Officer.com Police Blogs & Podcasts

Tim Dees
Editor-in-Chief
Officer.com

All my life, I believed that cops were the good guys. The people that raised me never made the dumb mistake of pointing at a cop and telling me, “You had better be good or that policeman will put you in jail.” If I was ever lost or in trouble, my first instinct was to look for a police officer, because they would make sure I was safe. Maybe my ideal would have been shattered if I had some adversarial run-ins with cops, but I never did. I spoke respectfully to all of the cops I ever encountered, and was treated with kindness and professionalism in return. This image is a much harder sell to young people these days, but not because the boys and girls in the trenches are doing a bad job.

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Tim Dees
Editor-in-Chief
Officer.com
It’s not a secret that I am no big fan of Al Sharpton. In my view, he’s made a career of championing any cause that would get him in front of a camera, especially if he could blame the police for another injustice rendered to a black man or woman. Sharpton is, in my view, a mean-spirited, narcisstic opportunist who cares far less about the ideology he spouts as his own celebrity. If he was truly interested in saving the lives of black people, there is another issue he could take up where he could prevent more killings of black people than the police will ever do. And to boot, he is far more well-equipped to address the problem than most anyone else.

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Tim Dees
Editor-in-Chief
Officer.com

The subject of police suicide has gotten considerable attention lately. First the California Highway Patrol acknowledged that their recent history showed a suicide rate among their officers five times the national law enforcement average, which is already a scary number. A month later, a USA Today report, documented that this was a national problem. Of course, those of us who are a little closer to the problem weren’t too surprised. Suicide among cops has always been our crazy aunt in the basement.

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Tim Dees
Editor-in-Chief
Officer.com

Having relocated to a different state, I had to make a pilgrimage to the driver’s license bureau last week. While I was there, it occurred to me that this is one of the last great equalizers of our society. No matter how much money you have or how important you think you are, you’ve got to check in here sooner or later and stand or sit with rabble like me.

The Department of Licensing (DOL) here does a pretty good job at making this process as painless as possible, using a take-a-number system that avoids having to wait in line. So, the annoyance I felt while I was there didn’t have a lot to do with the process. It had more to do with the degree to which we cater to people who can’t be bothered to learn the local language.

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