And so it has come to this: Nearly one-half of New York considers Al Sharpton to be a “positive force” in civic affairs.
Wow.
Talk about defining positivity down.
For sure, the now-wraithlike Rev has come a long way since his toxic younger days — since the Tawana Brawley calumnies, since the anti-Semitism of Crown Heights and since the lethal incitements outside Freddy’s Fashion Mart.
But Al is still all about Al, as evidenced by this week’s remarkable two-part poll from Quinnipiac University on NYPD-community relations during the early tenure of Police Commissioner Bill Bratton.
In a nutshell: Sharpton’s up, Bratton’s down — and the department’s headed for a hole in the ground.
Well, maybe not that bad — but close enough.
The poll follows months of controversy over the proper role of the police in a generally prosperous, yet always fractious city; a city that 20 years ago was as deadly as Dodge, but which today is far and away the safest in America. (In most neighborhoods, anyway.)
It came to a head in July, with the resisting-arrest death of petty criminal Eric Garner on Staten Island — an event now under investigation by the borough’s district attorney, Dan Donovan.
Mayor de Blasio, deliberately or otherwise, elevated Sharpton’s role in the ensuing debate, while undercutting Bratton’s. With one predictable result: Quinnipiac reports that 49 percent of New Yorkers now view the reverend as a “positive force” in municipal life, while Bratton’s approval rating fell from 57 percent in June to 48 percent at the weekend.
(The mayor, as is so often the case with those who play the ends against the middle, held steady at 50 percent approval — not great, but he’s weathering the storm.)
Sharpton’s ascendancy seemingly vindicates his principal thesis: That New Yorkers, especially black New Yorkers, now reject so-called “broken windows” policing, which has cops focus on quality-of-life offenders so as to discourage more serious criminals.
It turned New York around 20 years ago, but now “the broken windows thing has become a signal of profiling,” Sharpton says, dourly. It’s an observation that perhaps concedes more than the reverend realizes — but is he right?
Has New York truly wearied of aggressive policing?
Happily, not.
Certainly Quinnipiac’s pollsters found overwhelming backing for vigorous “broken windows” enforcement — right across the ethnic board:
“Support for the . . . policy is 61-33 percent among white voters, 56-37 percent among black voters and 64-34 percent among Hispanic voters, the Q-pollers report.
And: “By a 61-33 percent margin, with almost no difference between blacks and whites, voters want police to enforce quality-of-life issues in their neighborhood.”
So — take that, Rev. Al. Even your own constituency says you’re full of it.
Or, as Bratton puts it: “The vast majority of what we do is in response to community concerns.” But for how much longer?
Effective urban policing, especially in an age of racialized hypersensitivity, does not come easily. It requires a coherent strategy, such as “broken windows” — plus patience, training and a disciplined chain of command.
Many cities aren’t up to the challenge, for whatever reasons. This explains Chicago, Detroit and Philadelphia, plus others — like Ferguson, Mo.
Now New York seems to be on the verge of throwing “broken windows” over — Sharpton has too much invested in that outcome to accept anything less — just as cracks are beginning to appear in what was a textbook-perfect chain of command.
Sergeants Benevolent Association President Ed Mullins, predicting an imminent return of the bad old days, this week cautioned the Democratic National Committee to take its 2016 convention elsewhere. Someplace with safe subways, he said.
That’s a little over the top, but it’s a far-from-ridiculous message: Don’t expect my members to sacrifice themselves to advance Al Sharpton’s agenda, says Mullins. And PBA President Pat Lynch has said pretty much the same thing.
Bottom line: De Blasio & Co. will railroad the cops in the Eric Garner case at New York’s long-term peril.
City Hall writes this message off as contract-related hyperbole, and there’s probably something to that. But not much.
For Team de Blasio made it clear with the teachers’ union that a big fat contribution to the mayor’s PAC, the Campaign for One New York, is now the quickest route to lush labor settlements — and surely the cop unions noticed. Doubtless the check will be in the mail soon enough.
In the meanwhile, how ironic is it that the cop unions and black New Yorkers are together on one side of Al Sharpton’s signature issue — and The Rev is on the other?
Hilarious.