- STUNT_GRANNY@lemmy.worldEnglish3 hours
It straddles the state line. Partly in Kansas, partly in Missouri. A few other cities are like this, like Memphis and Texarkana.
- RizzRustbolt@lemmy.worldEnglish7 hours
Fuckin’ statewide vote for an issue that only affects one city…
And it’s not 25% of the city’s budget. It was a 25% increase in the police budget, bringing it to 38% of the city’s budget. Just enough that KC had to scrap plans for free bus fares.
- 6 hours
Wouldn’t be surprised if the bus thing was the real goal all along
- 1 day
Republicans are for “small government” unless they control the state and it is a local gov.
- FlyingCircus@lemmy.worldEnglish3 hours
“Small government” means there’s a few rich people who control everything, and regular people don’t have a place in it.
- 14 hours
No, they’re still for small government…as in they close down a tightly regulated and budgeted govt agency to outsource it to their buddies private company which exists solely to generate a profit.
16 hoursSpeaks volumes what those in charge think of the population doesn’t it?
Here I am bitching at the metro because the grocery store has weight sensors on the self checkout because no one trusts me as a consumer.
- SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish16 hours
Those stores see significant theft so I don’t blame them. Or we could stick to the honor system and pay 2X.
If it bothers you, use a cashier.
Maybe we should be addressing the underlying problem of “why are people stealing groceries”. I’ve never met a single person that is stealing a loaf of bread for shits and giggles.
- SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish11 hours
Not the grocery store’s fault. Oh wait, maybe all grocery stores should lose money.
Galen Weston as an example is one of the richest men in Canada. He can spare some cash.
- B0rax@feddit.orgEnglish15 hours
Weight sensors don’t stop theft. They irritate costumers to the point they will stop using the self checkout.
- SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish11 hours
How is it irritating? Swipe, put the thing in a bag on the sensor.
What’s irritating is people who get confused by this and insist on not using cashiers.
- B0rax@feddit.orgEnglish10 hours
Have you ever used these? Often the weight is programmed wrong, so the item you put there is not recognized correctly, often it triggers falsely because something unexpected happened, they are generally a pain to use because the tolerance is set too low.
They are fine in theory but not in practice.
- Alfredolin@sopuli.xyzEnglish20 hours
I just checked, in Helsinki, Finland (my instance’s location), 25% of the city budget (~1,25B€) would cover the police expense for entire country and more (~900M€).
Here police is managed by the state but I tried to make things comparable. And I don’t believe the police is extremely underfunded there. Is the US police driving tanks or wtf?
- SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish11 hours
Armored carriers, helicopters. Those helicopters range for $5-20M each.
- NiHaDuncan@lemmy.worldEnglish16 hours
That’s an M113 (variant), an APC (armoured personnel carrier) is nowhere near a tank.
- 16 hours
That’s a distinction without importance.
What’s important is that it’s military hardware that they don’t need and which reinforces their toxic mindset of being at war against certain neighborhoods, ethnicities, income brackets, and political ideologies.
- stickyprimer@lemmy.worldEnglish9 hours
The importance is in the mind of the person who knows more about armaments and wants to flex that on other people. This happens nonstop in gun control debates, as if you need the technical knowledge of a gunsmith to debate the regulation of lethal force.
- captainlezbian@lemmy.worldEnglish14 hours
Urban police have a fuck ton of high tech equipment, high pay, and unlimited overtime (because the cities politically can’t stop them from taking it). They also have frequent legal costs because they keep violating citizens’ rights.
- ZebulonP@lemmy.worldEnglish2 days
If two-thirds of a populace is opposed to something, and their government approves it anyway. Then their government is illegitimate.
- GraniteM@lemmy.worldEnglish16 hours
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government,
Core concept, really.
- Riverside@reddthat.comEnglish1 day
Yes, that’s capitalist “democracy” for you. Almost everyone agrees on increased funding and auditing to public healthcare, education, pensions and welfare in general, and yet we see all western capitalist countries heading in the opposite direction for the last 20 years.
