Clinton proposes 100,000 new police officers on streets

[ckramer]

Source: lat

WASHINGTON -- New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, campaigning for president in a neighborhood of Philadelphia so rough the mayor said, "Osama bin Laden wouldn't last here," pitched a $4-billion-a-year anti-crime package today that would put 100,000 new police officers on the streets and help stem the tide of repeat offenders back into the country's prisons.

Claiming that her husband's administration "reduced crime to historic lows" in the 1990s, Clinton argued that "we have to get back to doing what we know works."


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-campaign12apr12,1,1430481.story

[cloudbase]

1. What works is that there is less crime

when more people have jobs.

[Poll_Blind]

3. I like your idea a heck of alot better than the more cops thing. n/t

PB

[Lasher]

4. Me too. n/t

[thunder rising]

11. A two-fer...make all felons serve time as police. All the cops I know are fucking crooks anyway.

[stillcool]

6. although I've heard there...

are good jobs to be had in prison.

[DCKit]

9. Shhhhhhh. It's Hilly's moment.

Don't bring reality into it, or she'll have to promise the ghetto kids a pony.

[BunkerHill24]

29. co-signed...n/t

[davidinalameda]

2. great policy

I'm all for it

we need more federal help for local governments

maybe we can reallocate some of those funds being pissed away every day in Iraq to help the people in this country

[juajen]

18. Thanks for your post.

It's nice to see a post by someone who doesn't dis Hillary all the time.

I remember when Bill proposed this in his administration, and it did work and of course, employed all those policemen.

I hate to see people make light of policeman. My brother was one, and he was honest and brave, and utterly crushed when he had to shoot someone. Though this only happened once. People would be very surprised to learn that a lot of policemen never shoot anyone in the course of their career. Of course, they didn't have tasers when my brother was a cop.

I believe, also, that this is a good idea. In the coming recession it will be even more desirable, as a lot of people will be struggling with honesty versus starving.

So, in addition the added policemen, we will need to put place money in the hands of a lot of people who will work to keep people housed and fed. What a lot of work we have to do.

[Kool Kitty]

27. And that policy is probably the main reason

that crime went down in the 90s. (Are you listening, Rudy Giuliani?)

[CBHagman]

45. Community policing and the various policies...

It's possible you have seen this, but at least one magazine, the Washington Monthly, published an article about the Bush administration's war on cops. From what I can tell, they've basically dismantled all the community-oriented policing of the Clinton years, and of course I hear from Republican lawmakers that the federal government ought not to be assisting local law enforcement (!), at least financially.

Here's the link to the Washington Monthly article.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2003/0309.wallace-wells.html

This new paradigm, community policing, depended in part on technological advances, which allowed departments to map emerging crime patterns and high-crime areas and shift officers accordingly. But a crucial component of this policy was what came to be known as the "broken windows" theory of crime, whose most prominent proponent was the neoconservative political scientist James Q. Wilson. In ghettos, Wilson argued, the persistent presence of quality-of-life problems like vandalism, abandoned cars, and graffiti had profound psychological effects: It showed residents that the police had lost control of the streets to drug dealers and criminals, shuttering economic activity, signalling to criminals that it was open season on the neighborhood, and keeping residents from calling police when they saw crimes unfolding.

(SNIP)

The movement took hold in some cities in the early 1990s, with dramatic, well-publicized drops in crime in Boston, New York, and San Diego. But the idea went national in 1994, when President Clinton convinced a supportive Democratic Congress to pass the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) bill, which promised federal grants to help local departments put 100,000 new cops on the street. By 2000, COPS had helped departments hire about 70,000 new officers (upping local police strength by 12 percent nationally), and required that all of the new cops be out on street beats. In those six years, violent crime declined by 46 percent nationally, the most sustained, dramatic decline in the last hundred years.

(SNIP)

But from the start, President Bush sent a very different message. In the new president's first budget, when the economy had not yet gone entirely in the tank, he zeroed out the funding for the COPS program entirely. (Congressional Democrats were able to restore some funding, but the COPS program's funds for hiring street cops are less than one-sixth the average during the Clinton administration.)

And of course we could also get into the transnational consequences of the Bush administration's policies, including horrific violence along the Southwestern border.

[davidinalameda]

49. I also support things like midnight basketball

the idea was ridiculed at the time but it worked!

kids need alternative activities so they don't end up hanging out on the streets and getting into trouble

[OKthatsIT]

72. I think you can dream on about added social services

Hillary won't offer any. Remember, Hillary voted for the BANKRUPTCY BILL?

