dhirm5

additional weight -- are you serious? a radar detector weight is measured in ounces.

ipse dixit

Why not just save your spirited driving for the track, where it's safe for you, and more importantly safe for everyone around you?

Then you wouldn't need to worry about FOP plates or trying to evade LEO. Cuz, really we should support LEO simply because of the jobs they do to protect all of us, day-in and day-out.

Reata1

I liked it but....sometimes, "I feel the need for speed!" (Goose & Maverick)

Tedster

Regarding Police, sadly, all are not "good guys" and few are heroes, making selfless sacrifices to save someone from harm. Most are just doing their job every day. Yes it can be dangerous but so are other jobs that are many times more likely to cause fatal injuries such as roofers, loggers, and garbage collectors. They get on average six months of training, far less than plumbers and cosmetologists. I am definitely not anti-police and have several in my extended family but this "police are all heroes" fetish is dangerous when many have been caught breaking the law yet almost all are protected by their associates and FOP to the point where they are basically immune from prosecution unless there are serious aggravating issues and video evidence. The Supreme Court even ruled, recently again, that Police don't even have a duty to protect us unless we are in their custody.

I do my best to follow speed laws and avoid accidents. I also own a radar detector and use Waze on longer trips to help alert me when I am perhaps under surveillance, my right under the Constitution (except in DC and Virginia or in a commercial vehicle). In the rare cases I have been pulled over, I am polite but never provide testimony against myself when requested, as my attorney and many Supreme Court Justices have recommended. I understand that if I am detained longer than necessary to issue a ticket that the officer is violating my rights and I will remind them politely until they let me go on my way.

topherserrano

There are certainly bad apples in the profession as with any other. Hundreds of thousands of calls for service involving the police occur everyday and are appropriately handled with respect and fall unnoticed behind the curtains.

The selfless sacrifice they make every day when lacing up their boots is accepting the fact they may not return home to their families at the end of their shift because the work they do and environment they must operate in has the highest probability of the unknown, the situations they walk into every single day being extremely fluid and dynamic (domestic violence, assaults, stabbings, shootings, traffic stops, warrant arrests, etc). Loggers, garbage collectors, and roofers as you mentioned, operate in a sterile, semi-controlled environment in which mishaps happen as a result of an oversight/accident; they are not dealing with another human being with a cognizance that potentially wants to actively seek and kill them.

The training Police receive you mentioned is the Basic Police Academy which is 6 months (1200 hours) is comically incomparable to being a cosmetologist or plumber which have similar hour requirements for their own field. If you’re curious, there are lots of videos on YouTube for you to dabble in and get your feet wet. Its essentially double the 13-week boot camp for the military (albeit same core principles/discipline and structure, different field work).

What you fail to know is most law enforcement have attended college and have studied Police Field Work /Admin of Justice or have degrees in Criminal Justice to even be a competitive candidate to get hired (as of the past 15 years). After completing the Academy, training is conducted continuously, at least quarterly throughout the year, every year to maintain perishable skills, as well continuing education on evolving case law, procedural justice, defensive tactics, firearms proficiency, deescalation techniques, active shooter response, critical incident management, hostage negotiations, crisis intervention, basic life saving (BLS), drug abuse recognition, the list goes on and on.

There is no constitution for the Police to have a “duty to protect” because of the government not wanting to establish a “special relationship” with whomever has summoned the police. For example, if you are being physically attacked and call the police who happen to get to your location as you are being assaulted and the Police fail to apprehend or stop the perpetrator before he has caused you injury, you would be able to sue the government for failing to protect you. It’s not that the Police have discretion on whether they will or will not intervene. Most, if not all Police Officers enter the profession because they enjoy the excitement and accept with open arms the dangers involved in handling calls for service.

The Police’s fundamental duty to is to protect life and property; and to be accepted into an academy, you must complete several examinations during the hiring process, one being a FBI psychological examination, to ascertain you possess the traits the profession requires to weed out the proverbial freeze/flight types.

Unless you lace up, don a vest and actually work a beat, I don’t think you can make any statements referring to what kind of, or lack of, selfless sacrifices men and woman of law enforcement make. To impugn their sacrifice as something only a “few” actually make is dangerously ignorant. Let’s not forget the mental health sacrifice they make over the course of their careers with the grizzly scenes of traffic accidents, suicides, homicides, trauma, child abuse, elder abuse, and other shocking scenes they are first on scene to. The Police have one of the highest rates of suicide and are intrinsically advised upon the statistical data and research when they are in the academy, yet they still choose to continue the profession.

