Americas biggest police force

[babomb]

an FBI official joked about how shocked Americans would be if they knew how egregiously the NYPD is stomping all over their civil liberties http://www.alternet.org/civil-libert...t-police-force

[LouCipherr]

an FBI official joked about how shocked Americans would be if they knew how egregiously the NYPD is stomping all over their civil liberties This isn't directed at you babomb since that's not your quote, but... Shocked? How can they be shocked? Any well informed individual knows that 'stomping all over our civil liberties' doesn't just stop with the NYPD. This is occurring all over the US. Our government and president do it on a daily basis, so how anyone can be shocked to find this out is beyond me. Then again, most people would rather be "Mushrooms in the US Garden" - y'know, kept in the dark and covered in bullshit. So who knows, maybe it will come as a shock to 'some' people. It's a pretty sad state of affairs, isn't it? And it's only getting worse...

[AcesandEights]

The NYPD stomping all over civil liberties is unfortunately pretty old news. But, to be honest, some things I don't mind so much, because I'm callously evil and policing a huge city does take stern aggressive action. That said, they do need to come down on these guys who get unnecessarily violent or who are outright corrupt like a ton of bricks. The problem with these huge polities is they need large police forces and that means more bureaucracy, which means more corruption and--even if there are a majority of clean cops (not touching the feasibility of such a thing with a ten foot barge pole)--more chance for outliers. This all just means cops need to be held to a higher standard and the civil offices above them also need to be upfront with the public. When they roust bums and homeless folk or force transport them outside of the city (not sure if they do this anymore, but was done a lot in the 90s) the public needs answers and expectations set if the cops aren't going to do such a thing (i.e. all of the city streets will be a cluttered mess full of homeless beggars and thieves like it was in the 70s and 80s).

[Mr. Clean]

If Chicago could just do the same damn thing.....

[MoonSylver]

^^^^

[babomb]

Then again, most people would rather be "Mushrooms in the US Garden" - y'know, kept in the dark and covered in bullshit. So who knows, maybe it will come as a shock to 'some' people. It's a pretty sad state of affairs, isn't it? And it's only getting worse... That's exactly it. That's why this country is in the state it's in. People don't want to be inconvenienced by the truth. People would rather remain in denial, and blame anything they can. That's why so many people buy into the "terrorism" boogeyman. It's convenient. And easy. It doesn't seem to me that the stomping of civil liberties is due to individual cops taking things too far. This is far worse. It seems as if it's outright intimidation based on actual policy. Like they're actively trying to send the message to people that exercising your rights will get you hurt and/or arrested. During any encounter with cops these days is like a run in with a foreign occupying force. When you see videos of protests where cops are going around spraying pepper spray in the eyes of protesters that are already handcuffed and on their knees, or recently cops stopped traffic at an intersection looking for an armed robber and had everyone out of their vehicles in handcuffs and at gun point. Even women and children. These abuses are happening constantly, and it's all over the media. So you'd think that if it was truly painting cops in a bad light, an unwanted bad light, that something would be be done about it. But cops just get more and more aggressive, and their budgets keep increasing so they become more militarized. You never hear about public officials saying anything about investigating police behavior, or new policies to prevent brutalities or anything like that. It just keeps happening, and if for any reason a big deal is made about a particular incident, the officers get paid vacations until it gets swept under the rug. So the only conclusion you can come to is that this is not an unfortunate state of affairs, this is a deliberate thing. Cops are expected to be like this. For whatever reason, they're being told to intimidate the public, and they are very happy to oblige.