Posted on 08/29/2017 6:15:57 AM PDT by rogerantone1
John Lott By John R. Lott Published August 28, 2017 Fox News
0727 police
Police have a tough and dangerous job. Armored military vehicles and military-grade body armor aren’t just useful for soldiers, they make it possible for police to protect Americans.
During his address Monday to the annual meeting of the Fraternal Order of Police, the nation's largest police union with 330,000 members, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that President Trump is overturning Obama’s ban on supplying surplus military equipment to police.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
I didn’t like it then, don’t like it now.
Bad terrible idea to arm cops against the civilian population. Military is for deployment against foreign enemies; cops manage the civilian population. No no no no never militarize the cops, they don’t have sufficient training as it is.
Likewise.
bad idea
cops are not soldiers.
and soldiers shouldn’t be cops.
Trump is disappointing me with this and Session’s love of assest forfeiture.
cops are civilians.
I’ve noticed that they don’t even refer to themselves as civilians anymore.
they are civil servants.
Cops ARE civilians. We should be as well armed as they are.
Where’s my MRAP and select-fire AR?
You won that race lol
Overturning Obama’s order against police sounds good.
I don’t remember reading praise here for Obama when he issued it.
One of the few times I disagree with John Lott. Giving police military equipment is a terrible idea. They’re already the standing army that the founders didn’t want. This just makes it worse.
Obama was perfectly willing to militarize the police and just about every other government agency. But, after there was political hay to be made whipping up anti-police settlement because of Ferguson, a political decision was made to stop that particular type of militarization.
No principles involved.
President Obama issued Executive Order 13688 in January after the 2014 riots in Ferguson, Mo., amid concerns about the “militarization” of the police fueling a heavy-handed response. Items on the prohibited list include armored tracked vehicles, weaponized aircraft and vehicles, .50-caliber firearms and ammo, bayonets, and camouflage. And now the feds are looking to collect.A recall of items on the prohibited list that had been handed out via the 1033 program went into effect on Oct. 1, and law enforcement agencies have until April 1, 2016, to return them, a spokeswoman for the Pentagon’s Defense Logistics Agency told FoxNews.com.
Outrage as military vehicles, equipment taken from officers in wake of Obama order(Adam Shaw Published November 23, 2015 Fox News)
Bump
Yes I remember it.
My complaint at that time was not so much equipment, but tactics, and there are caveats.
Using the APCs for dealing w/mobs is fine and necessary (though I would prefer to see national guard in that case).
However, there aren’t that many mobs. Dealing w/mobs is what everyone’s thinking now, thanks to the commie left.
But the rest of time, and where my problem w/this lies, is when they use it for “normal” busts. Any mention that the “suspect” may have a gun, and out come the tanks.
I put suspect in quotes because that is the true problem w/”militarization.
Police pursue suspects, who are presumed innocent.
The military pursues enemies, who are not only presumed “guilty”, but hostile, i.e., they will refuse to go quietly.
The reason you have more dogs being shot and, in fact, innocent people being shot when the SWAT teams show up at the wrong address is exactly due to this presumption of guilt and hostility.
What makes it worse is when Bush armed each fed agency independently of the FBI, so even NOAA has its own police force. They showed up in full riot gear to raid a store where they were selling a particular type of coral that was “protected”.
My other beef with this is that whatever the police use, the public should be able to use.
Criminals prey on the public, not police generally. So if the police need certain gear to deal with criminals, the the public needs it too to protect themselves.
And as we can see with all the stand-down orders, the cops aren’t going to help you, even if they’re seeing it happen.
There was some support among us for Obama's action. I echo the others on this thread that police should not be military, and the military should not be cops.
HE HE HE HE HE, ... I LUV this, ...
great minds...
Using this type of equipment against actual criminals is fine, but there’s no guarantee that will always be the case. Local police should not have military equipment, IMHO.
The police already have select fire rifles, military grade body armor and grenade launchers. Most of that the purchased during the Obama administration and certainly right after Ferguson. There are yearly grants for body armor and for the last two years, especially after Dallas, there have been grants for level IV body armor.
You know how many MRAPS are/were available in the entire state of Missouri?
Five. There are over 600 police departments.
The rifles? M-16A1s. Sorry, keep those, we have Rock Rivers. The sidearms? M-9s, worn out. Bayonets? WTF are we going to do with those?
The 1033 program is good for getting things that would be good for natural disasters, like cots, blankets, and tents, as well as plethora of office equipment for any PD on a budget.
Having Hummers may seem nice until you have to pay to maintain them. Not in the average PD budget.
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