- Riverside@reddthat.comEnglish17 hours
Fully agreed, there’s only plutocracy and no democracy under capitalism
- HobbitFoot @thelemmy.clubEnglish1 day
The issue here is what to do when you have multiple levels of government. One government entity may be against a policy, but a larger government entity which includes the smaller entity may be for a policy.
This case is regarding police funding, but this could apply to school or welfare programs as well.
Yeah, and I know this sounds trivial by comparison, but we had something similar here recently and it was a proposed ban on fox hunting that the government scooched away that the populous were wildly in favour of.
I have to say that if 25% of my city’s money was being spent on police I’d be making them earn their fucking money and you may infer from that what you will.
Imagine the opportunity cost. And guess who lost the most in that trade? The most vulnerable.
- anon_8675309@lemmy.worldEnglish1 day
People forget that the people and the government are the same fucking thing.
No. People forget that the people and their government are totally separate.
The US hasn’t bombed Iran. The government of the US has, despite the protest of its people.
- anon_8675309@lemmy.worldEnglish16 hours
So many people missing the damn point. We elect representatives but WE THE PEOPLE are still in charge. The fact that our reps bombed Iran does NOT absolve us of responsibility!!!
- SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish16 hours
Like the Nuremberg trials…" Wasn’t me…I was just following orders"
- SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish16 hours
LOL…the people who voted Trump, or don’t vote at all.
Not voting is supporting Fascism. Sorry, American people do not get a pass after electing Trump twice.
- 1 day
Rich out of touch morons with the best benefits and healthcare on earth are not my people
- anon_8675309@lemmy.worldEnglish1 day
Way to misinterpret me.
We the people ARE the government. We only elect representatives. But all this (look around), it’s ours.
You haven’t been involved with politics at a local level, have you? Just the bullshit going on with flock surveillance cameras being pushed through is a good microcosm of how politicians don’t face consequences for failing to follow their constituents will.
- flandish@lemmy.worldEnglish1 day
not at that size, no. yes they all have addresses and put their pants on one leg at a time, but they are capitalists before anything else, including the people who voted for them.
which means they are no longer human - they are pieces of shit.
- SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish16 hours
People support US police budgets for the same reason they support gun laws, mass deportation, fear of black or brown people when white people are becoming the minority in some regions.
It all reached a critical point with Obama.
“People weren’t willing to throw their lives away in the people grinder machine, that means they fully support the people grinder machine”
Unironically yes. People should learn what it means to permit their government to ignore their wishes.
People should, but I’m kind of tired of all the keyboard warriors thinking that lack of blood on the streets equals lack of action and explicit approval, especially when they have no skin in the fight themselves.
It’s some of the most absurd shit. “I don’t see you actively hunting down child abusers, so you must be a pedophile” ass opinions.
It’s easy to call for others to die for a cause, and that’s a large part of what led to the situation we’re in now. People sitting back and sentencing others to pay for their desires.
It’s some of the most absurd shit. “I don’t see you actively hunting down child abusers, so you must be a pedophile” ass opinions.
Maybe so, but it’s also absurd to think that because the members of the population aren’t the ones actively making decisions, they don’t assume a proportionate amount of the guilt. Governments are nothing without their constituents, in fact they are shaped by them. It’s understandable to be hesitant toward action, that’s human. But to do all these mental gymnastics to avoid accepting part of the responsibility for what the US is like right now is disingenuous if not being blind to reality.
I think you, and many others, believe that US citizens have far greater control over our “representatives” than we actually do. We literally have no recourse (outside of the ammo box or absurd amounts of money) against a politician taking office and doing exactly the opposite of what they campaigned on, besides waiting for their term to be over.
Due to tons of laws built up over many years, the only way to get a seat at the table is money, and all the community fundraising in the world isn’t going to outspend corporate interests.
Look, I don’t have the time or the energy to debate club out all the issues with the US governmental system to the rigid expectations of everyone outside of it with an opinion. People make lifelong careers just trying to explain the mess to people living within it. You clearly have a strong opinion that the collective population of the US isn’t doing enough for whatever metric you have, and I’m not even trying to argue against that.
