Just watched this two-part video of a backstage meeting between 2016 Democratic Candidate Hillary Clinton, and several activists from the #BlackLivesMatter Movement.

I actually garnered a lot more respect for Clinton after seeing this exchange. Her focus on relentlessly tackling policy changes was spot on. Obviously, her family’s complicity in promoting race-based mass incarceration is noxious, and her current bid for the presidency is troubling.

I respect the #BlackLivesMatter movement and believe that their existence is critical to spurring the sort of “national conversations” that the corporate media always insists we need. However, we can recite stats about prison populations, the vestiges of slavery, a lack of adequate education and housing, institutionalized racism, micro-aggressions, and anti-black police violence all day long (and those conversations will never stop). The movement is hyper-intellectual, which is critical to its current success and national legitimacy. We know our shit. It’s not simply a swarm of black people running around incoherently yelling about “the man”.

But, what I’m ready to see is a platform. A draft bill. A candidate. A policy roundtable. A white paper. Something more tangible that catalyzes forward movement on the legislative side.

We have the intellectual butter. We need the policy guns.