COMBINE CRITICISM WITH CRITICAL THINKING

I’m glad you returned to your blog with your usual coolness. I was shocked at how the comments turned to the theme it did, feeding off each other. Where’s the common sense?
The US justice system isn’t perfect, but it’s the best one out there. And, aren’t we all in this world together? I believe in no god, but I still put my faith in man to do the right thing. I love my self, my family, my community, and my country. If you cross my path, I will give you the benefit of the doubt until I have reason to believe otherwise. Call me foolish. Tell me society will run me over and leave me lying in the dust. I don’ care. Ya gotta have faith, and lead by example, and pack heat when society does try to run you over.

I agree completely, sir. Taking a few bad apples in the police forces and holding them up as typical used to be the hobby of the radical “hippie” left. Now, sadly, it seems to be far more common on the right, especially among Lew Rockwell.com-style Libertarians.

Mas:

Thank you for being a voice of reason.

The current meme for dividing the population into three segments- sheep, wolves, and sheepdogs is right on point.

All of us, cops, private citizens, and military, must understand the fact that yes, there are sometimes bad people in our sheepdog community. People who will not behave in a lawful, Constitution – obedient, and mature manner must be corrected ( sometimes they merely need better training ) and those who behave as if the badge, the gun or the uniform place them above the law or common decency should be expelled from the sheepdog class – thats why we have police review boards, courts and courts-martial.

The fact that there are sometimes sheepdogs gone bad, or those who managed to get classed as sheepdog when they were really sheep with an attitude, or wolves, should not be allowed to discredit the vast majority of us – private citizens who carry out of civic responsibility, peace officers who never forget that their authority stems from their Constitutional office, and military who always keep their oath in mind.

I hope the foks who have mindlessly slipped into the ” all cops are bad” mentality will stop and listen to themselves, and then condct a little critical thinking. Bad cops are bad, bad soldiers are bad, bad armed citizens are bad; the operational term here is ” bad”, not their sheepdog classification.

GKT

It is a viscious circle perpetrated against the producers by the looters and their hordes of bureaucrats, enforcers, and mercenaries. The looters and their hordes all feed from the loot and booty trough. Welfare looters, warfare looters, tax-feeder bureaucrats, tax-feeder enforcers, and tax-feeder nation-raping military-industrial complex mercenaries…all of these produce NOTHING…just rob, seize, and steal. Spite is shown where spite is due, people choose to commit tax-theft and tax-robbery. Neighbors choose to loot each other, back and forth…and when one or the other refuses…the ENFORCERS bring their guns and threaten MURDER for any and all who shall dare to refuse the looting of the fruits of their labors. Enforcers get paid by enforcing the looting-called-taxation. THOU SHALT NOT STEAL. What part of NO and SHALL NOT INFRINGE is so hard to understand?
http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/real-security.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8/bryan7.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/cooper/cooper34.1.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/cooper/cooper37.1.html
http://militantlibertarian.org/2011/02/22/when-tax-feeders-revolt/
http://militantlibertarian.org/2011/01/23/fewer-snouts-in-the-trough-less-crime-in-the-streets/
http://militantlibertarian.org/2010/11/29/ddos-and-site-outages/

Hopefully everyone looking in the mirror knows, and can admit, whether they are a Producer or a Looter. The Producers should congratulate themselves and the Looters should get PRODUCTIVE!

Starving The Monkeys and Ending The Looterfest,
John and Dagny Galt
Starving The Monkeys, Owners Manual For The Universe!

It’s the Internet, Mas. Most of them couldn’t say those things to your face without crapping their pants. And yes, that is a stereotyping but it is also true.

Many thanks for the smarmy followup column. Perhaps you should just stick to blogging about shooting competitions if other folks opinions are too annoying for you.

Initially I read the blog and first few comments . I just today had a chance to read the rest. WOW! While my experiences with cops have been good some of my friends have not been so lucky. So I see where their coming from.I read about it too. But I reread the last post and I don’t understand what it was you said that caused all the vile to come out.

“The hypocrisy is revoltingly blatant.

Critical comments are welcome here, people, but let’s bring critical thinking to our criticism.

Leave the broad brush of stereotyping in the hands of the ignorant, where it fits so naturally.”

Summed the 80 odd comments up pretty well. I’m not sure if it was funny or scary how people will take the small minority and apply it to the majority.

Yes, there are some bad Officers, there are some bad gun owners as well, heck there are some bad guns out there too! Might as well sing the same tune as the Brady Bunch and get rid of guns all together eh?

I can only speak for myself here, but I will say this as a citizen. If I see an Officer requiring assistance, I will do what I can to help.

“Because the politician appointed to head Homeland Security hints that gun owners might be suspect, you should hate the police officer who patrols your neighborhood?”

