This sounds crazy!! Get rid of the current people & hire new ones… I repeat, It’s crazy… 
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Yes, of course. But it is exactly the sort of thing we can use to sink Biden.
However: not yet. It is too early.
Trump has a remarkable trove of dry powder; just waiting.
And the loonies are simply ADDING to Trumps ammo.
I am loving EVERY second of this 1968 redux. 
The nuttier they become the better it is for Trump!
Would it not be better to vet the current police force and then replace the bad apples as needed? Or is it estimated that the old is in such bad shape than starting from a blank slate would be cheaper? I don’t know the specifics of the costs involved in either solution, just seems inefficient to me.
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I though the protests these past couple of weeks were from all walks of life. Didn’t realize it was from the liberal side. Live and learn, I guess. I was wrong again.
I’m a registered independent. At least from my perspective, the idea of un-funding or dissolving the police is bonkers. Without police there would be armed neighborhood watch parties, for sure. That right there would give ammunition (pun intended) to folks rejecting gun control. And even if some neighborhoods feel the police doesn’t add anything valuable to their lives, the vast majority of neighborhoods in cities big and small think the opposite.
Agreed. In fact, I read in WaPo that unions are a part of the problem. Some clear bad apples should be removed from the force but the unions protect them. If an abusive cop is eventually removed, the union typically files a lawsuit and the city ends up paying through the nose. That should be changed.
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Perhaps. But it has been done before and I provided an example. There is a problem with police culture in some police departments, and if the only way to fix the problem is to get rid of and then rebuild the entire department, then that’s what should be done. If you have repeated occurrences of police brutality and racial injustice year after year, then it’s an ingrained “workplace culture” problem that requires and warrants harsh measures.
It was implied upthread by some that the protesters (and looters) are far-left liberals (and according to pattyb53, “real” Republicans aren’t even allowed to join in, only Democrats and "RINO"s are protesting). shinobi said that these ideas to get rid of police are from the left (aka, liberal):
Nobody said that the protests were “from the liberal side.”
Like I said, not having police is not a mainstream idea and it’s not going to happen. It’s media hype around fringe ideas blowing up out of proportion. Perhaps as a negotiating tactic (one side wants a $2B PD budget, the other side says no, you get $0, then they negotiate to somewhere more reasonable).
I’m with you on that. Police unions are not like other labor unions – they have too much power. Other labor unions are taking unprecedented actions now – AFL-CIO asked for the resignation of a Minneapolis Police Union chief. There’s pressure on federations of labor unions to kick out police unions. It’s one thing to protect workers from unfair labor practices, it’s another to protect them from punishment for criminal behavior on the job.
I don’t know about that. The power to kill you with impunity didn’t come from the union, it came from the lack-of-justice system where juries usually believe the police and prosecutors rarely bother. Bad incentives and lack of accountability basically.
In contrast, teachers unions have the power to wreck the next generation’s education by keeping incompetent or poor performing teachers around til they retire, opposing charter schools, and generally trapping kids without lots of economic means in a poorly performing system that sets many of them up for failure (the worst of which end up providing job security for the police).
We had something like 30 unarmed police killings last year, which is unfortunate for them to be sure, but I’ve got to think there’s a lot more damage done defending the lack of accountability in a nearly $1T public education system here in the US. Generously those killings might cost the police, er taxpayers, $5-10M for each unjustified one so maybe $100-200M? I’ve got to think there’s more than 5% inefficiency in public education which would run $25-50B/year and I suspect that’s quite a low estimate.
Of course reforming both works too, since it’s not an exclusive choice.
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Qualified Immunity has nothing to do with juries and prosecutors, because cases against bad cops protected by qualified immunity don’t even go to a jury.
I’m having a hard time figuring out how to respond to this other than to remind you that teachers unions are not protecting employees that take innocent people’s lives. Also $100M/yr ($1B over 10 years) is the cost of settlements in cases that do not have qualified immunity. I’m not sure of how many cases are never paid out because of qualified immunity.