And I'll wager Hillary won't change the tax laws for emergency purposes either. Tax laws on 401Ks which are losing all their value due to the devalued dollar. That's alot of baby boomers losing their retirement.

Did you know the UK's social medicine system won't perform certain types of operations for seniors because their old?

I'm for social services..I'm wayyyyyyyyy over here on the Left. Have been my whole life. Raised by a bunch of Socialists. So, you see, I was raise with eyes to see. I can smell fascism.

Voting for the Bankruptcy Bill knowing their were plans to bring down the economy. All the Globalists know The Plan.

It was Bill who signed US on to the WTO, without Congress ratifying it. That's against the law, just like there's been wars without ratifications. Presidents do what they like, they just call it something else.

It was Bill who hired those jackboots, train through privatized security companies. Trained for what? 2000K? What a joke.

OR even crazier...you remember how Clinton couldn't find Osama bin Laden? He'd bomb villages, but no Osama? Then in June of 2001, a reporter easily finds Osama in Afghanistan, brings his video camera and interviews Osama. Piece of cake.

The Clintons are friends with the Bush family. They've been friends since the old days in Arkansas when the CIA was landing/running drugs through the state, from Columbia. Arkansas is the headquarters of the southern mafia. It's just that corrupt and Bill being Govenor didn't change that fact.

[htuttle]

5. I just got an incredible feeling of deja vu reading that...

...Whoa...

[man4allcats]

7. I wouldn't mind a few more cops.

I live in the Spring Branch area of Houston. I keep my shotgun and my pistol loaded.

[rpannier]

8. It's not a bad idea

I've lived in the Czech Rep in the early 90's and have lived in Korea for over a decade.
In the countries (Europe and Asia) I've visited, the police presence does deter crime from occurring.

It does provide jobs as well -- Being a police officer is a job.

I'd like to see more done to provide jobs to inner city neighborhoods.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[12string]

15. more cops

we need fewer stupid laws,not more stupid cops.We live in enough of a police state already.If I wondered which of the candidates I was for I now know it is not Senator Clinton.

[Zachstar]

22. A number of laws need to be repealed. Both Criminal and Civil.

And we do not need more police.

I am glad to see people being reasonable about this. We have got to stop enabling measures that do nothing but put people in jail for no reason and leads to abuse on the streets.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

35. start with the victimless crimes.

pot, prostitution, and more.

[MrTriumph]

39. Drug abuse is not a victim-less crime

If you have ever been around someone who uses meth or cocaine, you will find that, almost without exception, they bring heartbreak and madness into the lives of those around them.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

43. I did not mention meth, and I agree.

but criminalizing it costs society more than providing treatment.

[Fumesucker]

47. The same can be said of alcoholics...

Alcohol is less addictive than meth and cocaine but not all that much so.

If making meth and cocaine illegal are good for society then making alcohol illegal would be even better since far more people abuse alcohol than meth and cocaine.

[High Plains]

51. Much like alcohol. And we should treat other drugs like alcohol.

Keep the cops out of it except to clean up the mess.

Regulate and tax the sale of all illicit drugs.

Use some of the tax revenues to fund treatment for those who need it.

Arrest people who commit REAL crimes, whether they're on drugs or not.

Fucking up your life or your family's life, for whatever reason, is not a crime. It may be a tragedy, but it's not a crime.

[High Plains]

53. That is hysterical exaggeration. Cut it out.

Millions (possibly tens of millions) of Americans have used cocaine.

An estimated 12 million Americans have used methamphetamines.

As with other psychoactive substances, a small percentage of them become problematic users at some point.

You don't hear about the other ones. No one can stand up and say "I use cocaine/meth and I don't have problems" because we don't allow such discourse.

[tuckessee]

59. Humans are social animals.

All humans live in some kind of relationship with other humans therefore any personal action or choice by one human can have an impact on another human.

Do you seek to control every form of human behavior just because someone else might suffer as a consequence?

Poor health can bring about "heartbreak and madness". Should unhealthy people be punished by law?

[MrTriumph]

60. Taking drugs is a choice and a bad one at that.

Taking drugs is a choice and a bad one at that. When you drink too much and get behind the wheel, the law holds you accountable for the consequences.

When you take drugs and get behind the wheel, the law holds you accountable for the consequences.

When you take your rent money and and use it buy drugs leaving your family in danger of being evicted- and if you don't believe this happens you are out-of-touch- you are being destructive to others.

