Interesting articles thread

[Singu]

My suggestion for the American left is to change their choice of rhetoric. The correct objective is to fund the police, not to defund them.

They need more money, not less, to retrain their officers to use less lethal force; to buy body cameras; to hire professional psychologists to assess violent officers; and to create community outreach programs that tackle the real roots of crime, which include mental illness, drug addiction, and poverty.

The last point is crucial. The logical justification for the slogan "defund the police" is to transfer the money to civilian-led initiatives that tackle the institutional causes of criminal behaviour. But there's no reason why police officers shouldn't directly participate in this effort. If the goal is to transition the police into a paternal rather than paternalistic role, then it would be logical to integrate these programs into the police's core constitution.

And that may well be the goal of lefties who shout these divisive slogans. But that's obviously not what's conveyed when messages like this, which are easy to take out of context, are taken out of context.

I think the police is funded enough already, with $6 billion budget spent on NYPD alone, and $1 trillion spent on War on Drugs over 4 decades. To be sure, they do require redirecting of those funds.

The culprit is probably the disastrous "War on Drugs" policy, which appears to have militarized the police and elevated the status of the police by giving them qualified immunity and extraordinary rights that go far and above what they really require, which has only made them less transparent and hence less accountable and liable for human rights violations that they commit.

Here's a conservative's opinion piece on "defund the police":

Don't defund the police. Defund the war on drugs. Let cops be officers of the peace.

For us who live in the suburbs or rural areas, the police remain the protectors of our life, liberty, and property. They come to our homes when alarms go off, injuries occur, or crimes perpetrated. We are grateful for their presence and actions.

In the inner city, however, the police and the citizens have a very different relationship. Many residents resent and fear the police. And on the other side, the police frequently take their lives in their hands, responding to urban disturbances and crimes. Just a few generations ago, the city beat cops were the neighborhood's welcomed protectors, just as they still are in my Spring Garden Township community. What went wrong?

Part of the answer is that the inner-city police have become less the defenders of the individual's life, liberty, and property – officers of the peace – and more the state's law enforcement agents. First and foremost, the police have become the state's force to prosecute the drug war.

And yet, after spending $1 trillion over the four decades on the War on Drugs, there has been no measurable decrease in drug use, addiction, or overdose rates, and the land of the free and the brave now houses 25% of the world's incarcerated.

The drug war has spawned many policies infringing on our constitutionally protected individual freedoms.

The officers of the peace of old carried nightsticks and revolvers. Many urban police forces now have military hardware, including armored vehicles with mounted machine guns, grenade launchers, assault rifles, and night vision goggles.

In many cities, police have citation quotas to meet municipal financial goals, particularly harassing and burdening the poorest.

Police unions have negotiated contracts giving officers suspected of wrongdoing, rights above and beyond those afforded to ordinary citizens, making the investigation of alleged misconduct more difficult. "Qualified immunity" shields police from personal liability unless a previous court has found in a prior case involving the same facts in the same jurisdiction that a law enforcement officer had violated an individual's rights.

Wherever you may lie on the law and order spectrum, I contend that most, including our police officers, would prefer "Protect and Serve" as the primary mission of urban policing to the inherent conflict of law enforcement. But how to restore that mission?

Eliminating qualified immunity and other extraordinary rights for police suspected of wrongdoing, no-knock warrants, civil asset forfeiture, military weaponry for community police departments, and quota systems for tickets, revenues, and arrests would be appropriate and relatively uncontroversial.

Inner-city policing no longer manifests our country's foundational vision of government established to protect our "Life, Liberty, and Happiness." The immediate cause, the War on Drugs, is a symptom of a more profound and fundamental illness; nonetheless, decriminalizing narcotic abuse would end the worst of the violence and individual rights violations of the drug war. The cure ultimately lies in welfare reform, school choice, a vibrant private economy, and recovery of traditional American values. Once again, inner-city police could be the officers of the peace.

[xerx]

I think the police is funded enough already, with $6 billion budget spent on NYPD alone, and $1 trillion spent on War on Drugs over 4 decades. To be sure, they do require redirecting of those funds.

The culprit is probably the disastrous "War on Drugs" policy, which appears to have militarized the police and elevated the status of the police by giving them qualified immunity and extraordinary rights that go far and above what they really require, which has only made them less transparent and hence less accountable and liable for human rights violations that they commit.

Maybe. I'd need to think about it.