When they’re being funded and trained by DHS/Federal government, given surplus military equipment and creating SWAT teams to serve minor warrants, yes I should distrust them. I don’t hate the average officer but I sure don’t respect or trust them. Given current trends I am moving towards hatred, as those officers support (directly or indirectly) a corrupt regime and become revenue generators. How can you tell who is good or bad? You can’t take the risk lest you end up on trumped up charges, “contempt of cop”. I’ll keep my mouth shut and get an attorney for even minor issues.

The argument that the media (mainstream or otherwise) lies, obfuscates, and promotes agendas doesn’t hold much water with me. I know this completely already from other experiences in politics/life. I don’t buy into every story of police corruption nor “they’re just dirty criminals/terrorists/etc.” by authorities when they make a bust.

The reason Philip you see more libertarians and conservatives complaining is they’re being harrassed more or seeing it via the internet or first hand from trustworthy friends. I find it more ironic that you have hippies/liberals who promote the “only cops should have guns” line these days after decades of fighting “the man”.

One can talk about bad individuals all day long among any group of people or organization. What happens though when that whole organization becomes corrupt with only a few good apples? Can you reform it from the inside?

Being one of the commentors about being a cop hater, I still maintain people were not hating on the police- but were definitely making comments about how little they are trusted today.
Especially in light of how often the USC ruling about police not having to defend a citizen is made. If they’re not hired to protect and defend, then what are they?
Well, they’re training to be SWAT agents.
As for the head of homeland insecurity didn’t ‘hint’, she stated.
A few commented, I among them, how the police leaders in their communities and counties do not support the Second Amendment- and this makes them oathbreakers. They set the example for their troops. How can you trust someone to ‘protect’ you, when they don’t even want you to protect yourself?
Again, it isn’t that we are cop haters- my son wants to become an officer and I encourage it- it is that we are tired of being treated like second class citizens by our employees. There are many police who shoot with our club IDPA and Steel and they’re always nice to talk with, but are definitely a clique separate from the rest of us. I wish it would change, that neither side had bad feelings toward the other, and it won’t happen if both sides are suspicious of each other.
Shy III

Thank you for writing this, Mas.

I was totally sickened by some of those comments and feel that anyone who broadly labels our police officers like that is either a criminal with an axe to grind, a sad failure living in their mother’s basement with delusions of grandeur and entitlement or simply a keyboard commando who thinks its cool to talk tough anonymously from behind a screen. Regardless, they are people who are not worth my time, effort or attention.

Thank you for being the voice of reason. Thank you for taking the time to write these articles and thank you for your efforts to educate and explain…from both behind the badge or in front of them.

“No one was happier than the cops when the drunk, off-duty Chicago officer who brutally beat up a female bartender was convicted, and no one more incensed when he only got probation.”

This right here illustrates the root cause of people’s negative attitudes toward police. It’s not that it’s a statistical certainty that a few police will commit crimes every year. It’s the Blue Code of Silence and the overall special treatment cops are given when they commit crimes, off-duty or not.

This practice very obviously creates moral hazard for police officers. These incidents get publicly exposed time and time again. Yet apparently nothing has been done to remedy the root cause. If something has been done, it’s either been ineffective or it hasn’t been publicized.

This will naturally deepen resentment and mistrust in citizens, especially among armed citizens, for a variety of reasons.

Thanks for a rational view across two populations.

I missed all of the earlier cop-hater comments.

My only thought is…why do I feel a sense of anxiety when I see a police car, rather than a sense of comfort? As a child, most of us are taught to respect LEO and see them as sources of potential assistance. Somewhere along the line, I think many of us run into the isolated officer who may not treat us well, causing a more cautious, rather than welcoming perception to become our normal stance. Police over-reaction during the 60’s in places like Chicago did not help that impression.

JMHO.

I think the question that isn’t being asked is; Why are so many law abiding people cop haters? What makes non-criminals dislike and/or fear cops?

Merely dismissing complainers as cop haters doesn’t get to the root of the issue. Have there been any serious academic studies on why there are so many people who hate cops? Don’t cops wonder if there might be a way to reverse the trend? Wouldn’t cops rather be respected instead of hated/feared?

There is no doubt that the Us vs Them mindset exists on both sides of the issue yet no one seems to want to make a serious effort to fix the problem.

One thing for sure, name calling won’t help solve the problem.

Mas,
I’m going to take the liberty of apparently going slightly off topic here. But bear with me. I’m going to talk about Wikileaks and its “Collateral Murder” video. You’ve seen the hype, I’m sure. “Apache crew knowingly fires on journalists! Intentionally fires at a van with kids in it!” All the rest of the spew.

