More on Police Military Style Raids

From Popular Mechanics of all places. Radley Balko, aka "The Agitator," is quoted in this article. He is the person responsible for that map of botched raids that Otter linked a couple of posts below.

He also coined the term - The Militarization of Mayberry about tiny towns that get fun new toys that they can use to terrorize their citizenry.

Thus, the sheriff’s department in landlocked Boone County, Ind., has an amphibious armored personnel carrier. (According to that county’s sheriff-elect, the vehicle has been used to deliver prescriptions to snow-bound elderly residents, and to provide protection during a suspected hostage situation.) Jasper, Fla.,—with 2000 inhabitants and two murders in the past 12 years—obtained seven M-16s from the federal government, leading an area newspaper to run a story with the subhead, “Three stoplights, seven M-16s.”

This approach, though, has led to problems both obvious and subtle. The obvious problem should be especially apparent to readers of this magazine: Once you’ve got a cool tool, you kind of want to use it. That’s true whether it’s a pneumatic drill, a laser level or an armored fighting vehicle. SWAT teams, designed to deal with rare events, wound up doing routine police work, like serving drug warrants.

The subtle effect is also real: Dress like a soldier and you think you’re at war. And, in wartime, civil liberties—or possible innocence—of the people on “the other side” don’t come up much. But the police aren’t at war with the citizens they serve, or at least they’re not supposed to be.

This is definitely a frightening trend that can really be tied in with the whole recent trend of failing to value the individual. That valuation choice leads to diminished property rights, limited choices through regulations (see the whole "Trans-fats" issue), and a general reliance on a government that has now proven time and time again that if you get in its way, it will crush you - justice be damned.

Oh yeah, Glenn Reynolds - Instapundit - is the author of the article. Heh!

Kid H.