Because they can lie and ruin your life...

[catnhatnh]

Because they can shoot you and get away with it.
Because they can pump up with illegal steroids and wear mirrored sunglasses.
Because they can do any damn thing they want, legal or otherwise and you can't stop them.

In my life I have been in a commercial fishery. That is damn dangerous and friends of mine have died. Their base salary was zero and their benefits were zip. Ain't a highway or park named for any of them nor pensions insurance nor funds for their kids. They were just fisherman and some of us drown. And no, the public doesn't grieve. I can live with that.

What I can't abide is a cop adoration thread or a poster who locks the thread when they can't take the criticism. If you tell me you think some or even all fishermen suck I would allow that some do and others don't and accept that maybe you dealt with a couple bad ones and accept no one is going to love ALL of them and that being the case, how much more bitter would you be at someone who abused your rights than toward a guy who overcharged you or failed to produce the seafood you ordered???

Being a good cop is a tough job and so is being a good teacher or fisherman.Competence is tough in any job and excelling at it is even tougher. Defending anyone based on "the job is tough" is bullshit and only gods are adored unquestionably.

And oh yeah,I hate pigs who disguise themselves as "public servants".

[Logical]

1. Cops very seldom get punished for MASSIVE mistakes in their job. The Police unions....

protect cops that should not be protected. And the legal system does not like to charge cops with crimes.

Cops have to much power with no one controlling it.

[catnhatnh]

2. This morning a poster claimed people were generalizing....

and calling all police "pigs". I replied with a video stating specifically showing a dozen NYPD beating and illegally detaining my son. Then I toddled off to work. Imagine my dismay when I found the wanker had locked their own thread after 10 hours when others also failed to like all police enough...

[Logical]

3. LOL...classic! n-t

[gopiscrap]

8. Thank you for calling them on it

most cops I have dealt with have a self entitlement asshole mentality to them and much of the problem lies in the cop worship bullshit we see on the mindless tube. Also remember statistically, more cops vote r than D!

[Hotler]

4. Notice you never hear the repugs talk about

busting the police unions. If you are going to go after the unions go after ALL the unions, police, football, baseball, basketball. They won't cause the cops protect the powers that be and the sport unions make tons of money for repug owners that in turn give big campaign donations. God I hate republicans.

[HubertHeaver]

5. It is not the police unions. There job is to demand due process and

provide a vigorous defense to the extent they have standing under the terms of the contract. It is the legal system's and the prosecutor's job to weed out the bad apples.

Too often that responsibility is laid off onto the police department's own internal affairs division.

[Logical]

6. There are flat out bad cops the unions defend. Read more. n-t

[HubertHeaver]

9. That is their job--their reason for being.

The union is there to provide a vigorous defense. Good, bad, or indifferent, the cops pay union dues, the union defends all. It is not their job to decide who does or does not deserve defense. It is the duty of the supervisors to remove the incompetent. It is the duty of the prosecutors to prosecute the criminal. But, in order to do so, they must give due process. They cannot fire someone in a fit of pique.


Your suggestion that I read more is insulting. I would suggest you take your own advise...learn the purpose and need--both historical and current--of unions.

[Sirveri]

12. Do the police need a union?

Yes, I know, Liberal blasphemy. I think they do, but it might need tweaking.

They already get a ton of protections built into the system, they form close bonds with the DA's office, so they already have a step up in their favor. So that sort of makes them like a union for managerial staff. They already have power, they shouldn't need union protection. The only reason I'd want to keep the union is to keep the force from going after the good cops and trying to get them tossed out. We've seen it time and time again, they violate the thin blue line and they get rode out of the force on rails.

So I guess the problem is how do we figure out who should the union protect and who should it not protect. But really, that shouldn't be the question, the question should be one of structural reform. The police like any organisation with power, should NOT be allowed to regulate themselves, nor should the police union push for that power. The problem is that they've pushed so hard to protect their membership, they've actually gone past the point where they're beneficial to society. Now we have a bunch of un-accountable thugs running around terrorizing the populace with minimal recourse from the public. It's almost like people getting upset at companies who make tons of money offshoring, when their only job IS to make money, not create employment in the US. Similar issue with the police unions, there needs to be some sort of balance struck.

[gopiscrap]

7. I fully agree

[treestar]

10. So if you are the victim of a crime, you aren't going to call them?

Or blame them because the crime occurred?

Who died at a commercial fishery and how? It is dishonest to claim it is just as dangerous. Criminals really do exist. Not everyone who is arrested is a purely innocent person.

[Zalatix]

11. The cops are not obligated to protect you.

This is a fact established by the Supreme Court, by the way.