I need an attitude adjustment

[neoncowboy]

I'm 32 years old. My generation watched the ATF burn down the Branch Davidians at Waco and get away with it. We read '1984' in high school and saw Rodney King have the ???? beaten out of him by LA's finest. I'm not bashing cops, just trying to give some perspective to my attitude and preconceptions. I have grown up respecting the police and appreciating their work, while at the same time maintaining a certain level of misapprehension and mistrust. From my experience, when the police (or any other branch of government authority) get involved in anything, there is as much a potential for injustice as there is for justice.

The laws of the land are not just or morally true/right anymore and represent in many cases gross disregard for personal rights, even those protected by the constitution. It doesn't seem like anyone is doing anything about it.

This recent NOLA thing is very scary to me for a couple of reasons:
1. A big city metro police chief said (to the press, no less) that only the police should be armed. I know that you aren't one of them, but you have to acknowledge that a lot of LEOs share that stupid sentiment. Now, that idea is well enough accepted that a police chief can just openly say it to the press!
2. Citizens of NOLA who (for whatever reason) chose to stay on their property and defend it were forcibly disarmed by law enforcement. Yes, staying their is dangerous. Yes, it might be stupid to remain in NOLA after the evacuation order...but don't people have a basic civil right to make that decision for themselves? Are property rights just nonexistent anymore?
3. A dangerous precedent could be set here. Government declaring responsibility for an emergency = evaporation of all rights of citizens. That scares the crap out of me! I am training because I anticipate an emergency in my community, in my lifetime (terrorism, civil unrest, invasion of foreign enemy, etc.). These are dangerous times. If the ???? hits the fan, that's the absolute worst time for my government to turn against me and try to forcibly deny me the means to respond/defend against whatever emergency.

I'm not anti-law or anti-law enforcement. I am, however, cognizant of a long history of unjust laws being instituted by our nation's legislative and judicial branches along with far too many cases of abuse of power on the part of some cops. There also seems to be a move afoot to make as many people as possible guilty of a crime and therefore subject to a loss of rights.

I'm really struggling to balance my respect for authority, desire to be a law abiding, morally upright citizen and suspicion of the government. I want to be a good guy. I want to hang with the other good guys. I want to be able to trust and respect the good guys.

 

[chaim]

One nitpick---

"but don't people have a sovereign right to make that decision for themselves"

People do not have sovereign rights, only governments do. People have civil rights/liberties. Property rights aren't a sovereign right, they are a basic civil right (very basic, one of the bedrocks).

That said, I agree with most of what you had to say, especially:

A dangerous precedent could be set here. Government declaring responsibility for an emergency = evaporation of all rights of citizens. That scares the crap out of me! I am training because I anticipate an emergency in my community, in my lifetime (terrorism, civil unrest, invasion of foreign enemy, etc.). These are dangerous times. If the ???? hits the fan, that's the absolute worst time for my government to turn against me and try to forcibly deny me the means to respond/defend against whatever emergency.

 

[neoncowboy]

my understanding of sovereign maybe I'm wrong...this is just how I'd always thought of it.

 

[Gatman]

You are wrong about the police chiefs statement I believe.

I remember him saying "Only the Police WILL have guns."

But otherwise I like you posting.

 

[chaim]

From Websters (the dictionary people):
Sovereign:
Main Entry: 1sov·er·eign
Variant(s): also sov·ran /'sä-v(&-)r&n, -v&rn also 's&-/
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English soverain, from Old French, from soverain, adjective
1 a : one possessing or held to possess sovereignty b : one that exercises supreme authority within a limited sphere c : an acknowledged leader : ARBITER
2 : any of various gold coins of the United Kingdom

Sovereignty:

Main Entry: sov·er·eign·ty
Variant(s): also sov·ran·ty /-tE/
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -ties
Etymology: Middle English soverainte, from Middle French soveraineté, from Old French, from soverain
1 obsolete : supreme excellence or an example of it
2 a : supreme power especially over a body politic b : freedom from external control : AUTONOMY c : controlling influence
3 : one that is sovereign; especially : an autonomous state

---
So the primary definition of sovereign is:
1 a : one possessing or held to possess sovereignty b : one that exercises supreme authority within a limited sphere

Since sovereignty is in the definition, its second most primary definition is (since the first is obsolete, and irrelevant to the discussion anyway):

2 a : supreme power especially over a body politic b : freedom from external control


No one holds supreme authority over their property. There is definately the potential for external control. The government has the right to tax it, put controls on your use of your property, and to seize it if you fail to pay taxes or even for eminent domain issues. If you live in an area with community associations, or if you bought a home with lien restrictions (which can be put there by previous owners while they owned the property), then those terms limit what control you have over your property. Thus, only governments are sovereign whether we like it here or not.

 

[neoncowboy]

OK...fer god's sake please pardon my misuse of the word 'sovereign' and let's look at the greater issue.

 

[sp40cal]

Here are the facts as explained by city, county, state and federal LE officers in my family.

None of them and I mean none of them are sworn to protect life or property.

they are sworn to protect and uphold the law, That it.

Don't wait for them to protect you, there are no laws in the books that tell them to do such a thing.

