This is kind of O/T, but I mentioned something that I
by IrishApache (2023-12-31 10:45:22)
Edited on 2023-12-31 10:57:13

In reply to: From a NY standpoint...  posted by IrishApache

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can now share a little more about, now having been fully separated from the NYPD for over two years.

I've met Bill de Blasio a handful of times, conversed with him, and even delivered a presentation to him once. Like many politicians, he can be quite charming when you meet him in person. Which can obscure how much of an absolute scumbag he can be.

Going back to late March of 2020, one must recall that de Blasio and Cuomo HATED each other, and were in a feud. And Bill couldn't stand being in his shadow as praise was heaped upon Cuomo for his daily press conferences in the early days of the pandemic.

The City had created ordinances requiring social distancing and mandating masks. In late March 2020, de Blasio had a meeting with top NYPD executives about the ordinances, a meeting a friend of mine happened to be at. One thing to note is that the NYPD has a pretty sizable medical division that employs a number of full-time and part-time doctors and is headed by a Chief Surgeon.

At this meeting, de Blasio demanded that the NYPD start producing summonses to show that this policy was being enforced. NYPD brass pushed back, noting:

a) While masking and social distancing are a good thing, our Chief Surgeon is far more concerned with indoor transmission than outdoor transmission, and taking enforcement action may not create any significant public health benefit.

b) Most importantly, there is already excellent compliance with these ordinances in most places around the City. The wealthy whites on the Upper East and Upper West Sides and the Asians in Queens have no problem wearing masks and social distancing. In those places, there is already good compliance because people fear the virus and understand the benefit of the ordinance. It's in places like Harlem and the Bronx where people are hanging around on streets and not wearing masks. There is a huge disparity in non-compliance depending where in the City you are. If you push enforcement on this, you are going to make us write summons almost exclusively to people of color, and really strain the relationship between the police and the black community. They urged the mayor not to push enforcement, and told him that the inevitable outcome would be horrid community relations and the Department bearing the brunt of the attack when the racial disparity became evident to the watchdogs. Further, this enforcement would be futile - it's not going to make the teens hanging out on a Harlem corner or in the Brooklyn projects suddenly start wearing masks.

But de Blasio overruled them, saying in essence, that he needed summons numbers, ne needed them fast, and he did not care where they came from. He was fully aware of the racial disparities in non-compliance, but he had to let people know that he was every bit as serious as Cuomo in the fight against Covid. He wanted the City government to look as strong as the State. He threatened the police brass and told them any precinct commander that is not on board should be removed. My friend was absolutely dumbstruck, calling me later that day saying "the fucking mayor is literally pitting our cops against black people so he can score points against the governor."

Of course, it played out exactly as predicted, and videos went viral of cops battling people of color on street corners over social distancing enforcement. The usual critics realized they had something good to hit the Department with, and (rightfully) went on the attack (see the below link).
In late April, George Floyd was murdered, the protests started, and all of this became suddenly irrelevant and went away.

But it was an episode that demonstrated what a POS that man was, and to say that the NYPD executives could not wait to be rid of de Blasio was an understatement. They could never have imagined that what was coming next could actually be worse.



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