Divemedic

We began the 72 hour checklist at 5 pm this afternoon.

• Vehicles and gas cans filled with fuel.
• Propane tanks all filled.
• Test run the genny.
• All outdoor furniture inside.
• Garage reorganized so we can get both vehicles inside.
• 5 gal Water cans retrieved and filled.
• Charge batteries.

Looking again at the picture from the other day:

Why do cops on SWAT teams feel the need to wear camouflage? They always seem to wear a pattern of camo that most closely resembles current military patterns. If cops in rural areas wanted to actually hide in their surroundings, they would wear RealTree or some other effective pattern. City cops would try to look like mailboxes, homeless people, or dumpsters.

The purpose of camouflage is to hide by blending in to your surroundings. That isn’t what is happening here. These uniforms are actually being worn so that the officers STAND OUT from their background. They WANT to look different. They WANT to look like they are some sort of badass John Rambo SEAL team operators.

By dressing like them, they are engaged in some sort of cosplay fantasy where they are also armed with “cool” guns that ordinary people can’t have. Then they go and raid the house of some grandmother, or flip a grenade into a baby’s crib. Note that when they guy in the building is actually armed and can mount any sort of resistance, they surround the place and wait him out.

Why do so many people suddenly have a problem with the cops? Watch this video of a grandmother’s house. The raid was done because someone from her IP address criticized the police, and they took offense.This meant that a short platoon of heavily armed cops had to use hand grenades against an old woman and her two young grandchildren.

The grandmother sued the police, and won. The court of appeals ruled:
“The members of the team are seen on the tapes impressively clad in body armor and big helmets and carrying formidable rifles pointed forward. It would take a brave criminal to try to fight it out with them, and of course there was no criminal in the house and little reason to expect one to be there,” then went on to compare the police to the “Keystone cops”  and called the actions during the raid “almost inconceivable.”

The odd part was that the Internet threats came because the grandmother didn’t know enough about her Internet router to change the password, and a neighbor was using it to post threats and comments about the police. The neighbor had been convicted in the past for similar actions, and this took police less than an hour to figure that out. The neighbor who actually posted the threats is visible in the video, sitting on his front porch watching the SWAT team pass by on their way to raid the wrong house. Had he actually been as dangerous as they claimed, he could have ambushed and wiped out the entire team.

“It took them only a day to discover that it was indeed he [Derrick Murray] who was responsible,” Judge Posner wrote. “But rather than give him the SWAT-team treatment, the police politely requested that he come to police headquarters, which he did, where he was arrested without incident. … The police department’s kid-gloves treatment of Murray is in startling contrast to their flash-bang assault on Mrs. Milan’s home.”

“The police neglect of Murray is almost incomprehensible. His past made him a prime suspect. A day of investigating him would have nailed him, as we know because a day of investigating — the day after the violent search of the home — did nail him.”

“So while the defendants are correct to point out that a reasonable mistake committed by police in the execution of a search is shielded from liability by the doctrine of qualified immunity,” the panel concluded, “in this case the Evansville police committed too many mistakes to pass the test of reasonableness.”

After the court ruling was made, the city settled out of court for $60,000. All paid for by taxpayers and not the cops who screwed the pooch.

And thereby created another few honest citizens who don’t like cops. Keep acting like an invading army, and the citizens will eventually treat you like one.

An old buddy of mine from my Navy days posted the following picture on social media:

I saw this and replied with this picture:

and the flaming began. See, I apparently didn’t realize that cops HAVE to do this because if they don’t, they will later be targeted by others, and I should understand that. I pointed out that the groups in the original picture are masked for the same reason.

I stated that, with the RARE exception of undercover cops not wanting to be recognized, cops should ALWAYS do their jobs in public, and needn’t be masked if they are not doing anything that they should be ashamed of.

Because I didn’t immediately bend down and lick their boots, I was instantly labelled as anticop. I support cops most of the time, but when they are wrong, I also point that out. So I responded with:

Cops always try to say that criminals are going to hunt them down, as if they are living in some cop drama television show, but the actual facts never bear that out. Just like the claim that a NY cop needs to carry a gun in Florida because they are on duty all the time and might be attacked by some ex-con they put in jail a decade ago, or perhaps they will need to arrest some criminal while on vacation. How can you be on duty and making arrests in a state where you don’t even know the law?

So along comes a cop who says:

Guys like this, we don’t fit into their box brother. And they hate it

I replied with:

I have long said that times are changing, and you either adapt and worry about image, or you will get steamrolled. If police lose the support of the public, they can no longer do their job. Some police appear never to have heard of Peel’s policing principals, and that is why they are losing so much respect. Stop acting like an occupying army as many police departments are doing, and the public will stop seeing you as the enemy.

I was blocked from the conversation at that point. The police need to stop demanding absolute loyalty. When a police officer screws up, admit it and take care of it yourself. If you don’t ALL of you begin looking like a street gang with a badge. The more of the public that you alienate, the more difficult it becomes to get your job done.

I said the same as a firefighter. There is a group that calls themselves the “Fraternal Order Of Leatherheads” society (FOOLS). I wrote about this dangerous trend about six years ago.  Our public safety personnel are looking at the public that they are sworn to serve, and all they see is the enemy. This is a VERY dangerous trend, indeed.

It’s getting worse.

EDITED: I left out an entire sentence. Sorry. It was there in my head when I was writing it, but somehow never made it to my fingers as I typed it.