excellent post on "the war on cops"

[tk]

from karl denninger.......
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=178220


Hmmmm.

A spate of shooting attacks on law enforcement officers has authorities concerned about a war on cops.

In just 24 hours, at least 11 officers were shot. The shootings included Sunday attacks at traffic stops in Indiana and Oregon, a Detroit police station shooting that wounded four officers, and a shootout at a Port Orchard, Wash., Wal-Mart that injured two deputies. On Monday morning, two officers were shot dead and a U.S. Marshal was wounded by a gunman in St. Petersburg, Fla.

Really.

Well, we don't know too much about the Wal-Mart or Detroit shootings yet. But we do know something about St. Petersburg, since the press identified the bad guy, and one of his former offenses. With the name and offenses the rest was easy, since The Department of Corrections data is public.

Let's see.... he appears to have had a rap sheet for armed robbery, grand theft of automobiles and grand theft of firearms.

Oh yeah, that was his first time in the pokey. The second time was for sexual assault - by force - and there's a child abuse charge in there for someone under 13 too (was that the victim in the sexual assault?)

The Florida Department of Corrections appears to have been quite-well acquainted with this individual, seeing as he was sentenced to to a five year and several four year terms (served concurrently it appears) and then a 15 year term for the sexual assault.

The obvious question that one asks is "why was this clown on the streets?" I suppose stealing cars and guns, resisting arrest, and armed burglary might not be enough to lock up someone forever - but sexual assault after doing the former things certainly ought to be. Perhaps if the Department of Corrections and the State legal apparatus were less-concerned about locking people up for smoking a joint and more concerned about keeping people like this jackal in prison where he belonged, he wouldn't have been in the community where he could get his hands on a gun (very illegally, I might add, since he was a twice-convicted felon) and shoot a Marshal.

In any event, let's put forward a few things for the police to ponder, assuming they care to.

*
You might get more cooperation from the local citizens if you didn't smash in people's doors - most-especially the wrong ones. It used to be that when you wanted to arrest someone you performed a job function called "police work", where you sat outside someone's home or apartment with a nice stake-out and waited for a good opportunity to apprehend them when there'd be little chance of violence. Now you initiate the violence, no doubt because it's really important to show off all that fancy hardware you bought and justify its purchase. Unfortunately there's a rapidly-growing list of people who did nothing that was actually criminal, or who weren't the criminal you were after, that get shot up and even murdered - all by "accident." If they survive the felonious assault (and that's exactly what you'd call it if a random citizen did it) their property is usually destroyed. That sort of incident tends to **** off the people in the neighborhood who are not the bad guy you're looking for and leads them to want to do things like flip you the bird instead of help you. The next time you have a criminal in the area you're not going to get any cooperation from anyone once you do something like this.

*
You might also get more cooperation from the local citizens if you actually arrested some of the bad guys who have been buttraping the people for the last three years or so with impunity. You know, like the banksters who are stealing houses? Or maybe you could bust the minions that they send out to change locks on homes they haven't foreclosed on yet and in which people are actually living. That's happened a few times in the last couple of months and in at least one famous recent case, in Florida, the woman who owned the house was reduced to cowering in fear in the bathtub while the thugs smashed glass to get in. It also appears that she couldn't count on the local Sheriff to actually arrest the bad guys when she called 911. Yes, I consider someone breaking and entering into a home they don't have title to a "Bad Guy", even if you do not. So does pretty much everyone else. Now about that cooperation you were interested in again....

In the end analysis there are more bad guys than cops. This is an intractable problem if the police believe that they're the answer to crime, the practice of which is likely to become much more abundant as our wealth is serially siphoned off and more people become desperate. Call that a "feature" if you will, of all the financial fraud and bogosity of the last few years.

Oh yeah, while I'm at it, those of you in law enforcement might want to look at whether those wonderful mortgage-backed securities your pension funds bought have any mortgages actually in them. There was another lawsuit filed over this just yesterday by some insurance companies.

All those bad guys you refuse to arrest?

They're stealing from you too. Still feeling good about not busting the clowns who broke into that lady's house?

