Patterico's Pontifications

3/1/2011

Dunphy on Cops Showing Solidarity with the SEIU and on Public Unions Generally

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:10 am



Jack Dunphy talks about an e-mail from his police union urging solidarity with the SEIU and Moveon.org. He first quotes the letter as describing Scott Walker’s plan as “shocking” and responds:

I must point out there is nothing particularly shocking about what Gov. Walker and the Republican majority in the Wisconsin legislature seek to accomplish, especially given that they campaigned and won election largely on their vow to curb state spending and close a looming deficit. They are merely trying to do as officeholders what they promised to do as candidates (which, on reflection, is shocking enough in itself). And it is troubling that we as police officers were being asked to endorse the lawless actions of the 14 Wisconsin state Senate Democrats who bugged out like a bunch of crooks with the cops at the door rather than allow the democratic process to unfold. Elections have consequences, I suppose, unless you can take it on the lam and prevent them.

He then continues:

There then came this paragraph:

At noon local time on Saturday, February 26, MoveOn.org will hold rallies in front of every statehouse and in every major city to stand in solidarity with the people of Wisconsin. Find a Rally to Save the American Dream near you by visiting the website and entering your zip code. You can also show your support by sending words of encouragement to Wisconsin’s workers via a special website created by the SEIU.

What? MoveOn.org? The SEIU? And they were asking cops to march in this parade? Surely this had to be some kind of elaborate Internet hoax.

And it got worse. If you dared to click on the link to find a rally, you learned that in addition to MoveOn.org and the SEIU, the events were to be sponsored by National People’s Action, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, USAction, the Daily Kos, Media Matters, and every other leftist fringe cabal this side of the Socialist Workers Party. The post concluded with a stirring exhortation: “Our brothers and sisters in Wisconsin are under attack. They need and deserve our support. The time to pull together is NOW.” They might have gone with something a bit punchier, like “Workers of the world, unite!”

It was no hoax. Would that it had been.

Read it all. One interesting part of Dunphy’s article is his support for the idea of unions for public employees:

But while I refuse to link arms with MoveOn.org, I also disagree with conservatives such as Jonah Goldberg (to whom I am indebted for opening the door to me over at National Review Online) who advocate for the elimination of public employee unions. Writing in the Los Angeles Times last Tuesday, Goldberg described private sector unions as having arisen out of the struggle between business owners and the workers from whose sweat they derived their riches and whom they exploited in the pursuit of greater profits. “It’s been said,” wrote Goldberg, “that during World War I, U.S. soldiers had better odds of surviving on the front lines than miners did in West Virginia coal mines.” Public sector workers, he says, have no similar history of oppression by their employers.

Which is true, as far as it goes, but it ignores the adversarial relationship rank-and-file police officers often have with both their own management and the city governments that employ them. True, on a typical work day we’re at little risk of a mine shaft cave-in, but we live with the fairly constant peril of getting the shaft from our bosses. Only the protections we have gained through collective bargaining prevent those bosses from making our working conditions intolerable.

And then there is the more basic, even conservative principle that labor is at bottom a commodity, one that is traded at prices determined by the market. Police officers, firefighters, teachers, and what have you should have the right to choose those who will negotiate a fair price for their labor on their behalf.

I share Dunphy’s view that public employees sometimes need protection from their bosses. But here is the problem I have with unions for public employees charged with public safety: how do you flex your muscles when the bosses ignore you? With work stoppages or slowdowns?

To be simplistic, while there are naturally advantages to any group banding together to show solidarity, I have always believed that a union’s trump card is the threat of a work stoppage. And that is the reason I don’t feel comfortable joining a union. I can’t imagine myself refusing to come to work over some labor dispute. And absent that, what leverage do I have?

I have heard of police engaging in the “blue flu” and have never respected that. It’s dishonest, and it poses threats to public safety when law enforcement is not properly staffed.

I’ll see if I can get Jack to explain here how his union gets its muscle. In the meantime, I’m pleased to have found an issue where I may be more “conservative” than he. I didn’t think it would ever happen!

