Is it really a cheap cop-out, or are the police simply observing their approriate place as part of the executive branch of government? Should the police then pick and choose the laws they wish to enforce?
It isn't a matter of picking and choosing laws, it's a matter of choosing to be part of an adversarial relationship with the citizenry.
And aren't they effectively supplanting their own wisdom for laws that, while they just may be unconstitutional in substance, were enacted in procedurally constitutional fashion by the legislature and interpreted by the courts?
See above.
If the community says via their elected represntives they want every person to wear a green shirt on Tuesdays or face a $500 fine, who is the beat cop to say "Thats unconstitutional, I'm not enforcing that"? After all, it's a law the community said they wanted, and if you really do indeed want police to protect and serve the community, seems to me that goes to enforcing the statutes YOUR represntives and government pass.
OUR. OUR representatives and government. The police are citizens no more or less than non-police.
Again, it's not whether to enforce them, it's whether to choose to be part of the system or not. And if you decide to be part of the system you can't buy in 100% and then say "I'm only doing my job and enforcing the laws passed by others."
Also, It seems to me in this instance, the police become even more dangerous because they then essentially override the courts as the constitutional arbiturs of all criminal laws. For example, I have good friends in the DEA, but if you ask me, federal drugs laws passed under the guise that they relate to commerce in some rational way is, well, a farce. Still, it's not up to the individual DEA agent to decide that for himself. Why? Because a DEA agent has no business second guessing the legislature and the courts, institutions that are, in theory, superior by nature in that they ARE the body politic--and as a public servant he is subodinate to them. He works for them. He is not the arbitur of the laws, nor should he act like one. To think that would be a good idea strikes me as counterintutive to the point that the police have become too powerful--wanting the police to decide what is constitutional and what is not would seem to me to be the ultimate power grab.
That's a very good point and I agree it could become dangerous but just as dangerous is your contention that courts and legislature are superior by nature. No one in this country, be they President or garbage man, should be superior to another. My rights as a United States citizens are not subservient to any other person, group or institution and my hackles raise when others treat me as such.
Gaining control of your representation is the answer, not blaming the guy who enforces the laws. Get control of your representatives and you get control of everything else--if there are no unconstitutional laws passed, there are none to enforce.
I agree and disagree. Control of our representation is crucial, but if you're the "point of the spear" of those representatives, you share in the blame.
Please don't construe this as criticism of you personally in any way, I certainly didn't mean it to be taken as such. I don't know you personally but you seem like a nice enough guy.
Another part of the problem is the militarization of our police. We've gone from Community Policing to a quasi-military type of law enforcement. And when you have any type of militaristic force, they need an enemy. Unfortunately, the rest of us have become just that.