If power is measured by corporate endorsements and
the kiss-up antics of Democratic politicians, the movement popularly
known as “Black Lives Matter” is awesomely powerful, its name painted into the streets of
cities across the nation. Record-breaking contributions have also
flowed to a broad range of social justice organizations from the
public-at-large, with bail funds amassing almost $100 million . Even tiny projects have seen their previously forlorn GoFundMe accounts suddenly stuffed with contributions.
The cash windfall alone is enough to make one giddy – including
life-long activists old enough to have participated in the radical mass
movements of half a century ago. The “fascist pigs” have not been
“offed,” but some of them have been indicted and Democratic politicians
now claim they want to rein in the ‘warrior cops” that only yesterday
were hailed as “heroes” of the constant “wars” waged against Black and
brown America. “Policing” as we have known it has been discredited in
ways that cannot easily be reversed, with 70 percent of white people
under age 45 agreeing that George Floyd’s killing was part of “a broader
pattern of excessive police violence toward African-Americans.” Sixty
percent of white folks of all ages told New York Times pollsters they
feel “positively” about the “Black Lives Matter” movement – meaning a
significant slice of Trump supporters object to police behavior, as do
overwhelming percentages of Black and brown Americans.
There is no doubt that, in the arena of public perception, we have
witnessed a stunning rout of the forces that erected the modern Black
Mass Incarceration State in response to the Black rebellions and radical
movements of the 1960s. The Democratic Party – whose politicians of all
races have for five decades been the hands-on urban managers of the
world’s largest police state – pretends to have suddenly seen the light.
In Covid-19/Great Depression Two America, the servants of capital say
we are all Black Lives Matter -- until the “crisis of legitimacy” passes.
But the oligarchs that rule this country and both its corporate
parties have no intention of dismantling the racist police state, beyond
staffing the blue legions with more Black, brown and female officers,
embedding the multiracial occupation army deeper in our communities and
increasing their intelligence capabilities. The “reforms” trotted out by
local and national Democrats do not alter -- but rather, enhance and
make culturally more palatable – the police mission to contain, control
and politically neutralize Black America.
-- Glen Ford, "Don’t Let the Democratic Party Bury the Movement" (BLACK AGENDA REPORT).