Knowing that LE is the afterthought and every present job of evry Coastie out there, after driving the small boat, maintaining the engineering plant, sopping up the bilges, finishing up one of several mounds of paperwork on the last SAR case, and whipping the Auxiliarist at ping pong on the rec deck, I can assure you the jack-booted thug mentality was in the boaters mind only. They wouldnt have been there at 2330 withjout a damn good reason. Coasties dont have situation rooms where we sit around and plan daring night raids on unsuspecting civilians for the fun of it. No, they didnt have to tell the boater why they were boarding, just that he was being boarded.
Yeah, after I posted, I was thinking, the CG guys here may have had info that we don't know about that justified that after dark boarding.
All my contacts with USCG have been positive, and go back quite a few years. I used to go to sea professionally, so have had to come in contact with them if only for the purpose of acquiring proper licensing, which is also in their bailiwick.
My first inclination, based on experience, is to give the Coasties, not the other guys, the benefit of the doubt. There is a definite "brotherhood" among sailors, I have always considered the Coasties to be senior members of it.
As to the whether they should have the powers they do RE boarding, that's another issue. Guess I'm going to read through the thread and see what opinions might be offered. The first 100 posts did reveal lots of ignorance.