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A Remarkable, And Disheartening, Series of Tweets from Los Angeles

Hornius Emeritus

By Hornius Emeritus
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Onboard 2.0

Onboard 2.0 9083

Posted
Posted
9 hours ago, Nolacycling said:

"Write off" is a reference to Seinfeld. But it is also a sad truth that it's not worth it to these delivery companies to protect some merchandise. I get it, it's a sad commentary on America, but what are the economics driving it.

Political correctness, and and the atmosphere created during the summer of BLM (not meant to say black folks are the culprits just that policing has become much laxer since that summer everywhere). 

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Pam Cummings

Pam Cummings 9817

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Smh. When you elect a criminal president who openly brags about breaking the law and getting away with it, then fail to hold them accountable when they try to overthrow the government when they lose their re election, people are gonna tend to think that stealing some shit off a train car is a lay up.

Edited by Pam Cummings
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956 Worldwide

956 Worldwide 35475

Posted
Posted (edited)
9 hours ago, Nolacycling said:

"Write off" is a reference to Seinfeld. But it is also a sad truth that it's not worth it to these delivery companies to protect some merchandise. I get it, it's a sad commentary on America, but what are the economics driving it.

On issues like law and order and safety, voters are notoriously unreceptive to fingerpointing about whose actual responsibility it is and instead look to whomever is currently in charge of government.  They also (accurately) intuitively understand that it's well within the capability of our law enforcement and justice system to put a stop to waves of smash and grab daylight robberies and looting of railcars.  So if those things happened, then somewhere along the line someone decided it was OK for them to happen. 

Edited by 956 Worldwide
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Onboard 2.0

Onboard 2.0 9083

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Posted (edited)
20 minutes ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

And just like magic, OB2.0 answers my question before I asked it. Thanks.

Oh this isn’t tied to political unrest ?  Yeah stay where you are and be safe. Is your middle name naive obtuse ?

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Johnny Sack

Johnny Sack 8397

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8 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

I think local cops and RR cops have concurrent jurisdiction on RR property.  But, I don't think local cops get involved much unless requested.

Of course they have jurisdiction.  California has lots of problems with tolerating theft.  
 

I am anti drug war.  And wish our jails were cleared out so we could focus on warehousing the violent and career thieves. 

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31964

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Just because someone argues that the usual "tough on crime" policies of increased policing and police power, increased sentencing and prosecution and prosecution power are failed policies, doesn't mean that they are accepting of crime.

The reality is that crime goes on, whether the crime rate is up or down, and most of us are blissfully unaware of it until someone points it out, usually for a political purpose.  Or something particularly heinous happens that's newsworthy.

What we've been doing for the last 50 or 100 years clearly isn't working, or working very well, and has monstrous social costs.

I'm open to something, almost anything, different, without short-term, knee-jerk, pearl-clutching responses.  Unjustified fear drives a lot of negative human behavior, and it's unbecoming of those capable of thinking past it.

 

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31964

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3 minutes ago, Johnny Sack said:

Of course they have jurisdiction.  California has lots of problems with tolerating theft.  
 

I am anti drug war.  And wish our jails were cleared out so we could focus on warehousing the violent and career thieves. 

I would bet that these thieves are not (yet, anyway) violent or "career" thieves.  I'd imagine it's mostly kids or pretty young people raised by wolves, in no small part because their communities are ravaged by drugs and the drug war.

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Guest Lobo

Guest Lobo

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I'm still confused about how Los Angeles police are responsible for an interstate freight train?  I'm guessing they also get the call on rowdy passengers flying overhead from Dallas to Honolulu?  What does the LAPD budget have to do with any of this again?  Oh yeah, the security issues at the Canadian border...

What was the book about all the abortions of the 19701980's being the reason the feared 1990/2000's crime wave never came to fruition? 

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7 minutes ago, Lobo said:

I'm still confused about how Los Angeles police are responsible for an interstate freight train?  I'm guessing they also get the call on rowdy passengers flying overhead from Dallas to Honolulu?  What does the LAPD budget have to do with any of this again?  Oh yeah, the security issues at the Canadian border...

What was the book about all the abortions of the 19701980's being the reason the feared 1990/2000's crime wave never came to fruition? 

Freakonomics.  But I think that was just one chapter. 

Edited by 956 Worldwide
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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31964

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14 minutes ago, Lobo said:

I'm still confused about how Los Angeles police are responsible for an interstate freight train?  I'm guessing they also get the call on rowdy passengers flying overhead from Dallas to Honolulu?  What does the LAPD budget have to do with any of this again?  Oh yeah, the security issues at the Canadian border...