I could go on, but you get the idea.

[High Plains]

65. Should we criminalize "poor choices"?

DWI laws are designed to stop intoxicated people from physically harming others. I think that's justified, but I think that's where we ought to draw the line.

Being so strung out you don't pay the rent doesn't cause direct physical harm to others, even though it can be horrendous for your family. People drink so much they don't pay the rent, but we don't use that as an excuse to throw them in jail. People may be so greedy for shiny new toys they don't pay the rent, but we don't use that as an excuse to throw them in jail.

There is no ethical or philosophical basis for punishing people for what they choose to ingest.

[MrTriumph]

70. physical harm is all that concerns you?

Financial disaster is often visited upon the families, friends and business associates of people who choose to use drugs. Not to mention the mental abuse delivered by those who use drugs.

And drugs often alter a person and they do indeed become physically abusive.

I suggest you find a new scourge to champion.

[Occulus]

71. Ah! The poster did not mention ABUSE.

An observation: to far, far too many people, use = abuse.

(The poster also did not mention meth or coke, which I'll agree wholeheartedly can be easily abused. That's not my point. My point is, we need to get people to stop thinking that use = abuse. Until we do that, the law really can't change.)

[ChairmanAgnostic]

34. I only wish you said it with emotion.

I agree with you 100%. Not only are we turning into a police state, with few remaining constitutional rights, the current numerous examples of violations of those rights seem to pass into the night.

More cops? What a crock. Thank you HIllary. you are rapidly becoming a corporate whore, just as Randi suggested, nothing more than a fascist piglet. Or is that sow?

my gosh, she's reading from the '92 and '96 playbooks - strong on crime bullshit that is so incredibly dated and disproved. No wonder the campaign sucks so bad.

[Orsino]

52. If there were more accountability for police in there, I'd praise the idea.

More police, if better paid and better able to cover their jurisdiction, might not feel so besieged as do current law enforcement officers, and might feel less inclined to shoot first. I don't feel comfortable recommending this yet, however, not as long as the US remains the number one incarcerator.

Redistribute wealth and educate Americans, I say, so that crime becomes a less attractive option.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

54. I'd vote for more teachers first.

I'd vote for more science REAL SCIENCE, like stem cells, NASA, solar power, cogeneration and energy recapture systems. If we are doing well, are employed, and have a future to look up to, crime will go down. Unless you talk about Enron, Haliburton, Blackwater and other white collar crime.

[Psephos]

56. The people here are not "so fucking incredibly stupid"

But I might apply that moniker to someone who uses over-the-top insult instead of an actual argument and then wonders how his argument could fail to be persuasive.

BTW, the US does not have more people in jail than all the rest of the world combined. You're off by more than an order of magnitude. I have special disregard for fact butchers.

[khaos]

66. "t must be something they're putting in the water to make people so fucking incredibly stupid."

http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/newscience/2007/2007-0705wangetal.html

[OKthatsIT]

73. Being a police officer now is joining a brotherhood

All the new jackboot riot police will tell ya...if they dare, about the plan to turn this country into a giant fema camp.

[Gonnuts]

10. So, this is her "job creation program"?

If this is her idea for creating jobs it simply shows her to be nothing more than an extension of elitists dreams of a total fascist state.

The more this women talks the more I hate her guts.

[RadioactiveCarrot]

13. Great.

Let's up the ante on the 'War on Drugs.'

1 out of 100 isn't enough.

:sarcasm: just in case.

[Norrin Radd]

14. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

[sasquatch]

32. Who will watch the watchmen?

:shrug:
Did I get it right?

[Zachstar]

16. Your husband also effectively started the drug war Clinton. Which has caused massive amounts of ruin

To the peace of America.

And you want to add in another 100k heavily armed police? Why don't you declare America a battleground while you are at it.

We have too many bad cops

We have too few community oriented cops

Cops are being armed with increasing firepower (I consider the taser to be a force multiplier because a cop can use it against innocents much easier than a gun)

Cops in the mid 20th century have no comparison to the near paramilitary force police are today. Police back then served the community (Hence the Donut reference) and prison populations were much smaller.

Today we are a land of prisons. And cops are armed so well these days that abuse is rampant.

So Clinton I am 100 percent against increasing the force levels of the police. America needs its tax money spent on better methods of training officers to solve cases without violence and handle people instead of tax dollars being spent arming them with liability saving, human rights violating taser guns.


Clinton I am tired of your fear tactics! This basically amounts to "Vote for me and ill make sure you street has more cops patrolling for your safety!"

