The Democratic People’s Republic of CHAZ

What does “defund the police” mean in practice? We may be getting a little rehearsal in miniature with the establishment of the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, endearingly nicknamed CHAZ.

This is the product of anti-police protests in Seattle that led the mayor to order the abandonment of one of the city’s downtown police precincts, ceding a six-block area of Seattle’s downtown to the protesters, who have turned it into a kind of anarcho-socialist utopia, with free food, free music, no cops, and lots of peace and love, man.

But we’re starting to see cracks in utopia already. It’s not as if this is the first time it’s been tried, after all, and this one seems to be on schedule to teach us all of the same old lessons over again.

Read the rest at The Bulwark.