6 ms·

The military is a national organization with a hierarchy stretching from the first-day-on-the-job cadet all the way into the White House. In the US, almost eve

by eiji 6y ago

The military is a national organization with a hierarchy stretching from the first-day-on-the-job cadet all the way into the White House. In the US, almost every police department is it's own thing. I'm not aware of any national organization. Usually the mayor is the top of the hierarchy. That means a faceless bureaucracy, towns and states removed, will deal with individual concerns in the military. Not a known person three miles from your house.

save_ferris 6y ago
Not just that, but much of the hierarchy above police forces is opaque if it exists at all. The Austin PD chief has come under intense scrutiny for his department's handling of various arrests and protests over the past few months, and after roughly half of the city council called on him to resign, it was reported that neither the city council or the mayor could legally fire him.[0] The city manager, which is appointed and not elected, has the power to demote the police chief, but the state does not permit a police chief to be terminated. Long story short, none of Austin's leaders have the power to fire the police chief. 0: https://www.texastribune.org/2020/06/18/austin-police-chief-brian-manley-keeping-job-despite-resignation-calls/ https://www.texastribune.org/2020/06/18/austin-police-chief-... edit: added reporting
- erichocean 6y ago
  County sheriffs are similarly "protected", in that they have to be voted out in most cases in the next election.
  - sukilot 6y ago
    That's fine. They are accountable to the electorate who can recall them.
    - closeparen 6y ago
      It’s less fine when the electorate consistently delivers a mandate to brutalize a minority population, or just isn’t paying enough attention to such down-ticket races to care.
      - roenxi 6y ago
        Criminals are a minority population (by number and temperament, not by race or anything). There structurally can't be any unbiased mechanism for effectively protecting minority populations or the criminals would use them. Look at the taxes-are-theft crowd; they think the electorate consistently delivers a mandate to brutalize their finances. They aren't totally wrong. They'd love a mechanism to avoid arrest if they don't pay taxes. So fine or otherwise, it is probably systemically optimum.
        FzguLzLA5BDxVC 6y ago
        What does this have to do with systematic abuse of specific groups? Criminals are people who break laws, they aren't a cultural group. They aren't some collection of people that are oppressed. I'd be impressed if you could show me some data showing that criminals (not prisoners) are systematically abused. What are you arguing for?
        roenxi 6y ago
        Thread ancestor said that the electorate was consistently handing out mandates to "brutalize a minority population". The electorate's power to hand out such mandates is also the power that it uses to define who criminals are. There can't be a check on that power without also opening up a huge can of worms for general law enforcement. > Criminals are people who break laws, they aren't a cultural group. If a majority hands out a mandate to oppress a minority group they can probably define the minority group to be criminals. In fact, there is a persuasive argument that that is happening.
      - erichocean 6y ago
        > or just isn’t paying enough attention to such down-ticket races to care The Open Society Foundations has had a ton of success in changing how crimes are prosecuted at the local level by pouring money into district attorney elections across the country. That's a major reason the BLM protests have been successful: most people are not being prosecuted because the local DA is a "friendly." Since many people don't pay attention, money spent at this level has been very effective. Presumably the OSF could target county Sheriffs races next, which would stop those cases from even reaching the DA's desk. Then the police wouldn't need to be abolished per se, they could simply stop enforcing laws that disproportionally target minorities, while simultaneously ratcheting up enforcement on the people who voted for those laws.
- pjc50 6y ago
  Hence "defund the police": they may not be able to fire the police chief, but they can give him an ultimatum to quit or have the budget from which his salary is paid reduced to zero.
  - klyrs 6y ago
    > ... or have the budget from which his salary is paid reduced to zero. That doesn't sound legal -- at the least, he could sue the city/state for those wages
