are there genuine times when cops cross the line? sure . however they represent a small percentage of the times great outrage is feigned or attempted.
some is authority/father issues/ a lot has to do with folks who never got over losing that bag of primo bud. its a shame those kinda folks dilute and diminish the truly valid important cases. in much the same way a false claim of rape or abuse harms the cases of the legitimate ones. i dare say i've had my share and part of a couple other guys share of police interaction and mine all came from doing the crime not from following the oracle balko's semi factual work. one of the worst casualties of the "wod" has been the relationship betweeen cops and noncops/"victimless criminals"
I'd sign on to
most of that, including the bit about authority issues. Lotsa folks can't abide being told what to do, no matter the circumstances.
For my own part, my "authority issues" came after my time in the service and their nature has nothing to do with resentment over being told what to do. I figure that pretty much everyone on Earth answers to someone: management, customers, family, etc. There are very, very few who don't. Maybe solitary subsistence farmers/hunters. And many are in positions of authority to direct others' actions. Also, most folks wear some sort of uniform. Sometimes it is called "business casual," sometimes "work clothes" or such.
Again, my authority issues are a bit different. See, I had the honor of working under the authority of some terrific men. Very high quality folks who earn much less than the average LEO. The sort of folks who inspired confidence in their abilities and that you wouldn't get killed due to their dumbassery or malfeasance. They may have had rank, but they earned their authority the hard way.
Most LEOs don't measure up(0).
Most are truly lesser men and it doesn't take long to figure it out. Yet, most of these lesser men act as if they had
earned the authority the claim rather than merely
borrowing it from the state & the citizenry. When it comes down to it, I am not surprised when lesser men abuse their authority. I see many of them kinda like soft-headed children running around with chain saws: amoral and not too bright, but dangerous, nonetheless. Best to not come to their attention.
Where I differ is that I think it occurs much more often than you acknowledge. The vast majority of the time, it happens to dirt bags nobody cares about, not even other dirt bags. Only the most egregious/outrageous ever see the light of day and most times even those are discounted, due to the fact that the LEOs are sticking it to---you guessed it--a dirt bag with a record.
The big stinks are caused when LEOs treat regular, decent, taxpaying folk like they are used to treating dirt bags. The LEOs are all sorts of surprised by the reaction, since that is how they treat any and all that come their way. Their question seems to be, "Why should this person get privileged treatment?"
We hear from LEO-excusing apologists "What do you expect to happen?" if one doesn't grovel in the face of LEO authority. "He was lucky he didn't have the crap beat out of him even more." That is, IMO, the counsel of toadies to LEOs and LEO authority.
(0) A USAF buddy in jump school had the same issue after he completed SF Scuba before jump school. He thought the Black Hats a bunch of ridiculous puffed up jokes after Scuba. In his case, he had trouble hiding it.
An ad hominem if I ever heard one.
I'd have to agree, though the accusation of ad hominem does not undermine the validity of the charge.
Stealing someone's property by means of authority is still stealing, from a
moral standpoint. Doesn't matter if it a bag of buds, cash a man was to use to purchase material for his business, or the destruction caused by a "dynamic" raid when a knock, a warrant, and an open door would have sufficed.
Folks
should get angry over theft and folks
should be suspicious of authority held by those in government. The Founders sure were.