Protection of life and property and how you do it is up to us.

sp40cal

 

[Gordon Fink]

Neoncowboy, your use of the word sovereign was correct, in my opinion. I claim sovereign rights. We all have them, or no one does.

That said, the police serve the law. Assuming no corruption, police officers can only be as just or as unjust as the law. Unfortunately, there is a great deal of unjust law, even though there are a great many good cops.

~G. Fink, who will be visiting his favorite cop tomorrow

 

[neoncowboy]

Assuming no corruption, police officers can only be as just or as unjust as the law.

I know that sounds plausible, but do you really think so?

I mean, those cops that enforced the order to disarm residents protecting their homes in NO? In my view, if they carried out that order, they had to know it was illegal. Or at least, should have known it was illegal (anyone enforcing laws is responsible for being literate in the law).

They did it anyway.

That's unjust. At some point, justice will demand that those charged with enforcing laws refuse.

 

[cropcirclewalker]

Sometimes a recognition of truth is painful.

There is nothing wrong with your attitude. You just need to learn to conceal it.

Join the Republican Party. Go to work for Halliburton. Keep your nose clean. Tape yourself at night to make sure you don't talk in your sleep. Read 1984 again, but don't keep a copy.

It's too late for me, but every night lately I get down on my bony knees and pray to God that Judge Roberts has been doing like I suggest above, well except for the Halliburton part.

 

[JohnBT]

"My generation watched the ATF burn down the Branch Davidians at Waco and get away with it. We read '1984' in high school and saw Rodney King have the ???? beaten out of him by LA's finest."

I don't believe things have gotten worse; it's just more of the same. I suppose some things don't seem quite so important when I've already seen similar things. We read 1984 in high school, too. Of course, I finished high school in 1968 and there was plenty of violence during that era as well. The National Guard killed students at Kent State in '70, Mayor Daley crushed the riots at the '68 Dem Convention and LA had the Watts Riots in '65. Watts was ignored more after the riots than it had been before.

"I kept remembering the stories we did in Watts after the 1965 riots. I vividly recall the twisted, shattered buildings that had burned to the ground. One by one, clean up crews had come in, leveled the structures, hauled away the debris, leaving nothing but vacant, weed-filled lots. Those lots had remained vacant for years after the tragedy of Watts, a wounded community with no places of business, just block after block of vacant lots."

- www.citivu.com/ktla/sc-ch1.html

Getting back to police powers for a moment, I was 16 in 1966, the year the police started reading you your rights - the Miranda rule. Well, they were supposed to do it.

John

 

[Ryder]

These transgressions do carry some weight with me. How much is hard to pin down but I don't think they are cause for action so long after the fact. Those are immediate action situations. Either you were there and did something or you weren't and didn't.

I assign respect based on a combination of my own previous experience and the current situation. No preconceptions based on the beliefs of others. I manage my problems as they develop and don't go out of my way to make enemies. Let enemies nominate themselves.

That's what I do. So far so good

 

[Fred Fuller]

"I'm really struggling to balance my respect for authority, desire to be a law abiding, morally upright citizen and suspicion of the government. I want to be a good guy. I want to hang with the other good guys. I want to be able to trust and respect the good guys."

Sounds as if your inner moral compass is being affected by events. Not to worry, from what you say your self determined course seems true enough not to have to worry about, to me anyway. FWIW I'm 52, a generation older than you. My wife is a PhD criminologist, a professor at a local university. We talk about the sort of things you mention here a good bit, trying to analyze and understand what these things mean.

There is a line between criminal and non-criminal behavior. That line is determined by laws which define what is criminal. It's that simple.

Legal does not mean moral. For example, slavery used to be legal. Legal does not mean right or correct. Legal is not even consistent over the years- "legal" is a moving target. And we won't even mention the human failings and shortcomings of those charged with enforcing, judging or making laws.

Problem is, the line between legal and illegal is moving- in YOUR direction. If that is what makes you nervous, your fears are well founded. We now have pages, volumes, bookshelves, whole libraries full of laws, not to mention various regulations and codes with the force of law. Law is now such a complex subject that no one person can understand all of it, legions of experts are necessary to interpret it for us and even these experts cannot often agree on what the law says. With such a multitude of laws, and new ones being added every day, how can any person hope to stay on the "right side" of the law? Compare all that to the original code, the Ten Commandments. How many law books, legislators, attorneys and judges does it take to say, "Thou shalt not steal?"

Keep on working on it, it's a complex problem. But you're on the right track...

lpl/nc

 

[bean357]

Disturbing....but I share your concerns!

Lee, as always, thanks for your insight~Cheers

 

[Gordon Fink]

My point is to not place too much blame upon the pawns for the actions of the king. Of course, pawns are often sacrificed once the battle is joined.…

~G. Fink

 

[CAnnoneer]

In SHTF to be disarmed can/would be equivalent to a death sentence.
Thus no matter what a police chief says, I intend to survive, ergo, remain armed. Albeit living in LA, I have high respect and appreciation for LEOs in general, so those among us who are LEOs, please do not take it the wrong way when I say in SHTF "you can have my gun only from my cold dead hand".