How do we end the police state?

[Scheavo]

https://reason.com/blog/2011/06/08/no-really-swat-team-raids-hous

No Really: SWAT Team Raids House at 6 AM and Handcuffs Father of Three Young Kids to Execute a Dept. of Education Search Warrant for Estranged Wife's Defaulted Student Loans

Matt Welch | June 8, 2011

When will someone realize there's a popular politics to be had AGAINST this kind of shit?I know Mike Riggs just mentioned it in the morning links, but if this story isn't a wake-up call about the militarization of police and criminalization of everything, then I'm afraid the patient is even deader than the Fourth Amendment. Read this, and weep for what your country has become:

    STOCKTON, CA - Kenneth Wright does not have a criminal record and he had no reason to believe a S.W.A.T team would be breaking down his door at 6 a.m. on Tuesday.

    "I look out of my window and I see 15 police officers," Wright said.

    Wright came downstairs in his boxer shorts as a S.W.A.T team barged through his front door. Wright said an officer grabbed him by the neck and led him outside on his front lawn.

    "He had his knee on my back and I had no idea why they were there," Wright said.

    According to Wright, officers also woke his three young children ages 3, 7, and 11 and put them in a Stockton police patrol car with him. Officers then searched his house.

    As it turned out, the person law enforcement was looking for was not there - Wright's estranged wife.

    "They put me in handcuffs in that hot patrol car for six hours, traumatizing my kids," Wright said. [...]

    The U.S. Department of Education issued the search and called in the S.W.A.T for his wife's defaulted student loans.
....

Think its fair to say a lot of this started after 9/11, and with the Patriot Act. But, how do you actually put an end to this? This is hardly the first story, I've heard quite a few sickening stories over the years - but this one really does seem to be the most clear example of just how fucked up our country is becoming.

[rumborak]

reason.com is known to put heavy anti-govt spins on everything. I will need to see another report of the story.

rumborak

[orcus116]

A lot of other new sites I'm seeing stem from one news source. I'm skeptical.

[Dublagent66]

Land of the free, home of the brave.   

[El Barto]

Yeah, the militarization of LEA has really bugged me for a while.  I think we're all supposed to be gradually acclimating to overwhelming force being the norm for police activities.  A couple of years ago, there were two different TV shows being produced about SWAT teams being filmed around here; one of which was just called Dallas SWAT!  They seemed to exist solely to glamorize the whole thing.  (I shit you not, on the first episode they flashbanged a car in a fast food parking lot!)  One of the things that's striking is that every town has a SWAT team now, and in some cases several.  The county commissioners here recently cracked down on the constables, and one of the issues was that every constable precinct had developed their own SWAT team, with no mandate whatsoever.

As for how we end it, we don't.  Half of the idiot populace of this country thinks it's just swell that we live in a police state.  You probably have the right idea, which is to stay as far off the grid as possible.  

Also,  personally, I don't see this as 911 related.  That's more a stripping away of constitutional safeguards.  

reason.com is known to put heavy anti-govt spins on everything. I will need to see another report of the story.

rumborak

Felony warrant raids have become the norm now, Rumbo.  That's just one example.  Where it used to be that serving a warrant was two guys knocking on the door, with SWAT only being used for seriously dangerous situations, the overwhelming force strategy is almost always employed now.

[rumborak]

A lot of other new sites I'm seeing stem from one news source. I'm skeptical.

Not only that, the wording is the exact same thing in every article.

rumborak

[Scheavo]

A lot of other new sites I'm seeing stem from one news source. I'm skeptical.

Not only that, the wording is the exact same thing in every article.

rumborak

That's because they copy/paste the same story. This happens all the time, it doesn't make the story a fabrication, it makes people lazy.

Aside from that, this was simply the latest story that inspired me to ask this question. Story aside, you cant deny that American society has become more and more militarized, and how at some point we started to assume the police officer has some moral authority / high ground, whereas the accused citizen must be wrong.

