Yep that's what I meant, the little free stickers.
Gotta put one in my wallet. It also is tacticaller as it's flat and won't print thru your butt pocket like badges do....
As a joke one evening while approaching my best friend's house for dinner, I slapped a "Junior Police Officer" sticker badge on the upper left corner of my best friend's Honda Accord. I put it right about where lots of people like to put those "State Trooper Association" decals that they get for mailing in $30 to some telemarketer that calls them and promises them that they'll "show their support for fallen Troopers/Police Officers' families,
'and get a handsome decal!'" (Haw. Less than 2% of the money they take in actually goes to such a fund, and everyone knows the old ticket-dodging tactic. Hint: it does NOT work with any officer I know. If you want to donate money to a good cause, go to them. DON'T pay out to a caller who called you.) The sticker I put was a simple gold-ish yellow flat color, the size and shape of a badge, that gives my department name on the top and "Junior Police Officer" on the bottom, in dark blue lettering. We give 'em out to kids like candy, and the kids love 'em. (Heck, find me a kid that doesn't love a sticker.)
So after I had it smoothed on the glass, I went inside, chuckling at the thought of my best friend's reaction when he found that he'd been "deputized" a "J.P.O." from his old home town (where I work as a cop). Here's the thing-- my best friend is, unlike myself,
extremely "car proud." He keeps that thing immaculate, always washed, waxed, vacuumed, and Armor-All'd. I figured he'd throw a fit when he found the sticker on his car.
A week and a half later, he calls me, and laughs gleefully as he relates how he had caught himself speeding past a patrol officer going the same direction, and had cringed, expecting a ticket,
but hadn't been pulled over! The
badge sticker [SFX: trumpets blaring regally in the background] had saved him! [
] He even thought he saw a little "thumbs up" from the cop, too. My best friend, who drives like something of a speed demon and always employs the top end radar detector in his car, declared that he was NEVER taking down the
[SFX: trumpets blaring] badge sticker from his car. I tried to explain that no cop I know would
ever give any credence to such a silly icon. But he refused to hear such nonsense! The
badge sticker was the
shtuff, baby!
A year later, I noticed it was fading, and we had new metallic gold badge stickers, embossed with the same wording. They look pretty durn shiny. I slapped a new one on his back window, next to the old one, figuring he would say "enough is enough-- no more!" Two days later, though, he called me again, thanking me for the boon.
This, from a guy with honors degrees in Aerospace Engineering and Computer Science from A&M, who is by all other measures, a purty smart fellow. Heh. You never know what people will convince themselves of.
* * *
As to the open badge for the Concealed Carriers? I STRONGLY oppose them, but won't arrest them unless they claim to be a cop while displaying them.