I said “impunity”, referring to the process by which a case would be unlikely to succeed or be brought in the first place. Yes, qualified immunity also discourages prosecution.
No, that was my estimate for all unjustified unarmed killings by police. you’re welcome to use your own estimates for settlements, % justified, etc. If some of these were not paid due to legal immunity, that would reduce the total payout.
($1B over 10 years)
Just like how $50B/year in educational waste is half a trillion over 10 years - big numbers get bigger over time. that’s without counting the lost educational opportunities either, which are also substantial. For example, here’s an estimate how shutting down the schools for the virus these last 3-4 months may have a present value cost of $1-2T from reduced future employment, etc. of course poor education is still more than nothing, and the current level of remote learning certainly isn’t top notch.
I mentioned “qualified immunity” not because you said “impunity,” but because that is what gives them such impunity.
I mentioned $1B over 10 years because that’s the statistic that was mentioned in the news (not $100M/yr). That’s the actual number paid out over the past decade.
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“The president and his team believe the massive protests in recent weeks will make it harder for critics to single him out.”
Never let a crisis go to waste.
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Go for it Mr. President… 
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I’ve spent about half of my 35 year career in the private sector and half in the public. It seems to me that the private sector finds ways to get rid of troublesome employees without having a lot of adverse consequences to the company.
Public sector employers, on the other hand, seem extreeeeeemely reluctant to even start the process of getting rid of a bad apple and then when they do, they cave easily to threat of lawsuit. I know the plural of anecdote is not data, but having worked with several public and private employers, I think I’ve got a pretty good chance of getting this correct on a general basis.
The unions are not the problem with cops or teachers. The problem lies with management.
I’ve worked with well over 50 cities & companies – directly or as a consultant. I’ve never found one that had an over-abundance of bad people at the rank and file level. Every single city / company that was struggling had managers & supervisors who were not trained and developed to be successful at their jobs.
I’ve worked in dysfunctional teams at midsize private companies. Something that often happens is that bad managers empower sycophant underlings and enablers. If you’re a competent, qualified direct report to an incompetent manager, he/she naturally will sideline or isolate you.
I remember one of my bosses from years ago. He was a VP-Engineering who got the title because his minuscule start-up was acquired and he had to remain in the organization as part of the acquisition deal. He felt proud of how he “made sure that the carcasses always fall next to someone else’s fence”. This meant that he’d create a nasty situation for an employee to force a firing, and make it look like the dismissal happened because of another coworker’s actions. Bad, bad person he was.
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The polling, which was conducted by RMG Group, shows McGrath, a former Marine fighter pilot, with the support of 41 percent of voters, while McConnell is backed by 40 percent. However, the polling also showed that when voters are informed that McGrath supports congressional term limits while McConnell does not, her lead over the Republican jumps significantly.
With the candidates’ positions on term limits factored in, McGrath was backed by 45 percent of respondents, while McConnell was supported by just 30 percent. But 17 percent of those surveyed were still undecided, and 8 percent said they’d vote for a different candidate.
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The real issue, as we’ve mentioned before, is that Trump isnt a “real” Republican. He co-opted the party for his presidential run. I have trouble expecting Republicans to blindly support Trump out of party loyalty, because Trump has done nothing to earn their loyalty, besides keep the Democrats out of the White House. The relationship is more “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”, and that door can swing both ways.
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Keeping the Dems out of the white house. What else!! Vote for Biden & our ship sinks… 
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Yes, keeping Democrats out of the White House is a HUGE deal. It’s the entire game. McCain failed in his attempt. Romney failed in his attempt and he is still sore about it.
Trump succeeded. Thank God. I cannot IMAGINE Hillary Clinton as POTUS. Just for starters, every conservative judge appointed by President Trump would today instead be a liberal warrior. OMG that is a “fate worse than death” scenario. Anyone who thinks it does not matter is in serious error. And there is SO much more good that Trump has done for our country. Only the pandemic has slowed him; but it will not stop him.
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