The extinction of the Peace Officer

If you've been around for more than 4 decades, you probably remember a very different "cop" from today's police officers. To understand some, let me emphasize this, SOME, not all of the problems, drilling into the metamorphosis of that era's police, you have to ask questions that will quickly take you away from the police themselves. Before I begin, this is not in defense of what police due today. In the same sense that explaining why a dog is vicious is not a defense of the dog's actions.

The police are not a company or business that developed and grew themselves commercially. They are formed and charged by our local governments. IMHO, the biggest change in the nature of the police officer happened (and continues to happen) due to the war on drugs. This is possibly the most costly of all wars that America has taken a battle position in. It has destroyed the lives of people, families, communities in America, and other parts of the world since the day it began.

Why? Because vices, while they may be destructive are human safety valves. Banning them does not remove them, it moves them. It also turns them into a profitable business. Very profitable depending on the demand. When you have something so profitable that our own government has partaken in it to raise money for black ops that congress wouldn't fund, then you've created a monster that you probably will never defeat.

When the illegal drug traders here started to become organized and powerful, is when they started to arm themselves and fight back. Police departments quickly became outgunned. They had to seek more powerful weapons and learn more battle tactics. When the drug traders began to commit horrendous crimes to create fear and control, the police had to become more intimidating aggressive.

As the book of laws grew fatter police officers had more to learn and try to understand their complexities and now in an environment where laws are changing faster than attorneys themselves can stay on top of them, the police have to stop the legal education at some point in order to just do their jobs.

As the image of the police officer has fallen from community white night to a necessary evil, and Hollywood had conditioned us to think it's ok to be disrespectful and combative, today's new police officers, as humans, face a lot of anger and hate they did not necessarily earn individually. It is transferred to them by putting on a uniform that presents them as some kind of dictators secret guard group to repress, scare, and abuse their citizens. Thus, when today's police officer faces a door, they don't know whether in the instant that door opens, if they'll be facing somebody's kid who spits in their face, the bloody face of a poor battered woman, a dog about to attack them or a bullet. How do you prepare for that?

This is the end result of an escalation that was started by, among other things, the war on drugs. The handling of which resulted in the destruction of citizens lives and families. The result of which bred generations of hate and broken families. The result of which has created and maintained a welfare culture. The result of which creates and maintains a group of people encompassed by crime and poverty. The result of which is a class of citizens that is constantly confronted with both crime and punishment which is met often with an unjustified amount of suspicion, force, and abuse.

If the peace officer is ever to return, the rule books need to be thinner in order to defund the businesses which provide these crimes as a service. When something is so profitable that it creates its own armies, and it's only this profitable because there are laws that made it this way. The simplest solution is to accept the optimal situation rather than the ideal situation and remove those laws and deal with causes of the problems rather than try to block the symptoms.

The test that failed because the results were forgotten.

I'm breaking for my usual ranting style (complain then discuss ideas to solve the problem) to offer this, a parable of sorts...

~1922 Italy (translated) "Son, why have you packed your bags? I've got you a job at the vineyard and you start next week!" Son, "I'm leaving to go to America Papa." Father, "Why Mario? What is there that is not here? Everything is here for you!". Son, "No Papa, America is the land of opportunity! If I stay here I will be working in the Vineyard for the rest of my life. In America, maybe someday I can have my own Vineyard!"

~1932 "Dear Papa, I've been in America now for almost 10 years. When I first got here I was beaten up and lost everything I had brought with me, even my shoes! A kind man told me he would provide me with shoes and 3 meals a day and a place to sleep if I worked on his farm for at least 2 weeks. After the second week he offered me the meals and place to sleep and to pay me $5 a week. I worked for him for almost a year and was able to save $200. I bought some new clothes and a train ticket to Sacramento. I was able to rent a room and find a job at the Granite Company where I worked in a granite quarry for almost 2 years but I was paid almost $12 a day papa! It was really hard work Papa, but I got big! I got into 4 fights while I was there the first year because they didn't like Italians. But after the 4th fight papa, everyone left me alone. By the time I left Papa, I had $2,500! It was really hard work and so I left and found a job at an oat mill that was much easier. I worked at the mill for 4 years and had saved $5,250 papa! I was able to buy 100 acres of farmland near a town called Napa and start my own farm. I hope I can bring you here someday papa."