I just think it’s absolutely rich to try and assign blame to the proletariat for hesitating to throw their bodies on the corpse pile from thousands of miles away, or even from right here but sitting on your ass taking no action yourself. And no amount of admonishing, debate club bullshit, mental gymnastics, semantics lawyering, philosophy 101, specific individual cases where my generalized statements are untrue, or whatever anyone can bring to bear is going to change my opinion that “If you’re so invested in this, grab a cheap plane ticket and get to work on it yourself instead of trying to guilt others into shedding blood.”
I’m not denying the responsibility of the people, where we can effect change. I’m simply stating that the area which we can effect is small and not going to make news broadcasts. Basing your take on the will of a country’s people on the multiple times distilled and removed news broadcasts that make it out is just silly.
This will be my last comment in this thread. It’s clear that many people here simply want an easy outlet for their frustrations about the US government and have decided the populace is the problem, rather than the systems of wealth and social inequality which are global at this point.
We literally have no recourse (outside of the ammo box or absurd amounts of money) against a politician taking office and doing exactly the opposite of what they campaigned on, besides waiting for their term to be over.
Fair enough, this problem is prevalent in a lot of other countries too. But again, a government is nothing without the people. There’s nothing (in theory) stopping the sensible majority from making their gripes known and felt at the very least. It might feel like speaking into a vacuum, but political systems do respond to pressure, even if it’s negatively. Furthermore, these problems don’t come about purely through malicious politicians, constituents are either complicit or they don’t take the time to understand the implications. It’s harsh, I know, but it’s true. This is a universal human problem, and it doesn’t necessarily make anyone a bad person.
Due to tons of laws built up over many years, the only way to get a seat at the table is money, and all the community fundraising in the world isn’t going to outspend corporate interests.
Again, constituents have a part in this. We’re associating a lack of direct participation in the build-up of these laws with innocence, which isn’t necessarily true. Across US history, people with the means to do so had every opportunity to push back against this.
You clearly have a strong opinion that the collective population of the US isn’t doing enough for whatever metric you have…
Not true, at least not entirely. It would be unfair to indict the US population as a whole for not taking enough action, as I said it’s human to be hesitant in that regard. The point I’m trying to make is that many people, especially US citizens, seem to victimize Americans and thereby deny that they have any agency. Which, unless we’re trying to get philosophical, simply isn’t true, or is at least a little disingenuous. I’d be far more accepting of the lack of action if this group were to own Americans’ implicit part in their country and its actions.
I just think it’s absolutely rich to try and assign blame to the proletariat for hesitating to throw their bodies on the corpse pile from thousands of miles away, or even from right here but sitting on your ass taking no action yourself.
Again, not I’m not “blaming the proletariat”. They have a part in current events. That much is undeniable. To say otherwise would be to separate the mitochondria from its responsibility to the cell, which as anyone who understands a little biology would know that doesn’t tend to work out.
If you’re so invested in this, grab a cheap plane ticket and get to work on it yourself instead of trying to guilt others into shedding blood.
Did you actually read my comment? I’m not trying to goad anyone into a revolution.
Basing your take on the will of a country’s people on the multiple times distilled and removed news broadcasts that make it out is just silly.
Well this is just outright strawmanning my point. My argument comes from my understanding of how the government and people work in tandem across all nations, not what I’m observing from the US specifically. The government is an extension of its people and how they’ve come to react to their environment, it’s no different with the US. Governments aren’t this separate organism that guides and/or terrorizes the populous. They’re (typically) made up of members of the populous itself. They are quite literally dependent on each other.
