Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
4got2wipe
In a brilliant place!
I probably shouldn't start my first political thread, but here goes.
I always get a little uncomfortable with all of the pro-police posts. I'm not anti-police, but I also don't think the "pro-police" posters on here are really thinking about what it means to live in a free country.
Remember, the government agents all of us are most likely to encounter are police. There are way too many Rashomon stories out there when somebody ends up dead. Video helps but there is still a lot of ambiguity. Way too many cases where you're left looking at things and saying "was that really necessary?"
The thing that bothers me is too many people on here seem comfortable taking the police at their word. It isn't conservative to do that. It isn't liberal either. All of us should have a healthy skepticism of the police. On another thread somebody said something about 99.9% or 99.99% of the time the cop being justified. I think most cops are good but I don't trust any group 99.9% of the time. And then you add in unfortunate but good faith fuck ups and it's a real problem.
I heard an interesting story about a woman from northern Idaho going to a black lives matter rally. Obviously she was a fish out of water. I think both she and the black lives matter group trust the police too little and think the system can't be fixed without a radical change. But I think all of the apologists for police that I see on here trust the police too much.
I don't know what the solution is. The only thing I can think of is having groups in other jurisdictions review video and audio from cases where anybody ends up dead. It is too easy for local internal affairs and local DAs to give local police a break. Even the local internal affairs people are investigating their colleagues. It is too easy to say "officer X is a good guy" and let it go. Local DAs have to work with the local police so they also have a conflict of interest.
Maybe it the folks who review be a combination of police in those other jurisdictions, DAs in those other jurisdictions, and citizens. Something like this would cost money but if we're actually serious about being in a free country we need to do something.
I always get a little uncomfortable with all of the pro-police posts. I'm not anti-police, but I also don't think the "pro-police" posters on here are really thinking about what it means to live in a free country.
Remember, the government agents all of us are most likely to encounter are police. There are way too many Rashomon stories out there when somebody ends up dead. Video helps but there is still a lot of ambiguity. Way too many cases where you're left looking at things and saying "was that really necessary?"
The thing that bothers me is too many people on here seem comfortable taking the police at their word. It isn't conservative to do that. It isn't liberal either. All of us should have a healthy skepticism of the police. On another thread somebody said something about 99.9% or 99.99% of the time the cop being justified. I think most cops are good but I don't trust any group 99.9% of the time. And then you add in unfortunate but good faith fuck ups and it's a real problem.
I heard an interesting story about a woman from northern Idaho going to a black lives matter rally. Obviously she was a fish out of water. I think both she and the black lives matter group trust the police too little and think the system can't be fixed without a radical change. But I think all of the apologists for police that I see on here trust the police too much.
I don't know what the solution is. The only thing I can think of is having groups in other jurisdictions review video and audio from cases where anybody ends up dead. It is too easy for local internal affairs and local DAs to give local police a break. Even the local internal affairs people are investigating their colleagues. It is too easy to say "officer X is a good guy" and let it go. Local DAs have to work with the local police so they also have a conflict of interest.
Maybe it the folks who review be a combination of police in those other jurisdictions, DAs in those other jurisdictions, and citizens. Something like this would cost money but if we're actually serious about being in a free country we need to do something.
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29 comments
According to the original concept EACH of us holds authority EQUALLY. The surrender of any of that authority to paid enforcers (police) is in direct conflict with the founding concepts of this nation - Except where those enforcers (police) are hired by local or state governments acting under the authority granted by a majority of it's citizens. So, within reasonable limits, giving authority (within statutory limits) to local police to detain, or temporarily constrain the rights of, citizens is allowable.
That police "power" cannot constitutionally apply to the federal government. Allowing the federal government to employ armed enforcers with authority over citizens is a significant breach of the constitutional limits on the reach of federal government. The federal government clearly understood that, up until J Edgar Hoover sought and received authority to arm the FBI to combat illegal liquor sales during Prohibition. To this day, the federal government has unconstitutionally armed several mercenary forces to enforce the will of the government upon citizens (FBI, DEA, SS - secret service, ATF, and more). That ain't right! And on that point, I completely agree with you.