50 Responses to “Dunphy on Cops Showing Solidarity with the SEIU and on Public Unions Generally”

  1. The problem isn’t public unions per se, but rather with politicians who sell out the general public in return for campaign contributions. If it weren’t for the latter, there would be no problem with the former.

    steve (369bc6)

  2. And I would say even private unions are too much. Even at the time that birthed their power they were too much.

    Sure workers should be able to choose who will negotiate for them. But an employer should be free to find different workers. At that point it becomes a matter of how difficult would it be to find and train a replacement work force. For many businesses that cost would be substantial and thus keep management at the table so long as the worker’s demands are at all reasonable. No employee should feel that they own their job, that it is theirs as a matter of right.

    Soronel Haetir (c12482)

  3. Steve; that is the crux of the problem, namely, the maintenance of power in the unholy alliance of unions and politicians. Struggling to stay relevant they adopt the heavy-handed tactics of extortion, threats of violence, violence and even murder in the case of the UMW.

    They have finally run out of other people’s money. They would reduce the rest of us to penury to maintain their high standard of living and perks. I find it precious that they accuse conservatives of being the new slave owners reducing union members to servitude. What they are really saying is that they are the carpetbaggers riding in on the coattails of dishonest pols who lie to get elected by relieving themselves on the taxpayers and calling it rain.

    They are well-advised to expect push-back if they get too carried away. Talk about tone deaf. Where unemployment is up there are many who are qualified to do their job at less cost and headache to employers and taxpayers. Nobody is irreplaceable.

    vet66 (eb4cdb)

  4. Jack seems to forget that his “boss” isn’t really his “boss”. The tax payers of whatever municipality he works in are his boss. No amount of obfuscation, deflection or disingenuousness will change that fact.

    RFN (5c3099)

  5. they retire way too early and they expect people to look up to them

    as if

    I don’t look up to cops… I think the profession attracts lazy dolts and violent yobs and more than its share of the corrupt

    happyfeet (ab5779)

  6. Jack, I support you until you choose to negotiate through the union with the appropriate government for your pay and benefits. At that time there is a problem. You are not dealing with your true employers, the citizens. You are dealing with their elected officials who’ve been elected based on money you paid in union dues. That presents a conflict of interest.

    Two factors could mitigate this somewhat, one would be Right to Work laws, the other might be subjecting unions to the Sherman Antitrust statutes. One or both of these are needed to level the playing field between employer and union.

    Absent that, negotiating for working conditions and safety considerations is “a really good thing.” Negotiating for pay and benefits is “a really bad thing.”

    {^_^}

    jdow (98e9d7)

  7. Pat,

    I’ve always been pro union, however, thats it – anyone can belong to anything

    I dont think that any group has a right to exert colective bargaining over non group members

    I dont think an employer has any obigation to employ anyone from a union unles that employer feels its in their best interest

    Striking workers are considered to quit their jobs and should not get to collect unemployment

    EricPWJohnson (06f365)

  8. This one is a lot more complicated that all the sound bites from either side indicate. And there’s the problem. But here’s a sound bite that pretty much covers it. “When you don’t honor the big rules you get the little rules.” When the boss treats employees like “Bodies” not human beings he/she is going to have problems. And when the boss is a real live human being and treats his employees like real live human beings and a percentage of them take advantage the boss has a problem. It’s a no win for supervision, or for people who are willing to take responsibility.

    glenn (2a84e9)

  9. Good analysis. I am also conflicted over the value of a public employees union but I do see some value to them in principle. Slow-downs and strikes are unconscionable but there is the advantage of pooling resources to represent an employee who has a legitimate grievance based on transfers, working conditions, etc.
    I am not comfortable with the current hue and cry over “pension reform” which really sounds like reducing pensions which were negotiated 30 years ago and relied upon by workers in giving up more lucrative private employment.

    Roberta (f57a20)

  10. glenn,

    Its not the “workers” company.

    Workers have a free choice to ply their skills and services for any employer that they want.

    When “employees” who have no capital at risk – no intellectual property in play who “think” they are owed something more than they agreed to, this is when they should find work elsewhere.

    Same for public service employees they can go anywhere they want, they have no obligation to stay in a position, however to hold taxpayers hostage to their demands or they wont perform their services that they agreed to be paid for – therein lies the problem at the very core – strikes are not American unless the strikers can be fired without cause – then they take the risks

    EricPWJohnson (06f365)

  11. And now we have gays running through traffic in NY the union stronghold of america.

    DohBiden (984d23)

  12. I agree with Glenn. If people would obey the Golden Rule and treat others as they would like to be treated then nit-picking over 5 minutes on the clock, etc. would not be “a federal case”.

