That it is the biggest missed opportunity for police reform I've seen in my lifetime.

Why?
Because this case was in fact one of the biggest things that the left and right could have united on and reached a mutually satisfactory compromise which led to durable changes regarding the state of policing within the USA.

Instead, what did we see? Knee jerk outgroup hate from both the red and blue tribes despite it not even serving them to act in this manner. Unfortunately things have turned out how they usually do -- support for one's faction within the state regardless of whether this leads to better outcomes or not for those who the factions pretend to represent.

So, how then could there have been unity on this issue? In figuring this out, one must challenge the precedent set in the Castle Rock vs. Gonzales decision -- namely that the police have no obligation to the public at all under the constitution (instead only to the state who employs them).

From the left:
The police did nothing to try to de-escalate the situation, instead standing down completely. The police look really shitty here, as it confirms precisely what people on the left have hammered on the cops for a long time about -- namely that the police only really have two modes of operation:

• The boot on your neck (or knee in George Floyd's case)
• Utter contempt and disregard for the people's plight.

In this case it was the latter in response to the former, which should have been seen as adding insult to injury and the messaging should have flowed from that. With this position, the left wouldn't have even needed to have an opinion on the trial, as they win both ways rhetorically:

• Kyle is a murderer: "Cop wannabe acts like a cop -- can we be surprised?"
• Kyle is not a murderer: "Young man tried to de-escalate the situation but ultimately had to take action to protect himself and *the people* from a riot that got out of hand. IF ONLY the police had acted more like Kyle and less like the uncaring enforcers we know them to be, perhaps this tragedy could have been avoided."

From the right:
The police were derelict in their duties towards protecting the property of red blooded Americans, and people can't be surprised when WE THE PEOPLE have to stand up for our constitutional god given rights, even if the consequences were less than ideal. If you are gonna hate Kyle for doing what he did, then the bigger crime is what led to these riots becoming out of control in the first place. Why is the mayor and police not on trial for allowing such a thing to happen instead of sacrificing someone who was *a minor* at the time to cover for your own moral cowardice?

Note the two big themes here:

• Pervasive biases around militia obligations of the citizenry, general cowardice
• Castle Rock v. Gonzales decision has led to cops being the king's men, not protectors of persons and property

Because of these, the police were able to more or less pin their own crimes and problems on Saint Kyle, using him as a Judas Goat for the death of Saint Floyd.

IF instead we saw the police being obligated under the law to protect persons and property, then those responsible for killing the same protesters would have been the police, which would have in fact worked out better for the protesters *and* the police, as then the case would have been about the role of police in society, not a murder trial where people's feelings mostly swirl around whether you identify more with the Crips or the Bloods.

Perhaps then some actual compromises would have had to been reached as a part of the trial, leading to some actual changes (for better or worse).