You Can't Elect a Friend

It’s all about money, and power.
One side ties your hands and demonizes your profession, and the other sees you only as a tool, an investment, measurable in credit and debit columns, and prone to discard the tool when it costs too much.

Or when it’s broken, or old.

*photo from Wisconsin State Patrol FB*

I’m reading things about proposals for changes to benefits and retirements at federal levels that aren’t going to be morale boosters or recruiting assets, and where the federal model goes in cost-cutting, Republican statehouses will follow.

The civil service system isn’t perfect but it was established to fight the corruption and nepotism of the political spoils system and it is imperative that a revolving door of patronage is never again permitted, at federal or state levels.

If you don’t think it matters, that’s likely because so far, it hasn’t mattered to you.

Ask any officer from a small department who works at will just how much it matters. They spend every working hour one bad boss, one “wrong” arrest, from the unemployment line or the courtroom.Officers from ‘conservative’ states, especially those with no workplace protections like POBR and that adhere only to federal OSHA standards (read: exempting government agencies from OSHA’s own regulations) tell me frequently of dire management abuses: from failing to provide safety equipment and basic vehicle maintenance, to officers being explicitly instructed not to record overtime, to some who have worked 30 days and more without a day off or been threatened (or fired) for voting the wrong way.

In every state, by the way, failure to accurately record work hours violates many, MANY laws but who is there to hold them accountable?

Pay attention to politics. Don’t make decisions on what candidates say, but on what they do- even more so once they’re in office.

How do your representatives vote on topics that matter to you?

When they have the opportunity to make your job safer, more rewarding, your retirement more dignified, your enforcement of law more objective, do they follow through?

If you need examples of what I mean, visit sites like this or this to find bills about law enforcement, and search the sponsors and voting records. Then search ‘bill tracker’ for your state and do it again.

How many from your state or district supported you?

How many from the political party you prefer voted the way you expect them to?

It’s an enlightening exercise.

“Backing the blue” is an empty claim if they blink when it costs.

Waving a blue line flag is worse than empty symbolism if they won’t follow it up with the legislation that lets you do your job, survive, thrive, and find the resources you need, when you need them- when you need to pay bills, buy a house, get therapy for LOD wounds physical or mental, replace a radio or vest that’s past its use-by date.

A fancy funeral is poor compensation for a life made harder than it needs to be.

It’s hypocrisy.

That thin blue line is your family crest.

Don’t allow it to be co-opted by someone who wants your vote, but doesn’t have your interests in mind on the voting floor.