Did land mines become gangsta when I wasn't paying attention?

Oh, no, wait. The defense industry. Those money-grubbing jokers!

The Sheriff of Polk County, OR, has one of these:

http://www.hendonpub.com/pvdc/peoples_choice?entry=421264

this is where I live, and I have no fear that the MRAP will ever be deployed, because Polk County is 96% white folks.

Oh, also, The Polk County Sheriff only has manpower for 10 hour patrols daily because this is deep Ron Paul country and people here voted down a levy to keep the fucking county sheriffs paid. I'm waiting to get shaken down for cash by the patrolman, but I try to only drive around during the 14 hours that there is no Polk County Sheriff on patrol or answering a phone.

You seen any of the 'Custom Gun Shop' TV shows a while back? Like half their customers for silenced machine guns, large caliber sniper rifles, assault shotguns, etc, etc, etc where local small time police departments.

In fairness to the cops, MRAPs aren't the most aggro of vehicles. They aren't usually armed, they're just big as fuck, so you won't have to worry about the police lobbing a high explosive shell at your car during a routine traffic stop.

A good way to ruin a perfectly good paved road.

When we shot up a car for a movie, we invited the Indiana cops to come out and participate. The chief came with his medically critically fat friends (they couldn't walk down a hill, had to use a 4x4) and a bunch of fully automatic weapons. They all had yellow teabagger flag shirts with the Metallica snake on it and I refused to touch any of their guns for fingerprinting reasons.

I wouldn't care if I learned they had all been put in FEMA camps.

I think it's a reasonable thing for a PD to want an APC. In the past, they'd buy a converted box truck that has some steel plating and a suped up engine installed aftermarket. People weren't really alarmed when it was just that.

Now though, the military will sell your PD surplus MRAPS for pennies on the dollar... cheaper by far than the most ghetto conversion. The rub is that the reason the military does this is because these things cost an assload to maintain. I read somewhere that PD's buy these things for around what a luxury consumer car would cost, but it costs many times that *per year* to keep the damn things maintained.

The short answer is "9-11 happened."

Muscles Are Required, Intelligence Not Essential.

I'm not sure how you can set him straight. Has he given any indication of why he thinks this way? Does he think it's literally true, or does he just wish policy could change and it would become true?

I'm willing to put down cash that your Marine friend(?) considers himself a "small-government libertarian."

He gives the impression he thinks it's true they're the same, and that our leaders are just too afraid to deploy such military equipment, like they're trying to sugar-coat policing or something. He also talked about how they have basically the same escalation of force and "capabilities", which isn't true because as someone pointed out in an earlier video here, the UCMJ makes things different. Military are also not trained for peacefully interacting with protestors and keeping order, save for maybe the national guard, which doesn't have a great track record.

One of the best timelines of events I've found is here:
http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2014/08/12/timeline-the-death-of-m ichael-brown-and-unrest-in-ferg uson/

However, they don't report the day when police arrived with military equipment, which was August 11th, a fact that is often left out of the articles I've seen save for pictures of the officers that are dated. But it was after the looting at least. It's all escalating now so there'll probably many thorough articles in the coming weeks, assuming this ends soon. National Guard is out there I hear.

Apparently they've forgotten the whole problem we seem to have when we ask our military to be the effing police force for an occupied nation. Those never, ever go wrong, so why not have our police employ the same tactics and gear?

Dangit. I left my papers in my other pants. Oh, well. I guess it's off to the detention center until about Monday...

Forgot the link
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/15/the-day-fergu son-cops-were-caught-in-a-bloody-lie.html

That's an amazing story. 5 stars for that.

Ah, yes. Black people with assault rifles. That is what is going on here. If only we had heeded wise council, by taking away Michael Brown's AK-47, and teaching blacks to obey the police and trust the government. Then none of this would have happened.

Watched it yet? It'll angry up your blood.

Yeah. I was actually afraid to because, well, he's a "funnyman." And I really can't think of anything that shook me so hard. A friend of mine was beaten and tased to death by Portland cops and they just covered it up. It also reminds me of the military state that happened in Madison. I've mentioned it before but I was just working on the street. The whole thing started because a girl wouldn't show her tits. It was a bunch of drunk college kids in costumes. The police always had a presence, but their increased presence turned it into a riot. We were on the roof when all of the horses left... I'd submit the video but I don't want to make the comparison between the two but it's well documented.

(I was actually shaky when I was typing that. Sorry grammarians of POETV!) :)