The Police: Systemic Crookedness and Systemic Stupidity

In calling for defunding of the police, many Democrats claim—usually without argument—that the police across our country are “systemically racist.”  Instead of trying to convince us of this claim, proponents just condemn or shout-down anyone who dares to question it.  But outside of fantasy land, this claim is a nonstarter.  In other words, there’s virtually no chance of it being true.

First, there are dozens if not many hundreds of police departments in every state, and every department is different.  Therefore, it would be one thing to point to a specific, department-wide practice, and then argue that the particular department employing the practice is systemically racist.  But even if you could make such a case without further evidence, it says absolute nothing about “the police,” i.e., the other 99.99 percent of police departments across the country. 

Second, the individual police departments under fire right now are nearly always under the control of Democratic police chiefs, mayors, and governors—and in many cases these bureaucrats and politicians are themselves black—which makes this Democratic claim of systemic racism even more bizarre.  If the police department in Minneapolis, for example, is systemically racist, then voters should not reelect the Democratic “leadership” that is crying about systemic racism. 

But all of this focus on systemic racism is detracting from a real problem.  Regardless of your race, when it comes to your individual rights the police are systemically crooked.  They are literally trained, often by national consultants and trainers, to lie, cheat, and bully their way to get what they want at your expense.  When it comes to the laws that protect your rights, the cops are literally trained to be lawless.  This is a true systemic problem (in which prosecutors and judges are complicit), and it affects all of us.

Bullying, intimidation replace reasoned debate in the “fake news” media

Trump (Public Domain)

Why would anyone read the New York Times (NYT) ever again?  It no longer maintains even the pretense of being a newspaper.  Instead, it has joined the mob.

The paper recently published an Op Ed by U.S. Senator Tom Cotton arguing for Trump's use of troops to quell mass rioting across the country.  This is a response supported by the majority of registered voters and something previous presidents have done under the Insurrection Act. 

But instead of responding to this Op Ed with argument and debate, the NYT employees responded like tantrum-throwing children in what has been described as an "open revolt."  The staff flew into a moral outrage, as they are highly offended by any ideas that deviate even slightly from their leftist thinking.  Such ideas make them feel "unsafe."  The end result was that the NYT Opinion Editor promptly resigned under intense pressure from the mob.

Where is #MeToo in all of this chaos?

Oddly, in the wake of massive rioting, property damage, injuries, and even deaths in Democratic-controlled cities across America, there is a lot of discussion about reduced funding for, and even de-funding of, police departments. 

Now, few people have been as critical of the police as yours truly.  I’ve written a book titled Tried and Convicted: How Police, Prosecutors, and Judges Destroy Our Constitutional Rights.  And all of my books, entirely or at least in part, have been very critical of the police.  But de-funding the police is an idea that’s so ridiculous even the hyper-liberal, floppy-haired Mayor of Minneapolis can’t get behind it.  (Watch this video to see the absurdity of it all.) 

Getting tough with UW and Wisconsin’s Jury Instruction Committees

Knightly studies copyright law

I’ve long complained that eleven sitting Wisconsin judges write our criminal jury instructions (JIs) and then somehow take and transfer a copyright in those JIs to the University of Wisconsin (UW), which then turns around and sells them back to us after we’ve already paid the judges’ salaries!  Worse yet, we lawyers have to pay annual update fees or the instructions quickly go out of date.  As I wrote in a recent blog post, I don’t think this is legal:

The “government edicts doctrine” states that court decisions and even “non-binding, explanatory legal materials are not copyrightable when created by judges who possess the authority to make and interpret the law.” (Georgia v. Public Resource, P. 4.)

Now, the UW-JI Committee gravy train could be coming to an end.  A non-profit California group called Public Resource just wrote a letter to the JI Committee members and UW stating this: