Police brutality and a few "bad apples"

[Civet]

Lets say for some reason one of his family has to be taken into a police station, how will Trump react when they come out with a blackeye, couple of cracked ribs and a gash on their forehead?

He seems to have forgotten that being taken into custody by the police does not mean you are guilty.

Trump's probably aware that he and people like him are generally treated with plenty of courtesy when they get arrested. I can't imagine he cares what happens to other people.

 

[Checkmite]

It helped that soon afterwards several departments and associations made statements contradicting the president's remark. This article shows a few (not a comprehensive list).

 

[alfaniner]

The Pidget just wants to be sure nobody touches his hair helmet once they finish his perp walk. He's willing to take a bump for that.

 

[Nessie]

The police don't determine if someone is guilty.

The police need to be regularly reminded of that.

 

[Travis]

What we need to do is disband all our nation's police forces utterly then form new police departments that are staffed via conscription.

 

[Mumbles]

What we need to do is disband all our nation's police forces utterly then form new police departments that are staffed via conscription.

I could go for this - remake all police at the state level.

Of course, we'd then have to discuss DAs, and our trial system...but it's a good start.

 

[theprestige]

What we need to do is disband all our nation's police forces utterly then form new police departments that are staffed via conscription.

This seems like a stupid idea to me. But you don't need my help to try it out in your community.

This signature is intended to irradiate people.

 

[The Don]

This sort of flip and incorrect statement should, of course, get corrected every time it's trotted out but it does get tiresome.

The AMERICAN PEOPLE DID NOT elect Trump — the (more easily bribeable) ELECTORAL COLLEGE ELECTED TRUMP. The useless vote that THE PEOPLE cast was overwhelmingly for Clinton.

Which means that, if the people's vote for president actually mattered, we would NOT have Trump in office right this second.

Yes the electoral college gave him a path to victory, but he wouldn't have got close unless tens of millions of people hadn't gone out and voted for him. It's no more remarkable than in the UK where a political party can have a huge majority despite getting less than 40% (of the 50%-60% of the people who could be bothered to turn out and vote) of the popular vote.

ENOUGH of the American people voted for Trump and furthermore a far, far greater number aren't outraged enough by his, his administration, and the GOP's antics to write to their Congressperson and tell them to get things sorted out.

Face it, Trump is the president that a hefty minority of those who bothered to vote want, and the president that the vast majority are willing to tolerate.

 

[Toke]

What we need to do is disband all our nation's police forces utterly then form new police departments that are staffed via conscription.

Not sure about the conscription idea, but the wholesale replacement have been tried.
It was tried here back in 17-something, with good results.
Something-Stan did it a decade ago, also with reasonable result.

 

[Darat]

What? Do they throw darts at a board to decide who to arrest?

Police investigate, prosecutors create a case, courts decide.

 

[Nessie]

The police role should be only as evidence gatherers and only the brightest cops who have a degree education should be allowed to investigate so as to gather evidence.

Policing, as it attending reports of crimes and disturbances, would be for other cops, whose prime role is to secure evidence and not touch anything.

 

[jimbob]

I could go for this - remake all police at the state level.

Of course, we'd then have to discuss DAs, and our trial system...but it's a good start.

The US policing system is broken. The UK is not perfect but at least we know every time that a police officer draws a Taser (even if they don't fire it).

The US has literally thousands of police forces employing a single full time equivalent. That can't have effective oversight.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Perhaps Trump wants the police to have greater freedom to act as that would have cleared up the Central Park jogger case quickly and neatly and spared him the annoyance of being pestered by people criticising his brilliant insight that the five original suspects are clearly the guilty men.

Despite DNA and a later confession pointing to a convicted serial rapist and murderer, you can't deny the police got confessions out of most of those juveniles so, you know, bad dudes.

 

[The Norseman]

Yes the electoral college gave him a path to victory, but he wouldn't have got close unless tens of millions of people hadn't gone out and voted for him. It's no more remarkable than in the UK where a political party can have a huge majority despite getting less than 40% (of the 50%-60% of the people who could be bothered to turn out and vote) of the popular vote.

ENOUGH of the American people voted for Trump and furthermore a far, far greater number aren't outraged enough by his, his administration, and the GOP's antics to write to their Congressperson and tell them to get things sorted out.

