8 Police Officers Dead this month. So far.

[Lee-Lee]

54. The disdain for police at DU puzzles and amuses me, and is mostly hypocritical

We on the left are supposed to be about government, and all it can do for the people.

Without the police keeping order, there is anarchy. In fact no government program, when it comes down to it, can ever exist without police power. Because all regulations, and in the end all taxes that fund all the programs we love, are enforced by the police in one form or another. No matter what the regulation or tax, ignore it long enough and the eventual consequence and enforcement involves and armed officer showing up. Some take longer to get there, but that, in the end, is the root of all government power and enforcement.

Love your local library? School? Fire department? Funded by property taxes. Don't pay your taxes? If you refuse to in the end that is enforced by an armed officer coming and seizing your property so it can be sold so your share of the collective cost of that library, and the fire department, and the schools is paid.

If the government did not have the power of the police to enforce taxation, NO government programs would exist, because nobody would pay taxes.

None.

Do you like environmental laws? Without armed enforcement in the end they are toothless. Most enforcement actions don't reach the point of needing it, because the threat is there and that is enough. If it wasn't, inspectors couldn't even gain access to most properties to check for violations.

Do you like like having highways and railroads? National parks? Without eminent domain, and armed officers removing landowners who refused to budge, they wouldn't exist.

This is a simple reality of government. To exist it must have the power to ensure compliance with the mandates of the majority with regards to taxation and behavior.

I know many of you are probably frothing at the mouth now mad at what I am saying- but it is reality. No police= no government programs that come from taxation. Because taxation not backed up by the power to seize property and arrest for nonpayment would never be paid.

This is a simple fact of government. Most here are loath to ever admit it, but it is true. Behind EVERY action government takes, behind EVERY program, there exists a line of men and women with badges, guns and police powers that enable it. Be they tax collectors, whose actions on the Federal level ensure our nations programs are funded, or Sheriffs deputies who enforce seizures when local taxes go unpaid, to city police who go along to ensure access when city inspectors are denied access to check for illegal hazardous waste storage.

If you like government doing things for people, then the price that comes with that is having a police force that is powerful enough to enforce the laws that enable that government to exist and operate. The more we want government to do, the more power we have to, in exchange, accept armed agents of that government having over us and segments of our society.

But 99% of people never think about that.