By Nancy Thorner and Ed Ingold –
In the words of Thomas Hobbes, (1588-1679), an English philosopher considered to be one of the founders of modern political philosophy, “Nasty, Brutish, and Short.” As John Daniel Davidson wrote in his June 5, 2020 article, ‘Abolish The Police’ Is A Slogan For The Destruction Of America:
"If you thought ‘abolish the police’—or it’s more moderate iteration, ‘defund the police’—was just some asinine slogan blue-check journalists, woke academics, and pandering public officials post on Twitter to show they support the Black Lives Matter movement, then you’re not keeping up with the revolution.”
"This week Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, announced the city would be slashing the police department’s budget by $100 to $150 million and instead “reinvesting in black communities and communities of color.” The cuts to the LA police will make up the bulk of $250 million in funds to be reallocated to “end racism in our city,” Garcetti said. How exactly those millions will be spent remains unclear, but the mayor has in mind investments “in jobs, in education, and healing.”
On June 7, 2020, amid calls from protesters demanding that New York City yank funding from the New York Police Department, Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city is going to do just that.
Fellow Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said in a primary debate Friday that she was actively advocating for a “reduction” of the New York Police Department’s budget, which she said was taking away from potential investment in housing. https://www.wnd.com/2020/06/poll-reveals-many-americans-actually-want-defund-police/
A day later, June 8, 2020, Minneapolis councilors vowed to abolish the city's 'toxic' police force after the death of George Floyd. Although City's mayor, Jacob Frey, opposed the move, councilors have a veto-proof three-quarters majority. The Plan would involve defunding police service and reinvesting money in community services and prevention.
In Washington D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser wouldn’t answer questions about removing a “defund the police” inscription which activists painted on a D.C. street. Bowser’s office had commissionedlocal artists and activists to paint “Black Lives Matter” on the street on Friday, June 5. 2020.
Not surprising is that celebrities including Lizzo, Chris Martin, and John Legend have signed an online petition demanding divestment from police departments.
As reported by Thomas Catenacci of the Daily Caller News Foundation, according to a YouGov poll just 16% of Americans support cutting funding for police departments. The YouGov poll was conducted with Yahoo News on May 29-30. The poll surveyed 1,060 U.S. adults.
As to the idea that funds would be diverted from the police department to provide social services to minorities. Historically speaking, very little money is diverted to the supposed beneficiaries. Over 90% goes to the social service staff and expenses, thus earning the loyalty of the true beneficiaries – dozens or hundreds of public employees.
The least we can do for our police officers is to ensure they have the best possible training and equipment – and enough funding for adequate staffing. When our communities hire police officers, we ask them to risk their lives to keep our families and neighborhoods safe.
According to the FBI, 89 officers were killed around the nation in the line of duty in 2019. These deaths were a tragedy that should not be ignored.
This is not to say that there aren't rogue cops. By law, police and other public officials are given “qualified immunity” for their actions. This is related to the sovereign power of states granted in the Constitution. Collective bargaining agreements, however, and policies controlling most public employees make it difficult if not impossible to terminate unfit and incompetent persons unless and until something like the Floyd incident illuminate the flawed individual(s). Action is then swift and appropriately.
George Floyd’s killer Derek Chauvin had over a dozen complaints, yet he remained on duty and even was involved in training new cops. Two of the 3 cops with him on that fateful day were being trained by him. Great example!
Sir Robert Peel leads the way in policing
The concept of a professional police force was largely unknown before the innovations of Sir Robert Peel in England in 1829. Prior to that time municipalities formed their own means of law enforcement without any standards of conduct or training. Sir Peel defined the organization and ethical standards which exist today throughout the civilized world.
Looking further back in history, the “law” applied mostly to the will of a monarch and his surrogates. Who can forget the infamous Sheriff of Nottingham? In medieval times, law was enforced by local rulers and warlords, using gangs of armed men employed at their pleasure. The common thread is that enforcement was on behalf of an individual or select group under his command, and well into the Renaissance at the behest of religious leaders or an ideology. The law itself was often subverted to those interests.
Little attention was paid to lesser disputes, which were often resolved personally and violently. The 30-year Hatfield-McCoy feud defines the conflict between familial and political differences. The duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr left one of our founding fathers dead and the other in a life of disrepute.