Allowing (very limited) police powers to professional enforcers hired by local governments as a means to promote the general welfare and safety, is both legal and reasonable. Police hired by a town to maintain the peace, defend citizens from illegal acts, and investigate crimes is both reasonable and necessary for the common good.
Your complaint (above) is really about where to restrict the power and authority of these paid enforcers, not in actually whether they should exist. And that question has been asked ever since the first town marshal was hired, and is absolutely still relevant today. Local (and state) governments continue to walk a very confusing and tortured path between citizen's rights and necessary powers that allow their enforcers to do the job they are paid to do.
It doesn't help that police are very human. Some will lie, others will exceed their authority. Some paid enforcers are bullies and others "get off" on ordering people around. The extreme majority of police officers are really good people who do a very difficult job because they believe in the mission and they honestly want to help. I believe that majority (recognized as the, "good guys" by most of us) is the reason people tend to believe the police first.
Honestly, no one has come up with a "solution" to the tightrope of police powers. I doubt anyone will. I am opposed to the excess authority society has granted to police over the past 85 years, but I know I cannot individually oppose that authority on the street and remain alive. OTOH, I do not believe there are very many instances of "racist" police shootings. Racist cops will harass certain drivers, ticket one race more than others, or bother young adults of a certain race while walking down the street. A "racist" cop, will not subject himself (or herself) to criminal prosecution just for the "satisfaction" of killing a stranger who happens to be a different race.
No sane police officer is going to draw his (or her) weapon and fire - unless they sincerely believe their life (or another person's life) is in imminent danger. The officer's perceptions during high stress confrontations can be very wrong, but even under stress, the officer knows that pulling the trigger can be a career killer and may become a criminal charge against them. There is just no room in that crowded, high stress, decision tree for "racist" decisions.
The decision on where to constrain the authority we citizens have given to paid enforcers still remains with us a citizens. (EXCEPT for the federal enforcers who are completely unconstitutional, yet continue to exist.)
I believe part of the perception issue across the nation is that cops are killing people without just cause and they lack video evidence to prove otherwise to the public. To the public, it appears cops are killing innocent people or people with minor traffic offenses and the cases get reviewed by other cop buddies of the agency and then nothing happens. To the public, this appears like cops getting away with murder. Then they say the case is under review by some agency but nothing much ever happens. At most, a cop gets fired. Then he likely gets hired as an officer somewhere else.
Now if a sign was put up over a highway stating camera speed zone starts in 500 feet for next two miles and speeders will be mailed tickets, traffic speed would likely drop immediately. However causing everyone to drive slower doesn't increase public safety either if traffic speed isn't an issue because traffic volume is so low that almost no one wrecks in that area.
Im beating a dead horse but this only applies if they kill a white person. I'm willing to guess that cops subconsciously know in the back of their minds, they can kill a black man(hell they even kill kids) with no repercussions so why take any risk with them? Im sure they aren't all racists and im also sure the black on black crime plays a part in their trigger happiness when it comes to blacks. However, that doesn't mean the police 100% innocent. Far from it.
Lol. This is usually EXACTLY what happens.
One of the things that bothers me is the willingness of a lot of people to believe some absurd story and just assume the police are guilty and it's all a massive cover up. So many people rushed to believe that Michael Brown was a real nice young man just walking down the street who raised his arms and got blown away by the racist cop. Or this most recent shooting in NC, the family of the VICTIM announces that he was just sitting in his car reading a book when the police came up and shot him. That's the narrative that gets passed around and people just accept it?
And the idea that (as chessmaster suggests) a public entity would conspire to cover up the criminal act of someone who violated that entity's rules is simply tin-foil-hat crazy. It is simply unrealistic to the point of absurdity. A city, town or village has nothing to gain by "covering up" inappropriate acts and everything to lose when the cover up is revealed. And recent history proves that nothing can stay "secret" in this cell phone video, cameras on every corner, era.
The media is as much at fault for the current epidemic of stupid overreaction and idiot conspiracy theory as the federal administration. The press takes individual events and blows them up as if it were common practice everywhere. The fact is, many of the recent police involved shootings have been situations where BLACK officers pulled the trigger, or the police departments are headed by Black chiefs, or the entire incident is clearly justified on tape, or the injured "victim" is non-black - but the media cannot sensationalize those points so we don't get all the facts, and we certainly do not get facts in context. The "demonstrations," riots, and looting fests are usually more media events organized by professional racists, that actual reflections of the community opinions.
