Here is the cowardice and the bigotry of the Los Angeles Police Department management coterie. That crowd has banned the Thin Blue Line flag from being displayed in any of the department’s public areas. Never mind that that flag symbolizes support for the policemen and policewomen who are in the streets on their beats protecting the rest of us.

LAPD Chief Michel Moore defended the controversial move in an email sent to Fox News Digital, saying, “Yesterday, we received a community complaint of the presence of a Blue Line Flag” with “the view that it symbolized support for violent extremist views, such as those represented by the Proud Boys and others.”

Then Moore actually acknowledged the…bizarreness…of his move; although he doesn’t seem to recognize it.

It’s unfortunate that extremist groups have hijacked the use of the “Thin Blue Line flag” to symbolize their undemocratic, racist, and bigoted views.

But he banned the flag, anyway, instead of defending the meaning and rejecting the extremist groups‘ hijack.

The police union demurred from Moore’s move. The Los Angeles Police Protective League Board of Directors wrote in part,

It is difficult to express the level of utter disgust and disappointment with Chief Moore’s politically pandering directive to remove Thin Blue Line flags and memorials for fallen officers from all public areas within our police stations. This direction came as a result of complaints from anti-police, criminal apologists, and activists who hold too much sway over our city leaders and, unfortunately, our Chief[.]

Naked, bare-faced pandering, true enough. I think, though, it’s far worse than that: it’s cowardice and rank bigotry.

It’s cowardice because Moore and his management group caved promptly and cravenly to, in Moore’s own words, a collection of undemocratic, racist, and bigoted extremists.

It’s rank bigotry because Moore and his fellows in management carefully, consciously disregarded the violent extremism his flag ban inflicts on us average Americans who do respect the police and wish to show that respect with the Thin Blue Line flag, especially in police department public areas; it inflicts that same violent extremism on the police themselves by barring their own public display; and it favors the views of violent extremists like BLM, antifa, and other undemocratic, racist, and bigoted groups over the views of honest Americans and our cops.