I’ve had several conversations with ex-cops. The most interesting was one who’s father is still an elected sheriff. To whittle it down, roughly 50% of cops are basically ex-high scholl jock types that could not find any other job that took advantage of their “abilities”. They like the machismo and can be regular brown shirts. The other half are either naive kids thinking they will change the world and guys that do as little work (including pulling people over) as possible and have a taste for donuts.
If you have ever blatantly run a traffic light or otherwise broke the law right in front of a cop, and he didn’t do anything, you were probably lucky to be seeing the latter in action. :)
Police forces are for the most part a representation of the community, for better or worse. Being a cop I can tell you that 50 percent of cops are definitely not ex jocks. Ex-momma's basement tenants maybe... but definitely not ex-jocks.