Look, I get you’re frustrated, and I’m sure that you see a lot of unjust hatred and blame directed towards Americans and you’re understandably retaliating against that. But this isn’t just because of a general lack of understanding for American politics. It’s because (essentially for the first time) Americans are taking the heat from foreign countries’ citizens that they’ve been (though not universally) throwing toward other countries with shitty governments in an equally ignorant and misplaced manner. This is world politics, baby. People can be pretty stupid with it. Though it certainly doesn’t help that the US is a global hegemony, so there’s a proportionally higher amount of pressure placed on the country to not screw anything up. And the past 1.5 years or so have been the biggest American screw-up in a long, long time, if not ever. So there’s really no question that there’ll be even more of it to come, especially if/when it gets even worse. I do wish you luck though, you seem to be a reasonable American. I hope the people who deserve it get what’s coming to them so you and others can pick up from there.
And I am sick of americans pretending nothing can be done and that their stupid nation is somehow different then the rest of the world. Do you know how fucking frustrating it is watching a nation collapse and try to take the world down with it all while the same people that expected people in the middle east to rise up and fight their oppressor sit on their fat asses and get offended when anyone asks literally anything from them? We all world wide have skin in this game, and you are all sitting around stating that the fucking self proclaimed world police does not concern us?!
Like wholly flying fuck sticks, but if your are being told often enough that a real nation would be full on in revolt to tire you out… YOU MIGHT BE PART OF THE ISSUE.
- 17 hours
I don’t know that you’re fairly representing the views of the person you’re responding to. They arent advocating for doing nothing, they are saying its collar placate and there is real, meaningful action to take (and being taken) that just doesn’t happen to be violent overthrow.
I think both of you are against folks who sit back and do nothing, and you’re both clearly passionate in how you feel. Maybe look for the ally there.
- FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.worldEnglish2 days
Yep, the state loves to control the two largest metropolitan areas. They also own St. Louis’ police. They want full control over the cities because we’re the cash cows for the state, despite all the lip service paid to farmers and rural people, who all depend on the money we generate here for their welfare.
It’s a remnant of Civil War-era law and unlikely to ever change.
Yep we damn well didn’t want to give the pigs anymore than they already get. And you aren’t wrong about the situation in St Louis. People don’t even understand how that shit can be like that. It’s completely fucked up in the eyes of most the rest of the world but in Missouri it’s just Tuesday.
- FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.worldEnglish2 days
Yup, I hate the KCPD.
It wasn’t that long ago that they were just letting break-ins happen because they wanted to make Jackson County Prosecutor look bad and try to kill her reelection hopes, all for having the temerity to criticize the shitty job that cops do here. I see them when I’m out walking the dogs a lot and they’re always friendly to my face, but I keep in the back of my mind that these people are a piece-of-refuse gang and they’d happily shoot me and my animals in the head if it were convenient for them.
Remember the cardinal rule, friends: Don’t talk to cops. Ever.
- 5 hours
Even if it weren’t convenient and they were just pissed that day…
- youcantreadthis@quokk.auEnglish2 days
Always a way to change it real democracy comes out the fake vavinal of a fleshlighr or wait no that’s not it but something like thay
- SirEDCaLot@lemmy.todayEnglish13 hours
TLDR: Kansas City has a weird setup where the police department is paid for by the city but reports to a committee that’s mostly appointed by the state governor. A statewide ballot initiative passed that requires Kansas City to spend a certain % of their yearly budget on police, even though both the city mayor and the residence don’t want to spend that.
- Jenblair@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish8 hours
Pendergast fault, its continues today because kc is a democrat strong hold, St. Louis use to be the same tho I think state is trying to regain control.
- grte@lemmy.caEnglish2 days
Alright, well I guess this transit expansion is going under the police file. I hope you like driving buses, cops.
But more seriously…
Adding insult to injury for Kansas City, local officials will have no say in how their money gets spent by the police department—even as they are required by the state to pour more funds into it.
Talk about a corruption machine.
Missouri is a very corrupt state. Besides what you just mentioned, which is true, we also voted in an anti-gerrymandering law in 2018.
Before it could go into effect, the Conservative Party got a repeal of the law onto the ballot with very shady text to trick voters into repealing their own votes.
- FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.worldEnglish2 days
Yup.
All we get is one seat on the state commission that runs our police, which is filled by the mayor. We are effectively powerless to regulate the police in any meaningful way.