[lordxizor]

The only way this ends is when the majority of Americans are against it. The sad reality is that it seems like most Anerican's attitudes these days are that they ahve nothing to hide and therefore are willing to give up some rights in this area to catch the bad guys.

[Scheavo]

The only way this ends is when the majority of Americans are against it. The sad reality is that it seems like most Anerican's attitudes these days are that they ahve nothing to hide and therefore are willing to give up some rights in this area to catch the bad guys.

True, and I think it goes farther than that - with facebook, a lot of people just willingly throw away much of their privacy, and then carry around a tracking device in their pocket.

[MetalMike06]

The funny thing is that that's often an argument some people use in support of more surveillance; "well, you give up all your information on facebook anyway - what's wrong with the government seeing it?"

[PowerSlave]

An update of sorts:

https://www.news10.net/news/article/141108/2/Questions-surround-feds-raid-of-Stockton-home

Found it while doing my nightly look at the FARK politics tab.

[Scheavo]

I'm rather dismayed at the amount of skepticism being accepted at how change is not possible. I don't think change is easy, and I think the way our system is set up now makes it extremely hard to reach people to even convince them change is needed - but skepticism and pessimism are self-fulfilling prophecies. The easiest way to make sure nothing will change is to think that change isn't possible.

Or will it just take too much time? Does the American empire need to fully collapse before anything can be rebuilt out of the rotten carcass that it is?

[lordxizor]

Does the American empire need to fully collapse before anything can be rebuilt out of the rotten carcass that it is?

I sure hope not, but sometimes it seems like it.

[El Barto]

Does the American empire need to fully collapse before anything can be rebuilt out of the rotten carcass that it is?

I sure hope not, but sometimes it seems like it.

Judging from previous empires, yes, it does.  Human nature is a pretty simple thing to exploit, and we learned that art thousands of years ago.  The current system exploits it [quite well, at times] to maintain the status quo, and I don't see that changing anytime soon. 

[Scheavo]

Does the American empire need to fully collapse before anything can be rebuilt out of the rotten carcass that it is?

I sure hope not, but sometimes it seems like it.

Judging from previous empires, yes, it does.  Human nature is a pretty simple thing to exploit, and we learned that art thousands of years ago.  The current system exploits it [quite well, at times] to maintain the status quo, and I don't see that changing anytime soon.  

Then how do we expediate that process? Without violence? What will occur which actually means the end of the empire? China is going to overtake our economy in 2016, or so I read - will that end it?

[El Barto]

I actually started a thread a while back about what form the demise of the American empire would take.  I honestly have no idea how it'll work out.  We don't actually have Visigoths hanging around outside the gates to expedite things along. 

For Americans to instigate change, we'd have to see a shift from the passive oppression we've got now, to a very active one, and even then it would take quite some time for people to rally.  I see a lot of similarities between us and Iran, and even though they're slowly creeping to that more active oppression,  it still hasn't reached a point of critical mass, yet.  I suspect some token reforms would probably add 20 more years onto their regime.  As long as the shift to totalitarianism happens gradually and with plausible justification, it will continue to be allowed.

Another problem is that as fucked up as it's become, most people still think our system is the greatest one ever conceived, so convincing them that we need to start completely from scratch just isn't going to happen.  Try suggesting to someone that we need to switch to a parliamentary system--LIKE THE FRENCH-- and see how it goes.   

[lordxizor]

That is another issue. Suggesting that America do anything like another country, god forbid a European one, and a good chunk of the population will instantly be against it. For whatever reason, everything we do has to be uniquely American.

[7StringedBeast]

That is another issue. Suggesting that America do anything like another country, god forbid a European one, and a good chunk of the population will instantly be against it. For whatever reason, everything we do has to be uniquely American.

The French have their own messes and problems.  The grass is always greener right?

