After all, just keeping your head out of the water in the big city takes all your energy and, if you're white, unless you're visibly queer, rogue cops may as well be living on another planet. Abner Louima, tortured with a plunger in a Brooklyn precinct in 1998, is a Haitian immigrant. Amadou Diallo, shot 41 times in his own Bronx vestibule in 1999 was a young Guinean immigrant who worked as a peddler. Dorismond was shot to death on March 16 after he angrily rebuffed an undercover cop who asked him if he knew where to buy drugs. This time, however, the funeral of a cop victim, Dorismond, triggered a bona fide riot complete with bottles and metal barriers thrown at the cops.
Rioting gets peoples attention real quick.
The poll numbers matched the anger on the streets. Gazing fondly into each other's eyes. It is too soon to know if all of this will translate into wide and effective civic action. However, there are already signs that it's business as usual for some in the political class. Up in Albany, Giuliani must have been laughing.