    Yes, citizens are the ultimate “boss” or “employer” of police and fire-fighters, but they are not the ones who have power to fire individuals to cover for themselves, etc.

    My grandfather was a coal miner in SE Kentucky bfore and after WWI. He died before I was old enough to know enough to ask him about history, but my father’s point of view- which I assume reflected his- is “a pox on all their houses”, the owners of the mines (even/especially if they became philanthropists like Carnegie) and the union bosses. People in authority are always prone to use that authority to care for themselves first.

    Sure there are a lot of cops “on the beat” who get a rush out of being in power over people, etc., which means to be a really good cop on the beat and stay they for any length of time means you need to be Mother Theresa or a masochist. There are agitators (sometimes called “community organizers”) always willing to make a name for themselves and garner power by blaming others for the problems of the city. And there are always higher ups in the city administration and police dept, etc. willing to sell out an underling to save their own butts.

    Journalists ought to remember that giving a false report about someone is on the same list as murdering people, because ultimately it brings the same amount of chaos in society. I don’t know of any single news article that makes clear exactly what it is that Walker is proposing and why, and rational arguments against it. On one end of the spectrum I understand and agree 100% that the incestuous relationship between unions, dem politicians, and money needs to be interrupted. (As it would if it was Repub pols. as well). The power of unions to line their own pockets by forcing the use of a related company such as health insurance also must be broken. One does not hear these points unless listening to Gov. Walker or a conservative journalist. The MSM is so over the top against Walker I don’t know if they have any truly valid criticisms or not.

    A central issue is who is concerned about the welfare of the state, the voters, the taxpayers. Walker and others would say they are and say that is why they were elected, chosen by the public to do what they are doing because this is what they said they would do. Others want to make the case that Walker is pulling a surprise, that what he campaigned on and what he is doing now are two different things. Obviously that happens so much you can say it and have people believe you even if there are no facts to back it up. Trying to judge the public’s will at the moment is nigh unto impossible the way questions are asked. It’s like asking people, “Do you want Filet Mignon or rotten hamburger for dinner?” The obvious answer is Filet Mignon. But if you add the possibility of rice and beans for $2.00/person and the reality of paying $20/person for the Filet, all of the sudden the answers are different.

    MD (from UW-Madison) in Philly (3d3f72)

  13. I think governor Chris Christie got it exactly right when he told a complaining teacher “you don’t have to work for us.” If you are being treated unfairly in the market, you can offer your services elsewhere where they will be compensated the way they “should” be.

    The truth is that these people are at the top of the pay scale and there isn’t a better “fairer” deal elsewhere. My response is unions are not necessary. If the public that pays the taxes doesn’t pay them what they want, they are free to try to get more elsewhere.

    Look at the Los Angeles School system in which obvious loser teachers keep their jobs because the city can’t fire them. The unions have a big part of the responsibility for that. The teachers don’t have anything to fear for poor performance and the whole system loses a lot of efficiency and children aren’t given the education we want them to have.

    People also forget that people choose these careers in the first place. No one forced these people to become teachers in the first place. And no one is forcing them to stay being a teacher. I was trained as a software engineer, and nobody was obligated to keep me as an employee, and I would get laid off or quit because I never fit in for a variety of reasons. I primarily work in law now specializing in telemarketing law and consumer protection which is much better suited to my personality. I didn’t need a union to protect me, I just needed to have incentive to find a way to deliver value to have the life style I want. So I have no sympathy for the unions or the workers who keep them running.

    Jeff M (0204be)

  14. Aren’t civil service laws designed to protect public employees from “getting the shaft from” their bosses?

    Theo (49acfa)

  15. Civil Service ! Civil Service ! Civil Service ! Civil Service ! Civil Service !

    Why are we not talking about the fact that these public employees are protected by Civil Service rules established in the 1880s ?

    Police and firefighters (my son is one) have hazardous occupations and get more sympathy from me. I had the experience of being on the Planning Commission for the city of Mission Viejo for a few years. It was quite an experience as I was also involved with a reform group called The Committee for Integrity in Government.