The people are, in fact, the answer to these problems. Those of us who have studied case law and understand what's going on in the world are well-aware that the police have no actual legal obligation to do anything other than show up and take a report after a crime is committed; then try to find the bad guy who did it. That's a nice idea, but it's difficult to take a report from a corpse.

But the people of this nation, including this state, are tired of the crap.

The problem for the peace officers of this nation is that we're tired of all of the crap.

We're tired of the crooks like this clown who thought shooting and killing an arresting officer was a good idea, and who the very same justice system let out of prison twice after he committed violent offenses. We're tired of the crooks that are stealing houses and otherwise generally screwing the public by doing things like filing false affidavits or even just breaking in and changing locks, not even bothering with a court judgment first. And we're tired of the crooks that are police officers who shoot and kill a man in Seattle who is whittling with a pocket knife or who kick down the wrong door in botched drug raids and in doing so shoot and kill innocent people.

You folks in the police forces are interested in only one of these sorts of crook but not the others, and when you're after the first sort you really don't give a **** how many innocent citizens' rights you trample in the process. While we're well-aware that the number of officers who do the latter are in the minority, the fact remains that law enforcement studiously evades applying the same standards to a cop who kicks down a door at the wrong house and shoots the occupant and the guy who commits a home invasion - even though both, when the wrong house is raided, are in fact the same thing and bring the same result to the victim.

This is a problem. See, if the Zombies come, and it appears you're concerned they might, you're outnumbered standing alone, especially when you let serial felons out of prison who appear to believe that **** and gunplay are sports.

If the Police stand with us - the good guys commonly known as "Joe Citizen", however, we all outnumber the jackasses.

"Joe Citizen" has guns too, and we're happy to carry them... but you don't want us to. You think that our unalienable rights are privileges and you make a good show of treating them that way. Further, as I pointed out, you don't think we have the right to be secure in our homes, persons and effects except when you show up with a warrant and can particularly describe what you're looking to search and seize, based on probable cause under judicial review.

I seem to remember somewhere that there's this pesky document that says we have both of those rights, among others. And I also seem to remember that you didn't give those rights to us, and neither did anyone else in government - we got them as a consequence of being endowed by our Creator with them.

We don't ask much, really, and if you're willing to recognize some fairly basic facts you'll find that the citizens will stand shoulder-to-shoulder with you.

But to do that you have stop with the "us .vs. them" crap. You have to do police work when you want to arrest someone, not blow down any door you can find with a SWAT team and all sorts of paramilitary gear, irrespective of what's going on. And you have to start arresting those thugs who you, thus far, refuse to touch - those guys who rob with pinstripe suits, and their minions who commit acts at their behest that, by any reasonable view of the citizens, are in fact felonies.

Finally, you need to start respecting the unalienable rights of the citizens in this state and nation. This means cutting the crap with the so-called "permits" to exercise unalienable rights.

All of them.

We'll stand with you - we want to - but respect is a two-way street and it has to be earned. We, the peaceful citizens of this state and nation, are willing to work with you. But you have to both work with us and respect our rights.

That's the deal, and if you don't like it that's fine - we don't have to help you.

Arrest the people that commit bad acts, and when you convict them, send them to prison until they're not a threat any more. I'm willing, in most cases, to believe they've rehabilitated if the evidence suggests it - once.

But when you let a guy out of prison for armed robbery that likes to steal guns and cars, and who resists arrest (with violence at that) when caught, he then sexually assaults someone, and you let him out of prison again?

That responsibility is yours and if he declares war on you, I don't understand why you're surprised.

I'm certainly not.

[admin]

Ending the war on drugs and the war on victimless crimes would end the war on cops. Everything else is beating around the bush.

People don't like cops not because cops don't arrest real criminals... it's because instead they arrest peaceful people.

Today the chances of an average person being harassed or arrested by police are leaps and bounds greater than being robbed or assaulted by a non-government worker. I've been pulled over for speeding on an open road going 5-10 miles over the limit 3 times in my life, I've never been attacked or robbed (in all cases judge threw out the tickets, but i will never get the time i wasted during the stops and going to court, that time was stolen from me). If I do get attacked or robbed I don't expect cops to be helpful. So, what ARE they there for? For all practical intents and purposes to harass and arrest peaceful people mostly, people who harm no one.

