Knock LA

Let me outline how broken policing is an institution in the US:

1. Cops are generally stupid and untrained. You just had to watch them testify in the Afroman trial and you might think "geez these guys aren't the brightest bulbs". No, theyre not. But they are also the most average cops;

2. Cops are corrupt. They steal things all the time. "We miscounted the money". Yeah, right. You got got caught stealing;

3. Cops lie all the time. They'll lie on the stand. This happens so often there's a term for it: testilying [1];

4. Cops never go after other cops. In fact, you're generally punished or even killed for going after other cops. It's career suicide;

5. If, somehow, you get charged with a crime, you as a cop have rights the rest of us can only dream about. You're not allowed to interview the suspect for 24 hours. Their union rep must be there and so on. Enough time to get their story straight. Why don't we all have those same rights?

6. Cops aren't trained to de-escalate. They're only trained to escalate, lethally. Cops kill over 1000 people a year [2]. A pretty famous example is the murder of Sonya Massey [3]. Sonya was lethally shot for being near a pot of boiling water. This case was also quite rare because somebody went to jail;

7. Some departments go so far to essentially be gangs. One of the most famous examples is the LA Sheriff's Department [4];

8. Should a prosecutor actually go after a cop, it's typically career suicide. Prosecutors live and die by conviction…

No, they're just another group of incompetents.

https://knock-la.com/lasd-gang-regulators-shooting-zabala/

> Jason Zabala, an inked Regulator, is responsible for the deaths of at least two people and cost the County $4 million.

...

> In October 2011, an on-duty Zabala ran a red light and was involved in a collision. Sonya Benton, 49, was inside the other car. The impact gravely injured her spine, causing long-term damage and prompting a fusion surgery. At the beginning of the case, the County’s counsel asserted that Benton’s injuries weren’t serious and the surgery wasn’t necessary. The case settled for $80,000 before trial. Taxpayers picked up the bill for her award and everyone’s attorney fees. Zabala remained a deputy.

...

> The deputies later claimed Laffitte had a gun. However, Zabala said in his deposition that he never saw a weapon on Laffitte. A handgun was recovered from the scene, but it tested negative for Laffitte’s DNA, according to court documents. The testing did conclude, however, that at least two other individuals handled the gun. Shortly after the incident, Cotton said in a press conference, “I want revenge for my brother’s death. There will be no justice in Los Angeles until my brother’s murderers go to prison… I want them jailed for killing my brother and brutalizing my family.”

> That didn’t happen. Laffitte’s family settled the case for $1,500,000 before it went to trial. Taxpayers, of course, footed the bill. But the deputies who killed Terry…

SB79 was “meant to address two crises at once: The state’s long-term housing shortage and the financial precarity of its public transit agencies.”[a] The 3rd crisis is the enormous budgetary deficits the state and cities are also facing: San Diego has a $300m deficit, SF $728m, LA $1b, CA $45b. One suspects the 2nd and 3rd crises are the intended targets.

But it’s unclear how SB79 would fix transit’s fiscal cliffs. The SF BART system is facing a 2026 cliff and ascribes its steep revenue declines to high work from home rates and a struggling downtown area [c] The SD MTS system has a 2028 cliff LA Metro uses sales tax increases (measures M and R) to fund 50% of its budget (fare revenue funds only 1%), yet it still faces a 2030 cliff. RTO remains deeply unpopular and downtown commercial real estate has seen steep losses [d] However, SB79 does allow transit agencies to develop and acquire land adjacent to transit stops as an additional revenue source [e]

SB79 supporters seemed to be focused on lowering multifamily rental prices, but again it’s unclear how SB79 would accomplish this, since it still depends on market incentives to add multifamily units. Banks or investors won’t loan money to developers unless the net operating income (rent) is high enough to justify investment. The other factor is interest rates, but SB79 can’t change that. Many existing multifamily properties struggle to break even and now have the highest loan delinquency rate after offices [e] Manville…

Take away from the parent and your comment is that Policing is a high skill hard job with a lot of associated responsibilities and accountabilities.

Thus I find it alarming that on average, US officers spend around 21 weeks training before they are qualified to go on patrol [1] while a teacher needs at least a bachelor degree so 4 to 5 years of training [2].

I find compensation for both professions laughably low in the US (teacher: $57,220[2], officer: $62,600[3]) however police equipment budget [4] is orders of magnitude higher than that of teachers that need to spend their own money on school supplies [5]. So there is an argument to be had about the difference of quality of life of these two very important professions. The LAPD gets a $2 billion budget [6] which is equivalent to the total military spending of nations like Lithuania [7]. Maybe a lower barrier of entry to the force and bigger crime and arrest statistics with everything that it entails and it implies on the ground to create such numbers in the books is what it takes to maintain this kind of budget?

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56834733
[2] https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/how-long-does-it-take-to-be-a-teacher
[3] https://www.salary.com/research/salary/alternate/police-officer-salary
[4] https://www.investopedia.com/how-are-police-departments-funded-5115578
[5]…

I should mention I am referring specifically to police in the United States. The short answer is because cops defend cops, including bad cops. People like to say it's just a few bad apples, but it's far more prevalent than that. And even if it were just 1 in 100, the fact that the cops band together to protect a rapist/murderer/whatever shows that they care more about unity than morals.

I realize this answer is lacking, but I've had this argument so many times and it drains hours out of my day to pursue it - because the supporting data is complicated and people are correct to provide counter arguments (and then I have to respond and it goes back and forth for a while). I encourage you to do your own research on statistics regarding police officers in the US. The one everybody likes to cite is how many police officer's beat their wives - 40%. And even this data point is very complicated and requires a lot of nuance and so on.

But since people enjoy stories, here's one egregious example of a sheriff's department abusing their power. Even I think this is exceptionally awful and most police departments aren't this bad, but it's well researched and makes for a good read.

https://knock-la.com/tradition-of-violence-lasd-gang-history/

I'm happy to share it, but I'll admit I didn't include the name in my original comment because the source will get some people riled up. I was referring to the guide from LA's chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America.[1] I think it stands up as an example of an extremely well put together guide regardless of your political affiliation.

As a progressive person, I used a combination of that and The Knock LA's voter guide[2] to get the progressive perspective and then I combined that with Ballotpedia[3] to get a non-partisan view, see more mainstream endorsements, and campaign finance details (California often has too many confusing ballot measures, so when in doubt looking at who paid how much to support a proposition is my usual tiebreaker).

[1] - https://dsa-la.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/DSA-LA-2024-General-Election-Voter-Guide.pdf

[2] - https://knock-la.com/the-knock-la-progressive-voter-guide-for-the-november-2024-general-election/

[3] - https://ballotpedia.org/California_elections,_2024