Now, I’ll freely admit to not being a typical YouTuber. But, yeah, I went and I watched the Collateral Murder video. And you know what? If I’d been the gunner in that Apache, and could see what that camera footage showed, I would absolutely have fired on them just like he did. Because, you know what? There’s not one visible sign that these are journalists. Not one. And they didn’t let *anyone* know they were going to be there. At one point, before the Apache opened fire, there’s what MAY have been a long camera lens poking around a corner of a wall, held by a crouching man … or MAY have been the anti-tank missile *that it looked like*. And the Apache crew knew they had friendly armor in the area. And even that aside, there’s no mistaking the AKs that several of the AP journos’ poorly-chosen escorts are toting, and hell, one of them is toting an RPG plain as day. The Apache crew made exactly the right call. They had no way of knowing there was a noncombatant news crew among the armed, unidentified, presumed-hostiles in a free fire zone. There was no visible sign at any point during that video that anyone in the target zone — including the apparent reinforcements who showed up in a van to evac their wounded — was anyone *BUT* an insurgent.

But look at the comments on YouTube. People who watched that video, with that title, and *who didn’t know any better*, thought what they were de-facto told to think.

This is pretty much what you get from YouTube. People think what they’re told to think. The Big Lie is not the sole province of governments. YouTube has become, in part, a court of public opinion, and one in which the defendant never gets to speak.

That said … I fully support 95% of the law enforcement officers who patrol my streets. But I don’t trust the politicians who give them their orders as far as I can throw them by their politically-correct press-conference sound bites. Unfortunately, we have a situation where those who make the law have used it for political ends and, in so doing, have made so much of it either arbitrary, incomprehensible, or contemptible that they have made the body of the law unworthy of respect. When you make the body of law unworthy of respect, that lack of respect rubs off on those whose job it is to enforce it, whether deservedly or not. (And this isn’t helped by an ever-growing emphasis from local governments upon enforcing most zealously the laws which yield the most revenue. Honest citizens, not surprisingly, don’t like being fleeced to fill the shortfall in some local government’s spendthrift budgets.)

The problem begins at the top. But the solution, I think, begins at the bottom. The comments about codes of silence are right on the mark. To an extent, they are inevitable; but at the same time, they cannot be tolerated. “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” The police must police themselves as strictly as, or more strictly than, they do everyone else. Their position of public responsibility allows nothing else. And, most do. But while one bad apple may not actually spoil a whole barrel, it only takes one or two bad apples to make people start wondering whether the whole barrel is in fact bad.

Thank you MAS for good sense.
My son was in the Katrina mess. You ought to hear the stories he has about what really happened. // There are a whole lot of bad cops. Deliberately ignoring criminals, and being law breakers themselves. Our general public dispises the arrogant cops that flaunt their authority like school yard children. Not to mention the revolving door prisons here. Convicted of 5 felonies plus jail break, and out in a year. Cynical?? Me??

While it is ignorant and absurd to paint all law Enforcement officers with the tar brush of fascism, it is most certainly true that what were formerly Peace Officers have morphed into Law Enforcement, a wholly different mindset and approach.

To this I would ascribe the rampant militarization of Police departments everywhere as a large part of the problem, a change in mindset from Protect and Serve to a modified (mercifully) version of breaking things and killing people. This is not to say that Cops have become ruthless killers, although far too many citizens are killed in questionable shootings all across America.

It is also true, in addition, that as municipalities have formed under (corporate) municipal Law, old-line common Law principles of “keeping the Peace” have been supplanted by the ‘gotcha’ factor in Statutory Law, which most of the time does not allow for the issue of intent, but is rather a cut and dried matter of guilt to be caught in violation of one of the thousands of arcane and usually ridiculous “laws” now on the books. Police officers are expected to produce the revenue to justify their job,. and the Statutes are used as a municipal cash cow, with the police department charged with rounding up the cows.

Further, urban decay has bred a form of fear of the citizens that produces over-reactions in what are generally simple highway stops. Officers have become belligerent, demanding and rude, and often ask for the trouble they receive. No one has to tolerate abuse from anyone, least of all a Public “servant” who may have stopped the motorist at random, looking for something, anything, with which to issue a ticket, which start, these days, at $100.00 and go way, way up. This happens daily, everywhere.

I am a grey haired grandpa, not some angry kid. But I am disgusted with the decline of civility and respect among the Police forces where I live. Growing up, such actions would (and did) result in a quick firing and a not so gentle suggestion to seek a different line of work. This is no longer true, and the routine insults to honest citizens are never addressed; It is only the citizen who has decided not to Kowtow to the rude demands of some cop that makes the news, and the cop is always exonerated. We are the citizens here, we deserve respect and should not be made to feel that we are but moving targets in an arcade, waiting to be victimized by some cop short on his quota.