[El Barto]

An update of sorts:

https://www.news10.net/news/article/141108/2/Questions-surround-feds-raid-of-Stockton-home

Found it while doing my nightly look at the FARK politics tab.

I didn't see this the first time through.  Holy Shit!  The DoE has there own SWAT team now.  This is exactly what I was saying about every LEA adopting militarization practices. 

[rumborak]

Hamilton said the search was not related to student loans in default as reported in the local media.  

Assuming the truth of this statement, there's the first part that was misreported. I'm not defending anybody here, but a big part of the whole emotional rage was based on that this was for a student loan default. Which it was not.
I think a *much* bigger issue is that this piece of news was copied and pasted across news stations, without any of them checking any of the details. Especially FOX News once again proved their lackadaisical approach to truth in news.

rumborak

[William Wallace]

How do we end the police state, Scheavo? We increase it's funding through taxation and give it more authority over more aspects of our daily lives. 

Seriously, nothing will change until a greater number of people, especially the "it'll never happen here" people, begin to experience the repercussions of law enforcement with too much power. Time wrongfully spent in prison or the taste of the business end of a nightstick will change a lot of minds.

And although I'm not justifying the abuses of our rights taking place, I think it's important to remember that we don't have a police state, at least not yet. When the federal government bans certain styles of music and assigns the cops to your neighborhood to enforce the bans, as happened in Nazi Germany, then we can start complaining about a police state. I think the hyperbole will turn people off to the possibility of an authoritarian regime ever coming to power, preventing them from ever putting up a serious fight.

[Scheavo]

How do we end the police state, Scheavo? We increase it's funding through taxation and give it more authority over more aspects of our daily lives.  

Wow, do you even attempt to read my posts, or do you automatically just put me into this "government is the solution!" ideology, that is very undescriptive of my overall political views? I notice how you stayed completely out of my first thread since coming back, maybe because I don't even mention the government at all, and highlight consumer power?

Seriously, nothing will change until a greater number of people, especially the "it'll never happen here" people, begin to experience the repercussions of law enforcement with too much power. Time wrongfully spent in prison or the taste of the business end of a nightstick will change a lot of minds.

Or does this make the first sentence serious? Increase the police state rapidly, so more people come face to face with the bullshit? I'm confused.

And although I'm not justifying the abuses of our rights taking place, I think it's important to remember that we don't have a police state, at least not yet. When the federal government bans certain styles of music and assigns the cops to your neighborhood to enforce the bans, as happened in Nazi Germany, then we can start complaining about a police state. I think the hyperbole will turn people off to the possibility of an authoritarian regime ever coming to power, preventing them from ever putting up a serious fight.

Fair enough, I am being a tad hyperbolic. We do fit a lot of the description of a police state, even if it's not as bad as Nazi Germany. Police have too much authority, and we give them too much credit. I admire people who want to protect their communities and have met a fair amount of admirable police officers, but there's just as many who do it so they can carry a gun and boss people around.

[William Wallace]

How do we end the police state, Scheavo? We increase it's funding through taxation and give it more authority over more aspects of our daily lives.  

Wow, do you even attempt to read my posts, or do you automatically just put me into this "government is the solution!" ideology, that is very undescriptive of my overall political views? I notice how you stayed completely out of my first thread since coming back, maybe because I don't even mention the government at all, and highlight consumer power?

By calling for higher taxes, publicly funded health care and other entitlements, you put yourself in that camp. I was being facetious, but I highlighted a serious contradiction in your ideology. You want a state powerful enough to take from some and give to others, etc. But not powerful enough to increase it's police powers to abusive levels. That's impossible.

Sometimes I don't participate in threads simply because I don't want to.

 

Seriously, nothing will change until a greater number of people, especially the "it'll never happen here" people, begin to experience the repercussions of law enforcement with too much power. Time wrongfully spent in prison or the taste of the business end of a nightstick will change a lot of minds.

Or does this make the first sentence serious? Increase the police state rapidly, so more people come face to face with the bullshit? I'm confused.

