Some horrible policing advice from the leader of the free world
“When you guys put somebody in the car and you’re protecting their head you know, the way you put their hand over [their head],” Trump said, mimicking the motion. “Like, ‘Don’t hit their head and they’ve just killed somebody, don’t hit their head.’ I said, ‘You can take the hand away, OK?”
And with those words, once again Donald Trump became the worst person in the world.
Police administrations around the country felt the need to explain that no, they would be nice no matter what the President said about the treatment of criminal gang members, and hands would remain over the fontanelle of every murderer today and every day thereafter in case anyone was worried about such.
Why? Because we are “nice.” We’re in the business of “nice.”
Busted for 75 in a 55? I’m a nice guy to you. Caught in the act of sodomizing a little boy? It’s all smiles and flowery words. Just tried to take my gun from me while in a fight for my life? It’s not a problem. I will even offer you a comment card.
I actually wake up most days wondering how I can make the criminal justice experience a better one for my clients, but that habit has now been interrupted because now I’m being forced to explain to everyone that the nearly 800,000 police officers in America working for one of its 18,000 police departments are probably not going to take the American President at his word that he will cover our legal fees if we stop being polite to criminal gang members.
I have to ask; has anyone ever considered not taking the bait in situations like these? These comments are actually a great example of how he came into office in the first place.
His base of angry “We’re tired of being called racist” under-employed citizens really don’t want cops to be nice to criminals and are cheering—loudly—while of course “the left” is losing its mind at him once again saying something both terribly obvious and terribly politically incorrect, as if he didn’t provide such low hanging fruit on an hourly basis.
When his predecessor was in office, I can say as a career cop that he truly did make my job more difficult. I’m not talking about the guns the ATF let walk into the hands of these same Mexican cartel members whose foreheads I wish to swab with a moist towel should my AC not be sufficient in the back seat; no.
I’m talking about how he would weigh in on politically charged police involved (or citizen involved) shootings. Calling cops “stupid” for holding even black college professors accountable for their behavior (though he tastefully made up for that one with the “Beer Summit”).
Fanning the flames of the “Hands Up / Don’t Shoot” phenomenon, even after it was proven no one had their damn hands up. Greenlighting riotous behavior if you felt like it, because “feelings.”
Now, because of actions like those I listed above, we have the polar opposite kind of man in the White House who has made my job harder today for the opposite kind of encouragement.
I think it would be great if we were just left alone to do our impossible jobs. We have our body cams now to record our behavior (and comically, the behavior of our clients), everyone has their cell phones to record us as we record them, we’re pretty much aware of the fact the President won’t be writing a check to our lawyers, and we’ve all clarified that the dome of every clients’ head is going to be treated as if it were our own no matter how deplorable or violent they are.
We should also consider pointing out that water is wet and odd-numbered sequels are always inferior to the even-numbered ones, but I’m willing to concede that one if I can just have a cup of coffee with my favorite Circle K clerk without having to reassure anyone that people in the White House don’t affect my policies no matter who they caucus with.
This guy is an idiot, the last guy was a different kind of idiot, and we’ll deal with the next inevitable idiot as well. See a pattern forming here? “We got this.” Relax.
When officer Alexander D. Teach is not patrolling our fair city on the heels of the criminal element, he spends his spare time volunteering for the Boehm Birth Defects Center.