When Law enforcement goes away and is replaced by genuine Peace officers that are not junked up in Ninja suits and driving a surplus APC, carrying automatic weapons and grenades to bust some kid in a pot house, then will the citizenry feel comfortable, and maybe we can get back to America.

My two cents

I too was taken by suprise when I started to read the commentary from the readers of this blog. After seeing the general trend of the commentary, I bailed and went on to something more productive than reading the toxic comments from the posters. Honestly, I was saddened by the tone of the response and hope that the attitude of the respondants was an abboration in attitude of your readers rather than the general concensus. I love your posts and will continue to read them, but I find last nights thinking disturbing.

Z Says: Perhaps if you would idenfity the “root cause” you speak of the rest of us could understand what you are talking about.

Wow. Ya have good teachers and bad teachers. Good sailors and bad sailors. Good cops and bad cops. When they do something good, you rarely hear about it. When one does something bad, the media has a field day. A few of them have attitudes, but if I had to put up with the stuff they did I would too. God bless ’em along with our military and firemen. We can’t live without them.

If you do not believe “Any cop, no matter how bad, over any citizen, no matter how good,” then you’re the minority amongst your brothers.

Mas,
I very much enjoy this column for its timely, relevant and often prosaic content. People of like mind visit here to respectfully share observations and experiences regarding current issues. It has become a place as comfortable as my own living room. It was as though someone had hung a sign on the front door stating: “Stupidity Free Zone”. Then this…

The degree of fear exuding from some of the responses (and continuing in the ones above) is amazing and disturbing. My hope is that it is the current economic and political situation that has frightened otherwise stable folks to their intellectual limits. Some are close to full blown panic.

Please continue your calming and logical commentary. The nation will heal itself in due time and these fears will pass.

Well put as usual Mr. Ayoob. Thanks for all the great posts in your blog; there’s many of us that appreciate them greatly.

HankH

Mas,

I think Z’s statement above is a good summary of citizens’ grievances.

I for one would be “okay”- and I’m using that term VERY loosely- with (“bad apple”) cops’ transgressions if they were all prosecuted AT LEAST AS uniformly as a non-cop would be for committing the same crimes…of course the problem, as you’ve already essentially acknowledged, is that this does not happen.

I know you’re on the side of the citizens, but the “cop hater” remark was hurtful to me. Even if you meant it to be addressed only at “some” commentators, it’s still dismissive to the concept that many others like me who hold doubts need (not just should, NEED) to be taken seriously. It’s wrong to be dismissed as haters on the basis of how we choose to express those doubts.

And come on- the implication that some of us are “too stupid” to know what’s going on when watching a recorded event on You Tube (not counting videos deliberately edited to mislead opinion, of course), really? You Tube (and its viewers) should not be dismissed either; without them, all we may have to go on are conflicting witness/police reports and buried CCTV evidence like when Erik Scott was shot at a Costco in Nevada, for example.

I think the biggest message that I’m going to take away from this whole incident is that nobody’s perfect, we should strive to better ourselves, and we should takes times like these as opportunities to remind OURSELVES of this indisputable fact of humanity.

Way to go Mas. You are an excellent ambassador between the law enforcement community general public. As for me, my family, and all those that I call friends, we have the utmost respect and admiration for those that choose to place themselves in danger to protect us. Thank you all for your service.

As yourself and others have already mentioned, there will always be the bad apples. Only a complete and utter moron would judge the the whole on the actions of the few.

Keep up the good work!

your choice of only responding to those on the far extreme saying “occupying army, or stazi” by taking a few of the comments you didn’t like and applying the broad stroke of we are all cop haters is the same thing you gripe about.

then to slant it as the negative effect of many who have never posted here – well i guess only the people who can speak out are the ones you agree with? or is it the ones with a badge? or the ones signing your check? which is it? maybe it is just a few who are getting frustrated at seeing the steady loss of our rights? the steady turn of the peace officer into the militant government enforcer and revenue officer.

until i see the law abiding officers consistently publicly stand and speak out against the law breaking officers then i have reason to feel suspect. if those charged with enforcing the law cannot enforce it in their own precinct then what should we expect? watching a police captain conspire to protect his pedophile friend makes me sick to my stomach. will he be charged on the same exact charges as a citizen? i hardly doubt it based on past cases i’ve followed.

what i do see is these swat teams that go with no-knock warrants getting awards and commendations for events as messed up as raiding the wrong address or shooting a dog from behind as it ran away. or pointing an assault rifle or shotgun at the face of an older woman washing dishes because they “felt their life was in danger”

until you and others speak up and say you disagree with those actions then your silence is consent of those actions.

