So The President's Police Commission [Interim] Report Was Released And...

I missed it. Well, no. I saw the headline but had to gloss over it due to more pressing matters. Turned out the news report I saw didn't link to the actual report anyway.

Apparently, its main recommendation is to form a task force to make further recommendations.

Punt!

Yeah, no real change at all, no real change likely, not now, not ever. The way things are is the way they are supposed to be and the way they will be for all time to come, world without end, amen.

Bill Bratton, Dave Grossman and all their acolytes and devotees have yet again won the day.

How and why does this happen over and over and over again? Just like police shootings, the same scenario plays out again and again, study after study is commissioned, excuses and made, nothing changes

I finally found a news report that actually links to the commission's findings and lists the major other recommendations made by the commission. It took some searching, and that tells me that the commission is being treated as irrelevant, its recommendations optional, and that the media-government has no particular interest in the matter. Things will stay as they are.

But these are the main recommendations of the Commission as listed by Philly.com in a post titled:

TLDR: Key Recommendations from Obama's policing task force

(Link to the actual report. 115 pg PDF. You be the judge.)

1. Embrace a guardian mindset to build public trust and legitimacy.

2.  Acknowledge the role of policing in past and present injustice and discrimination and how it is a hurdle to the promotion of community trust.

3.  Establish a culture of transparency and accountability in order to build public trust and legitimacy.

4.  Law enforcement agencies should promote legitimacy internally within the organization by applying the principles of procedural justice.

5.  Proactively promote public trust by initiating positive nonenforcement activities.

6.  Consider the potential damage to public trust when implementing crime fighting strategies.

7.  Track the level of trust in police by their communities just as changes in crime are measured.

8.  Strive to create a workforce that contains a broad range of diversity

9. Build relationships based on trust with immigrant communities.

10.  Collaborate to develop policies and strategies in communities disproportionately affected by crime.

11.  Develop comprehensive policies on the use of force that include training, investigations, prosecutions, data collection, and information sharing.

12. Mandate external and independent criminal investigations in cases of police use of force resulting in death, officer-involved shootings resulting in injury or death, or in-custody deaths. Report data on all officer-involved shootings to the Federal Government.

13. Adopt identification procedures that eliminate or minimize presenter bias or influence.

14. Release department’s demographic data.

15. Collect demographic data on all stops and arrests.

16. Implement response protocols to mass demonstrations that prioritize de-escalation.

17. Use civilian oversight of law enforcement to strengthen trust with the community

18. Refrain from quotas for arrests, tickets or summonses. Don’t use quotas to generate revenue.

19.  Seek consent before a search and explain that a person has the right to refuse consent when there is no warrant or probable cause.

20. Adopt and enforce policies prohibiting profiling and discrimination

21. Federal agencies should provide technical assistance and incentive funding to jurisdictions with small police agencies and encourage small departments to  consolidate.

22.  Establish national standards for the research and development of new technology, for instance, body-worn cameras and social media.

23. The Department of Justice should develop best practices that can be adopted by state legislative bodies to govern the acquisition, use, retention, and dissemination of auditory, visual, and biometric data by law enforcement.

24. Update public record laws.

25. Federal government should support the development of new “less than lethal” technology to help control combative suspects.

26.  Require both basic recruit and in-service training on policing in a democratic society.

 Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/TLDR-Key-recommendations-from-the-21st-Century-policing-task-force-report-Philadelphia.html#UcekdW3YCCytZRHL.99

Sigh.

Well, this is pure Bratton and Grossman, it has little or nothing to do with what the public has been trying to communicate to the Powers That Be about national problem of violent policing.

What this report tries to do is re-conceive the problem, not as one of violent policing, but as one of perceptions -- perceptions which can be changed by better communications and slight modifications in behavior.

In other words, keep doing what you're doing, only be smoother and less aggressive about it.

Keep on your killing spree because that's what's driven down crime rates. But do it with a bit more.... finesse. So as not to rile the peeps so much. M'Kay?

Recommendation #1, this "guardian mindset," is pure Grossman and his "sheepdog" bullshit. It's time to take the blinders off. Grossman uses that "sheepdog" analogy all the time and it's now emblazend on the minds of movie-goers thanks to its uncredited use in "American Sniper." It's been a factor in police culture for decades, and it is one of the reasons why there are so many killings by police.

The police are brainwashed to believe that their highest accomplishment is to "kill the wolf" -- and the "wolf" is defined as anyone who deviates from the fold, not someone who preys on the flock at all, merely someone who doesn't quite fit the standard set by the shepherd and ultimately by the owner of the flock.

The Guardian/Sheepdog doesn't work for and doesn't care about the flock per se. The Guardian/Sheepdog works for the shepherd -- who in turn works for the owner(s) of the flock, an the Guardian/Sheepdog's highest goal is the approval of the shepherd and the owner(s).

When the Commission says their first recommendation is for the police to adopt a "guardian mindset" all it means is that they are recommending that all police start with the insane premise Grossman has been promoting for decades.

It doesn't have anything to do with police violence and killing; it may in fact increase  the level of violence and killing overall.

Yes, indeed, let's have another task force with more recommendations. Let's have more Best Practices.

Sigh.