Not just tens of thousands of people! It was millions--estimates are that half a million protested on June 6 alone. That should be very encouraging!

It's a shame that all the attention got burned up on drastic-sounding measures like "defund the police" (it doesn't even matter what people actually meant by that--it brings up images of heavily armed drug lords running everything a la parts of Mexico, so it's terrible marketing) and not on things that could have garnered widespread agreement like police reform including drastic reductions to qualified immunity.

The verdict on Chauvin, which transformed him from fired police officer to convicted murderer, is still hopeful. The large majority (polls say: 3/4) of Americans felt that the verdict was just. But having the soul of the country isn't enough. Someone needs to do the dirty work of getting legislation passed that has real substantive positive impact on people's lives. And that includes knowing how to make incremental changes with broad support. I'm crossing my fingers that this will unfold in the coming months and years.