"The federal government shipped nearly 4,000 more assault rifles to local law enforcement agencies in the three months following the Ferguson riots, marking a huge surge in the amount of lethal firearms being doled out to police and sheriff’s offices.
The Ferguson riots drew attention and criticism to the massive firepower state and local police are now able to bring to bear on their citizens, and earned scrutiny for the Pentagon project, known as the 1033 program, that helps arm many of those agencies by making surplus military equipment available to them.
President Obama called for a review of the program, civil rights advocates said the local police had become indistinguishable from the military, and even some police departments questioned their own policies."
And we still don't know what else they have sent, nor what they is still in the pipeline to be sent.
I have this very bad problem with Police Officers, even though I used to be in law enforcement when I worked security for the Housing Authority and Volunteered as an Auxiliary Officer for a Municipal Department in North St. Louis County. Too many Police Officers, Sheriffs Deputies and State Troopers have this mindset that they are "Warriors" and are fighting a "Battle" against crime and drugs.
WRONG!!!
Law Enforcement is supposed to keep the peace first and foremost. Then comes the job of apprehending those who willfully violate the law, then comes enforcing the mostly bs ordinances and writing traffic tickets.
Instead, many towns use their Law Enforcement Agencies as revenue enhancers and generators. With ticket quotas and deliberate targeting of out of state vehicles for things such as asset forfeiture and illegal searches and seizures.
A former cop friend of mine who I used to consider a very good friend until a woman came between us, was recently sentenced to 5 years in prison.
His crime?
He and another officer arrested a drug dealer and and kept the money but sold the drugs he was carrying to another dealer.
Too many times I saw that behavior repeated when I was working in St. Louis City and County. I reported such behavior to supervisors who instead of investigating as they were supposed to, pulled me from a good shift and gave me a crap beat and crap hours, and somehow everyone I worked with KNEW that I had reported the bad apples.
I found my tires slashed a few times, my windows and windshield broken a few times also.
It was when I got shot at, while on my rounds and only the fact that it was winter saved me as the shooter got the shoulder of my large bulky jacket and not my shoulder.
Two days later I quit and went back to being an assistant manager for a gas station and later back to working for Valvoline as an assistant manager.. I made considerably more money and with much better benefits working for Valvoline than I did working for the housing authority.
And now the FedGov is giving those same officers who for the most part CANNOT be trusted, Automatic Weapons, Armored Vehicles, Body Armor, Grenade Launchers and who knows what else.
Now you know why I don't trust most Cops.
Because they no longer "Keep the Peace" they terrorize the populace and ignore the Oaths they took when they first put on the badge.
Which is just the way the FedGov likes it. After all, if a sworn officer will foreswear their Oath, they will do almost anything you want.
You just have to make the carrot big enough.