I agree wholeheartedly that we as responsible citizens cannot go around painting groups with a broad brush, such as found in the comments you mentioned.

However, I have to point out, calling it “hate speech” plays right into the liberal/progressive/socialist agenda. Were the comments horribly uninformed and from a terribly negative point of view? Absolutely.
As much as I disagree with the comments made, though, I cannot stomach the use of the phrase “hate speech.”

“Hate speech” is a term used in other (more socialist) countries in order to suppress freedom of expression. I think we should refrain from using the term if we can. Call it “ignorant rantings” or “uninformed stupidity” or any other disparaging term you like, but “hate speech” is opening a door for liberals to call for similar suppression in our own country.

I believe that the 1st Amendment is just as important as the 2nd, and those two together protect all the rest.

Thanks for an enjoyable blog, as usual.

Mas,
I cannot imagine how or why any reasonably intelligent, law abiding resident of the US would be a cop hater. These men and women deserve our praise and support and not hatred.
There are bad eggs in every profession, but it seems like it is worse when a police officer goes bad that is exponentially worse. Even with that said, there is no reason for anyone to hate cops in general because of the actions of a very few.
I don’t want to even try to imagine what our lives would be like without all of the great police officers in this country.
My thanks to all of the police officers that put their lives on the line every day.
Steve

http://carlbussjaeger.blogspot.com/2011/05/ayoob-crams-his-other-foot-into-his.html

Bullshit, Mas. Answer the questions asked, not the strawman arguments you posed instead.

And ask yourself why a good cop (Maxwell) can come shooting at my range when you aren’t welcome.

(now scrubbing my hands with bleach)

A Physician gives himself dope, messes up a surgery and kills an infant, gets a DUI and smacks his wife and he gets a slap on the wrist from HIS medical association and continues to practice.

An attorney gets busted with cocaine, associates with hookers, steals money from his clients and lies in open court and he MIGHT get a slap on the wrist from HIS bar association and continues to practice.

A reporter does anything you can think of and you will probably never hear about it.

But, if a cop gets caught with one joint OR, lies to his boss during an investigation OR, has sex on duty OR, gets caught lying in court and he WILL lose his police certification and never be a cop again.

I have seen all of the above first hand in my 30+ years as an LEO.

I HATE bad cops, but the facts are that law enforcement is the most heavily regulated profession in the country.

The high profile assholes with badges always get a lot of press, but the vast majority would take a bullet for you without thinking.

One more reason that I dislike politicians like Obama and Clinton is the heat they cause the police to get every time they make big brother bigger.

I’d challenge the critics of the police to spend a few weeks out on the street, where you don’t know if the next traffic stop will be a lead foot heading home from work, or a man on the run with a shotgun under the seat. These guys are making life and death calls every day. Give them a break. Most of them are doing the best they can, and just want to go home to their families when their shift is up.

To speak to both sides of the issue:

Most cops are upholders of the law, sworn to serve and protect, ready to face dangers in the line of duty to protect citizens from violent criminals.

However, there is also an intrinsic belief in police forces that creates an “us and them” mentality: either you are police or you are criminal. Most cops do not have non-cop friends for very long.

This creates a dichotomy. Those of us who believe we are cop-supporting, gun-owning, concealed-carrying private citizens look out for our fellow citizen and would not hesitate to use reasonable force to protect the law and the land. But the very cops we support intrinsically believe we are not to be trusted, as non cops, with fire arms. I have many friends who have unlawfully been confronted by cops that they cannot carry weapons in their vehicles, that their round-in-the-chamber hollow point weapons are “cop killers,” that they are breaking some kind of implied law that only cops are allowed to bear arms to defend themselves.

The issue we face is that we non cops do not know whom we can trust. A change in the general population of the American police force needs to occur to recognize those lawful carrying citizens as fellow protectors rather that threats. When cops stop thinking of us as bad citizens, we can stop thinking of them as bad cops.

I will second what Z has just said.

When we “civilians” stop being “civilians” and return to being fellow humans who deserve AND GET Respect then we will have some respect to return.

When we “civilians” see the law en-FORCE-ment officer who breaks the law being treated the same as us “civilians” and being expelled from behind that “Blue Wall”. When we see them getting the same sentence as we would get for the same crime.
Then we will begin to have some respect for the profession again.

All of the talk about “bad apples” is just talk.
Show us some action on cleaning up the profession not empty words.
IOW … Clean House so we Can respect our Public Servants in Blue again.

We “civilians” want our Peace Officers back and the militarized LEO’s gone.

Why can’t I defend myself for myself with my natural inherent unalienable Right to self defense which is supposedly protected by my local Peace Officer and the Constitution?

