The Wrongologist

What’s Wrong Today:

Over the last several decades, America’s police forces have increasingly come to resemble ground troops. This all became clear to us with the response after the Boston Marathon bombing. Tank-like vehicles, armored-up cops, helicopters were all part of the man hunt. There was a picture in the Boston Globe during the Marathon Bombing showing two police officers side by side. They both had identical helmets, flak jackets and weapons.  One had a big patch on his back
that said “MASSACHUSETTS STATE POLICE.” Another officer next to him, his patch said “BOSTON POLICE.” 

Today’s policemen are a far cry from the cops of the 1950’s. The 1960s brought about the invention of the SWAT unit—which in turn led to the debut of military tactics
in the ranks of police officers. Nixon’s War on Drugs, Reagan’s War on Poverty, the post–9/11 security state under Bush and Obama: By degrees, each of these innovations expanded and empowered police forces, sometimes at the expense of civil liberties.

From the Huffington Post:

Where these teams were once used only in emergency situations, they’re now also used as an investigative tool against people merely suspected of crimes. In many police
agencies, paramilitary tactics have become the first option, where they once were the last. The police now use overwhelming force.  Even when arresting a drunk, they use multiple cars.  After the Boston bombing they had large
numbers of police just stand around as a part of “confidence building” and to “deter” the bombers. And the
military tools are supplied by the federal government and the taxpayers. The Pentagon’s 1033 program, started in 1997, gives surplus military equipment to local police agencies. Millions of pieces of equipment have since been given
away, some $500 million worth in 2011 alone.

Once they get the gear, police agencies even in tiny towns have used it to start SWAT teams.

The Department of Homeland Security has a program that cuts checks to police departments via federal grants specifically tied to drug policing and asset
forfeiture policies. Since Sept. 11, 2001, the DHS has handed out some $34 billion in grants to police departments across
the country, many for the purchase of battle-grade vehicles and weapons. This program has created a cottage industry of companies who make militarized equipment and take checks from local towns in exchange for guns, tanks and
armored vehicles.

These DHS grants dwarf the 1033 program. At the end of 2011, the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR) found that some defense contractors that had previously served the Pentagon, have since shifted their focus to police departments, hoping to tap a new homeland security market
bounty expected to be worth $19 billion annually by 2014. Police agencies have a whole new source of funding for their military gear. Elsewhere, CIR found that:

• In Augusta, Maine, with fewer than 20,000 people and where an officer hasn’t died from gunfire in the line of duty in more than 125 years, police bought eight $1,500 tactical vests

• In Des Moines, Iowa police bought two $180,000 bomb-disarming robots

• In Arizona, a sheriff is now the proud owner of a surplus Army tank

• In Montgomery County, Texas, the sheriff’s department owns a $300,000 pilotless
  surveillance drone

A couple months before the CIR report, the Montgomery County department made headlines when its DHS-funded drone accidentally crashed into its DHS-funded BEARCAT, which stands for “Ballistic Engineered
Armored Response Counter Attack Truck”; in other words, an armored personnel carrier.

In effect, the DHS and Pentagon programs have given rise to a police industrial complex. Concord, NH applied
for a $258,000 Federal grant for a BEARCAT. According to the Concord Monitor, the matter is before the city council, and there is significant local opposition to the acquisition, mostly based on the potential for militarization of the police force. Dozens of people testified against the BEARCAT. Some people held signs saying, “More Mayberry less Fallujah”.

Nashville BEARCAT

The question is that these grants are supposed to be for the purpose of preventing terrorism; they are not supposed
to be about making a police officer safer while executing search warrants, standing by at protests, or other things like that. Note that there’s also a Bearcat just up the road from Concord in Manchester ,so can’t they save a few bucks and just share?

What’s happening here is that we’re building a domestic irregular military. Why? The last time more than 10 terrorists were in the same place at one time in America was on
September 11, and all the BEARCATS and SWAT teams in the country wouldn’t have prevented it, and wouldn’t have helped anyone at ground zero.

What’s happening is a pre-staging of gear and equipment: And its standardized vehicles and standardized equipment. These units can now be deployed anywhere in the country for “missions”, because the equipment and training of each unit is increasingly identical, rather like plug-and-play. The tendency, encouraged by the DHS and Federal grant money, is for all police units across the country to become interchangeable — the only differences will be their uniform patches and the jurisdiction stenciled on the flak jackets.

OK, that may be a bridge too far. To say that the
police are militarized is not the same as saying they’re becoming a Domestic Military, although the claims are related.

The federal government has an obvious and legitimate interest in protecting the country from terrorist attacks. So at least in theory, anti-terror grants to domestic police agencies might make sense. But what are these grants doing to
prevent terrorism?

The best way to stop overzealous law enforcement agencies is with good oversight of their actions.

• We need elected public oversight committees that deal with government actions

• We need to hold government accountable for its actions and require them to justify
  their actions

• We need to make them follow the law

We can’t allow a confiscating entity like a local police department, or state agency, or the Drug Enforcement Agency to reap any financial gain from their actions. We must eliminate self serving actions taken only for self serving or financial gain.

We can’t allow local, state or federal government entities to hide behind bad (security or secret) laws.

We must make the government abide by the Constitution without exception.

It is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad.  -James Madison