I served over 20 years as the chief of police in Madison (WI), four years as chief of the Burnsville (MN) Police Department, and before that as a police officer in Edina (MN) and the City of Minneapolis. I hold graduate degrees from the University of Minnesota and Edgewood College in Madison. I have written many articles over my years as a police leader. After retiring from the police department, I answered a call to ministry, attended seminary, and was ordained as a priest in the Episcopal Church. After almost 30 years serving in and leading two Episcopal Churches in the Diocese of Milwaukee, I am "sort-of" in the process of retirement. Life is good.
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Bush went out to destroy the US Constitution. If you remember, Bush stated that running this country would be better if he was a dictator. Of course, he had spent two years illegally spying on America, the moment he can into office.
Torture has been employed by American police department for who know how long? Look at the Chicago Police back in 1970s and their secret detention center.
The police never had any faith in the US Constitution and in the Bill of Rights in the first place since this country was founded. They think and still think that those two documents are impediments to doing their job. It has taken various individuals and organizations like the ACLU to keep reminding the cops that those two documents were created by our Founding Fathers due to the lack of impartiality by the British justice system.
Never say never! Try to be a bit more balance here. I know you feel strongly about this, Gunther, but it will aid the conversation… we need to hear each other.
It is hard when you look at the history of police when you had the Palmer Raids of the 1920s, police red squads to deal with communists, socialists, progressives, and labor unions plus being a private police force for the corporations, wealthy people and even for various presidential administrations and as Sherlock Holme stated in the episode The Adventure of the Copper Beeches quote ” Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser.”
One more thing, we teach torture at the School of America and would not be a bit surprised if we still teach it. How can we expect our police not to use torture when our own military and CIA have been teaching Central and South American military to use it for years despite the evidence that it doesn’t work?
I would recommend you read the book Policing America’s Empire
The United States, the Philippines, and the Rise of the Surveillance State where Americans of the Manila police and the Phillippine Constabulary use torture, create techniques of illegal surveillance and secret police files on various groups and export them to the American police departments back in the USA. Good reading.
Improving Police: A Necessary Conversation 
Bush went out to destroy the US Constitution. If you remember, Bush stated that running this country would be better if he was a dictator. Of course, he had spent two years illegally spying on America, the moment he can into office.
Torture has been employed by American police department for who know how long? Look at the Chicago Police back in 1970s and their secret detention center.
The police never had any faith in the US Constitution and in the Bill of Rights in the first place since this country was founded. They think and still think that those two documents are impediments to doing their job. It has taken various individuals and organizations like the ACLU to keep reminding the cops that those two documents were created by our Founding Fathers due to the lack of impartiality by the British justice system.
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Never say never! Try to be a bit more balance here. I know you feel strongly about this, Gunther, but it will aid the conversation… we need to hear each other.
LikeLike
It is hard when you look at the history of police when you had the Palmer Raids of the 1920s, police red squads to deal with communists, socialists, progressives, and labor unions plus being a private police force for the corporations, wealthy people and even for various presidential administrations and as Sherlock Holme stated in the episode The Adventure of the Copper Beeches quote ” Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser.”
LikeLike
One more thing, we teach torture at the School of America and would not be a bit surprised if we still teach it. How can we expect our police not to use torture when our own military and CIA have been teaching Central and South American military to use it for years despite the evidence that it doesn’t work?
I would recommend you read the book Policing America’s Empire
The United States, the Philippines, and the Rise of the Surveillance State where Americans of the Manila police and the Phillippine Constabulary use torture, create techniques of illegal surveillance and secret police files on various groups and export them to the American police departments back in the USA. Good reading.
LikeLike