    If you read that article, you will note that, in 2005, the Committee broke up and ceased operations. The reason was that the reform candidates we supported, and who defeated the corrupt incumbents, took only a year to become a fair imitation of the people they had defeated. The lure of making new friends and getting the attention of people in politics outside the city turned their heads just as certainly as a large contribution from the SEIU would do.

    It is tough to reform politics. The present situation in the country, and in many of the states, makes reform more viable as a cause but it is still tough, as we see in Wisconsin. The CIG has begun work again as interest and the enthusiasm of the tea parties brought back the willingness to get out and organize. The pessimism of 2005 is still around but the necessity of change has overtaken it.

    Mike K (8f3f19)

  16. “…I have always believed that a union’s trump card is the threat of a work stoppage.”

    I believe the greater problem is the necessary corollary to this statement, that the unions must be able to compel ALL employees of a particular business or agency to belong to the union and accept their representation in negotiation. Without that the union could not meaningfully strike even if is perfectly legal. If employees are not FORCED to join, then the union becomes a true “free association” of like minded people.

    I’d have no problem with such a group, whether they are public or private employees. But that’s not what they want. Jack Dunphy, whom I admire, wants to force anyone who works for the police department to be a part of his union. That’s a non-starter to anyone who loves liberty and values respects his own ability to decide for himself.

    Gesundheit (d7ea47)

  17. Comment by Mike K

    Why did the Committee not work to boot out the “once-reformers”? Discouragement? Just worn out? I certainly can understand both of those. I guess one could hope that after a few cycles of finding new reformers the candidates would get the idea that the public meant it.

    Maintaining integrity is a non-stop process, and we would prefer to think (self included) that an occasional holding to account is all that is necessary.

    MD (from UW-Madison) in Philly (3d3f72)

  18. I share Dunphy’s view that public employees sometimes need protection from their bosses.

    Yet these are the same groups of people who think *we* need their bosses to be involved in every aspect of our lives.

    I would have less of a problem with the whole concept if these unions (and protest sponsors) were filled with people skeptical of the government’s ability to run things well.

    MayBee (081489)

  19. I should say – run things well and impart “fairness” into our lives.

    MayBee (081489)

  20. I’m confused, I thought that Governor Walker’s plan did not affect Fire and Police unions, just other PEUs. Also, I believe it is illegal for PEUs to strike. It would be nice if the MSM would do their job and tell us what actually is in Governor Walker’s plan instead of union talking points. Maybe that’s just asking too much.

    Tanny O'Haley (12193c)

  21. I’ll agree that, sometimes, public-sector unions are needed.

    But I think Jack is assuming that the adversarial relationship his department “enjoys” is the norm. I think for most, the LAPD’s experience is atypical.

    And it certainly isn’t true for sanitation workers, firefighters, teachers, general employees (clerks, and other assorted office drones), etc.

    Now, if the unions would like to stop donating money to – and doing work for – political parties, I wouldn’t be so annoyed. But the fact that the highest contributor to the Dem party for the last election in Wisconsin was the teacher’s union leaves me concerned that there is a conflict of interest when the people who give you money to get elected (and stay elected) are the people you’re supposed to say “no” to when it comes contract-negotiation time.

    Scott Jacobs (218307)

  22. Comment by Tanny O’Haley

    It is my understanding that police and firefighters are left out too, but apparently union-union bonds are thicker then that.

    Maybe that’s just asking too much.
    Maybe?? – Are you feeling OK? Perhaps you need to check your temperature.

    MD in Philly (3d3f72)

  23. they retire way too early and they expect people to look up to them

    as if

    I don’t look up to cops… I think the profession attracts lazy dolts and violent yobs and more than its share of the corrupt

    Comment by happyfeet — 3/1/2011 @ 8:23 am

    happyfeet, I’m sure that your comments are well reasoned and have some factual basis. Would you care to share whatever that might be?

    labcatcher (7c7733)

  24. no

    happyfeet (a55ba0)

  25. Clarisse asked Montag if it was true that once Firemen fought fires instead of burning books.

    The Bradbury movie, Fahrenheit 451, takes place in the future at a time when a hedonistic anti-intellectual America has abandoned introspection and self-awareness. Books are illegal and anyone caught reading or possessing one is confined to a mental hospital while firemen burn the books for the good of humanity.

    ropelight (06bcb2)

  26. Why did the Committee not work to boot out the “once-reformers”? Discouragement? Just worn out?

    One issue is that we had recruited those candidates. One of them had made all sorts of promises that he never intended to keep. Another was a Marine wife who had served on the school board and PTA and who turned out to be just a ditz. She would decided issues, local issues but some that cost neighbors thousands of dollars, on the basis of whether a party to the dispute attended her church.

