Rich Lowry of National Review Online ponders a failure for the group calling itself Black Lives Matter.
Black Lives Matter came up with the single most effective political slogan of the year.
While no one was likely to be overly impressed with Joe Biden’s line, “Build Back Better,” and Donald Trump’s “Keep America Great” or “Make America Great Again, Again” didn’t have the resonance of the original 2016 version, BLM broke through the clutter with a catchphrase that was memorable, pungent — and utterly devastating to Democrats.
After a surprising Tory victory in the British parliamentary election in 1992, the pro-Tory tabloid The Sun famously boasted, “It’s The Sun Wot Won It.” In the same spirit, it could be said that in this year’s congressional election, “It’s ‘Defund the Police’ Wot Lost It.”
Democrats have an uphill battle to take the U.S. Senate — pending two Georgia runoffs — and suffered shocking setbacks in the House that drastically diminished their majority.
All over the map, Democrats got hammered on defunding the police, which couldn’t have been better designed to extract maximum political pain with zero upside.
Black Lives Matter has been a stunning success in the elite culture. It won the obeisance of almost every major institution, from corporate America to sports leagues to colleges. It created a powerful, if dishonest, narrative of systemic police racism. It got invested with nearly a holy significance, such that criticizing it is considered at least a sin and perhaps a firing offense.
Much more importantly, at least for a time after the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, it won the goodwill of a clear majority of Americans.
To take this position of strength and use it primarily to associate your allies with a politically radioactive position requires extraordinary strategic folly and heedless ideological fanaticism. BLM had both, in ample supply.