What was the book about all the abortions of the 19701980's being the reason the feared 1990/2000's crime wave never came to fruition? 

As mentioned, RR police have full law enforcement powers on railroad property under federal law and off railroad property according to some state laws.

Local police have jurisdiction on railroad property, but don't normally exercise it until requested by RR police.  It's something they are mostly free to ignore.  But they're not forbidden to operate on RR property, I don't believe.

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JimmyJames

JimmyJames 12271

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LOL at the usual turds trying to make this a political issue with their bullshit defund the cops arguments. 
 

Union Pacific has plenty of money to spend protecting its own fucking trains and tracks yet some of y’all expect the taxpayer to do it for them? That’s about as good of an example of a Republican opinion that exists right there. 

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Guest Lobo

Guest Lobo

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I saw video of a well known "don't defund the police, we must have law and order" proponent watching cops get murdered and he smiled and refused to stop the crimes in progress.  Didn't realize a 200 year old crime (train robbery) was such a recent phenomenon for some of y'all. 

Wait until you hear about these new criminals called Pirates!  Careful, they travel in groups!

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wildcat09

wildcat09 29533

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6 minutes ago, JimmyJames said:

LOL at the usual turds trying to make this a political issue with their bullshit defund the cops arguments. 
 

Union Pacific has plenty of money to spend protecting its own fucking trains and tracks yet some of y’all expect the taxpayer to do it for them? That’s about as good of an example of a Republican opinion that exists right there. 

Well, before modern policing the police departments that weren't started as slave patrols were started because businesses wanted to offload the cost of protecting their businesses onto taxpayers. So it's sort of natural at this point for many to expect taxpayers to foot the bill.

I do find it funny that LAPD chooses not to do anything about this, though. Maybe they've got a policy of not doing anything with trains unless asked, I dunno. But it seems like it would be beyond fucking easy to just set up next to the one place all the train cars get broken into and catch some criminals. But I'm sure catching speeders in LA's constant gridlock is more important or something. 

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JimmyJames

JimmyJames 12271

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4 minutes ago, Lobo said:

I saw video of a well known "don't defund the police, we must have law and order" proponent watching cops get murdered and he smiled and refused to stop the crimes in progress.  Didn't realize a 200 year old crime (train robbery) was such a recent phenomenon for some of y'all. 

Wait until you hear about these new criminals called Pirates!  Careful, they travel in groups!

Little known fact. Joe Biden’s great great grandpappy was a pirate so therefore he’s secretly plotting to make piracy legal, but only if you’re black or Mexican. White people still cannot plunder the high seas. Read about it on Facebook. 

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Guest Lobo

Guest Lobo

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And a famous Buccaneer visited Joe Biden to share in their bounty.  That pirate even made a crass comment at Emperor Trump's expense.  

Coincidence?  I think not! 

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Johnny Sack

Johnny Sack 8397

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Posted
4 minutes ago, Bravo said:

You dont think there is a connection between less propensity by liberal DAs in these cities to lessen bail or convict and the real defunding of local police to the increase in crime?

No way. The Soros DAs have no impact on crime or law and order.

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956 Worldwide

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21 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

Well, before modern policing the police departments that weren't started as slave patrols were started because businesses wanted to offload the cost of protecting their businesses onto taxpayers. So it's sort of natural at this point for many to expect taxpayers to foot the bill.

I do find it funny that LAPD chooses not to do anything about this, though. Maybe they've got a policy of not doing anything with trains unless asked, I dunno. But it seems like it would be beyond fucking easy to just set up next to the one place all the train cars get broken into and catch some criminals. But I'm sure catching speeders in LA's constant gridlock is more important or something. 

A state monopoly on violence and policing is a pretty universally accepted indicator of state capacity and development.  I don’t think it’s really a Republican take to say that the state has a compelling interest in preventing widespread property crime. 
 

A good rule of thumb when traveling is that the more heavily armed private security you see, the worse the country. 

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Guest Lobo

Guest Lobo

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Is there a Godwin's Law, but for George Soros mentions?  

And while we're at it, some kinda law for the Clintons, Kathy Griffin, the Gay Mafia, and a Mister Ronan Sinatra?  

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wildcat09

wildcat09 29533

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2 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

A state monopoly on violence and policing is a pretty universally accepted indicator of state capacity and development.  I don’t think it’s really a Republican take to say that the state has a compelling interest in preventing widespread property crime. 
 

A good rule of thumb when traveling is that the more heavily armed private security you see, the worse the country. 

Oh yeah, I fully agree. Given how fucked even our most basic shit (like keeping the power on when it's cold) is, I'm sympathetic to the "let Union Pacific pay for its own security" argument, but the answer to our problems isn't better allocation or deployment of limited state capacity, it's developing more robust state capacity. 