HELL NO CLINTON!!

[High Plains]

55. Bill Clinton didn't start the drug war, but he did nothing to stop it, either.

It just rolled right along, with ever-increasing drug arrest numbers each year and an ever-increasing prison population.

Clinton didn't do a goddamn thing about it. Not good politics.

[Wizard777]

17. We need 100K cops in the oval office RIGHT FREAKIN NOW!

This dumb bitch is going to turn a blind eye to that continuing criminal enterprize called the Bush adminsitration. Now she wants to lock us up.

:wow:

Nevermind President. She can't be a Senator anymore. She's trying to throw the race. There is just no way anyone can be THAT freakin stupid.

[Zachstar]

19. Let us keep "Bitch" out of it. I know we are angry aboutthis from Clinton but we must not be hostile

However I think it is quite clear in my view that Clinton is going to give us 4 more years of bush like policy without all the major controversy bits.

The fact that she wants to put 100k more police on already tense streets is more than enough evidence in my proof that Clinton has no idea what the situation with the crime is. She needs to do her research

100k police on the streets just means more innocents in jail and more people abused.

[Wizard777]

24. But I was trying to keep the word hang out of it.

But I know what you mean about the tensions on the street. 100K cops is exactly what america needs to ease it's fears of the newly emerging police state. That move is so brilliant it can only end in riots or civil war.

[housewolf]

20. Bill Clinton ran on that campaign platform

Recycling....

[Zachstar]

23. In 1992 This is 2008

And today police are armed to the teeth and have tasers that are commonly used in abusive situations.

And how did the Clinton administration lead us? Loss of Congress, Scandal, NAFTA, Scandal, etc.. leading to Gore Losing to a voter fraud when he could have overcame that had Clinton scandal not put a bad name on democrats.

[sofa king]

76. It worked pretty well, too... until Bush killed it.

One of the many, many ways he screwed us for that rich mens' tax cut. Bush killed the COPS program, and state governments kept the police but jacked up your various state, property and automobile taxes to pay the difference.

[raystorm7]

21. We could use 100,000 officers on just the streets of Houston Texas right about now!

[Kip Humphrey]

46. How original!

[Wizard777]

25. We want Cops to lock up people like Bush and Cheney.

We don't want cops to lock up people like us. Soon we'll be wanting cops to lock up people like Pelosi and every last memeber of Congress aiding and abeiting the continuing criminal enterprize operating out of the White House.

[OKthatsIT]

57. Congress should be changing 401K tax laws RIGHT NOW

So many people are going to lose their 401K's. If we don't invest in gold or silver right now.

But the tax laws penalize you if you want to save your investment. If we dont invest in metals now..that 401K will be worthless..ZELCH!

Right now if you want to use the 401K, you end up with half of it going to Govt Revenuers. But if you don't do it, it will be worth NOTHING!

[Ellipsis]

26. Why not 100,001 or 100,235... exactly 100,000 like Hubby proffered in 92

Gaming now.

[Yes We Did]

28. The election year ploy from an untrustworthy politician. Crime. She'll use anything.

[Zachstar]

30. Well the fact that she used it lost ANY chance she has in the GE in my view.

If people are going to vote for this crap. They are going to vote for McCain.

[darue]

31. wont somebody please thing abouts the children? if it takes a village of cops, deputize EVERYBODY!

we need to send a message and a hundred thousand child cops is it. hell, deputize EVERYBODY!!

[OKthatsIT]

33. Gawd...don't we have enough 'jackboots'..come onnnnnn.

In case you havent noticed, we have really corrupt police forces across this country. Most of them couldnt tell you what was in the Constitution. Most of them use tazers like eating candy.."Oh what's a few 300 dead people anyway?"

PLALEEEZ, Hillary...getting US all just alittle closer to TOTAL FASCIST GLOBALIST 'New Wave Economics' which only points in one direction -> The American People pay for their own enslavement.

[rsmith6621]

36. Yep Hillary A Hillary Not Original Moment

....Billy did that in his administration....can't she be original AND CREATIVE...nope...she is stale and washed up...

....Paahlez do us a favor and quit Hillary

[0007]

37. Oh Hum!!

Don't just suspect your neighbor
Report all suspicious movments

[newburgh]

38. Perfect. The further militarization of our streets instead of jobs.

How did this idiot get this far in the race?

[pattmarty]

40. I thought her "old man" already did that?

[raebrek]

41. 100,000 police sounds familiar. How many police do we need?

