What purpose were the protest marches intended to accomplish? To express disapproval of racism? Yet if practically everybody is against racism - and it is quite difficult to find self-avowed racists in 21st-century America - who are the protesters marching against? Consider the case of Minneapolis, in particular.
If every elected official in the city is against racism and against police brutality, then why was it even necessary to organize a protest march? Our Constitution guarantees "The right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." What grievance did the #BlackLivesMatter protesters in Minneapolis have against the municipal government they have themselves elected? This is a great mystery, given that the prosecution of charges in the Floyd case will be directed by Minnesota's black attorney general, Keith Ellison.
Logically, the protests make no sense as a means of seeking a "Redress of grievances." There is no legitimate reason to suspect that Keith Ellison will engage in a cover-up of racist wrongdoing in Minneapolis, so why did the George Floyd protests turn into a nationwide movement? What is the grievance of the protest mobs that took to the streets in Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, and other major cities across the country?
Perhaps the answer can be found in the rhetoric of the protesters.
"Stop Killing Us," the protest signs demand, but this should not be interpreted as an invitation to ask the question, who is killing whom? The protesters are not interested in a discussion of facts.
We do not need to speculate what political agenda this rhetoric seeks to advance; it's an election year, after all, and anyone can see which party's politicians are celebrating the #BlackLivesMatter protests.
If the claim were ever made explicit - if the protest leaders ever dared to assert that Republicans were to blame for George Floyd's death - the rebuttal would be as simple as one word: "How?" As previously explained, Minneapolis is a bastion of liberalism, and the site where Floyd was arrested is in Minnesota's Fifth Congressional District, whose current representative is Ilhan Omar, arguably the most far-left Democrat in Congress.
If every elected official in the city is against racism and against police brutality, then why was it even necessary to organize a protest march? Our Constitution guarantees "The right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." What grievance did the #BlackLivesMatter protesters in Minneapolis have against the municipal government they have themselves elected? This is a great mystery, given that the prosecution of charges in the Floyd case will be directed by Minnesota's black attorney general, Keith Ellison.
Logically, the protests make no sense as a means of seeking a "Redress of grievances." There is no legitimate reason to suspect that Keith Ellison will engage in a cover-up of racist wrongdoing in Minneapolis, so why did the George Floyd protests turn into a nationwide movement? What is the grievance of the protest mobs that took to the streets in Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, and other major cities across the country?
Perhaps the answer can be found in the rhetoric of the protesters.
"Stop Killing Us," the protest signs demand, but this should not be interpreted as an invitation to ask the question, who is killing whom? The protesters are not interested in a discussion of facts.
We do not need to speculate what political agenda this rhetoric seeks to advance; it's an election year, after all, and anyone can see which party's politicians are celebrating the #BlackLivesMatter protests.
If the claim were ever made explicit - if the protest leaders ever dared to assert that Republicans were to blame for George Floyd's death - the rebuttal would be as simple as one word: "How?" As previously explained, Minneapolis is a bastion of liberalism, and the site where Floyd was arrested is in Minnesota's Fifth Congressional District, whose current representative is Ilhan Omar, arguably the most far-left Democrat in Congress.
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