    It was terribly difficult to oust entrenched incumbents. In local elections, name recognition is everything since voters are not very motivated and tend to show up based on other matters on the ballot. We had put out superhuman efforts, like having 100 housewives picketing on all the major traffic intersections ay 7 in the morning every weekday for weeks before the election. The same people would be out there for the tea party rallies, which I attended and photographed.

    Now, I have to get back to Rumsfeld’s book.

    Mike K (8f3f19)

  27. News outlets in this area reported this morning that the police department in Bell, CA had a “baseball game” in which officers were given different rankings (Single, double, triple, home run) based on the number of tickets they issued to citizens in an effort to raise revenue.

    I really appreciate cops, but there are certainly some number of them who can be criticized.

    MayBee (081489)

  28. I heart MayBee. And kmart hearts underage non-consensual goats.

    JD (2028b1)

  29. Blue Flu: The result of what are considered overbearing work-rules.

    Drive-by Policing: The result of hyper-accountability in work-place regulations.

    Neither are citizen-friendly.

    Is it time to seriously consider a return to the “Spoils System”?

    AD-RtR/OS! (b8ab92)

  30. In all these discussions about unions – and I am 100% opposed to public employee unions where membership is required for employment – never forget Pournelle’s Iron Law of Bureaucracy which states that…

    “…in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people: those who work to further the actual goals of the organization, and those who work for the organization itself. Examples in education would be teachers who work and sacrifice to teach children, vs. union representative who work to protect any teacher including the most incompetent. The Iron Law states that in all cases, the second type of person will always gain control of the organization, and will always write the rules under which the organization functions.”

    Horatio (55069c)

  31. ____________________________________

    I’m pleased to have found an issue where I may be more “conservative” than he.

    While Jack makes a good point, in the context of 2011 — when the public sector and its employees (and unions) are running circles around the private sector and the average taxpayer/citizen — I have to say that what Wisconsin’s governor is attempting to do is a necessary and long overdue correction.

    Beyond that, when it comes to one’s personal sense of well-being, including the part that involves income, a lot of us are swayed by a bit of greed and the trap of “limousine liberalism”—-ie, behavior symbolized by the people of Greece who, based on opinion polls, voiced great do-gooder support for that country’s public-sector strikers not long ago, but who also are notorious for bending over backwards to avoid paying taxes.

    Mark (411533)

  32. Comment by MD in Philly

    Maybe that’s just asking too much.
    Maybe?? – Are you feeling OK? Perhaps you need to check your temperature.

    No temperature, just feeling discouraged because of a long term injury in my shoulder and tremor in my hand. Surgery is not available to fix my problem and acupuncture has helped a little, it’s still a problem. I’d like to get back to work. I liked my work. I’m sorry it came out in my comment. Here’s something more positive. It’s not asking too much for the MSM to take a little pride in their work and do their job and tell us what actually is in Governor Walker’s plan instead of union talking points.

    How’s that?

    Tanny O'Haley (12193c)

  33. Tanny–the police unions are opposed to Walker’s plan because there is no reason it can’t be applied to them in the future. The only stated rationale I’ve heard from Walker’s side to explain why the reforms exclude the police and firefighter unions is an explicit reference to the possibility of strikes–that we can afford a strike by teachers, but not by police and firemen.

    I do have two questions directed to Jack Dunphy:

    1)Why should we respect police unions when the biggest obstacle to getting rid of badly behaving cops is the unions, which seem to reflexively go to bat for any cop accused of misbehavior, and seem to almost always win in any situation short of the bad cop actually being convicted of a crime. It may actually be harder to get rid of a bad cop than it is to get rid of a bad teacher, which is hard enough.

