On Tuesday a white police officer in Baton Rogue, Louisiana, shot and killed a black man named Alton Sterling. One day later a white police officer in Falcon Heights, Minnesota, shot and killed a black man named Philando Castile. According to critics of the criminal justice system, police shootings like these can be stopped only if meaningful reforms have been put in place. But according to Heather Mac Donald, author of the new book The War on Cops: How the New Attack on Law and Order Makes Everyone Less Safe, those critics have it wrong.
While some pundits use the phrase “war on cops” almost literally, with false claims that violence against cops has been surging, Mac Donald mostly leaves this idea alone, aside from one assertion that anti-cop rhetoric has “spawned riots, ‘die-ins,’ and the assassination of police officers.” Instead she aims to push back against the critics of the criminal justice system, defending intrusive policing practices such as stop-and-frisk and calling it a “dangerous lie” that the system treats whites and blacks differently. She says we need more proactive policing and stricter incarceration practices to protect our cities from “mass destruction.” But as Tim Lynch observes in his review of the book, Mac Donald doesn’t make a very convincing case.
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