SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT: 

THE GRIM TRUTH – FROM DAILY MAIL:  Police retirements have risen by 45 percent in the past year, with officers opting out of forces across the country amid Black Lives Matter demonstrations that fueled anti-cop rhetoric.   The alarming statistic was revealed by the Police Executive Research Forum on Sunday, with the organization also revealing that resignations rose by 18 percent during the same twelve month period.  'It is an evolving crisis,' Chuck Wexler, the organization's executive director, told The New York Times, adding that police forces are also struggling to attract new recruits.  Anti-police sentiment was sparked by the murder of George Floyd by white cop Derick Chauvin in Minneapolis on Memorial Day.  It prompted some politicians to say they were in favor of abolishing or defunding police forces across the United States. Commissioners claimed that rhetoric caused a spike in violent crime and led officers to feel betrayed by their elected officials.  New York City, for instance, saw large-scale BLM marches during which some participants threw bottles at police and set their patrol cars on fire.  Mayor Bill de Blasio subsequently slashed $1 billion from the NYPD's operating budget, despite a surge in shootings and murders.  In 2020, 2,600 New York Cops handed in their resignations -  almost double the 1,509 resignations clocked the year before.   It was a similar story in many police departments in large and mid-size cities around the nation.  And, of course, African American citizens have paid the highest price amidst the crime surge we have seen in the past year. 

THE REVOLT CONTINUES – FROM THE WASHINGTON TIMES:  House and Senate Republicans introduced bills on Monday that would bar federal funds from being used to teach The New York Times’s "1619 Project."  The measures are unlikely to pass the Democratic-run Congress, but the bills reflect mounting opposition to efforts to inform school curriculums with the newspaper series, which reframed U.S. history with a focus on slavery and racism as the defining characteristic of the American experience.
“Activists in schools want to teach our kids to hate America and hate each other using discredited, Critical Race Theory curricula like the 1619 Project. Federal funds should not pay for activists to masquerade as teachers and indoctrinate our youth,” said Sen. Tom Cotton, Arkansas Republican, the bill’s main sponsor in the Senate.  “High-quality civics education is vital to the health of our democracy,” added Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, and another sponsor of the bill. “Debunked activist propaganda that seeks to divide has no place in American classrooms and no right to taxpayer funding.”  A good move and good words, but, alas, the bills have no chance of passage unless Republicans win back both houses of Congress next year.  Moves like this build the Republican position and let voters know which side has their values at heart.

June 14, 2022