Why can’t a serving LEO Obey the Constitution as it is written and ignore unconstitutional “laws” ? [which are “Null and Void on their face.” Justice Brandeis USSC]

Obey your Oath to the Constitution.

Interesting response by Shy Wolf in his last paragraph, where he talks about the police having their own clique separate from other shooters. I’ve seen the same thing, friends who have become police officers and, before they’re out of the academy, already take on that “Us against them” mentality, with the “them” being everyone else. A friend, several years ago, told me when he was in the academy, that one of the instructors told his class that they may as well write off all their old friends, because those old friends would never want anything to do with them now that they are going to be cops. That’s a setup. He changed, and turned his back on the rest of us, and I imagine many of the other cadets did the same because they were told to. In that highly-charged atmosphere of training, the trainees want to do what their trainers tell them to. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. I wish it weren’t so, but I see it when I’m around cops at the range or at a gun store. They keep their distance from us regular folks, as if we’re lepers. I don’t understand or like it, but I still support and defend our Galveston County Sheriff’s Department, who I believe to be some of the finest to ever wear a badge. And that friend quit the PD where he worked for over 10 years. I don’t know why, since I wouldn’t call him a friend any longer.

Hi, Massad;

I missed the first post, but I do have a view on the subject.

The police are, just as you say, composed of mostly good people with a few bad apples – just like the general population. For this reason, when I meet an officer I give them the benefit of the doubt, but I don’t blindly trust them to be a good person.

The demonstrated potential for pure accidents by the police is a real concern. Here is an interactive map showing hundreds of cases where the police botched SWAT team raids, often by simply getting the address wrong. Many innocent people have died as a result, including people honestly defending their homes under the castle doctrine.

http://www.cato.org/raidmap/

Frequently the damage they do is never made right, often not even with an apology to the victims. I personally think the idea that they can just knock down your door and come into your house without warning violates the fourth amendment of the constitution. The police’s highest priority should be to do no harm to the innocent. I’d rather the bad guy get away than to see an innocent person die during a hot pursuit. You can catch the bad guy later, but the dead innocent person stays dead.

And when this happens, the police should pay the same penalty a private citizen would in similar circumstances.

No human agency will ever be 100% trustworthy. That doesn’t mean that the rest of them are evil – it just means you have to recognize this, and hope those you meet are the good ones, and be prepared to take legal action to defend yourself, if not.

And for the good cops out there – kudos to you for doing a dangerous job to the best of your ability.

Am I cop hater? By no means. Do I blindly trust someone because he’s a cop? Of course not. But most of the time, they are good people.

-Popgun

Mas,

I have seen all sides of the equation.

The idiot with a pencil and a badge, the corrupt and on the take, and the honest hard working officer that I think most Cops are. I hate the word police officer, to me respect is given when I call a badge wearer a “Cop”. If I call you a “Cop” that means I respect you. Others may take it differently, I don’t know or care.

If you want to talk crooked law enforcement I ony have to look in to my family history. Love them, yes. Respect for my family members that wore a badge, no. I think what we are seeing today is the manifestation of society getting fed up with government. Being that uniformed police officers are the front line government troops, it is only natural that they share the brunt of the displeasure.

The goal and task of law enforcement is to use what people say and do against them. That sets the stage for distrust right from the start. Then when you add a few bad apples, combined with society’s laws that stifle the honest working citizen I think it is only natural that such discord is in evidence.

I would like nothing more than to never have to call a police officer to solve problems that I am equiped to handle on my own. However such is not the case due to our laws and system of jurisprudence. Yet when I do call to report something I am often viewed with suspicion and told to do things that are not for my safety, and are in fact downright detrimental to my safety. If my local law enforcement isn’t concerned with my safety, why should I be concerned for their’s?

Sadly, while a uniformed LEO is one of the few groups of people I will assist without question, their assistance to me is suspect. They are often more interested in what charges they can bring forth against me. It doesn’t help that your local LEO is insulated from society by a vehicle with windows rolled up and air conditioner set to “Feezing” and running from call to call. I have seen the lack of respect firsthand towards those they serve, by law enforcement. It is actually quite common, and disheartening.

Is this lack of respect criminal? No, not to my knowlege. What it is however is very telling. Some of the served are getting tired of the servers and the way government manifest itself. Take care and stay safe Mas. I’m sorry I missed you last month at your MAG class.

Vince

I use to believe you were a man of truth and reason.
Purchased every one of your books and have reread them
many times.
I just tossed them all in the trash.
This will be the last of your missives I will read.

Charlie

Mas,
That was a well though out, only mildly offensive response to your last blog entry.

What people want is what our founders wanted for us, equality under the law, or in short, liberty and justice! I would love to trust police officers, but the short skinny of it is that doing that can cost you more money than you make in a year, or even your life! Is it right that police have more privileges, and protections under the law, with less consequence, and higher than average GDP per capita pay?

