Obama supporter gets it right
August 29th, 2009 by adminJim Moran (Democrat, the Obama Soviet) bans signs that disagree with Obamacare a his town hall meeting. A cop enforcing this censorship gets it exactly right, via Michelle Malkin:
When the protester asks why other sign-holders aren’t being threatened with trespassing charges, the officer says it’s because the protester’s sign has a picture.
“This used to be America!” the protester exclaims.
The officer retorts: “It ain’t no more, okay?”
No it’s not.
Hope and Change. Leave your freedom at the door.
Posted in Politics | 8 Comments »
August 29th, 2009 at 11:38 pm
I have been a cop since 1976 and I can assure you this officer is an abomination. Most of us know the law, know what our duties and responsibilities are and have at least “glanced” at the constitution and its amendments. This guy is obviously untrained and can’t think on his feet or set himself apart from his politics or race and actually do his job which is lethal in our business.
August 30th, 2009 at 5:34 pm
Dave, with all due respect, I disagree. As a forensic pathologist, I’ve been dealing with cops for 25 years and see a pretty consistent pattern.
When it comes to constitutional rights associated with the cop’s job on a day to day basis, *most* try to stay within the spirit of the Constitution, if not the letter. Cops, at least in most jurisdictions, have a good handle on how to treat folk when they show up for a robbery or domestic disturbance, or whatever.
But that’s different from enforcing an unconstitutional dictate given to them by their command structure. I’ve never seen a cop balk when given the mission to stop a protest or pull down signs or anything like that. They may try to act in a constitutional manner in the small — not engaging in excess force, not arresting someone for mouthing off to them personally — but I’ve never seen a police force refuse to do what they are told in the large, even if the act is unconstitutional. The bottom line is that cops do a pretty good job of trying to accomplish their mission in a constiutional manner, but they don’t ask if the mission itself is constitutional.
As an example, consider a warrant for arrest for someone who is being arrested for praying in school, similar to a recent case I blogged about. I don’t know a single cop who would refuse to arrest that person if it was a valid warrant, *even if he or she believed the arrest was unconstitutional.*
It seems that once the order is up at the organizational level, the attitude of the cops is that it’s no longer their responsibility, but something that will be decided in courts. And if the effects of the censorship or whatever cannot be reversed, then that’s just life.
August 30th, 2009 at 8:48 pm
Ah, how quickly we forget the oaths of loyalty to GWB and the Republican party that needed to be signed prior to any staged GWB townhall-like event. Freedom, indeed, was left at the door.
August 30th, 2009 at 9:23 pm
Bullshit. “Town hall-like events?” They were party rallies. And they were statements of affiliation, not “loyalty oaths.”
The problem, Eric, is that you don’t see the difference between a party rally and a supposedly open town hall meeting. If these had been advertised as party events only open to the party faithful at a party venue, this would not have been an issue. There is certainly freedom of association as well as freedom of speech.
The problem is that the Dems want both — they want to have closed door party-only events, and *pretend* that they are open door events. You can’t have both. If the Dems want to drop the pretense that these are anything other than party rallies that don’t represent anything else than support from the party faithful, at least that would be one less lie.
September 2nd, 2009 at 4:11 am
Admin: point well taken. It’s been brewing for a while however, behind the scenes. that’s when they (command)get the arguments or we raise concerns. There’s also a lot of us in command positions now that wouldn’t do it.
It’s a hell of a lot better today than it was when I first started, you must have seen the evolution yourself. When I first started we actually worried about being bombed by anarchist groups (Weather Underground for example), or sniped and we took a lot of precautions even at home.
Eric: one is a public even involving taxpayers, the other is a private event by private donors that gather for a common purpose. Not even close.
September 2nd, 2009 at 7:52 am
Dave:
I hope that command in police do take their constitutional responsibilities seriously. But I’m not optimistic. I see two things happening.