Who, indeed, will guard us from our guardians? This is one of the crucial issues of our times. I have nothing profound to add to this discussion except to say that my fellow denizens of the Right should avoid automatic support for the police just as the Left should eschew kneejerk accusations against the police.
dallas702 and jester214, no disrespect but I think you're missing the point about conspiracy theories.
I am a firm believer that conspiracies are very rare. But when they do they are usually driven by something going wrong and a few people saying "we've got to cover our asses."
Take the recent NC case. I originally pegged this as likely a good shoot because of the claim that they found a gun on the scene. Points like "there was a gun there" are unlikely to get made up.
But now the police have released some but not all of the video. Why not all? If the missing video shows nothing, why not share it? Nothing in the video the police has shared really excuses the police. Scott looks disoriented at worst. Nothing is in his right hand in the video the police have provided, nor is he behaving aggressively.
I don't know what happened. I'm open minded to the possibility that the police were in the right. But, frankly, this is looking like a case where the police on the scene overreacted and now they're trying to cover their asses.
I doubt that Scott was literally doing nothing but reading. The police claim to have found marijuana in the car. I wouldn't be surprised if he was stoned. That was likely what the police observed and they figured they'd grab the guy. Maybe it took Scott a while to figure out what was happening given the TBI and being stoned and by then one of the police officers had panicked. Then the police were hoping that they could hold off releasing video until the new NC law exempting police videos came into effect.
Is that an unbelievable conspiracy? People cover their asses all of the time.
As MrDeuce says, we shouldn't reflexively embrace either narrative without evidence. What bothers me the the reluctance of the police to provide that evidence.
Overall, I think you're putting a lot of faith in people who are doing a high stress job but making between $40K and $55K a year. I think high stress and low pay is a recipe for people fucking up. The sad part is that police fuck ups can leave people dead, and that's why I think the "who watches the watchmen?" question is so important.
But the crime of smoking marijuana doesn't carry the death penalty. If this was a case where an overstressed police officer let things spiral out of control that is just not acceptable.
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Maybe not a foolproof "solution," but filming the police will go a long way toward holding them accountable for their actions and putting them on their best behavior. It's just so obvious.
None of this would have come to our attention without cell phones and the insignificant cost of sending bits and bytes around the internet. You wonder just how many innocent people have been killed.
Specifically to conspiracies... Will people try to cover their asses? Hell yes they will. But a cover-up of this magnitude would involve multiple police officers seeing a gun being planted (with the victims wife watching/recording) and then dozens of people from more than one agency in the subsequent investigations (department and SBI) also being complicit. Not to mention one of the officers would need to have already had a weapon they were prepared to leave that couldn't be traced back to them. I call that a helluva lot less plausible than a guy had a gun on his ankle and pulled it when he saw guys with guns outside his car.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/43…
by Josh Gelernter July 23, 2016 4:00 AM
--> "we were invited to try out the FBI’s FATS machine — the Firearm Training System, a virtual-reality arrest simulator."
(CUT HERE)
"It works like this: A trainee stands in front of a movie screen, onto which are projected pre-filmed interactions with potentially dangerous suspects (played by actors). The scenes play out differently depending on the choices the trainee makes (different middles and ends are selected by an instructor). The choices the trainee has to make tend to boil down to shooting or not shooting. He has in his hand a gun that shoots light beams. He shoots at the screen, and the FATS machine records where the virtual bullets go."
"When I was the trainee, I got killed over and over again. Everything happens very fast: A suspect shoves your partner, and a split second later your partner’s gun is in the suspect’s hand, and you’re dead. A suspect’s hand drifts out of sight behind a kitchen island — even though your partner is shouting at him to keep his hands up — and suddenly he’s holding a gun, and you’re both dead. A suspect charges you, suddenly, and you don’t shoot because you can’t see a gun. He has a knife in his waistband, but before you realize it, you’re dead."