I have a few friends that are police officers, whom I do trust. But when you watch 12 other officers that you don’t know, arrest your Army veteran fiancee on felony “Aggravated Unlawful Use of a Weapon” charges for having an unloaded fully cased pistol under her back seat on her way to a firearm repair shop, while they have fully loaded, rounds chambered firearms on their hips, all because she interpreted the law’s writing of “within reach” differently than the officers… You start to wonder why the law protects them “better” than it does her, why the law affords them more privileges than it does her. When it costs you over $50,000 to fight that case in court, and find out the Police officers are getting Time-and-a-half to be there… you REALLY start to wonder why the law compensates them better than you. When your fiancee loses her job just for being under felony investigation, and you watch Officers like John Killackey point a gun at someone while drunk in the same general area as your fiancee was busted for not even touching a gun… and you see that officer keep his job… the us vs them mentality kicks up ten-fold.

You see Mas, it’s not that people have blind hatred, it’s that a lot of people have been victimized, and have no recourse other than to move to the country, or become agoraphobic… When you get a lot of victimized people, you get a lot of anger. Instead of calling us out as “cop haters” or watch your peanut gallery give you verbal dutch rudders, why not post on ways we, the victims of the police forces of the United States of America can healthily deal with our victimizations?

That’s it… that’s the challenge! post something constructive for us victims! Suing costs too much money and lawyers are reluctant to take up cases against cops that haven’t been caught on camera, and the chiefs are only interested in protecting the department’s image… So help me find another way for us victims to if not get justice, then at least to heal.

The cop haters are always ready to pounce; normally when its not called for; these same cop haters never commend any LEO for a job well done; nor do they ever express any sorrow when a LEO is lost in the line of duty.

It’s just too bad that some kind of record can’t be kept on this verimin so when the day comes that they have to call 911, all the LEO’s are busy elsewhere. However, to the LEO’s credit, they would still do their best to help even the cop haters.

To the LEO’s of America, the majority of patriotic Americans stand with you. Jobs well done.

Thank you Mas…perfectly said! Jack

“Am I a fool, or did the word think escape your lips?”
Unfortunately, thinking is not the most popular of pastimes these days.

My CC instructor is a LEO, btw. Great guy. We should all be so fortunate.

It seems that the police fraternity is undergoing the same identity problems as modern Islam. Islam is often reviled because of the actions of very few radicalized individuals and their radicalized clergy. Police are often reviled because of negative actions by a few radicalized individuals and their radicalized leadership.

The answer to both problems is the same. The good cops and moderate Muslims need to clean house, be vocal and visible and change the problems from the inside.

Anytime a police officer conducts an act, in the line of duty, that is seen as quesionable by the citizens, then that act needs to be examined fully in the light of day as a questionable act by a citizen would. To often we see questionable acts done by officers then their department close ranks around them and defy anyone who questions the conduct. To often what would be criminal investigations for citizens are only “internal” investigations for the police that then seem to be rubber stamped as okay. Even when an investigation is handed off to another agency it is handled invisibly and when the fining of all is good is handed down, the citizens are expected to shut up and move along.

I’ll reiterate, the only way to fix what is seen by many as a “perception” problem is for the police to fix it themselves.

Mr. Ayoob, you are right. Hate is a very divisive and unhelpful emotion. I would suggest that it is fuelled entirely by fear. While fear is very valuable in keeping use alive, when it degenerates into hate the survival value all but disappears. Sadly, in today’s world, positive role models and the professional training necessary to dampen the all too human slide from fear to hate is severely rationed. However, you sir are a stellar example of a role model with such training in abundance and I am very grateful you have chosen to share your thoughts and knowledge with us.

Tim at Tim’s Cogitorium has a nice little piece on his blog called “Fear Sells” (timscogitorium.com/tinblog/2011/03/fear-sells.html) .

I appreciate a little critical thinking from you Mr. Ayoob. I used to be an Anti-Cop person myself because of running into a lot of “bad” cops as a youngster. I must say that the older I get the more I realize that what made most of my encounters bad was motivated by my own “bad” decisions. From meeting more and more cops I have come to realize that they are mostly good fellows. So I think that the sentiment may not be so deserved as the media (and alternate media) paint them.

I’m agnostic when I see a LEO. I legally carry but would rather not be stopped and tell him I’m legally carrying. You never know how they’ll react. On a broader note. Didn’t Ms. Napolitano (DHS) brand our ex military as potential terrorists, so you know how she feels about civilian carry. Now there’s the ATF supplying the Mexican cartel and blaming it on the stores they did the straw purchases from. Until Obama gets out, I do not trust my government anymore.

