S.F. cops grouse about what it's like on the front lines - Rowdy protesters, long shifts, scant food

SF Chronicle ^ | 3-22-03 | Steve Rubenstein and Kathleen Sullivan, Chronicle Staff Writers

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Sixteen hours of running around town in a helmet and getting yelled at by strangers, and all he got was a banana and a Snickers bar.

Also about $400 in overtime, but never mind that.

"They can have the overtime," said one of several hundred San Francisco riot cops. "I don't need the overtime. I'd pay them the overtime not to have to do this."

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Notice how these "journalists" refer to SF law enforcement officers as simply "cops". America's journalism schools are pathetic.

[OpusatFR]

They deserve hazard pay. With all these people using the streets and sidewalks as toilets, I wonder how many are concerned with typhoid, cholera, intestinal parasites, and dysentery?

How would they tell the difference between an outbreak of cholera from this diseased behavior from an actual terrorist attack?

[truthkeeper]

bttt

[Experiment 6-2-6]

They deserve hazard pay.

Especially with the backpack of 12 Molotov Cocktails discovered stashed under a bush...

[samtheman]

The police should go home and let the good people of San Francisco destroy their own city in "protest". It would be a lovely sight.

[_Jim]

The hardest part is watching what happens to ordinary fellow citizens when they get together in a large throng.

Wrong ... these aren't 'ordinary fellow citizens', for the *real* ordinary fellow citizens are busy working, raising families, fighting in Iraq ...

[Outrance]

It might be a good idea to go out and support the police with refreshments and encouragement. This has been done in Philly (water ice donated by local company adn distributed by talk radio organization) in the past with positive results.

[netmilsmom]

This officer said he would gladly pay to NOT have to be there.
Isn't there some nice food business that can give these fine men some food.
Can someone ping a CA list???

[Lockbox]

I guess next that the good liberal citizens of SF will complain about the cost of Police protection during this time.

[anniegetyourgun]

I hope the SF police will continue to smile (even laugh) at these creeps. I'm sure it DOES drive the anti-American traitors crazy. It's a tactic Freepers must use as well.

[Clink]

He knows protesters are upset with the federal government

I disagree with this statement to a certain degree. I believe that most of these "protesters" simply see an opportunity to gather their masses for a "party" where (almost) anything goes and they get to act out their debauchery and idiotic rituals (beating a drum, painting their faces, etc.) in public.

[SandRat]

The cops were pretty well organized, he said, but it would have been nice to have had a little more food and water.

Okay all of you FReepers in the SF area, make the phone calls, find out where to go, get permission to be there, then take an Old Fashioned Farm Hands POT LUCK Lunch to the men and women of SF Thin Blue Line. Can't do that then just bake some cookies, or buy a dozen Krisie Kreemes and drop them off at an SFPD station, the word will get around of the kindness you are doing.

Watch the SFPD smile.

[LibertyAndJusticeForAll]

Someone needs to do a comprehensive international report on the death, destruction, disruption and chaos that the anti-war protests continue to accumulate.
A.N.S.W.E.R and other communist party organizations (already documented), who are paying the bills for these large anti-war protests need to be widely exposed.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/863783/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/867886/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/869876/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/870000/posts

[bluesagewoman]

My husband worked the protests here during their anti-aparteid kick. I worked in the station processing. You can't imagine how nasty those folks can be. They spit, urinate on the floors or your leg (and worse), puke, insult and contantly squirm and jerk away trying to make it as difficult as possible. The stench of their bodies was sickening in closed quarters.

Those days are long and hard for the police officers. I can remember being so grateful when some kind soul would drop off some sandwiches to the outpost or station for the officers and staff. (Restuarants wouldn't deliver because of the chaos, or procrurement procedures were too complicated, so you couldn't order.) It was often the only thing anyone would get to eat or drink for 24 hours or more. And the thanks the officers get is to be made out to be Nazis on the 6:00 news.

[I_Love_My_Husband]

ping!

The fact that these guys don't get food is appalling! They are out there for US!

I was speaking to a lady bus driver on the 5 line about it and she was pretty disgusted with the protestors. She's a real nice bus driver and we've spoken on several occasions.

The 5 line got very messed up because of all of this.

I'm hoping that there's less and less people out there in the coming weeks, that protesting has jumped the shark.

[Riley]

>>It might be a good idea to go out and support the police with refreshments and encouragement.

This is a good idea, but I can see how they might view such gifts with suspicion. There isn't much that is beneath the mobsters in SF.

If it were possible to flag down a loose officer and ask him to duck into a shop with you to watch you buy some bottled water for the troops, then they'd have nothing to be concerned about.

The more I think about it, that's a hell of a good idea.

[FITZ]

Wrong ... these aren't 'ordinary fellow citizens',

It's very doubtful that any of the protestors is holding down a job or ever has. They've been catered to all their lives and they think they're superior to the cops because the cops are actually having to work for a living.

[American Preservative]

S.F.P.D. ping! : )

[gaijin]

The writer's primary goal is to trivialize the problems an ordinary SF cop faces.

Notice how many times he's careful to use the term, "combat suit" --the implication is that they're dictatorial.

The quote, "A peanut butter and jelly sandwich would have been nice" was carefully chosen because it makes the man seem much more like a boy than a stoic police officer.

The reference to the police BBQ calls forth the image that cops just want to eat doughnuts.

The goal of the writer is to TARNISH.