You have obviously never worn a badge either and have no clue what it's like. LEOs are trained how to survive. There is no fair or unfair when it comes to survival.
I admire and respect the honorable service of all LEO and Military, current and prior. I thank them when I see my local police performing valuable functions in my community, and I do my part to promote the twin aims of Strength and Order in this country. I fully understand the desire for self-protection in a risky line of work. Not only from physical harm, but from prosecution and job security as well. When that unending quest for self-protection becomes a quest for superiority, it comes into conflict with individual liberty. For a sacred order of knights charged with upholding the rule of law in the land, police sure seem to be exempt from many of the laws they hold dear. As a common civilian, I see that as a conflict of interest. Fear is a powerful tool for garnering respect, and I fear many police see it as a means to secure personal safety on the job (yes, this is a "morals" vs. "realism" conundrum that requires careful balance)
Back in the day, police were criminally undergunned with their snub revolvers, and many needlessly lost their lives in situations they had no hope of surviving. Had they been allowed parity of weaponry with their suspects, their tactics, training, and organization would have likely carried the day in many of those cases. Even more civilians would have been able to fight back, force for force, with those who preyed upon them had they had the same weaponry. That is what I am advocating. Criminals will always be capable of getting the same guns police have, so they can be assumed to always be
at least equal to police in equipment (radios, guns, armor, etc.). The "9s" carried by 'bangers are essentially equivalent to most service sidearms already. And yet law abiding citizens are for some reason supposed to be content spectators of the perpetual arms race and welcome disadvantage.
Military force has its place; the absolute destruction and subjugation of an implacable foe through that most horrible of contrivances "war." Police are supposed to be constructors of order, not bringers of overwhelming destructive force.
to suggest law enforcement agencies have massively out-geared the populace (well, outside of NYC, Chicago, SoCal and NJ) is sorta amusing to me.
Thank you for making my point for me (especially if you intended to do so
). The governments and police forces in these areas are notoriously heavy-handed at times, have a reputation for flagrantly arrogant behavior (stop and frisk, anyone?), and are above any real accountability from their populations (how many Governors and senior politicians in Chicago are in the clink now, and yet there's still no repudiation of political dynasties, or a RICO case taking down the entire political hirearchy?).
I'm a little unsure of the comments regarding PD's using drones. A predator drone is a multi-million dollar machine that requires trained operators and a multi-million dollar command and control "trailer".
Progress, my friend, progress. Automatic guns were once trailer-mounted crew-served weapons, and 8-bit computers massively expensive contraptions spanning rooms and dozens of operators. In a year or even now, autonomous drones will be more the norm, only needing human direction occaisionally when important decisions (hint, hint) are needed. In the States, they will probably be used more like tower-mounted cameras, patrolling the same general "beat" gathering footage to be compiled for pending cases later, or targeted to observe suspects or other persons of interest. It's important we get out in front of this before we have a surveillance state like London in our big cities--it's not paranoia, it's human nature that authorities tend to take as much of the blanket as we give them. Seeing how our government acts with such impunity using drones overseas, I have every reason to be suspicious of their use over
my roof.
Don't encourage people to sit inside Plato's cave of ignorance
Nice reference . I've always imagined lots of mooing and baah-ing from the people tied up in that cave
. For the record, I fear no totalitarian takeover in this nation, but I do know history. Terrible regimes alway ascend faster than anyone expects (Italy just elected a "charismatic loudmouth's" party of unknown origin; sound familiar?) I've seen where authorities are given an out to expand their influence, they take it, and then reap every reward that influence can garner. Our brilliantly frustrating system of checks and balances wasn't put together in response to a government that had crushed every means of resistance, but to guard against a government ever having such ambitions.
I noticed this "Ammo Conspiracy" story has finally made Forbes online magazine...
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2013/03/11/1-6-billion-rounds-of-ammo-for-homeland-security-its-time-for-a-national-conversation/
Still sounds a bit hokey as far as tin-foilery (they don't mention clearly that the contracts are an optional maximum), but the desire for under-oath explanations from the folks making these (budgetarily dubious) decisions seems legitimate.
some of us just happen to be employed by the state
In a more rural setting, I would guess (since I'm not from one) that authority is more locally distributed and the police are highly responsible to their community, whom they know personally. The big cities is different. There are so many police, so many people, that both become mere faces to eachother, initiatives and assignments are directed from on high, and the only real input the public has on the process is occaisional votes for bonds and commissioners--about as indirect an oversight process as can be imagined. Here, the police have great latitude as to how to govern their affairs, with little to no regard for the public's perception so long as the city government approves. That said, there are an awful lot of rural towns here in Texas who over the years have had to round up their entire police departments for corruption and drug running.
My criticism is not of individual officers' honorable and valuable service, but of how it may be misdirected by their superiors if they are not reigned in appropriately. Just as many non-gunnies are ignorant of the potential they may need a gun one day, many people fail to percieve the ebb and flow of political power through our system (which "grows from the barrel of a gun").
Noble Cause Corruption
TCB
Please refrain from personal attacks or belittlement