Today in tone-deaf newspaper columns

[Vombatus]

I hear ya, and that's fine. But if a driver's not impaired but makes a harmless mistake, a warning will do. Police can issue a simple warning citation that can show up on future stops, right?

I'm not defending this guy, per se, but the fines are staggering, and traffic cops can be inhuman assholes playing God. Something as simple as momentary confusion in an unfamiliar part of town can sock you for $200.

I agree with Matt, he was probably only going to get a warning and all that changed when he bolted at the green light.

 

[Spartan Squad]

I hear ya, and that's fine. But if a driver's not impaired but makes a harmless mistake, a warning will do. Police can issue a simple warning citation that can show up on future stops, right?

I'm not defending this guy, per se, but the fines are staggering, and traffic cops can be inhuman assholes playing God. Something as simple as momentary confusion in an unfamiliar part of town can sock you for $200.

The guy might have gotten off with a warning but based on the deputies accounts and his own non-apology apology, it sounds like he was kind of a deck. I got out of ac ticket for pulling into an intersection against a red light after I thought my light had turned green because a) the highway patrolman was at the end of his shift and b) I wasn't an asshole to the guy. I basically called myself a dumbass and he was just laughing at me. Anyone who's spent time in Cali knows the CHP don't let many people off with warnings.

 

[Doc Holliday]

If you watch the video, at the end, he gets very hostile. He even tells the officer to "give me my ticket" ... He turned this into something much bigger than it was. Now he can stew in it for a while. But, his genuine lack of being sorry for anything is enough for me to say he should just take his shirt and hit the road. I'm betting the managing editor or publisher tells him to take a walk in a couple weeks.

 

[Fredrick]

His follow-up column is too defensive and far from apologetic. As an angry, tired old man, he's dug his heels in even though he lied and embellished everything. Time to let him put his boots up and rest them for a while. A long while. As a reader, I'm as offended by his follow-up as I was the first column. He admits he made a mistake but he hardly seems sorry about it.

Have to agree Doc. He's 84. Time to get guest speakers like he did with the sheriff for the lodge but no more columns. His followup column doesn't even touch the fact he said in the original piece he knows how minorities feel when they are stopped and feared for his life on this stop. I am assuming the 84 year old is a local legend and everybody in town must know who he is, but he's done, finished, kaput. Again, he's 84. At some point you should retire anyway.

 

[dirtybird]

I assume most people feel in some way wronged at the end of that kind of traffic stop. You're in the wrong end of a power dynamic. You're opinion of the interaction probably hinges on if you get a warning or a ticket.

I recently got pulled over, something I felt I probably didn't do. Cop thought something was amiss (asked if I was nervous, which I should have been since I was about to be out $200). Right after, I stewed, thought of ways to try to fight it or reduce it, even looked where the guy was camping out, trying to nail folks on the way to church. In the end, I'll end up paying, and I'm sure I'm less in the right than I felt when it happened.

In any case, not worth a column, but probably not some intentional broadside toward the cops either.

 

[Alma]

If you watch the video, at the end, he gets very hostile.

Being unkind is not against the law.

 

[Doc Holliday]

Being unkind is not against the law.

Whoever said it was against the law? The point was, the guy was being a jackass and he took the same approach with his column. Who are you? The message board police? Get over yourself.

 

[Alma]

Whoever said it was against the law? The point was, the guy was being a jackass and he took the same approach with his column. Who are you? The message board police? Get over yourself.

I agree the column shouldn't have run.

I also think it was a petty stop in a sea of a thousand petty stops, and having a second cop there was weird, and context that was only provided after the column was written.

The guy also didn't believe the police were trying to stop him. He thought they were after someone else.

Many years ago, after covering a basketball game on a college campus, something similar happened to me. At 2 am, I turned on a Red light in the middle of campus. No one on the road, and I'd never been on the campus, so I didnt see the no right turn on red sign. A campus police officer, 2 blocks away, behind two red lights - the only other car on campus, I'd guess - sees this and hits his lights, going through one red light of his own to stop me.

At the end of the stop - I'm perfectly polite to that point - he hands me the ticket. I look at it. "How much is it?" I ask. He proceeds to tell me that, since he's a campus cop, he can't determine that; he has to submit the ticket to the county and I gotta call them to know what I owe.

