what do we do with violent people?

As more and more stories and videos of police brutalizing Occupy protesters come out, I'm reminded of something I wrote about a year ago.

police proud of their illegal tactics

Here is the state's playbook. Exploit fear to increase the power of the state at the expense of personal liberty, and then immediately use that increased power in ways other than how it was originally justified. Today's local new provides one tiny example.

As I understand it "RIDE programs" allow police to detain motorists in the absence of reasonable suspicion. Presumably citizens don't like being detained by men with weapons, but accept loss of liberty associated with these programs in the hopes of reducing impaired driving and making roads safer. If such programs failed to make roads safer (an empirical question), or if such programs were used for other purposes, it would violate the terms under which the liberty was surrendered.

Well, here in my hometown, police openly - and rather proudly - acknowledge that they can and do use these programs for other purposes.

a few unrelated items

On my brief trip to Maryland for the holidays I had a run in with the police. My "suspicious" activity was pulling into the parking lot of a community park at 6pm and walking around near my car. I was detained for questioning for about 20 minutes by an armed asshole who, when I didn't give meaningful answers to his questions and asked if I was free to go, threatened to arrest me, called for backup, and had me thoroughly frisked.

I found Life of Birds at the library, and, well, I couldn't pass that up. Katsu loves it too. He's been staring like that for 10 minutes.

I found some ground water buffalo in the freezer last time I went to Cumbraes, and, well, I couldn't pass that up. I don't think I could blindly distinguish it from beef by texture or flavour. I won't be offering Katsu any of the spaghetti I'm making.

asshole toronto cop can't stand being called an asshole, so he files a lawsuit... like an asshole

Virginia cops kill an unarmed man suspected of stealing flowers. Hooray for the state!

woman chained, kidnapped, thrown in a cage

for not wearing a shirt. I have to think the cops feel pretty stupid about this, right? Some of them anyway.

How dare you not let me abuse my power!!

Where people whose job it is to enforce the law go to complain when they aren't treated like they're above the law.

Or as Thoreau says:

They even announce the names of cops who gave them speeding tickets, in hopes that other cops will take notice of this “unprofessional behavior.” Um, yeah. Sure.
I doubt that the creators of that site realize this, but by highlighting instances where the law is applied even to cops they are actually portraying law enforcement in a positive light.

I say “Bravo!” to the cops who apply the law equally and impartially to all of their fellow citizens, including people who enjoy positions of trust and authority.

More on the taser attack

Arthur gets it right as usual. Cops use extreme force against nonthreatening victims for simply failing to do exactly what they say. They take their cues from our imperial overlords, who invade nonthreatening countries for failing to do exactly what they say.

The public watches, and does nothing.