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Time magazine on police killings
Time Magazine wonders why killings of police officers are up (although far below the high point during the urban Crack Wars).
Could things like this have some slight relevance here?
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I would suspect that part of an increasing willingness to resist and kill police officers would stem from the increasing lack of respect for the citizenry by the police.
Citizens increasingly see examples of the police acting as a force acting outside of the norms of acceptable behavior, using no-knock warrants on non-violent or mistaken citizens, using lethal force in situations where only non-lethal force was justified, and the like. The more citizens are driven to see police as an "us vs. them" force, the more likely they are to resist.
Just my theory, but I do believe that the more willing the police are to use force against citizens, the more citizens will be willing to use force against the police.
She should relish the experience. After all, unlike her law abiding neighbors,she gets to legally carry a gun, which puts her way ahead of rabble who aren't police. And surprise of surprises the cops show up when she calls and says she has been threatened. Not something they are known for when it comes to "ordinary" citizens.
Hell, she's got a bird nest on the ground compared to the populace. If she thinks it is scary for her, just think how scary it is for the "ordinary" citizen on his own with no means of self defense.
Damn, do I sound insensitive? Well, as a matter of fact, I am desensitized to a sub-population that has garnered for itself status far above the average citizen and often times is the more dangerous predator of the average citizen.
All out of sympathy, baby.
I'm pro-cop, as my comment suggests, but I think Straightarrow makes a good point. The sort of cops that I know and associate with are all pro-gun and pro-citizens' right to keep and bear arms. If I lived in Boston or NYC I'd probably have a different perspective.
No sense arguing over whether she deserves what she got for being a cop. Those guys called her "the police," but if you got in their way, they'd treat you the same way.
It's not about sympathy (although the author of the piece clearly thought it should have been.) It's about whether we tolerate the kind of people who threaten to kill a cop just for being a cop in "their" neighborhood.
I don't think anyone condoned the behavior of the thugs, nor do I think anyone said she is getting what she deserves.
However, that doesn't mean I sympathize with her when the principles I hold to she, in her official capacity, must and will hold against me.
I would support her defending herself from these thugs with any force necessary. The difference is that I also support any citizen who finds himself in that situation doing the same. She would not. Her job is to maintain the status quo, which means citizens are not entitled to the same level of protection and defense and self-defense she and her compatriots are.
There is no argument you can make that this is not so. The law says it is. The law is wrong, but it is enforced. And it is enforced by her and the other officers of the law.
This isn't about hating cops. It's about wanting us all equal under the law. So I stand by my earlier post. She is much more fortunate than the "ordinary" citizens in her neighborhood. That doesn't mean she deserves the treatment, but she does have more and better recourse, doesn't she?
Having lived through the 60's, I had the theretofore unique experience of going through my adolescence in an adolescent period of time. It was common then to hear cops referred to as "pigs." For a while it was so common it seemed that "pig" would become a generic term for all time to completely replace "cop."
Fortunately, this stupid and childish epithet passed into oblivion. But with the elite intelligencia now embracing left-wing kook politics something similar, and more dangerous to cops, seems to creeping back.