I have read plenty of stuff here, and I have to say that some people will say “Survivalist Nut” for those that choose to prepare for the worst. I don’t think that’s the case, but there are some “Nut Cases” that prepare to do the worst……….. but that’s Not what most people are all about. Most of the people are decent people, but maybe I should brand them all as “Survival Nuts” that are out to get me. Some people would complain about how unfair this would be, but I have left other forums because of hateful people that I didn’t want to mix with, because I have better things to do.

Now there are a group of people who seem to think that every police officer is out to get them and would like for all police officers to be fired. I had a bad dealing with a police officer (off duty) and his brother, back in the 80s, and after they were convicted, the brother got 4 years and the police officer got 8 years, for the same crime, because as the Judge said, “He knew better than to do what he did”. I was an on duty police officer at the time and I’m still working as a police officer, so when I hear people that are so hateful towards the police, I have to wonder if they feel the same way about people of certain ethnic groups.
After Katrina (less than 50 miles from New Orleans), we were also without telephone or radio communications, and the general public was offering to help us if we needed help. Any community that I have worked in, has always been supportive of the police and I’m glad that none of the hateful people from online have lived where I worked. There are a few hard core criminal types in every community, but the good always out number the bad. I don’t know what the Hateful types expect of us, but I’m glad that I have a much better working relation with my community, and I wondedr what they would say about the comments on here. We didn’t take guns after Katrina and I would have Refused! As far as Homeland Security calling the shots, they Never will with me, especially with an extremist in charge. When talking about SWAT equipment, some people would have us go around without ANY guns, or be facing criminals that are better armed, like in the North Hollywood bank robbery……… That’s Not going to happen to me. I could take a position that only the police should be armed, but I have always said that the 2nd Amendment was an Individual right, even before Heller. If it makes you feel better to not trust me, then go right ahead, but when I work, you would be the odd ball.
I will always be equipped with the best equipment that I can get, and you can do the same, and I have no problem with it. I’m of the opinion that All decent people should be armed.
Say what you want and trust who you want, but I don’t worry about online warriors that hate me for no reason……… but then you will find someone to fight with out there if you look hard enough. I do wonder if any of these online hate mongers wear white sheets.

Let me see…cophaters read about combat-booted, black-clad, masked ninjas with badges shooting family pets at the wrong address, burly police officers body-slamming a frail elderly woman to (illegally) disarm her, New Orleans pd cops turning on citizens, murdering them. Cops gunning down a (Gulf War veteran) cpl holder in a Las Vegas Costco parking lot. The illegal, unConstitutional, so-called “war on drugs”, is in actuality a war on freedom. The thinking here is: “If it makes you feel good, we must make it illegal!!!!!!” Cops seem to be more interested in busting pot-smokers instead of going after real criminals. Did you know that there has never been a death due to marijuana use? None. Nada. Zilch. Except, that is, for cops shooting them! There is no known overdose amount. It doesn’t react with any other medication. It has been used as medicine for six thousand years with success. Until the 1930s, when William Randolph Hearst copped an attitude re: Mexicans. That’s how it became illegal. Because of idiots. And the idiots are still in charge, so we are #%@*&wed until we can vote them out. Pot smokers are non-violent, so it’s much, much safer than arresting a rapist or a robber! I could go on and on with more cop-horror stories, but what would be the point? One percent of all professions are occupied by sociopaths anyway, so it isn’t any wonder that most of us don’t like cops. The bad ones seem to speak for the rest of them. Until the United States Constitution is recognized by ALL cops and enforced to the letter and the spirit, I will dislike (most) of them. Where do you stand, Mas, with the forces of tyranny, or freedom?

My son is a patrol officer in a larger Midwest city. I didn’t raise him to be a low life drunk ahole that beats people up. He knows right from wrong and I think was born to do what he does night after night, with INTEGRITY. I’ll ask the cop haters out there, what do you propose? Who will be your proxy to enforce the law?

I pray all the times that if he’s in trouble, that someone on the street steps up and helps him.

A Dad proud of his Marine / cop son.

Look around your areas. More agencies than you would think have reserve programs, most LEOs are happy to have them with budget cuts and giving them less manpower on the streets.

Police use of force issues could be cut just by putting two officers in a car, a lot of escalation of force issues are caused by scared officers who are by themselves. An officer is a lot less likely to escalate force if he has a buddy to help.

Help make the powers that be comfortable with the idea that citizens are part of the solution. Become a reserve, have a CCW, go to public safety events, go to your local department’s citizens academy, go on a ride along with the local constabulary, when you travel by air check a firearm so the TSA is used to dealing with it and perceives it as normal. Do what you can, if you want to wait for others to unscrew themselves you will wait a long time.