Leighton Woodhouse at the Free Press has written one of the better articles that I have not seen widely shared.
The usual choreography of these protests goes something like this: Thousands of normal people show up, along with a smaller contingent of organized agitators. The agitators engage in enough petty property damage to create a situation in which there is a standoff with the cops. Under the cover of the crowd, they then engage in more serious property destruction. If they are emboldened enough, these agitators might launch some largely symbolic attacks on police lines: throwing trash, vandalizing an unattended police cruiser, that kind of thing.
If the strategy is successful, it provokes a violent reaction from the police that is directed at the general mass of protesters. The experience of being attacked by the police when you haven’t done anything illegal outrages the nonviolent majority of the crowd, which then becomes incrementally more violent in return. The situation escalates.
Sunday did not follow that script.
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