Taking the paramilitary nonsense out of our police forces would go a long ways towards restoring the respect that they once enjoyed.
The feds enabled it from top to bottom, and not just with equipment, but encouragement, training, etc. At the grand level, it was a response to terrorist groups like the Weathermen, the Black Panthers, and others. The idea to turn police into paramilitaries.
A big element was that at the state level, the feds wanted police to have military-type standards of physical fitness, and some degree of aggression training. Its legal background was the RICO Act of 1970.
It very rapidly turned into a “Corruption Act”, at its peak “arresting” some $6b in property, annually, and giving a 10% cut ($600m) to local police, just because it was on their turf, even if they had no involvement. And to get the property back would cost its owner about $100k in superior court, which usually meant that it was not worth it to even try.
This, in effect, subsidized local police departments to buy any kind of military or police equipment they wanted, which is why the front cab of most police cars today has more screens and equipment than a high performance jet.
One of the really ugly side effects of paramilitarizing police has been the lure of steroid abuse, which has a powerful lure for police who have bought into the notion of job aggression, even though in the vast majority of what they do, aggression is not a good thing.