What do we do about these motherfucking cops in this country?

[Lee-Lee]

87. If any of you "experts" wants the plan of somebody who has done the job

Fix LE pay. In most places a rookie cop starts out just barely making enough to get by and they have to work side jobs to really make it. Much like teachers, if you want hire good people and keep them you have to pay them properly. You want more, pay more. You want officers to take more risk? Pay accordingly.

This also comes into the realm of residency requirements I have seen some suggest here. Yeah, you can try and have them- but that works both ways. That means officers in Beverly Hills will have to be paid enough to actually live there too- and what that will lead to is a system where new rookie officers all go work in low income areas, but as soon as they have a few years under thier belt keep apply to more well off areas that have to pay more due to residency requirements. Then you end up with good, experienced officers working in affulent areas, poor areas get rookies and the ones who can't get hired on anywhere else.

Support real due process rights for all officers- full union representation and backing. Cops are workers just like anyone else and deserve full labor protections- to deny that to ANY worker is very anti-progressive. A cop who knows he/she has a strong union will feel a lot more free to speak out about abuse and criticize superiors when they are wrong.

Eliminating pensions and putting cops on 401k type programs. I know in most cases this is a bad thing, but a pension in LE had a bad side. I saw a lot of cops who were totally burned out and just didn't care anymore. But they had 18-20-22 years in and were just doing the bare minimum to survive the next few years it would take to be fully vested in the pension and retire. If they had a retirement plan that allowed them to switch careers at any point without loss with no "end date" they had to work to they would have left the profession when they burned out.

Eliminate 12 hour shifts- 12 hour shifts wear down judgement and reasoning toward the end of the shift.

Eliminate odd swing shift schedules- this is bad because officers work tired often, but also because it leads to isolation- when the only people you know who are off when you are off are cops, that is all you hang out with and it ends up isolating them.

Quit bashing all cops- look around at the blatant and bigot attitude toward cops in this forum. How many cops come across this forum, read that crap, and get turned away from progressive politics? More than you think. It leads to more alienation from yen community and helps foster the "us vs them" mentality.

Quit asking cops you do know to fix a ticket or run somebody's license or other stuff like that. It's illegal, puts them in an akward spot and leads once again to cops just hanging out with cops and isolating themselves.

Establish a VA type system of pension and health care for those injured on the job. Every time a use of force incident happens people on here call the cops cowards and assert that the cops shoild have been more willing to accept risk of death or injury to avoid harming the individual they were dealing with. If you want that and want cops to take more risk you need a system that will take good care of them if they get injured and can't work the job anymore- tossing them out on Social Security Disability is the only plan most PD's have, and that doesn't cut it.

Quit rushing to conclusions every time some incident happens. There are lots of bad people out there, not every officer involved shootibg is a racist murderer on a rampage. Give it at least 48 hours to play out before pronouncing judgement based on a few sensational media accounts. Saying "racist pigs murdered another" 5 minutes after an initial report just shows your own bigotry and once agains serves to alienate all other cops from you and your cause.

Quit lying or exaggerating about cops actions. Take the recent case a Salisbury NC- the NAACP held a press conference accusing local police of harassing a local minister a year prior- saying the officer was aggressive and racially profiled him. The video was produced and the officer was nothing but polite and professional. How do you think that affected relations between the NAACP, other minority leaders, and officers of that department?

Before screaming all over about how a cop should have "shot him in the leg" or "used a taser instead of a gun" try gaining a little experince in the use of those items to see if your screams are realistic.

Don't hire anyone under 25 for LE- give them enough years as an adult to get experience in the "real world" but also to see what mistakes they make and if they keep a clean background until then.

I have plenty more for when I am at a computer- this was a lot to type on a phone.