Police and Cat In Tree; Bad Cops

I was intrigued by this story about a police officer creating problems with getting a cat out of his tree. Let's not try to pretend that there isn't a significant problem with militant police and cops with attitudes in the US. A lot of this is nurtured by the federal government, asserting a power grab into state localities. The feds give local police goodies like machine guns and make them feel like Rambo. Weak-minded men like that sort of thing.

The article in the link seems fair. The neighbor with the cat was probably a little off. My criticism of the police officer is that he should have done on Saturday what public opinion forced him to do on Tuesday, recognize that the neighbor is difficult and move on. Why take hard feelings against the neighbor on the cat? Forgive my slang, but cops are cops. Cops do what they do because they enjoy backup and constant support in anything that they do. They are not the lone wolf type, though they like to pretend that the case. They know each other for miles and miles. That guy could have had 20 cops over there on Saturday, but he waited until constant phone calls to his place of work pressured a department response. Why did it take that much? The dog was kept inside for a day and the cat was up the tree for seven days.

There were no insurance issues for the cop to just call his pals from work to help him out and hold the ladder. For that matter, just hire a damn insured tree service to use a boom. If the boys in blue quit playing the power games, the public would respond with more respect and admiration.

This reminds me of an off duty cop I encountered in Richmond. He was whizzing off a ramp, going too fast to merge properly, and rolled his window down to scream at me because I would not let him in. First of all, he was supposed to slow to merge into traffic flowas needed, not the opposite. Secondly, I couldn't get over without hitting the car to my left who had me pinned in, and traffic was very heavy. The passing stream would not let me over. I had no reason to target the guy. He was in his private vehicle and no uniform showing. I think he was in civvies. If he hadn't been so intent on the Red Sea parting for Moses, he may have noticed how I was as pinned in as he was. Life's not perfect.

The guy shouts that he's a police officer and I should have gotten over. All I could hear was "I police", exact words not clear, and see him gesturing for me to move over. This si all happening at about 55 mph. He was a bit nuts. I shrugged and laughed, and shook my head at the jerk. I took an exit to get rid of the guy or at least settle it, half expecting shit-for-brains to follow me. So, I figure he went home and cried to his wife about the bad man who deserved to have bad things happen to him.

Not only was he completely wrong in his understanding of traffic law, he had poor self control and was very quick to excessively assert his position as a police officer. He was also off duty. It's not like his had his lights on and was in a police car or anything, or even on official business. Though, I could not have done anything differently if he had. By the way, I forgot to mention this was on the Interstate 95 bypass around Richmond. It's not exactly a quiet neighborhood street where a driver always has the option of changing lanes anytime he wants.

I have a lot more stories just like that. Many people have stories just like that one.