My 1994 Crime Bill is fulfilling my commitment to put 100,000 new police officers on the street to strengthen community policing.

http://www.ontheissues.org/Celeb/Bill_Clinton_Crime.htm

Putting 100,000 More Police on the Streets. In 1999, ahead of schedule and under budget, the Clinton-Gore Administration met its commitment to fund an additional 100,000 police officers for our communities. As a part of the COPS Program, the President announced new grants to increase community policing in high-crime and underserved neighborhoods. To help keep crime at record lows, the President won funding for the first installment toward his goal to hire up to 50,000 more officers by 2005.

http://pearlyabraham.tripod.com/htmls/bill-legacy2.html

I want 100,000 more police officers for community policing. The House voted for 50,000 but that's not enough. As we've seen in cities from Los Angeles to Houston, putting more officers on the street, working with people in their communities prevents crime and lowers the crime rate.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2889/is_n17_v30/ai_15502557

edited to add: 100,000 it is a big round number. IT'S BIGGGG AND IT'S ROUND.

Raebrek!!!

[raebrek]

42. one more time as so many noted the 1992 time frame.

"My idea for the deficit is to cut inefficient spending, reduce by attrition Federal employment by a 100,000 and give it to the cities to put 100,000 police officers on the streets in the next five years," he said today.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CEEDD143AF93BA2575AC0A964958260

So if this continues true to form we should hear about cutting the 100,000 Federal employee's by attrition soon. Very soon.

Raebrek!!!

[ohio2007]

44. And the state and local level tax base was to pay the wages of the police after the earmarks were

distributed.

same story,same last name, different year.

[hedgehog]

48. Back to giving people fish instead of teaching them how to fish,

so to speak. In theory. today's criminals grew up in the safer neighborhoods of Bill's administration, didn't they?

BTW, aren't crime rates down in most places? What makes crime a central issue all of a sudden?

[lakeguy]

50. lets see...

provide jobs that pay people a liveable wage or-

use that same money to put more cops on the street. then use even more money to put the criminals in jail at 50k a year each. oh, and the privately owned prisons need to make enough profit so the owners can retire offshore and never pay any taxes.

[Texano78704]

58. How about...

Doing something about the historically low employment participation rate instead?

Do we really need to put 100,000 police officers on the street when the ones on the street right now waste more time arresting drug users than they do catching violent criminals? If you really want more cops on the beat, legalize drug use.

[lonestarnot]

61. That's right, increase that 1 out of 100 to 1 in 10

[RoadRage]

62. Clinton's administratoin "reduced crime to historic lows"

Umm.. no. Roe vs. Wade reduced crime to historic lows. The law to allow abortions was inacted in 1973. 20 years later and it's 1993. All of a sudden thousands of un-wanted low-income children were not on the earth 20 years later. Un-wanted low-income children are more likely to grow up and become criminals, and by the mid-90's there were many less kids born into this situation.

Typical Clintonian mindset - take credit for anything that you can, and push blame for anything else on anyone else.

We don't need more cops. We need more funding to help people get on their feet so that crime isn't the only answer.

[Zynx]

69. You read that in Freakonomics didn't you?

My problem with that argument is that it is a eugenics argument and I really feel uncomfortable with it. I point out that prosperity became more widespread in the 1990s and also the population aged. I'm not entirely certain the number of abortions was astronomically higher in the 1970s and 1980s than it was previously also. Plenty of people got abortions in states where it was legal and also illegal abortions were VERY common.

[slackmaster]

63. How about spending that $4 billion on education grants, anti-gang programs...

You know, things that actually keep kids out of trouble.

Or give it to Planned Parenthood.

[Doctor_J]

64. Yes, 1/100 citizens in prison is not enough!

I am getting to loathe Sen. Clinton, or at least the part of her that is campaigning.

[killbotfactory]

67. Maybe we can double our current incarceration rate

just as the recession hits us hardest.

[Johnny Harpo]

68. When In Recent Political Campaigns Didn't A Candidate....

promise more police on the streets? Not that we don't need them, but this 'promise' has just become another piece of campaign rhetoric. It's just become something they have to say.

[BreweryYardRat]

74. Why not split the difference?

50,000 more cops nationwide (God knows Philadelphia alone could use about 5,000 more), and put $2 billion towards government jobs in green energy.

And raise the minimum wage, while they're at it.

[entanglement]

75. I suppose their 'solution' for tough economic times is more jackboots and more tasers

:eyes: