I read a lot of Reason.com and used to be a regular reader of Radley Balko back when he had his own blog and between that material and stuff like Three Felonies A Day I'm pretty much on board with the idea
I'm not familiar with the specific media you cite (though you might be interested to know that several years before BLM became a thing, the John Birch Society published a book opposing the militarization of the police), but I agree 100%
I support the principle of jury nullification, though with the caveat that it has been badly used by both black juries to let off blatantly guilty perpetrators from the neighborhood, AND historically by whites to protect white perpetrators against black victims.
OTOH, the principle also remains that an individual should be tried in the jurisdiction in which he is accused of committing the crime. This was made into law in the Constitution specifically because colonists were being brought back to England for trials, and that was happening as a workaround against jury nullification. Clearly the Founding Fathers understood that, and still chose to err on the side of jurisdiction.
I am also opposed to asset forfeiture, and especially support local bans on it. I freely admit there is a lot of sloppiness in police handling of issues. I find the legal presumption of good faith on their parts suspicious at best, and I am adamantly opposed to all public service unions for ANY government service job down through the public schools. I am opposed to the war on drugs as such and find the outlawing of drugs Constitutionally suspect.
I think we put people in jail to readily,
Probably.
Absolutely. I don't know how Megan's Law is still on the books. Well, actually, I supposed it's because of general stupidity conflating principles with morals and support for a principle with moral approval of those to whom the principle applies.
Then I read something like "The Toxoplasma of Rage" and it all makes sense again. Of course BLM publicizes loopy cases - the structure of our media landscape practically demands it. There's a reason Radley Balko is relegated to some obscure media blog and BLM gets coverage whenever they want it - he's not willing to go to bad for really bad dudes because he isn't willing to be wrong when it turns out they're lying about how the police treated them.
That said, with the technology so widely available, officers with nothing to hide should be embracing it. If they can be trained to call out the registration of every car they approach on foot, they can be trained to switch on their body cameras at the onset of a confrontation or even casual encounter.
“Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.” GK Chesteron
Inde muagdhe Aes Sedai misain ye!
Deus Vult!
*MySmiley*