This is a 2 am traffic stop.

 

[Doc Holliday]

I agree the column shouldn't have run.

I also think it was a petty stop in a sea of a thousand petty stops, and having a second cop there was weird, and context that was only provided after the column was written.

The guy also didn't believe the police were trying to stop him. He thought they were after someone else.

Many years ago, after covering a basketball game on a college campus, something similar happened to me. At 2 am, I turned on a Red light in the middle of campus. No one on the road, and I'd never been on the campus, so I didnt see the no right turn on red sign. A campus police officer, 2 blocks away, behind two red lights - the only other car on campus, I'd guess - sees this and hits his lights, going through one red light of his own to stop me.

At the end of the stop - I'm perfectly polite to that point - he hands me the ticket. I look at it. "How much is it?" I ask. He proceeds to tell me that, since he's a campus cop, he can't determine that; he has to submit the ticket to the county and I gotta call them to know what I owe.

This is a 2 am traffic stop.

Almost the same exact thing happened to me at an Applebees in Roanoke, Va. after a Hokies football game around 1 a.m. a couple of years ago. I was polite and explained my situation. He let me off with a verbal warning.

My point is, you seem to have a preconceived notion that all cops are dicks. They're not, they're doing their job. Treat them with respect, and they'll do the same. This guy was a deck and he got what he deserved. As a sports writer, you should understand this as much as anyone because a lot of fans think sports writers are know-it-all dicks. They're not. They're just doing their job.

 

[Alma]

Almost the same exact thing happened to me at an Applebees in Roanoke, Va. after a Hokies football game around 1 a.m. a couple of years ago. I was polite and explained my situation. He let me off with a verbal warning.

My point is, you seem to have a preconceived notion that all cops are dicks. They're not, they're doing their job. Treat them with respect, and they'll do the same. This guy was a deck and he got what he deserved. As a sports writer, you should understand this as much as anyone because a lot of people think sports writers are know-it-all dicks. They're not. They're just doing their job.

No, I don't think they're unusually rude. I think they're a product of a crime control model/ethos that has been running unabated for 37 years.

shirt, a 10 year old kid is a block away from their house, and we got adults calling cops like a kid napping is about to take place.

 

[cjericho]

I agree the column shouldn't have run.

I also think it was a petty stop in a sea of a thousand petty stops, and having a second cop there was weird, and context that was only provided after the column was written.

The guy also didn't believe the police were trying to stop him. He thought they were after someone else.

Many years ago, after covering a basketball game on a college campus, something similar happened to me. At 2 am, I turned on a Red light in the middle of campus. No one on the road, and I'd never been on the campus, so I didnt see the no right turn on red sign. A campus police officer, 2 blocks away, behind two red lights - the only other car on campus, I'd guess - sees this and hits his lights, going through one red light of his own to stop me.

At the end of the stop - I'm perfectly polite to that point - he hands me the ticket. I look at it. "How much is it?" I ask. He proceeds to tell me that, since he's a campus cop, he can't determine that; he has to submit the ticket to the county and I gotta call them to know what I owe.

This is a 2 am traffic stop.

On the ticket, it didn't say how much the fine was? Did he write it up on his notepad?

 

[dirtybird]

Almost the same exact thing happened to me at an Applebees in Roanoke, Va. after a Hokies football game around 1 a.m. a couple of years ago. I was polite and explained my situation. He let me off with a verbal warning.

My point is, you seem to have a preconceived notion that all cops are dicks. They're not, they're doing their job. Treat them with respect, and they'll do the same. This guy was a deck and he got what he deserved. As a sports writer, you should understand this as much as anyone because a lot of people think sports writers are know-it-all dicks. They're not. They're just doing their job.

The way you wrote this, is sounds like being polite is some magic bullet. It's not. If you were more of a deck, maybe you get a ticket, which implies the cop is pretty unprofessional. But I've been plenty polite to cops, and sometimes, I get my ticket, sometimes not.

Since their job isn't to fine people for being rude, if the difference between ticket or warning is how deferent I am, than someone is not actually doing their job but is in fact being a deck.

(That's how that whole unbalanced power dynamic works which makes folks feel like cops are dicks, something an officer probably has to factor in)