- garbagebagel@lemmy.worldEnglish1 day
Hey this happens in Canada too. In BC, the capital city has 23% of budget go to VicPD. The city has tried turning down budget increase requests, then the province stepped in and forced them to do it.
If the government did what the people want, our military destroyers would be named “Boaty McBoat Face” and similar
- NannerBanner@literature.cafeEnglish2 days
I wonder if you couldn’t start hiring social workers and garbage collectors under the police’s budget. Pitch it in some ridiculous but slightly connected way. Garbage collectors could be ‘gathering evidence’ as the law allows garbage to be searched without warrant, and social workers could be some sort of ‘post-incident contact follow-up-ers.’ Hell, expand it to wildly mildly connected things, like roadwork and bike paths, you know, to make the cops able to get around faster.
Social workers, Crisis intervention teams, psychologists and a whole lot more. Police work doesn’t necessarily just consist of shooting people. But I guess in the US that’s a radical viewpoint.
- poopsmith@lemmy.mlEnglish2 days
Policing in the US rose largely out of slave patrols. You can’t just tell them to hire social workers and expect any change. The problem is so deeply rooted and systemic that you have to eliminate the entire concept of police and start from the ground up.
- SabinStargem@lemmy.todayEnglish1 day
If I was in charge of replacing the police, part of the changes would be limits on serving as an officer and other roles. This would encourage fresh blood to replace the old, and help prevent corruption: Former police officers can end up under the batons of their successors, if they don’t ingrain good values into the next generation.
By breaking up the career and authority of police officers into discrete chunks, we can also prevent power accumulation via social bonds among them. Something like:
1 year of academy -> 3 years as officer -> 1 year paid remedial education -> 3 years as officer -> 1 year paid remedial -> 3 years as officer, etc.
While we would lose raw efficiency due to elections, education requirements, and so forth, I think something like this would help prevent police from becoming a vile cornerstone of society.
- prole@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish2 days
Those things are separate from police in the US. Probably intentionally.
The problem is the KCPD doesn’t report to the city. They don’t have to do what the mayor says so they just do what they want.
It’s gross and they end up paying out a lot in lawsuits.
Oh they privatized trash pickup. It sucks. Cost more and you never know when they will get there. It has improved marginally in recent years. But even just a year or two ago. They would regularly not show up till the day after pick up was supposed to be. Often well after sunset. I’m guessing they were probably purposely understaffing. Abusing their employees to nickel and dime the contract for every cent they could get.
And if there’s one thing our dip shit state legislature is against. It’s having competition for privatized services. Especially after the Kickbacks they get.
- youcantreadthis@quokk.auEnglish2 days
Well see the police budget is now 99 percent this new peoples internal affairs that get anti tank weapons and are hired to follow cops around there are ten with gins pointed at cops at all times under the logic that policibg makes you good so were just policing the police so they’re more efficient and good
I was wondering the same, malicious compliance. You could do a lot under the guise of pre-crime prevention.
- Alcoholicorn@mander.xyzEnglish2 days
Give every sanitation worker a badge and a gun. Call them the police anti-littering squad or something.
- HubertManne@piefed.socialEnglish2 days
Why can’t the city just put all sorts of social services under the police department. Heck do the whole city and everyone gets better pay and benefits.
- chaogomu@lemmy.worldEnglish2 days
That’s not a very good idea, imagining cops being involved in any social services makes me cringe. A better idea is to force all officers to live in the areas of the city they patrol, with a housing stipend, so they can’t complain about being forced out of the suburbs and into the city.
- HubertManne@piefed.socialEnglish2 days
You would not make cops social workers you would make social workers cops. Not all places require a degree in law enforcement and such. Just make designations like Arrest officers and social officers and such.
- Tedesche@lemmy.worldEnglish2 days
They mean using the police budget to hire social workers and other social services providers.
- Etterra@discuss.onlineEnglish2 days
I wonder how much of that 25% is being spent to pay for lawsuits it settled or lost? I’m sure that’s not just an LA thing.
