible programs should be implemented across the land to prevent future Floyds and Taylors being killed at the hands of various law enforcement agencies.
In the meantime, there is political hay to be made in this election year that has already given our Left so much ammo against President Trump and the Republicans. For a party without a single viable idea of how to better respond to the virus, let alone how to revive the economy, all they have to offer is solution-free partisan vituperation to convince their constituents and light-thinking lackies that a new glorious age will spontaneously start if we can only get Trump out of the White House, Republicans out of Congress, and pack SCOTUS with an enlarged bench of progressive justices. The rest will miraculously take care of itself under a distended government that will redistribute the country’s wealth, hire more of the unemployable incompetents, pay everyone regardless, and become the major player in our economy – i.e. socialism on steroids.
When the dust settles, what will the gutless politicians do with police departments that are becoming more insular and frustrated as they are charged with keeping the peace in public environments ever more conflicted in values, mores, attitudes, perceived pasts, fearful futures, …, all existing under a shroud of confusing, contradictory, unknown, and variously interpreted and randomly enforced laws, regulations, and codes that become more impenetrable by the day? The cop on the beat can no longer reliably predict anyone’s behavior, and must therefore become a programmed automaton who survives his shift by avoiding conflicts and strife whenever possible, and when not, then apply one-size-fits-all rules in the most self-defensive and often ruthless manner possible.
[update] We just finished watching the evening news that covered the ongoing demonstrations from several big cities across the country. The President made a ‘law and order’ speech in which he separated those lawful protesters from the thugs, looters, arsonists, and now killers on our streets. We hear people of all ranks, starting with the Floyd family, calling for the violence to stop, that such behavior is not serving the memory of their murdered son George, nor anything good that hopefully would come out of this after the dust settles. The politicians calling for calm and calling out the rioters are all from the Right. The only political leader voices from the Left are using this ongoing national tragedy to attack the administration, and to further divide us and convince all that there is no hope of unity in the future. They realize more than any of us that those on the streets are their imperturbable constituents, loyal voters, and their very political lifeblood – they can do no wrong.
If a progressive wanted to counter any of this shameful behavior by their political leaders, one need only ask, ‘Where are the Pelosis, Schumers, Obamas, Bidens, Jacksons, Sharptons… with their messages of peace and calm, calling for the protesters to abide by the law and rioters to stand down?’ The only words from their and their lamestream lackies’ mouths do nothing but throw fuel on a raging partisan fire, and give their imprimaturs to the lawlessness on the streets by pledging their solidarities from which are absent any condemnation of the riotous mobs. Even the word ‘riot’ is not in their vocabulary when they occasionally stray from lauding the “just protests” on our cities’ streets. In Democrats’ eyes, it is all one homogeneous nationwide protest against Republican racism and social injustice. For them this indeed is one helluva crisis not to let go waste.