[EricCartmann]

Ending the war on drugs and the war on victimless crimes would end the war on cops. Everything else is beating around the bush.

People don't like cops not because cops don't arrest real criminals... it's because instead they arrest peaceful people.

Today the chances of an average person being harassed or arrested by police are leaps and bounds greater than being robbed or assaulted by a non-government worker. I've been pulled over for speeding on an open road going 5-10 miles over the limit 3 times in my life, I've never been attacked or robbed (in all cases judge threw out the tickets, but i will never get the time i wasted during the stops and going to court, that time was stolen from me). If I do get attacked or robbed I don't expect cops to be helpful. So, what ARE they there for? For all practical intents and purposes to harass and arrest peaceful people mostly, people who harm no one.

Truth!

[saberune]

Well said. It is my firm belief that law enforcement has evolved into a creature with a massive ego that simply prefers to take the path of least resistance.
Why go after violent Mexican gun runners when you can nail an arrest on an unsuspecting/law abiding gun owner on a technicality?
Why go after street gangs when you can nail arrests on high school kids skateboarding on the sidewalk?
Why actively patrol neighborhoods when you can hide on a side street and write speeding tickets all day?
Does your dept. have all that tacti-cool gear provided by DHS funds? Why not play dress up kick in a few doors looking for a FU*%ING PLANT!!!?? Wrong door? Oops, just be thankful you weren't shot. Too bad about your dog though.....

[TexasChris]

Well said. It is my firm belief that law enforcement has evolved into a creature with a massive ego that simply prefers to take the path of least resistance.
Why go after violent Mexican gun runners when you can nail an arrest on an unsuspecting/law abiding gun owner on a technicality?
Why go after street gangs when you can nail arrests on high school kids skateboarding on the sidewalk?
[b]Why actively patrol neighborhoods when you can hide on a side street and write speeding tickets all day?Does your dept. have all that tacti-cool gear provided by DHS funds? Why not play dress up kick in a few doors looking for a FU*%ING PLANT!!!?? Wrong door? Oops, just be thankful you weren't shot. Too bad about your dog though.....

Bold....I read a study that said there was no difference in crime reported whether patrolling, or just waiting to be dispatched.

I gotta go find it now though.....

[jrsweb]

Same thing goes for a politician. They pass laws that make it harder on the common citizen and makes it look like they are doing something about a problem when in reality they completely failed to address it all.

That's why gun control is being pushed because we all know that the criminals are the ones that are going to obey the gun control laws, right?

It's not just the police. We can start listing all the federal agencies that do the same thing... TSA, ATF, FBI, DHS, etc.

[acco]

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/sto...omments-submit

Oddly enough, up here in "law and order" Canada, there actually seems to be a bit of common sense floating around. The story is about our Prime Minister tabling a new bill to make Citizen's Arrests easier to undertake. A step in the right direction.

[TomAiello]

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/sto...omments-submit

Oddly enough, up here in "law and order" Canada, there actually seems to be a bit of common sense floating around. The story is about our Prime Minister tabling a new bill to make Citizen's Arrests easier to undertake. A step in the right direction.

Lol. The US and Canadian political vernacular are different enough to give your sentence almost exactly the opposite of your intended meaning.

In the United States, the motion to lay on the table (often simply "table") or the motion to postpone consideration is a proposal to suspend consideration of a pending motion.

In the United Kingdom and the rest of the English-speaking world, a motion to place upon the table (or motion to place on the table) is a proposal to begin consideration of a proposal.

So to us in the US, you basically said that your PM was killing the proposal.

In our Congress, when a motion is "tabled" it is basically being killed off.

[acco]

Interesting, that actually clears up some confusion that I have had in reference to US TV shows. Now it makes more sense.

[11b101abn]

So.....it was thier own fault that those officers were shot and/or murdered?

Bullshit. Fucking ridiculous.