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Do Progressives Really Want to ‘Defund the Police’?

AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee

The “Defund the Police” movement is dead for the time being. After two years of exploiting the murder of George Floyd, far-left activist groups like Black Lives Matter and others have declined in popularity, and the Democratic Party has fled from the slogan faster than Michael Moore to an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Of course, this doesn’t mean those who wish to weaken local law enforcement agencies have given up. They are merely biding their time until another opportunity arises to foment nationwide hatred against the police.

In fact, the only reason Democrats have eschewed the slogan is that it became toxic politically as crime rates surged across the nation. Even the aptly-named Charles Blow conceded this in a recent op-ed:

When Democrats underperformed in 2020, party leaders placed part of the blame on the movement to defund the police. The Democratic strategist James Carville called “defund the police” “the three worst words ever in the English language, maybe.” Representative Jim Clyburn blamed some Democratic losses directly on the “defund the police” movement and suggested that the slogan actually hurt the Black Lives Matter movement, saying, “It had the possibilities of doing to the Black Lives Matter movement and current movements across the country what ‘burn, baby, burn’ did to us” in the 1960s.

Now, Democrats are busy criticizing Republicans for commandeering their favorite mantra and calling for the defunding of the FBI after its search of former President Donald Trump’s home. Conservatives have slammed the Bureau for what many view as a politically-motivated effort to use the Justice Department to derail any plans Trump might have for running for president again. They argue that the right wishes to turn a blind eye towards corruption among local and state law enforcement agencies while focusing on the FBI only because it is targeting their guy.

There is some merit to this criticism. I argued previously that more conservatives should be pushing for the same type of reforms among local and state level police as they are for the FBI and other federal law enforcement agencies.

But this criticism can also be reversed. If the left is so virulently against corruption in the justice system, why haven’t they called for the defunding of all law enforcement, including at the federal level?

I believe the answer to that question gives us an insight into what the far-left is truly attempting to accomplish.

The hard left is authoritarian to the core. We can easily see this in how they choose to push their agenda. In most cases, they prefer using force and deception rather than persuasion.

Look at how so-called progressives are attempting to push the transgender agenda among young children. They lie to the public, claiming there is nothing to see here, and then try to shame us into silence by calling us transphobes. The woke Sanhedrin deploys the Cancel Culture Community™ whenever someone steps out of line when discussing trans and other issues.

One of the so-called progressives’ favorite tactics involves trying to get people fired or ostracized for expressing views they don’t like. Social media companies like Twitter and Facebook censor right-leaning views while amplifying left-wing opinions. In several cases, they have even worked with the government under President Joe Biden to accomplish this objective.

But, while these tactics have had some success, it has not quite given the Marxist crowd the control they desire. The ultimate point we must understand is that in order to totally enforce their agenda, progressives need the police. After all, who is going to arrest people for expressing views that give some folks anxiety like they already do in the United Kingdom? Who is going to carry out the confiscation of firearms if they manage to get their way in Congress and the courts?

This is not a farfetched theory. Some have already called for this radical change.

Author Robert J. Kane, in an op-ed for The Hill, wrote:

And so, at this crossroads, I pose the radical question: Why not disband most local police forces and federalize them? Not under the seemingly obvious choice of the Department of Justice — which would simply perpetuate policing’s singular focus on crime fighting — but under the U.S. Public Health Service.

In order for the hard left to see their vision of a Marxist utopia become reality, they have to use foot soldiers to make sure nobody can oppose this. This is why they don’t actually want to get rid of police – they want to replace them with federal law enforcement agencies that they control. While this has not yet become a popular movement on the hard left, it is not hard to see how federalizing all policing in America would make it easier to get what they want, is it?

In light of this, we should not be fooled into thinking the hard left wants to get rid of the police. In reality, it is very possible that they are simply moving incrementally towards a national police force that they would use against their political opposition. Just look at how they have cheered for the FBI each time it has made a move against Trump or his allies. Remember how they cheered when Capitol officers shot and killed an unarmed Ashli Babbitt?

This is yet another reason why conservatives need to snatch the conversation over criminal justice reform from the left. Sensible people can work together to figure out ways to make our justice system more just. But Marxists will not. Their aim is to create an army of foot soldiers that will enforce their ideology, and they will succeed if we are not willing to engage in the debate in a meaningful way.

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