I didn't mean it that way. I don't want things to become so terrible that people are forced to engage, but might just turn out that way. 

[Scheavo]

There's no contradiction in my ideology. I believe government, i.e. people coming together and working together in an institutional manner, can work in various circumstances. Like building roads, hospitals, paying for school, paying for health care, providing defense, protecting the environment, and like... nothing else. I don't think the market works very well on their own in these issues, and I have history to back my position up. The world isn't black and white. The options aren't anarchy or something along the lines of communism, and it isn't a contradiction if you fall in between the two. I mean, I start a thread about scaling back governmental powers, and you make a snide comment about me wanting to increase governmental powers.

And none of these requires an abusive police powers. That's a ludicrous jump, and ignores, well, countless examples in our own history, and around the world. You can collect taxes without having it illegal to video tape police officers, or ending the drug war, without having the highest incarceration rates in the world, without giving police officers the benefit of the doubt, without giving the DoE it's own enforcement team, without the Patriot Act, etc, etc, etc. Impossible? Well, then its been done!

[Super Dude]

I for one welcome our new police overlords.

[Ben_Jamin]

What enrages me is when Police shoot the suspect killing him in the process. I understand if he has a weapon but damn, you have all this training and armor for you not to get shot or killed. Why not shoot him in the legs or arms.

[El Barto]

Never take chances when you're in a life threatening situation.  As we all know, I can't stand cops, but this is one area where I usually defend them.  A guy with a knife can close 15' a whole lot quicker than most people assume, and plenty of cops get shot with their own gun after short struggles. 

[ClairvoyantCat]

What enrages me is when Police shoot the suspect killing him in the process. I understand if he has a weapon but damn, you have all this training and armor for you not to get shot or killed. Why not shoot him in the legs or arms.

Police are trained to aim for center mass, not necessarily to kill the suspect but simply because it is the easiest place to aim for.  I think it'd be totally unfair to expect the police to aim for a target like the legs or arms, which are tough targets and often in motion, in a time of intense pressure.  Maybe if they have a clear, undisturbed shot, but only under those circumstances would I expect it.  When life is on the line I wouldn't blame any cop if the life of the suspect playing second fiddle to protecting his own and others. 

[El Barto]

Also worth pointing out is that people are generally terrible shots when it comes to gunfights.  Cops are no exception since most of them don't shoot every day like Harry Callahan.  If you look at the statistics, most shootouts occur at very close quarters and result in a very small hit percentage.  Expecting Johnny to aim for the hardest things to hit is really putting him at a severe disadvantage. 

[Scheavo]

Which is why we started giving cops more non-lethal (or not intended to be) weapons - but then, since they're "non-lethal," they start using it first chance they get. Like tasing a wheelchair bound grandma, or a kid in like 2nd grade.

This wasn't meant to be a thread against cops, rather the system set up where cops have so much authority and superiority. That in turn attracts assholes who are going to abuse that power.

[El Barto]

Yeah, they really do seem to be far too gung-ho with the tazers.  I've defended them in plenty of cases with that, wrestling grandma to the ground on the side of a busy highway is going to be much more dangerous for her than just tazing her, for example,  but they really do seem to get off on it a little too much.  I think it's also made them a bit lazy.  The use of force continuum is a touchy subject among coppers, some like it, some hate it,  but given that plenty of cops seem to whip out the tazer even before soft control techniques, I'm thinking it should probably be a bit more standardized.  In a non-life threatening situation, the consideration for tazing should probably be for the benefit of the suspect, not the cop. 

[PraXis]

You can end the police state by voting out ANYONE who supports the Patriot Act and who doesn't try to fuck with our Second Amendment RIGHTS.

[TL]

and who doesn't try to fuck with our Second Amendment RIGHTS.

Because you never know when the king of England is gonna get all up in your face.

[orcus116]

 

[XJDenton]

To be fair, we are just waiting for the right time.