Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness

It amused me last night when I saw someone say that k pop stans had done more to disrupt the police (explanation here if you don't know) than any elected Democrat and I could reply to say that Minneapolis councilmembers are talking about disbanding the Minneapolis Police Department.

Steve Fletcher's twitter thread about this (and more) yesterday shows someone who's thought about this already, whose constituents have suffered for his opposition of bigger police budgets (he didn't even have to propose cutting the budget, just not increasing it was treated as a hostile act).

It's interesting that now the cops' biggest bargaining (or racketeering) chip isn't on the table any more; the implicit threat, "if you don't give us what we want we'll stop catching criminals and start acting like ones" has been realized in Minneapolis over the last week. So this, Fletcher is arguing, is an opportunity to to be seized: while what was feared is now already happening. There will be no better time to decrease funding and increase accountability.

It's an extraordinary twitter thread altogether.

The civil rights charges being filed by the Minnesota Department of Human Rights are a good sign too. They're investigating the last ten years of policing in Minneapolis. And the quotes from the governor, lt. gov. and the person who'll be leading the investigation are all saying good things, not just platitudes. It seems like they get it.

“George Floyd should be alive. He deserved to live a life full of dignity and joy,” [Departmentof Human Rights Commissioner, who'll be running this investigation] Lucero said. “Community leaders have been asking for structural change for decades. They have fought for this and it is essential that we acknowledge the work and commitment of those who have paved the path to make today’s announcement possible.”

“All of us agree that hate and discrimination should not be part of the fabric of this great state,” Lt. Governor Peggy Flanagan said. “But the grief and anger of this past week did not emerge from a vacuum. This is about a culture that continues to go unchecked. We can and must choose to do better. George Floyd, and the state as a whole, deserves this of us.”

“Silence is complicity. Minnesotans can expect our administration to use every tool at our disposal to deconstruct generations of systemic racism in our state,” Walz said in a news release. “As we move forward, we ask the community to watch what we do, not what we say. It is going to take action at all levels from the neighborhood on up, to get the change we need to see. This effort is only one of many steps to come in our effort to restore trust with those in the community who have been unseen and unheard for far too long.”

And it says a lot that when I said "yaaaay!" and Andrew asked why, and all I could say was "they charged the other three!" he knew I meant the other three ex-cops who aided and abeted the death of George Floyd. The main guy's charges have been upped from third- to second-degree murder too.