    - ChristianBundy 6y ago
      On what grounds could "he" sue?
  - pc86 6y ago
    That's not even remotely how it works. You can't legally do that.
    - joshuamorton 6y ago
      The city could absolutely cut the police budget to $0.
      - roenxi 6y ago
        Can do all sorts of things, but when somebody turns up with a gun there has to be some physical mechanism to stop them from seizing control of the local supermarket. The city can defund the entire police force, but it will have to set up or allow an alternative which will end up the same as the current one if the incentives don't change. Resetting the entire system every time something goes wrong isn't really a viable strategy. It'll work every so often.
        ChristianBundy 6y ago
        Of course. This isn't controversial. If someone takes a bunch of hostages then we need people who can de-escalate and rescue them, but that isn't what most cops spend their time doing every day.
kanox 6y ago
Creating a new federal body to specifically deal with use-of-force by law enforcement could correct many issues by conducting investigates in a more impartial manner. It could also issue nation-wide guidelines such as making it impossible to turn off body cameras.
- GVIrish 6y ago
  I see this much like the Civil Rights Act. There was no way segregation was going to be ended without significant legislation and enforcement from the federal government. Bottom line is that the sort of large scale reform needed to end systemic problems of police misconduct is going to be extremely difficult to achieve via local reforms. Congress needs to end qualified immunity, end civil asset forfeiture, increase federal oversight, and potentially write new laws governing the use of body cams. One idea I've seen from police reformers is a 'Missing Video Presumption' law. The basic idea is that if the body cam (or vehicle cam) footage goes missing and there is a conflicting account of events, the court will presume the video would've corroborated the civilian's version of events. This would give an extremely strong incentive to not turn off cameras or sabotage video as police have done in a number of cases.
  - kanox 6y ago
    A lot of these policing issues seems to come from progressive localities so I'm not sure it's even due to government unwillingness to solve the issues. Most organizations are really extremely bad at dealing with internal abuses which is why external watchdogs could work very well. Mandatory body cams make a lot of sense but if you need to deal with the opposition of 1000s local police unions it's not going to happen very quickly.
    - GVIrish 6y ago
      > A lot of these policing issues seems to come from progressive localities so I'm not sure it's even due to government unwillingness to solve the issues. Part of the reason for this is that police unions fight vigorously against reform and police unions are powerful in local politics. That's why some police departments ended up getting disbanded by their municipalities to restart from the ground up. It seems like opposition to body cams in general isn't strong, but the real fight will come when stronger laws are proposed for when body cams need to be on, penalties for not having them on, and when footage must be released.
Shivetya 6y ago
and these same city officials, especially mayors, are politically connected to their police departments doubly so if they are unionized; not all police are unionized. politicians learn real fast to not go up against any organization backed by a public employee union. police and educators are the absolute worst in this regard. I keep looking back at how many bemoan corporate money in politics and how references that Citizen's United was the cause but completely ignore that DNC platform while supporting that completely ignores these unions contributing; in fact one certain Senator's webpage is explicit in only using corporation examples. Hell that same person wants you to pay for the DNC and RNC conventions; its criminal we pay for their convention security as is Simple reason, when people are paid by tax coffers that means their unions are and in turn it just becomes one giant slush fund for politicians who want to remain in power.
dogman144 6y ago
Yeah having a tight value set and tight enforcement of integrity violations among other values is certainly a function of the federal structure. Police don't have that. It's too localized and going beyond the current state of affairs requires on a police chief with ethical super powers to really enforce things, as it would be starting from Base 0 with an Elliot Ness-like reform.

