US gun culture has police arming to keep up

The Boston Globe ^ | August 23, 2014 | Michael A. Cohen

[2ndDivisionVet]

Over the past two weeks, Americans have been transfixed and horrified by the surreal images of police donning camouflage and gas masks and pointing sniper rifles at unarmed demonstrators in Ferguson, Mo. Why have police departments become so enamored with tools more associated with war than with walking the beat? One answer is receiving precious little attention: America’s gun culture.

America is a nation awash in firearms. It’s simply impossible to talk incisively about what’s happening in Ferguson without talking about guns and the ease with which ordinary citizens and criminals can get access to them.

Police today are much better armed because it’s the only way they can keep up with criminals. When powerful semi-automatic and military-style weapons started to appear on the streets, police departments began moving from six-shot revolvers to semi-automatic weapons. That trend accelerated after several high-profile incidents where officers were simply outgunned by criminals, the most infamous being a 1997 shoot-out at a North Hollywood bank in which the robbers were toting automatic weapons and wearing body armor.

According to David Kennedy, director at the Center for Crime Prevention and Control at John Jay College, though these types of events are as rare as a “meteor strike” for most communities, police departments increasingly have come to believe that “they should have the technology ready in case one occurs.”(continued)

[spodefly]

Yes of course, the people that commit the least amount of crime per capita are the reason for the militarization of police.

[School of Rational Thought]

So the proliferation of firearms is causing more violence, as is cited in the increase in police kills in Massachusetts, then the police should be disarming, not arming up.

[devolve]

.

- Who paid? That is an excellent question “Brooklyn Attitude” -

- They say that billionaire George Soros and his “Open Society” is bankrolling anti-law enforcement in the USA -

- Great - the traiterous turncoat teenage Jew that worked for the NAZIS in WWII - whatta creepy slimeball -

-

[Brooklyn Attitude]

“- They say that billionaire George Soros and his “Open Society” is bankrolling anti-law enforcement in the USA -”

Strategically that would be just the sort of thing that could be used to discredit Soros. Too bad Repubs are too stupid to use it.

[Secret Agent Man]

i was referring to the cops in this piece, but yeah they’re liberals/socialists who only want their security forces - ie police,/private guards - to have guns -and themselves of course.

[Finny]

You left out the rest of the quote. Here it is, in full: “Where did all the Indians come from? They look friendly enough.”

Actually, Six, that was Master Gunner's post that I had bumped. :^)

I have to wonder ... if there were no survivors, how does anyone know what Custer's last words were?

[ought-six]

He was able to text those words before the signal died.

[Finny]

Ah!! Okay.{^)

Yet ... I remember reading another famous quote somewhere:

"Don't trust everything you read on the internet." -- Abraham Lincoln

[DuncanWaring]

Didn’t someone make a movie once in which only the police and military had guns?

[MasterGunner01]

According to the History Channel write-up for the DVD: “...a soldier named August Finkle was the lone survivor of “Custer's Last Stand,” a battle that is practically synonymous with “no survivors.” Forensics on the man's skeleton and his two gunshot wounds definitely show that the story he reluctantly told the world nearly 50 years after the battle was true. He alone survived, and his tale of what actually went on in the battle should revise our interpretation of the events of the day. The special reveals the amazing story of seven others who very nearly survived—who rode for miles away from the carnage only to succumb to their own fear and turn their weapons on themselves.”

I saw the History Channel special and they did make the case for a sole survivor. The other survivor was a horse, “Comanche”.

[ought-six]

Actually, Lincoln didn’t SAY that, as in orally, but he did post it on his website while he was staying at a Holiday Inn.

[ForYourChildren]

Thanks for the pics.

Yea, they are just trying to keep up.

Does this mean I get one? or two or three?

[Finny]

Fascinating!!! Thanks for the post.

Ever read Thomas Berger's "Little Big Man"? Great book, better than the movie which was pretty good for a movie, and ... the main character was the only survivor of Little Big Horn!

[Finny]

Wow! I learn something new every day!! {^)