Face it, Trump is the president that a hefty minority of those who bothered to vote want, and the president that the vast majority are willing to tolerate.

Some states have laws that supposedly require their electoral college members to vote as the winner-take-all popular vote dictates, sure. I say supposedly, because I read of an electoral college member from Washington state — before the election — who was quoted as saying he'd vote for Trump no matter the popular vote; he had to "vote his conscience" and would take the fine the would have been imposed for ignoring the state law.

I think it was a thousand dollar fine. One of Trump's backers could have easily paid the thousand dollars for the vote — surreptitiously of course, but pretty cheap for such an important vote.

Besides, as I've said, overall, the popular vote overwhelmingly went for Clinton which I think is a much better representation of what the people of the United States actually wanted rather than what we actually got.

 

[PhantomWolf]

Much as I hate to defend Trump, if you watch the video it's pretty clear that this was an attempt at humor, along the lines of when someone says that "if you catch a child molster, just toss him in a cell with a big black dude named bubba, and then turn the lights down low for them."

It's pretty typical of Trump humour when you listen, it's a bit rambly and loses a lot of it's bite because of the way he speaks, but from the tone of voice and the way it is delivered, it's is him trying to do a funny. It's also responded to in the same way, first with the laughter you give a Dad Joke, and then by, oh, the President told a joke, we better applaud it.

Was it a funny joke? Not in my opinion, and the way he delivers his jokes makes them rambling and tends to suck the funny out of them even when they could be funny, so not a big change there.

Was it appropriate, again not in my opinion. It's not the sort of joke that a President should be trying to tell in a speech, even if they are capable of getting humor across well. No more then if they told the Bubba joke above, there are certain things that might work fine down the pub with your mates, but you just don't say and do as President, and this was one.

Was it the President inciting violence and police cheering because they are inherently brutal and want to beat on people... again, not in my opinion.

 

[Babbylonian]

Was it the President inciting violence and police cheering because they are inherently brutal and want to beat on people... again, not in my opinion.

I don't think they were cheering brutality. I think they were cheering because, inexplicably, police tend to support Republicans and they knew the beast wanted the response. They're morons cheering for a moron saying something moronic. Nothing surprising there.

 

[ponderingturtle]

The US policing system is broken. The UK is not perfect but at least we know every time that a police officer draws a Taser (even if they don't fire it).

The US has literally thousands of police forces employing a single full time equivalent. That can't have effective oversight.

Yea we can't even say we know every time the police kill someone.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Much as I hate to defend Trump, if you watch the video it's pretty clear that this was an attempt at humor, along the lines of when someone says that "if you catch a child molster, just toss him in a cell with a big black dude named bubba, and then turn the lights down low for them."

It's pretty typical of Trump humour when you listen, it's a bit rambly and loses a lot of it's bite because of the way he speaks, but from the tone of voice and the way it is delivered, it's is him trying to do a funny. It's also responded to in the same way, first with the laughter you give a Dad Joke, and then by, oh, the President told a joke, we better applaud it.

Was it a funny joke? Not in my opinion, and the way he delivers his jokes makes them rambling and tends to suck the funny out of them even when they could be funny, so not a big change there.

Was it appropriate, again not in my opinion. It's not the sort of joke that a President should be trying to tell in a speech, even if they are capable of getting humor across well. No more then if they told the Bubba joke above, there are certain things that might work fine down the pub with your mates, but you just don't say and do as President, and this was one.

Was it the President inciting violence and police cheering because they are inherently brutal and want to beat on people... again, not in my opinion.

Why does saying he was intending it as a joke change anything?

 

[ponderingturtle]

I don't think they were cheering brutality.

Except in the literal sense. They knew that they don't have to worry about any justice department investigations for 4 years, that is something worth cheering about. They won't have the systematic racism exposed for that period

 

[PhantomWolf]

Why does saying he was intending it as a joke change anything?

Because jokes aren't something to take literally, and those listening understand that. I get it, you don't like Trump, the majority of people don't, but he says enough objectionable things that he does mean seriously which he can be vilified for that you don't have to take his inappropriate humor out of context and use that too. When you create spurious attacks on him, then all it really does is weaken the real attacks, something he knows full well with his whole "Fake News" spiel.