* Police are not soldiers and shouldn’t be expected to respond as such. Mr. Toomey appears to be pandering for the support of law enforcement and their families. Communities patrolled by officers who look and act like the next iteration of Robocop are also communities with voters. They will take note in November, too.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Editorial – Weapons of distraction: Toomey’s wrong call to militarize police arms
By The Editorial Board – June 30, 2016
There’s something about a looming election that compels an incumbent politician to once again assert how tough on crime he or she is.
On Monday, Sen. Pat Toomey, the Pennsylvania Republican running for re-election, made a campaign stop at the Law Enforcement Officers Memorial on the North Shore. He called for a full restoration of the “1033 program” that made it possible for local police departments to request military surplus equipment used in Iraq and Afghanistan for free or at a very low cost.
In response to mounting complaints about the militarization of the police around the country, President Barack Obama curtailed the 1033 program with an executive order last year. Military hardware more appropriate for ferreting out guerrillas in Fallujah or fighting in the lawless borderlands of Pakistan and Afghanistan is a lot more difficult to come by now.
The Obama administration took the complaints of protesters in Ferguson, Mo., and across the country seriously and agreed that arming police with military-style weaponry actually escalated tensions. They resembled an occupation force in the eyes of the communities where they patrolled.
In a tough campaign against Democratic challenger Katie McGinty, Mr. Toomey is now insisting that there’s nothing wrong with domestic police departments having military-style weaponry and transport vehicles, despite big differences between the mission of police officers and the mission of those in the military. He’s called on Ms. McGinty to back his call to militarize local police.
Citing the Orlando massacre this month, Mr. Toomey declared that “we are a nation at war.” Therefore, police in small towns and big cities should be armed to an extraordinary, even frightening degree, even if the optics are bad.
Police are not soldiers and shouldn’t be expected to respond as such. Mr. Toomey appears to be pandering for the support of law enforcement and their families. Communities patrolled by officers who look and act like the next iteration of Robocop are also communities with voters. They will take note in November, too.
Read the full article here.