    2)Police are the only group of people who are legally empowered to commit violence, even lethal violence, against others, at their own discretion and generally with little fear of repercussions, so long as they can justify it after the fact to their superiors. (Ordinary people can kill in self defense, of course, but have to justify it to strangers–unbiased (hopefully) investigators, prosecutors, perhaps a grand jury and ultimately a jury of their peers. Police need only justify themselves to their bosses and other police.)
    In light of that, shouldn’t we treat them more strictly than we do other public employees, not less strictly?

    kishnevi (4e170d)

  34. I agree with Dunphy. And I have no problem with police, fire, teachers and sanitation personnel organizing. Porblem is thet vast morass of government bureaucrats at all levels who have been allowed to unionize for no good reason other than helping organized labor and the left. There’s a vast social service and back office staff who should be employees at will and never allowed to unionize. This is the problem in NY; inexpicably Bloomberg threatens layoffs of the big 4 above, yet welfare and social services agencies grow unabated.Nobody is going to miss a clerk, but they will miss those needed services.

    As those to rip cops; let us all know when someone shoots bullets at you at work, or when you are required to work nights and weekends regularly, or have to subdue a some sleazy criminal. Also let us know when some snotnose unshowered trustafarian wearing a “Free Mumia” shirt shows up at your officw and tries to bait you into punching him.

    Bugg (9e308e)

  35. You don’t have to rip on cops to be opposed to public sector unions.

    You want the short easy version of why public sector unions are *wrong* and incompatible with a republican form of government? It’s this:

    Governments, as a type of organization, are unique in one way – they are able to *compel* their “customers” to pay whatever they require through taxes. They are a monopoly without any competitor in the services they provide. Therefore, if a public sector union is able to coerce the government into granting a higher level of benefits, they are effectively forcing their fellow citizens to pay what they desire.

    In other words, public sector unions work against the democratic process. They are an unequal player in the labor market.

    Gesundheit (aab7c6)

  36. On one level I want to tell Jack that everyone has a tyrant boss experience… and maybe now is the time for younger officers to take a little more take home pay but less benefits in return for a different environment.
    Municipalities that are hard pressed should be cutting the ties with their losers and recruiting the best from other agencies…. oh. wait. that is how the private sector works.

    Well, anyway, police are asked to do a tough job and need protection from the Jesse Jacksons of the world. They need a legal team, they need spokespeople… otherwise individual cops would be up against 17 activist “witnesses” who saw him/her bump a minority kid with his flashlight and then be facing jail time.
    Cops need protection.
    But on pay, cop labor is a commodity. And commodity prices do not always rise in a straight trajectory. Sometimes the prices need to revisit previous lows and reset according to the market.
    The unions just want the trajectory to run upwards forever.

    The public, of course, wants to be protected and served. And sometimes that means.. simply.. protect the golden goose. Serve it by not taking too much.

    The unions always pull out the “HERO” card when it comes to Police and Firefighters. But if we are buying “heroes”… what do we get? If I think life is priceless, then we can only afford one dual purpose firefighter/cop.
    Maybe we need just out of Afghanistan/Iraq heroes that will start out for $60K?

    I am also troubled by anecdotal accounts of union beholding police turning a blind eye to violence done by their other union brethren upon protesting non union taxpayers…. it is unconscionable for police to take sides based on union affiliation

    SteveG (cc5dc9)

  37. Ahhh, but without the public sector unions, public employees would be at the mercy of governments being able to “compel” their employees to work at whatever wages government was willing to set. There has to be a happy medium between the not so distant past where Public Employees were underpaid, and today where they don’t care if they bankrupt the government they work for.

    The Public Employee unions have gotten away with what they have because politicians have not been willing to do their jobs as legislators, but rather have used their Office as their re-election campaign HQs. Who wants to be seen as soft on crime, or not supporting a good education for kids?

    Instead of asking what the benefits AND drawbacks of wage and benefit negotiations were, politicians went for the easy answer, the one that would get them votes. And never looking down the road to where what they promised could bring us.

    So, we are left with memes where safety employees are willing given hero worship; bad teachers are overlooked, and often impossible to get rid of; unions are given raises and benefits without looking at the bottom line; and politicians are re-elected time after time on a promise to get it right the next time.

    flicka47 (0ade53)

  38. Comment by Tanny O’Haley —

    I’m sorry for your situation, and I apologize for coming across as critical of your comment. In one way, of course it is not too much to ask the MSM to have a little pride in their work and give some adequate news coverage and clarify the facts. But in another way, it does not seem to be common for that to happen anymore.

