Your Choice: The Dumbest Idea or the Worst Slogan Ever

Willie Brown in SFPD's 2018 lip-sync video

Grey eminence Willie Brown--rich, fashionable, extremely successful as California Speaker and Mayor of San Francisco--doesn't hesitate to call 'em as he sees 'em though it may not be what his Democratic Party colleagues want to hear.

According to Willie Brown there is no way "defund the police" is a winner: [bold added]

The call to “defund the police” as part of the anti-racism, anti-police-brutality movement is either one of the dumbest ideas of all time or the hands-down winner of the worst slogan ever.

...But many defenders of the concept say they don’t really mean defund — they mean reimagine. Take away dealing with homeless people from police, for example, and re-steer the money for that to social services programs.

Fine. Let’s talk about how to do that. But we’re starting from a terrible disadvantage because of that “defund” slogan...

People are legitimately shocked by the police misconduct they see on TV and social media. But everyone still wants the assurance that when they dial 911, a cop is on the way.

You take away people’s feelings of personal safety, and you lose voters.

While I do agree that we should restrict the number of interactions between armed public servants--for example, taking accident reports, clearing homeless encampments, and reporting internet scams may well be offloaded to someone other than the police--asking the public to distinguish types of incidents then calling the right number is too much of a burden. I like the simplicity of "911", which like Google's home page can branch off in a multitude of directions.

Final thought, not original: they meant "defund the police" and tried to retreat to "re-imagine the police" after the outcry. A sensible riposte is why didn't you say "reimagine" in the first place?