The first is that Chief positions are pretty politicized. Chiefs answer to the Mayor or City Council or County Commission, and those are politically-motivated. A Chief that says that he will not do something may not lose his job, but there will be hell to pay — funding cuts, staffing cuts, etc. There’s a lot of logrolling at that level. A Chief who decides to go that route will have to be willing to leave. And it’s worse for subordinates, who are open to the charge of insubordination.
And I have to say that it’s not an emphasis in management training as far as I can see. I spent five years with a law enforcement agency, not as a sworn officer, but as a ME, and went through their Command College. Though there was a lot taught about constitutional rights, there was hardly a peep about what to do in the situation of receiving an unconstiutional mission.
September 5th, 2009 at 3:55 am
admin: I ASSURE you there are many of us talking about it and there’s a vast majority… maybe not the top dog in each community, but a vast majority that aren’t going to be used as government thugs nor are we going to stand by and watch the rights of our friends, community, and other family members be trampled for a “greater cause.” It is true that Chiefs are political appointees but they also are vulnerable to charges from their own citizens especially if they are verified by the police officers under his/her command. Also, not to change the subject, but why aren’t there more M.E.’s out there? God we could use quadruple the number available to us. Your importance to law enforcement has not gone unnoticed by those of us that rely on you on a daily basis nor your tribulations and restrictions that you endure or have endured. We appreciate it, we appreciated everything that you did and had to endure trying to do your duties. Thanks.
September 5th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
There are a number of reasons why there are so few “real” MEs.
The first is pay. We are one of the few medical specialties where you have to receive an extra two years of training in order to take a 40% cut in pay. That means that we tend to get three kinds of folk in the business: those who love it and are willing to take the hit to do something they like, those who are in it for other reasons (such as geographic, family, lifestyle issues), and those who can’t do anything else and have found an undemanding jurisdiction that has low standards.
Which leads to the second reason. The second is that there are essentially no standards for hiring. There are lot’s of jurisdictions who have people who are not board-certified forensic pathologists, or not even physicians at all, who do the work. There are many reasons for this as well. The first is that it keeps costs down. Why hire a board-certified forensic pathologist when you can get a psychiatrist who can’t practice his or her primary specialty for whatever reason at one-quarter the price? As long as there are no scandals, who cares about quality? The second is that these lower-end folk tend to be more pliable when it comes to saying what the DA wants to hear. Why hire a professional when you can get someone for half the cost who will provide scripted results? The third is that in many places the “Coroner” office (and remember, I’m a Medical Examiner, not a Coroner) is an elected office where all you need to be is over 18 and without a major felony conviction. Why would politicians get rid of a nice political job?
They won’t, until there’s a major scandal. And even then they really don’t want to change things. Even large city offices can be like that. Washington DC went through, what, something like 5 Chiefs in 15 years — to the point that no board-certified person would apply to take the position. I’ve heard that’s changed, but I haven’t looked into it. Look at stories from New Jersey, Massachusetts, Indianapolis and other places where politics and corruption eats up and spits out folk with purely professional orientations.
The third is that, just as folk don’t want to pay for professional Medical Examiners, they also don’t want to pay for adequate facilities and staff. We tend to work in antiquated facilities with too few people. You see MEs on TV getting postmortem CT scans and MRIs and interesting tests to solve cases. In most jurisdictions, folk are lucky to get any xray services at all. Those cases just don’t get solved.
So, you have a profession that doesn’t pay well and in which you are always at risk of political hack jobs screwing you around, and where people simply don’t believe that what you do is worth paying for or respecting — at least in some jurisdictions. In other jurisdictions, it’s different; I’ve worked in North Carolina and Georgia, and both places have been great. But the bottom line is that until pay, infrastructural support, and respect go up, folk will not flock to the profession.
That, by the way, is a story that the Democrats who want to make medicine in general a more unattractive profession might consider. When the politicians make a profession something shunned by those who have other choices — when the best and brightest decide to become socialist bureaucrats who want to use medicine for social engineering instead of physicians who want to treat patients, patients will suffer.