    Comment by kishnevi
    Police are the only group of people who are legally empowered to commit violence, even lethal violence, against others, at their own discretion and generally with little fear of repercussions, so long as they can justify it after the fact to their superiors. (

    kishnevi- I don’t know if you personally know any police officers, but the idea that they have little fear over repercussions of their actions does not match my experience (with a son who is a Philly cop). There is concern in the back of their mind all of the time when they interact with somebody on the street. The job of Internal Affairs is to not make it easy to just walk away from a complaint, even if you’re not sure who the complaint came from. Every time someone is arrested there are on-lookers ready to accuse the police of something, sometimes making an officer hesitate using an appropriate amount of force.

    In some ways police do need to be held to a “higher standard”, but so should the public. If you respect a police officer and cooperate there should be zero tolerance for “unnecessary roughness”; on the other hand, once a suspect becomes uncooperative they should expect to be made to be cooperative very quickly and not complain about it.

    MD (from UW-Madison) in Philly (3d3f72)

  39. “cooperative”?

    They need to stop yelling “stop resisting” at you when you are just flinching from getting beat with tools designed to bring the hurt

    SteveG (cc5dc9)

  40. I don’t know if you personally know any police officers, but the idea that they have little fear over repercussions of their actions does not match my experience (with a son who is a Philly cop). There is concern in the back of their mind all of the time when they interact with somebody on the street. The job of Internal Affairs is to not make it easy to just walk away from a complaint, even if you’re not sure who the complaint came from. Every time someone is arrested there are on-lookers ready to accuse the police of something, sometimes making an officer hesitate using an appropriate amount of force.

    Yeah, but when was the last time someone didn’t get convicted of “resisting arrest”, or for “striking a peace officer” when they didn’t?

    The fact is that juries, far more often than not, side with a testifying cop simply because they are a cop. We’re conditioned to accept what they say at face value.

    Scott Jacobs (d027b8)

  41. Scott

    I’ve always gone into debt to buy good representation.
    Once a bike cop pushed me into his partner, who then tripped over his own bike. Tore his shorts and got an owwie scrape on his knee. Paramedics came, I called him a pussy. I wasn’t trying to resist, and I didn’t “strike” anyone. I bounced off the whiner that fell lie as if he was struck by Thor

    $10000.

    Charges dropped.

    I don’t know how much it’d be today… and I have to disclose that in a small town I went to grade school, jr hi and hi school with two night shift LT’s as well as some people in the DA’s office.

    I’d have to toss out Sheen $$$ to get out of it in Aspen

    SteveG (cc5dc9)

  42. MD–Didn’t mean to be disrespectful to your son or any other specific police officer!
    But I wasn’t thinking of community activists going after a police officer because he messed up Antwan’s dreadlocks. I’m thinking of those cases where police officers used lethal force. Most of the time, it seems as if the after the fact investigations either clear the officer involved, or at least refuse to blame him. Katherine Johnston type cases are relatively rare (by which I mean punishment of the officers involved is rare), and part of the reason the officers were punished derived the consistent disregard of law and individual rights by the unit involved in that shooting–conduct which we can hope is not widespread among other police departments.

    What it boils down to is that a cop’s job includes the power to shoot you, and that power alone should mean greater scrutiny and stricter limits.

    on the other hand, once a suspect becomes uncooperative they should expect to be made to be cooperative very quickly and not complain about it.
    The problem is that some cops have a very flexible definition of ‘uncooperative’.

    kishnevi (90434f)

  43. but it ignores the adversarial relationship rank-and-file police officers often have with both their own management and the city governments that employ them.

    If you don’t like how your boss is treating you, quit and get another job like the rest of us have to do.

    j curtis (76f478)

  44. I support the idea of law enforcement but I have been pretty disappointed with many of the actual police officers I have interacted with. If you call them for some reason, they act like they are doing you a favor for even showing up, then go on to tell you there is nothing they can do for you. Pretty standard union hack behavior.

    If they pull you over, they tend to be rude for no real reason. Their value is really limited to providing a minor deterrent to certain types of crime. Alot of their time is spent hassling law-abiding citizens over minor matters. Should you ever have a confrontation with a violent criminal, you better be armed because all the police can do is analyze the crime scene once you are dead.

    That is not their fault per se, they can’t know when a crime is going to occur. But we should not overestimate their effectiveness and put them in some privileged category immune from criticism or market forces in regard to their wages and compensation.

    Ken Royall (67885e)

  45. Comment by MD (from UW-Madison) in Philly — I did not take your comment as critical, it was a call for me to think about what I wrote. I should expect more from the MSM.

    Thank you.

    Tanny O'Haley (12193c)

  46. Jack, you really must get word of these things out BEFORE the demonstration. Then it would be possible for us to get out there with a posters containing only the word “SHAME” in big letters and “on you” in small letters. Counter demonstrations do matter.

    {^_^}

    jdow (98e9d7)

  47. In this thread I see cops being accused of being power hungry, killers, thugs, lazy union hacks as well as stupid and corrupt people who retire too early.

    The justifications or reasons (if any) given for all these generalizations mostly seem to be specific incidents that seem to me to best describe the one or two officers involved not cops in general.

    I can’t think of profession that has more people that know more about how it should be done than the professionals that actually do it, than police work. It seems that training and experience are worthless when someone wants to opine about what a cop did in a specific incident even though they weren’t there and just read about it in the newspaper. That might even include police administrations who tend to view things the way that brings them the least heat from the press and their liberal political masters.

    People complain an Officer tells them that there is nothing that the police department, or the Officer who is there, can do for you. That does not make them a union hack or lazy. It makes them someone who knows what his job is and what he can and can’t do, legally.

    If you know of a corrupt cop or cops and don’t want to go the agency’s Internal Affairs unit, let the local D.A. know, if you don’t trust the D.A. or believe that they are in cahoots with the cops, go to the State Investigators or the FBI.

    Cops have no business being in demonstrations as demonstrators. They should not strike or blue flue. They do need the unions to be able to afford decent legal representation (Police unions generally have attorneys on retainer or available) for the inevitable lawsuits that come with proactive police work.

    Retiring too early? The body gets broken and worn out after 30+ years of chasing, fighting and controlling bad guys. Most working cops probably get in more fights in a career than pro boxers and those fights have no rules, they are win or else.

    labcatcher (7c7733)

  48. Labcatcher,

    While I am always polite to and give the benefit of the doubt to law enforcement officers, I have way too many interactions with people who are on the force who should have been weeded out in the selection process.

    Background: I live with a Sheriff’s department employee. I spend a lot of time with deputies and police officers socially and at the gun range. My goddaughter is a police dispatcher.

    Of all the people I know, the young deputies and officers are the ones I find abusing the rules most. Driving drunk, beating up people then claiming “resisting” or “assault” when the only punches thrown were by the officers. These are things that some of them routinely brag about doing.

    Some of them are the most dishonest people I know. One you man would lie to your face about something you caught him doing red handed. Even when there was no reason to lie, he would. Yet he could pass the lie detector tests, answer all psychological tests, etc. All his coworkers know this about him, yet he is still employed and driving a patrol car. His chain of command should have already canned him. His coworkers should have been reporting his misdeeds. His union should not be defending him.

    The vast majority of the officers I know are honorable people and have my utmost respect. The idea that officers, who know about incidents or people like the ones listed, above allow them to continue, I find thoroughly disheartening.

    Jay H Curtis (8f6541)

  49. Jay,

    Sounds to me like you have a pretty awful Sheriff who is not doing what he needs to do to control this department. Have you brought any of these issues to the attention of someone of some agency that can do something about it?

    Did you witness these assaults as a ridealong, or is your knowledge second hand? You will need facts, not hearsay to get the action you seem to want.

    labcatcher (7c7733)

  50. labcatcher,

    Most of these incidents I hear about because the ones who claimed to be involved brag about their exploits. So all I have is hearsay. But the stories seemed to be consistent between the people who are bragging.

    Don’t get me wrong, though, these incidents are not common. I was making the distinction that the bad apples I have come across mostly seem to be the young ones and that those occasional bad apples seem to get away with whatever they are doing for a very long time. The ones I know of who are no longer officers left the force without being publicly chastised. Whether or not they were forced out, I don’t know.

    Jay H Curtis (8f6541)


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