by eiji 6y ago

save_ferris 6y ago

Not just that, but much of the hierarchy above police forces is opaque if it exists at all. The Austin PD chief has come under intense scrutiny for his department's handling of various arrests and protests over the past few months, and after roughly half of the city council called on him to resign, it was reported that neither the city council or the mayor could legally fire him.[0] The city manager, which is appointed and not elected, has the power to demote the police chief, but the state does not permit a police chief to be terminated. Long story short, none of Austin's leaders have the power to fire the police chief. 0: https://www.texastribune.org/2020/06/18/austin-police-chief-brian-manley-keeping-job-despite-resignation-calls/ https://www.texastribune.org/2020/06/18/austin-police-chief-... edit: added reporting

erichocean 6y ago
County sheriffs are similarly "protected", in that they have to be voted out in most cases in the next election.
- sukilot 6y ago
  That's fine. They are accountable to the electorate who can recall them.
  - closeparen 6y ago
    It’s less fine when the electorate consistently delivers a mandate to brutalize a minority population, or just isn’t paying enough attention to such down-ticket races to care.
    - roenxi 6y ago
      Criminals are a minority population (by number and temperament, not by race or anything). There structurally can't be any unbiased mechanism for effectively protecting minority populations or the criminals would use them. Look at the taxes-are-theft crowd; they think the electorate consistently delivers a mandate to brutalize their finances. They aren't totally wrong. They'd love a mechanism to avoid arrest if they don't pay taxes. So fine or otherwise, it is probably systemically optimum.
      - FzguLzLA5BDxVC 6y ago
        What does this have to do with systematic abuse of specific groups? Criminals are people who break laws, they aren't a cultural group. They aren't some collection of people that are oppressed. I'd be impressed if you could show me some data showing that criminals (not prisoners) are systematically abused. What are you arguing for?
        roenxi 6y ago
        Thread ancestor said that the electorate was consistently handing out mandates to "brutalize a minority population". The electorate's power to hand out such mandates is also the power that it uses to define who criminals are. There can't be a check on that power without also opening up a huge can of worms for general law enforcement. > Criminals are people who break laws, they aren't a cultural group. If a majority hands out a mandate to oppress a minority group they can probably define the minority group to be criminals. In fact, there is a persuasive argument that that is happening.
    - erichocean 6y ago
      > or just isn’t paying enough attention to such down-ticket races to care The Open Society Foundations has had a ton of success in changing how crimes are prosecuted at the local level by pouring money into district attorney elections across the country. That's a major reason the BLM protests have been successful: most people are not being prosecuted because the local DA is a "friendly." Since many people don't pay attention, money spent at this level has been very effective. Presumably the OSF could target county Sheriffs races next, which would stop those cases from even reaching the DA's desk. Then the police wouldn't need to be abolished per se, they could simply stop enforcing laws that disproportionally target minorities, while simultaneously ratcheting up enforcement on the people who voted for those laws.
pjc50 6y ago
Hence "defund the police": they may not be able to fire the police chief, but they can give him an ultimatum to quit or have the budget from which his salary is paid reduced to zero.
- klyrs 6y ago
  > ... or have the budget from which his salary is paid reduced to zero. That doesn't sound legal -- at the least, he could sue the city/state for those wages
  - ChristianBundy 6y ago
    On what grounds could "he" sue?
- pc86 6y ago
  That's not even remotely how it works. You can't legally do that.
  - joshuamorton 6y ago
    The city could absolutely cut the police budget to $0.
    - roenxi 6y ago
      Can do all sorts of things, but when somebody turns up with a gun there has to be some physical mechanism to stop them from seizing control of the local supermarket. The city can defund the entire police force, but it will have to set up or allow an alternative which will end up the same as the current one if the incentives don't change. Resetting the entire system every time something goes wrong isn't really a viable strategy. It'll work every so often.
      - ChristianBundy 6y ago
        Of course. This isn't controversial. If someone takes a bunch of hostages then we need people who can de-escalate and rescue them, but that isn't what most cops spend their time doing every day.

kanox 6y ago

Creating a new federal body to specifically deal with use-of-force by law enforcement could correct many issues by conducting investigates in a more impartial manner. It could also issue nation-wide guidelines such as making it impossible to turn off body cameras.

GVIrish 6y ago
I see this much like the Civil Rights Act. There was no way segregation was going to be ended without significant legislation and enforcement from the federal government. Bottom line is that the sort of large scale reform needed to end systemic problems of police misconduct is going to be extremely difficult to achieve via local reforms. Congress needs to end qualified immunity, end civil asset forfeiture, increase federal oversight, and potentially write new laws governing the use of body cams. One idea I've seen from police reformers is a 'Missing Video Presumption' law. The basic idea is that if the body cam (or vehicle cam) footage goes missing and there is a conflicting account of events, the court will presume the video would've corroborated the civilian's version of events. This would give an extremely strong incentive to not turn off cameras or sabotage video as police have done in a number of cases.
- kanox 6y ago
  A lot of these policing issues seems to come from progressive localities so I'm not sure it's even due to government unwillingness to solve the issues. Most organizations are really extremely bad at dealing with internal abuses which is why external watchdogs could work very well. Mandatory body cams make a lot of sense but if you need to deal with the opposition of 1000s local police unions it's not going to happen very quickly.
  - GVIrish 6y ago
    > A lot of these policing issues seems to come from progressive localities so I'm not sure it's even due to government unwillingness to solve the issues. Part of the reason for this is that police unions fight vigorously against reform and police unions are powerful in local politics. That's why some police departments ended up getting disbanded by their municipalities to restart from the ground up. It seems like opposition to body cams in general isn't strong, but the real fight will come when stronger laws are proposed for when body cams need to be on, penalties for not having them on, and when footage must be released.

Shivetya 6y ago

and these same city officials, especially mayors, are politically connected to their police departments doubly so if they are unionized; not all police are unionized. politicians learn real fast to not go up against any organization backed by a public employee union. police and educators are the absolute worst in this regard. I keep looking back at how many bemoan corporate money in politics and how references that Citizen's United was the cause but completely ignore that DNC platform while supporting that completely ignores these unions contributing; in fact one certain Senator's webpage is explicit in only using corporation examples. Hell that same person wants you to pay for the DNC and RNC conventions; its criminal we pay for their convention security as is Simple reason, when people are paid by tax coffers that means their unions are and in turn it just becomes one giant slush fund for politicians who want to remain in power.

dogman144 6y ago

Yeah having a tight value set and tight enforcement of integrity violations among other values is certainly a function of the federal structure. Police don't have that. It's too localized and going beyond the current state of affairs requires on a police chief with ethical super powers to really enforce things, as it would be starting from Base 0 with an Elliot Ness-like reform.