Stick To Catching Speeders
link Arizona immigration law will boost crime in U.S. cities, police chiefs say.
This from people supposedly hired to protect citizens from crime and enforce the law. If the notion that enforcing the law will actually boost crime, then what about the corollary? What if we didn’t enforce laws at all, would crimes then decline? This seems to be the brilliant conclusion pushed by certain police chiefs, among them those from the famously crime free meccas of L.A., Houston and Philadelphia.
This is somewhat related to the raging argument about dealing with the crime associated with drugs. The bleat you hear often is that the war on drugs doesn’t work; why criminalize many for small indiscretions which don’ t harm anybody but the user. This in itself is a debate which can be discussed by passionate champions on both sides and we won’t do it now. But the theme that’s common to both of these issues is that the problems have been allowed to get so large that people now have trouble dealing with it. Both can be traced back to waffling and uncommitted responses at the outset. In the case of Arizona’s immigration law, the opposition is not based on capacity to enforce, it is mired in political haymaking which has everything to do with votes and nothing to do with efficacy.
What if people got away with murdering people who annoyed them? What if people began stealing from neighbours because they had better stuff? If these incidences got to large enough numbers, would police throw up their hands and say that to enforce laws against this behaviour would only drive a wedge between the police and would be criminals? It’s not just absurd, it’s irresponsible and stupid. If police think that policies are politically wrong, then like everyone else, vote for someone who better reflects your opinion, or better yet, run for office.
Cops should be in the police business, not in the policy business. It can only be a matter of time before they decide that enforcing traffic violations will only drive a wedge between motorists and police officers. Actually, if you eliminated all the policing activities that would create divisions and drive wedges into society, you probably wouldn’t even need police officers. That sure would help most city budgets. All I can think of that’s left for them to do is responding to barking dog complaints. That’s safe, I mean what do we care if we disenfranchise dogs.