Looking for another Top Cop
by digby
Chuck Todd, Chuck Shumer and the Village twitter tag team are very excited at the idea of appointing New York Police Chief Ray “stopnfrisk” Kelly to the Department of Homeland Security now that Napolitano has decided it’s time to do something else. (Bernie Kerrick is still in jail I believe, or maybe he could make a comeback…)
As far as I’m concerned, if we have to have a police chief, maybe we could pick one that has some imagination and a regard for the constitution. Like this guy:
Hoover Institution fellow and former police chief (in San Jose and Kansas City) Joseph McNamara writes in [the] Wall Street Journal:
Simply put, the police culture in our country has changed. An emphasis on “officer safety” and paramilitary training pervades today’s policing, in contrast to the older culture, which held that cops didn’t shoot until they were about to be shot or stabbed. Police in large cities formerly carried revolvers holding six .38-caliber rounds. Nowadays, police carry semi-automatic pistols with 16 high-caliber rounds, shotguns and military assault rifles, weapons once relegated to SWAT teams facing extraordinary circumstances. Concern about such firepower in densely populated areas hitting innocent citizens has given way to an attitude that the police are fighting a war against drugs and crime and must be heavily armed.
Yes, police work is dangerous, and the police see a lot of violence. On the other hand, 51 officers were slain in the line of duty last year, out of some 700,000 to 800,000 American cops. That is far fewer than the police fatalities occurring when I patrolled New York’s highest crime precincts, when the total number of cops in the country was half that of today. Each of these police deaths and numerous other police injuries is a tragedy and we owe support to those who protect us. On the other hand, this isn’t Iraq. The need to give our officers what they require to protect themselves and us has to be balanced against the fact that the fundamental duty of the police is to protect human life and that law officers are only justified in taking a life as a last resort.
I know. I’m quite the comedian. Like anyone who writes such a thing could ever be nominated, much less confirmed.
But seriously, this creepy, behemoth agency we call “Homeland Security” is growing out of control and unless it’s abolished (my first choice) it should be headed by someone who is able to come in and take a fresh look at all the money and power its amassed and assess where it can and should be cut. It’s a very bad idea to let this thing become yet another sacred law enforcement agency that has no boundaries and no limits on what the taxpayers are required to spend to keep it in shiny new technology and warmaking toys.
McNamara would be a great choice. Unfortunately, he isn’t a right wing hawk and/or Republican so it’s impossible.
They’re also talking about Joe Lieberman which is enough to make me take up drinking at 1:30 in the afternoon.
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