We have all witnessed devastation in the 20th century caused by loyalty of the enforcers to an individual or ideology rather than the Constitution and the law. Germany in the 30’s and 40’s is a prime example, but no less in modern Iran. Warlords rule Afghanistan, despite attempts to form a representative government based on the rule of law. Outside of Europe, only a handful of the 200 or so countries are governed on behalf of their citizens.
We don’t have to look far to see modern examples of feudal rather than constitutional law enforcement. Drug cartels control the law in Northern Mexico in their own self-interest. The “protection racket” persisted in large US cities through the 1970’s (perhaps later) where you paid someone to avoid “trouble”.
Today most gang warfare is largely over drugs, by whom and where they are sold, and enforced violently. “Protection” for private business has evolved to selective code enforcement for those who don’t toe the political line.
Alternatives to law enforcement?
What are the alternatives to law enforcement based on the Constitution and the law? Is it an ideology based on race or religion? Are some more equal than others (as in “Animal Farm” by George Orwell). One has doubts over the preeminence of the Constitution, since those calling for dissolution of professional police departments have shown it little regard in the past.
Even close oversight has unintended and dangerous consequences. For example, the 2016 consent decree imposed on the Chicago police department by the Obama DOJ coincided with a 50% increase in homicides and violent crime. Following the consent decree, police stops decreased to only 20% of previous years. Each stop obliged the officer to fill out three pages of a report, taking at least 20 minutes. It became far more attractive to investigate crime scenes than suspicious activity or individuals.
Whatever comes out will probably not affect the personal protection provided to high city and state officials, at a cost of nearly $1 million per year for each.
Nov. election peril for Trump?
According to "Free Market Warrior" Loren Spivack, popular author, economist, political activist, and highly sought speaker on economics and small government:
“The November election is going to be close. This is because our country is so evenly divided. Half the country despises Trump, as much as the other half loves him.”
“For Trump Law and order is not only a winning issue, it's a landslide issue. Trump needs to get in front of this, and the time is now. (He'll lose the election if he appears impotent in the face of chaos.)”
“Everyone sympathizes with George Floyd. Virtually no one, outside the professional left, sympathizes with the looters and rioters. This is being done to change the trajectory of the election. Trump can turn the narrative around completely, and change the course of American history, if he acts NOW.”
The following guidelines were proposed by Mr. Spivack for Trump to follow:
- He needs to make a national speech committing the full resources of the federal government to law and order wherever it is challenged.
- He needs to declare the Corona Virus lock down over, from coast to coast. It has clearly contributed to the frustration we're seeing exploding in streets. And no one is taking it seriously anymore, anyhow.
- He needs to federalize the National Guard and send it to wherever rioting is happening.
- He needs to promise that anyone looting, rioting or destroying property will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. If the local authorities won't do it, it will be done at the federal level (yes, there are several ways of doing this.)
- He needs to promise that he will veto any federal aid to rebuild what is destroyed by the rioters. This is important. The Democrats are going to want to federalize the damage by having the red states, in effect, pay for the blue state rioting. Everyone, especially the blue state Democrats, needs to know, up front, that they're paying for the damage they allow.
- The Justice Department needs to investigate the networks that are organizing and coordinating this rioting behind the scenes. This didn't all just pop out of nowhere. I smell a rat. And if they look into it, they'll find one.
Republican blame misplaced
Why is it that Republicans, and especially Trump, receive the blame for things they are not responsible for fixing? It is because Democrats and liberals have the responsibility but do not get the blame for not fixing?
Minneapolis is just such an example, as is Chicago, Detroit, NYC, LAS, SF, DC, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, St. Louis. All have one thing in common: Wall to wall, end to end, sea to shining sea Democrat governance and union dominance, and trouble; racial tension, poverty, debt, union dominance, corruption, and riots. But not to worry, they will fix it soon.
Roger Kimball is the editor and publisher of The New Criterion and publisher of Encounter Books. His most recent book is “The Fortunes of Permanence: Culture and Anarchy in an Age of Amnesia.” Kimball had this to say in his article published on May 31, 2010, Those Burning Our Cities Aim to Destroy Our Civilization:
“There is some macabre irony in the fact that while most of the country is “locked down” by the diktats of the health police, enforced by power-mad governors and those aspiring to power in city councils and mayors’ offices throughout the country, abetted by virtue-signaling sheep who scream at their neighbors if they get within six feet of them or appear in public without a mask, thousands of vicious criminals are given leave to loot and burn and pillage. The rules about “social distancing” are suspended so long as people are bent not upon making their living but destroying the livings of others."