(FURTHERMORE)
"Conversely, a lot of scenarios can be resolved peacefully. People shout and scream, but they keep their hands up, and everyone lives — assuming you don’t get carried away and shoot them. The point of the FATS machine is to prepare agents for the split-second life-or-death decisions that all law-enforcement officers are inevitably required to make. It teaches something that the FBI has learned over decades of dealing with bad guys: that if someone you’re trying to arrest does something with his hands other than keep them in plain sight, there’s a good chance that he’s planning to shoot you. That’s why policemen shout the keep-your-hands-where-I-can-see-them thing so emphatically. They want to be sure that if you do something else with your hands, it isn’t accidental."
"It also teaches agents to treat unarmed suspects like armed suspects until they know better. Particularly the ones who charge or attack. The fact is, there’s no way of knowing whether someone is unarmed or just pretending to be unarmed, until he’s been searched."
(END PROLOGUE)
(HERE IS THE INTERESTING PARTS: )
"Last year, a self-described “radical political activist” and Black Lives Matter protester named Jarrett Maupin agreed to go through a FATS-style police exercise — not using a FATS machine, but using paintball guns in a parking lot. Maupin was told to question a man behaving suspiciously. The man’s hands disappeared momentarily behind a car, reappeared holding a gun, and Maupin was “killed.” In the next exercise, two unarmed men were having a loud argument. Maupin approached them, one of the men starting walking aggressively toward Maupin — and Maupin shot him dead."
"A local Fox affiliate in Phoenix filmed Maupin’s experience (you can watch it on YouTube). Afterward, one of the local reporters tried the same exercise, and got exactly the same results. The reporter asked Maupin what conclusions he’d drawn from the experience. “I didn’t understand how important compliance was,” said Maupin. “But after going through this, yeah, my attitude has changed. This is all unfolding in 10 to 15 seconds. People need to comply with the orders of law enforcement officers — for their own sake.”"
(SOME OF THE AUTHOR'S CONCLUDING THROUGHTS & REMARKS: )
"Maybe the answer to racial tensions and anti-police protests is for police to offer every member of Black Lives Matter a chance to take the test that Maupin took. Or maybe the police should start doing FATS-machine demos in high-crime neighborhoods, to help people understand the decisions cops are faced with. Maybe they should open FATS arcades. I bet they’d be popular."
"In the meantime, though, it’s worth remembering: Policemen, FBI agents, DEA agents, et al., have a very tough"
(END.)
************************
I am trying to understand some from both P.O.V.s Both from the people being shot and from the police who are using force. I don't know if the police are using this particular video simulation system for training / certification or if they use something similar. Or for that matter, just play organic field experience could probably result in the same type of thinking.
I do agree that the media and the news outlets are over sensationalizing the news to some degree. I don't know how the press used to be funded prior to ad revenue and ratings. Not sure on a solution there for balanced reporting in the press. IT seems sensationalist, bad news, or just plain "echo chamber" reporting drives the ad revenue, which affects what gets covered and how it gets covered.
I am not sure how the founding fathers *hoped* the press or news outlets would be funded. Maybe this is a charity I should look into for donations: non-profit press(es).
I sympathize with the police. I can empathize how they just want to let some things slide -- they just want to protect, serve then return home in one piece, alive to see their loved ones. It's a dangerous blue-collar job.
One thing that might help future generations is more participation in mentoring programs like Big Brothers Big Sisters. Where well-off people volunteer their time to help give mentoring and guidance to children and young adults who are socio-economically disadvantaged. The conserva-dudes hear make it sounds like it's a simple "mentoring problem" of knowning how to act around police officers. (1) hands visible and (2) compliance within reason.
And assuming we can get fair and accurate reporting, that would be a good first step. Note, I didn't say un-biased. Most POVs are biased in some way or another. That I understand and most people, whether well-meaning or nefarious, all have biases, even unconscious ones. But as long as I can identify the writers biases, I find what I read can still be of use and valuable (to me). So to a degree, the press is letting us down here. But I still think we can eventually sort through this --- body cams or not -- to get to a better outcome for all citizens.
I saw a stat someplace (unfortunately I can't remember where!) that said, like the FATS system, that military in stressful situations shoot unarmed civilians at *lower rates* (i.e., the military performs *better* with unarmed casualties) under stress than the police officers do.
So perhaps we should look at what training the military uses and perform some of that for police officers (instead of systems like FATS or whatever is currently in us). Just a thought, if true.