Monday - March 04, 2002
Cops Wrapped in Flags
I was watching the news today and saw a report on
how the policemen of Sultan, Washington were in such dire straits that they had
to fix their own equipment. It was a petty thing to be putting on a national
news program and I don't understand how even people with "standard" views of the
police would think this newsworthy, but there it was on Jim Lehrer's show. And
there was some wheezing old police chief complaining that he was trained to be a
cop, not to troubleshoot problems with his computer. I don't know where he gets
off, almost everybody I know has to tweak their computer, especially the more
high tech their equipment gets.
The trouble is not that he thinks that he's too
good to work on his computer, but that the police have way too much technology
in their vehicles. If their equipment is down for repairs, then that's a good
thing. That means that they aren't acting as highwaymen and robbing the peaceful
populace of money. The less time they have with operating equipment, the freer I
am to move about the country without fear of their confiscation of my money.
Besides, their budget is given to them by their citizens, and the police
themselves usually get to decide how to spend it. They can hire people or they
can buy new equipment, or they can be more austere and just do with less
equipment. Their whining is largely focused on priorities they themselves set. I
hate it when public servants complain about how much money we give them to
spend. Every civilian company I have ever worked for had tight budgets
too.
So, again, I have let my bias
show. But my point is not that the police have too much equipment, it is rather
that they tend to be arrogant. The old policeman that couldn't even breathe
comfortably used the old line "I put my life on the line" as his excuse for
needing more money to maintain his equipment. I'm tired of the police wrapping
themselves in the flag.
But Skyler,
you've been in the military, do you feel the same way about veterans? Yep, I do.
I hate it when veterans who served in peacetime, or even as pilots flying
milkruns over Kosovo claim that they are deserving of special status because
they "put their lives on the line." Our military and our police forces are made
up of volunteers who are compensated in many ways. They get paid, they get
career opportunities, and they get excitement. In fact my first rant a few years
ago was about this very topic. The short version is that only the reservists who
have to interupt their lives to serve in extremis, or anyone in the military who
was in sustained and bloody combat is due any special
respect.
But there is a big, BIG
difference between the military and the police. The military exists to protect
the people. The police exist to control the
people.
The Posse Comitatus Act,
although much modified since Reagan started his "war on drugs" still has the
effect of keeping the military out of domestic police matters. The military's
sole role in our nation is for
defence.
The police, on the other hand,
have the stated purpose of "protecting" us, but in reality their role is to
provide crowd control, to prevent disorderly conduct, to occasionally arrest
people, but mostly to generate revenue by ticketing people who are traveling
peacefully and taking their money from them. All of these tasks involve
controlling the citizens' activities to some extent. We would like to believe
that this control extends only to violent law breakers, but for the most part
their focus is on revenue generation and on filling jails with people who use or
sell drugs. Their violent and oppressive function towards drug use has escalated
crime in this country to levels unseen since Prohibition and they have even used
the "war on drugs" to circumvent the Fifth Amendment and fill their coffers with
property confiscated from people who are not given due
process.
So I have little sympathy for
some old policeman who has to work a little harder to lie in wait and rob people
of their money. I have little patience for a man who claims a higher status when
the main part of his job is to ambush peoceful people. I have little regard for
a man who tells me that I should stand in awe of his dedication and his
willingness to "put his life on the line" when he is little more than a thug who
enjoys striking fear into the lives of the people who pay him. Besides, our
nation's highest court has ruled this past year that Police Officers are not
allowed to be very intelligent, and the police often prove this rule in
practice.
Athens in its classical days
went for about 400 years without any police of any kind. When a crime was
committed, passersby were expected to take action. It's unreasonable to expect
that this enlightened attitude towards allowing the people to be armed and
empowered will be made policy any time soon, but if it were, I think crime would
probably go down. No one would be put in jail for drug use because most people
would mind their own business. Crimes would again be only things like murder,
assault, rape, and robbery, which all people recognize as criminal. Civil courts
can take care of fraud and other crimes. But then, I'm dreaming again. Mostly if
selling and buying and using drugs of any kind were made legal, almost all
organized crime would end overnight. Why would a business engage in violence if
it were easier and cheaper to operate legally and
peacefully?
I hope the out-of-shape,
wheezing policeman from Sultan, Washington suffers much difficulty with his high
tech ambushing equipment and I hope that the people he tries to control are
given that much relief from his ambushes as a result. I hope that the mantle of
superiority that he wraps around himself gets moth-eaten and recognized by
others for the insulting fraud that it is.
Go Back to the Start, Do Not Collect $200 Send me your two cents
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