We don’t live in a more dangerous world, and evil hasn’t come to the United States (or, I guess, it hasn’t come in any greater quantities than it always has). By early counts, last year was the second-safest year for police officers since 1959. Crime remains at near-historic lows. Yet there’s an ongoing belief in law enforcement that the police are constantly under attack. You see it in the exaggeration and hyping up of the threat of ambushes and targeted killings (both of which do occur, but are vanishingly infrequent when compared with the number of cops on the street). And you see it in the menacing movement within law enforcement that sees the world in apocalyptic hues and that urges police to shoot more people more often — to dispense with hesitation and critical thinking and rely more on primordial instinct and muscle memory.
The increasing militarization of police departments with the support of the Federal government selling them military-grade weapons surplus, is not helping the situation. That, and the long term move from foot patrols to patrol cars by most police departments in major cities.
Any cop, and I emphasize ANY cop, who does something stupid like tell a person to take their hands out of their pockets and then, when the person complies, kills said compliant individual because the cop was frightened by the act of the individual taking their hand out SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN A COP. And said stupid cop should be tried, convicted and imprisoned for his act of homicide.
First, slash cop wages. Cap government employee wages at twice the median household income for the area they serve. Use the massive savings to drastically increase the police force. Sure, you'd have fewer ‘qualified’ cops on the street, but you'd also have a heck of a lot more bodies and a reduction in the impression that they're some elite bastion against the criminal element.
Second, apply the law equally. No special rules for any public employee; no exemptions from gun restrictions, no immunity from prosecution, no immunity from civil litigation. If a citizen would be arrested and tossed into jail for shooting someone, so too should the cop. Maybe a lot of insanity in persecuting those who exercise their rights to self defense would go quickly out the window.
Since this would also immediately take away a lot of the toys (is that automatic rifle permitted to everyone else? No? Time to sell it off, SWAT team...) I don't think a lot of further action would have to take place.
I don’t care what cherry-picked data say: we live in a dangerous world.
Jesus, they can’t even trust or be honest with each other! What chance do normal civilians have?
I see the problem as the police reacting first whereas they should first reconnoiter, investigate, take a look-see, that what they were told is true, and that the address is correct, too.