~1942 "Dear Papa, I've been in America now for almost 20 years. I spent 18 hours a day for many years starting my Vineyard papa. I was starting to do really but then this war started. I'm too old to fight papa. But I love this country I would fight if I could. So I tore out my vineyard to help grow food for the war. Now I have to work my farm with the help of only one other person, a woman who I've known for a long time. We are married now. I want you to meet her papa. I hope we win this war. We work so hard. Beth sometimes comes to bed with her hands wrapped in wax and cotton because they're sore. It's hard work papa. But I am grateful that I am here."

~1952 "Dear Papa, so much has happened since I last wrote. Shortly into 1945, Beth and I started to rebuild our vineyard. It was very hard Papa, I broke my legs, both of them. Beth lost a finger when a gate fell. But it was some of the sweetest times I can remember for us both. Beth gave birth to Antonio, our first and only son. After Antonio, the doctors said she could have no more children. I swear papa, when things get better I will bring you here to see our vineyard and meet your grandson!"

~1962 "Dear papa, I'm still writing to you even though you've passed on. I miss you. I wish Antonio knew you like I did. Our vineyard has really grown, I was able to purchase another 200 acres from my neighbors, we are doing really well Papa, I wish you could see. Antonio goes to the finest schools and has everything he could want. This country is hard Papa but it's given me so much I could have never have had back home. America is my home".

~1972 America, Antonio, "I can't manage the vineyard anymore. I'm in too much pain. And your mother, well, you know. I'm counting on you. We have given our blood to this place, and it has rewarded us and you. Son, please honor me and take this business." Son, "I will Pop, I will keep it in the family and your work will not be lost."

~1982 Elizabeth, "Antonio, please com quick, Benji has fallen!" Antonio, "Oh no!!! Benji son, you have an owee on your knee, it will be ok, don't worry, I'll go get some ice cream OK???"

~1992 Antonio, "Benji son, why aren't you practicing your martial arts?" Benji, "I don't like it anymore dad. I want to be a professional skier!" Antonio, "Well son we'll see when you're older."

~2002 Benji, "Dad, I really don't want to work at the vineyard anymore. Have you seen my trophies? I'm going to ski professionally." Antonio, "Son, this vineyard is your legacy, it will provide for you and your family when I am gone". "I don't want it dad. It's too much work, I just want to ski." Antonio, "Do you have any idea how hard your grandfather worked to build this business? Decades of hard labor and during the war lost it all and had to rebuild again? And I have grown this and worked it hard so that you can continue to live like this and provide for your family in the future!" Benji, "SO what! Work work, that's all I hear. What do I care? I didn't have to do it. I've spent my time and hard work learning to ski! That's what I want!"

~2004 Elizabeth, "Benji, your father died this morning...."

~2005 Benini Vineyards Attorney, "Ben, you realize that once you sign this paper, this property and business that has survived for fifty years will no longer be yours or your home? Furthermore, a majority of the money from the sale will go to pay the debts that have accumulated for the last 10 years of nobody really running this business." Benji, "Yes, I know, but it's of no use to me. I'm a professional skier, I make enough, I'm just tired of having to deal with it. Signed..."

~2007 Winter Olympics sports announcer, "Oh what a terrible turn! Ben Benini is out for the season with that last run...spend some time drinking some wine Ben..."

~2008 Doctor, "Ben, you will be able to walk again, but it's going to take time. And you will probably be able to ski again also. But you will never be able to compete again." Ben, "My career is finished? You said you could restore all the functionality!" Doctor, "I never guaranteed anything Ben, we've learned not to do that."

~2009 Benini Vineyards HR director, "Well Ben, I mean, your family name is on the vineyard, but no one in your family owns it anymore, in fact my boss works in China most of the time. And you have no real experience in vineyards, surprisingly. I'm afraid there's nothing I can offer you here, maybe you should try for a job with a ski maker or a resort?"

How could Ben have known the real value of what his father had offered to him? He had no idea what the sacrifice to build it truly cost. And even Ben's father, Antonio, didn't completely know the sacrifices his father, Mario, had made. So in an instant, Ben gave it away without almost any thought.

For the generations of American's who have grown old in this country, the words of their parents about the sacrifices and hardship, that their great grandparents made and the even greater sacrifices of the generations before them, have rarely been heard let alone experiences and felt by the generations after them. The history and stories of the tremendous sacrifices that it took to build "the greatest country on earth" have been diminished and distorted with each passing decade such that the sacrifice for the liberty that created this, the "land of opportunity" is a story that is all but lost today. And so, "The Great Experiment", America, maybe soon considered a failure, only because the fact that it succeeded is a story that is no longer told. Thus we continue to sell our liberty for false security promises because the value of our liberty is lost to us further with each generation that has not had to fight or see the fight to save it or try to live without it. Liberty that is given away does not return freely.