The Classic Liberal Blog

A quick personal anecdote, plus a disturbing video.

Disclaimer: Kids, do not try this yourself.  It won't work out so well for you.

About a year ago, running late as always, I was driving through a miserable snow storm on my way into my office.  Now it had been snowing hard for about 48 hours, and late the night before, while pulling out of one of those carport things, I slid and knocked my driver's side mirror off.  Anyways ...

Closing in on two hours for a normally 20 minute drive, I pulled into the left-hand lane to turn into the office parking lot.  The left-turn to the parking lot just happens to be right before an intersection, so often, cars get lined up behind me.  On this occasion, a police car pulled in behind me.  No big deal.

I pulled in, parked my car, gathered up my phone, keys, and briefcase, and got out of the car.  As I turned to walk into the building, I noticed the cop had pulled in right behind me, turned on his lights ... and then he starts barking through his loudspeaker, "Get back in the car!  Get back in the car now!"

Rather surprised by this, running late to begin with, and had been sitting in traffic on snow covered roads for almost 2 hours ... I got rather angry.  I did get back into my car, but when the cop came up to my window, I immediately asked him what his problem was.  I was not at all pleasant, nor did I intend to be.  He said, "Your mirror to begin with!"

"To begin with" ... Great.

I asked him if he had noticed the extreme weather we'd been having for the past couple of days, to which he basically said he didn't care.  I then handed him my license and paperwork.  He proceeded to ask me if I had been drinking or taking drugs.  This made me angrier, so I reminded him that I was about to go into my office, it's first thing in the morning, and that I found his question more than absurd.

And of course ... I went off on him about turning on his lights in my parking lot and barking through his loudspeaker at me ... being that all this was about was a stinkin' broken mirror to begin with.

He questions me about my driving record, and I tell him it's 100% clean.  He goes back to his car to check it, comes back, confirms I have a clean record, and then ... he barks, "I have the right to search your car!" To which I replied, "Well, so much for the fourth amendment!"

I continued, "Go ahead, search the car!  Just clean it up when you're done. I'll be in my office. You can return my keys there."  I knew I was pushing him, but hey, he started it! A mirror broken, oh, about 12 hours ago, simply didn't warrant lights, the loudspeaker, and his threat to search my car.

So he yells at me, "I'm the authority here!  You will do as I say!" To which I reminded him (not so politely), that I was the authority, that he worked for me, and maybe he should get to catching actual criminals instead of harassing me.

He continued with his threat to search my car (thinking he had a trump card or something), and I proceeded by reminding him to clean it up when he was done, and that he could find me in my office when he was finished, to return my keys.

He then gave me my license and paperwork back, and drove away.

This brief telling doesn't really do the actual incident justice, because it was one of those times where two men were literally on the verge of a throw-down.  I was pissed (and out of my car by now)! And I had every right to be, because an obviously freshly broken mirror, in the middle of a huge snow storm in Michigan, simply didn't warrant his loudspeaker display and authoritarian attitude.

Why am I telling you this?

Because even though I'm all in favor of "law and order," as this incident shows (and more brutally the next), it's now gone way too far!

He could have simply rolled down his window and told me that I could get a ticket for a broken mirror, and better get it fixed quick.  You know ... a friendly exchange between two people ... two Americans. He could have even walked up to the car to see if the break was fresh or not, and if it had been obviously old, politely said, "sorry, but I have to give you a ticket for this," and served me the ticket.

Both of us would have proceeded on to have a normal day, with no hard feelings.

Maybe we've forgotten, but in America, the police have authority only by extension of our individual right to protect ourselves. Today, however, many cops no longer respect this authority, an authority that we gave them!

Case in point #2: In the following video, a woman who called the police (otherwise known as the victim of a crime), gets hauled into a police station, held down to the floor, violently strip-searched, and left naked in a jail cell.

The Police State in America today, is throwing thousands of years of human justice down the toilet ... while us citizens stand idly by.

We can't enjoy the benefits of having police protection, if it means throwing away our inalienable rights in the process.

WARNING: This video is disturbing.