“Not all Police are heroes”, is your own opinion which I respect. It takes a person cut from a specific cloth to want to choose to enter the most thankless yet noble careers there is today. I think you’d be a little more informed to make blanket statements if you actually had first hand experience.

Enjoy your 911 and be safe.

centaur

It is pretty clear that you have an attitude towards the police. You get pulled over for speeding and mouth off about your "rights" and it goes real well from there.

dhirm5

That depends on a lot of factors, including ethnicity, unfortunately.

I'm with the fellow who doesn't fetishize police - the ones I've had interaction with have been fine. But most "thankless and noble" profession? That's a bit much.

Noah Fect

This. When everybody is a "hero," nobody is.

Did you eat today? Thank a commercial fisherman.
DId you stay dry today? Thank a roofer.
For that matter, is your roof still there? Thank a firefighter.

Cops are on that list, too, but nowhere near the top. On the one hand, I don't respect all the pissing and moaning they do about how dangerous their jobs are. Their jobs are not particularly dangerous, and when they are, it's often their own fault. But on the other hand, I do respect them for doing that job, because it's one of those jobs I couldn't do well, if at all.

3rdpedal

Never met a cop, and I've met many, who pissed or moaned about how dangerous their job was.
I do know instances of how dangerous their jobs were, how with a 15 year old kid pointing a gun at them they had to make the choice to risk their life to disarm the kid rather than shoot the kid to potentially save their own life.
And I do not believe that in most instances that danger brought upon a cop is their own fault.

dhirm5

Policing is dangerous in USA pretty much entirely because of our ridiculous gun laws. A handful of you ppl love your guns so much, the rest of us have to live with the constant threat of some ****ing idiot and a gun, particularly the police.

detansinn

Being a former elected official and a former police commissioner, the FOP, support your local police, thin blue, etc sticker club isn’t going to have any impact on your experience being pulled over. Having your badge in your wallet when you flash your ID? Well, I have seen that work for my brother.

You want to have a positive interaction with police when you’re pulled over?
1. Have your license and registration ready to go, in hand, with your hands on the steering wheel when the officer approaches the car. Pullover to the extent that the officer can be safe walking up to your car. Demonstrate that you care about their safety through your actions.
2. Don’t go hiding that radar detector (or anything for that matter). The officer already saw it. The presence of a radar detector isn’t a problem for you unless you are in DC or Virginia. The less activity you engage in when getting pulled over, the better.
3. Never, under any circumstances say “Do you know who I am?” “I’m friends with X” You’d be shocked in how many people engage in that nonsense. When I was a public official, a number of strangers told officers that they were friends of mine. Don’t be a douche.

You don’t want to get pulled over in this first place?
1. Pick a lane. Swerving and weaving in and out of traffic draws attention to yourself. It also endangers others, which makes it more likely that you get pulled over. Don’t pass from the right lane.
2. Don’t tailgate. It’s viewed as being overly aggressive. If you want the car in front of you to get out of the way, use your flashers aka light horn. Some states treat slow cars in the left lane more harshly than speeders — bless you, Oklahoma where you can get pulled over for blocking that left lane while cars whizz by going over a buck.
3. Situational awareness. Waze and a radar detector. Not one or the other. Both. You don’t realize how much is missing from Waze until you run it alongside a radar detector. Pay attention to other performance cars. If the guy in the 911 is going the speed limit in the right lane, perhaps, it’s because they knows that there is a speed camera around the curve. The person driving way too fast? They probably don’t know anything.

Be safe. Drive smart. Don’t get tickets. If you do get a ticket, hire an attorney — not that ticket fixer nonsense, a real one.

topherserrano

I agree, all professions who’s contributions allow us to live happy, healthy, comfortable livelihoods should be regarded equally. Each have their own inherent risks and sacrifices.

On a side note, I’m genuinely interested in how you are knowledgeable of how “not particularly dangerous” the job of being a cop is, along with how you’ve reached your conclusion that the dangers of the job are a result of their own fault? Really intriguing conjecture.

topherserrano

Amazing how broad your knowledge of policing in America extends. I’d love to hear more, it’s quite entertaining.

dhirm5

I could keep you in stitches for hours. Some decent info here if you actually care to see a different perspective https://www.vox.com/22740719/police-...lence-firearms

centaur

Lets change the "ridiculous gun laws" to suit the people who do not own or like the idea of anyone owning a gun. That would certainly stop gun violence as these criminals, drug trafficers, gang bangers, etc. would surely capitulate and hand over their weapons in short order. You betcha!