Gosh, here I thought that cops were paid to stand in the line of danger to protect the people. Thank you for the correction that their safety and security overrules the entire reason why they are paid well and have incredible benefits.
So what happens when the shift goes from assassinating family pets and they start opening fire on loved ones in your home? By your explanation, officers have a right to show up when one of your loved ones gets out of control and blast them.
It is not a slippery slope, it is an outright cliff: when we do not hold officers to the same laws that everyone else lives with, the line of what is 'acceptable' drifts constantly. Twenty years ago, an officer opens fire on a family pet, they'd have to show bite marks, explain a couple times how they tried to disengage, and even then might not be employed for long. Now, the investigation, if it extends much at all, simply looks for an officer to be 'worried' about the situation that might have happened, and pats the officer on the back and moves on.
Twenty years ago, an officer opening fire on a child holding a toy gun would likely face charges, not just dismissal. Today, they are cleared within hours, no charges pending.
Officers are paid to perform a job. If they think that job is too much for them, then they should quit or be fired and someone who can handle the job should take over. Instead, an ever growing population is becoming afraid of calling officers, knowing that doing so might turn a difficult situation into a fatal one. It is an ever expanding problem. Because inner cities, twenty years ago, didn't care what officers did in inner cities, just so long as it was contained to 'rough areas.' Now those 'rough areas' are just about everywhere, where it seems reasonable to open fire on a car full of kids simply because someone refuses to accept their authority.
Cops have a right to perform the job they are hired to do, under the rules that the people put forward, or they can stop accepting the money and go home. That is the truth that you seem to want to utterly ignore. They do not have more of a right to life or liberty than you or I do, they do not have wholesale permission to open fire in non-life threatening situations, and we MUST enforce these rules upon our lawmen, pressuring politicians to ignore cop unions and follow the will of the people.
Standing ovation!