Sen. Tom Cotton: The BLM Effect

I doubt that Sen. Tom Cotton wrote this.

It goes without saying that Cotton is a neocon. Everyone knows this.

The article is correct though that BLM is the cause of the crime wave. This needs to be bluntly stated. BLM and “antiracism” and the “racial justice movement” IS THE CAUSE OF THIS.

National Review:

“Last year, our nation experienced the largest single-year increase in murder in American history and endured some of the worst riots in a generation. It’s no coincidence that this appalling death and destruction surged at the same time as the virulently anti-law-enforcement “Black Lives Matter” movement became more popular, powerful, and pervasive. The consequences of the “BLM Effect” continue today.

The current crime wave has many similarities to the infamous “Ferguson Effect” that gripped our nation after Officer Darren Wilson justifiably shot Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., in August 2014. Anti-police agitators at the time started the “hands up, don’t shoot” myth and created the original Black Lives Matter organization soon thereafter. This group, founded on a lie, condemned proactive policing, argued for a radical reduction of the prison population, and championed a “de-militarization” of police departments. Its most enduring contribution to the public debate, however, was the libel that our men and women in blue are racist and target Americans based on the color of their skin. …

The BLM Effect caused an even more shocking drop in policing, paired with a stunning rise in murder. From last summer to this winter, police in Chicago made 53 percent fewer arrests compared with the same period in 2019. Murder in the city rose by 65 percent. In New York, police made 38 percent fewer arrests and murder rose by 58 percent. In Louisville, Ky., police made 35 percent fewer arrests and murder rose by 87 percent. In Minneapolis, Minn., police made 42 percent fewer arrests and murder rose by 64 percent.

The BLM Effect shares similarities with the Ferguson Effect, but is distinct in important ways, particularly in severity and extent of damage. Between 2014 and 2016, murder nationwide rose 23 percent. In 2020 alone, murder increased by more than 25 percent. In essence, the BLM Effect unleashed more death in a single year than two years of the Ferguson Effect.

Recruitment of officers has similarly suffered, with 86 percent of police chiefs reporting that they are short-staffed. Between April 2020 and April 2021, as crime and retirements surged, the rate of hiring in mid-sized departments dropped 29 percent and plummeted 36 percent in large departments. The flood of officers out of larger departments, paired with the trickle of recruits, will exacerbate the ongoing crime disaster.

The institutional wreckage wrought by the BLM Effect is a symptom of a deeper ideological cancer. In the days to come, we must work to rebuke the radical anti-cop ideology that emerged in 2014–2016, metastasized from 2017–2019, and became debilitating in 2020. If the ideas that undergird the movement remain unchallenged, the BLM Effect will continue.”

The match was lit in Ferguson and St. Louis in 2014.

The fire spread to Baltimore in 2015. It went national during the George Floyd riots.