I hate the law enforcement we've got and tend to agree with defunding police departments and reallocating their funding to other people who can perform many of their functions better, but arresting thieves is squarely in the real cop shit they should be doing. The fact that they seem to choose not to do it in a case like this is indicative of some pretty systemic problems, most likely both within this particular department as well as the American law enforcement community more generally.

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JimmyJames

JimmyJames 12271

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18 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

A state monopoly on violence and policing is a pretty universally accepted indicator of state capacity and development.  I don’t think it’s really a Republican take to say that the state has a compelling interest in preventing widespread property crime. 
 

A good rule of thumb when traveling is that the more heavily armed private security you see, the worse the country. 

Of course the state has a compelling interest in protecting widespread property crime. That’s not what this is about. 
 

Is a cop stationed outside your house to make sure your television doesn’t get stolen? Of course not. Union Pacific can afford and can figure out how to protect its own trains and tracks. If it chooses not to that is a business decision, not a defund the police matter. 

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4 minutes ago, JimmyJames said:

Of course the state has a compelling interest in protecting widespread property crime. That’s not what this is about. 
 

Is a cop stationed outside your house to make sure your television doesn’t get stolen? Of course not. Union Pacific can afford and can figure out how to protect its own trains and tracks. If it chooses not to that is a business decision, not a defund the police matter. 

I’m not saying it is defund the police and I think we’re talking past each other. To use your example—  I don’t expect a cop outside my house, I expect a prevailing atmosphere of law and order and for crime to remain within a spectrum of frequency and expectability. And there a spectrum of costs I’m willing to accept.

Leaving doors unlocked is either Mayberry or North Korea.  I’m happy to lock my door to live in a bigger city with more freedoms, and maybe pay for an alarm system, especially if I have valuable shit. Once I’m installing burglar bars, I’m going to begin voting differently and listening to “tough on crime.” . And if I always have to leave someone at home or at a regular place of business armed at all times— the state has stopped functioning and maybe I will welcome the junta.

Basic social theory, the first reason we create a government is to share the cost of providing security against external threats and internal disorder. 

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Brisketexan

Brisketexan 106508

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46 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

A good rule of thumb when traveling is that the more heavily armed private security you see, the worse the country. 

Man, that is a solid truth.

38 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

Oh yeah, I fully agree. Given how fucked even our most basic shit (like keeping the power on when it's cold) is, I'm sympathetic to the "let Union Pacific pay for its own security" argument, but the answer to our problems isn't better allocation or deployment of limited state capacity, it's developing more robust state capacity. 

I hate the law enforcement we've got and tend to agree with defunding police departments and reallocating their funding to other people who can perform many of their functions better, but arresting thieves is squarely in the real cop shit they should be doing. The fact that they seem to choose not to do it in a case like this is indicative of some pretty systemic problems, most likely both within this particular department as well as the American law enforcement community more generally.

Here's the problem -- it's not that PDs are incapable, or underfunded.  It's that they are UNWILLING.  If you haven't seen the purposeful disengagement of law enforcement from basic policing (essentially, a petulant exercise of "if you won't let us police the way WE want to, then FINE!  We won't police at ALL!  See how you like THAT!")....being that cops and their leadership have frequently stated that exact strategy.....I can't help you see what you refuse to see.

10 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

I’m not saying it is defund the police and I think we’re talking past each other. To use your example—  I don’t expect a cop outside my house, I expect a prevailing atmosphere of law and order and for crime to remain within a spectrum of frequency and expectability. And there a spectrum of costs I’m willing to accept.

Leaving doors unlocked is either Mayberry or North Korea.  I’m happy to lock my door to live in a bigger city with more freedoms, and maybe pay for an alarm system, especially if I have valuable shit. Once I’m installing burglar bars, I’m going to begin voting differently and listening to “tough on crime.” . And if I always have to leave someone at home or at a regular place of business armed at all times— the state has stopped functioning and maybe I will welcome the junta.

Basic social theory, the first reason we create a government is to share the cost of providing security against external threats and internal disorder. 

Bingo on the bolded.  That's basic Adam Smith stuff right there.  The challenges with American law enforcement is the dichotomy of "laws by which certain people are protected, but not bound, and by which others are bound, but not protected."  And American law enforcement being above and outside the law is a big problem in that respect.

I don't see how we resolve this problem, by the way.  A civil society very much needs a functioning law enforcement apparatus.  The one we have fights tooth and nail against being such a functional apparatus, and fights any and all efforts -- big or small -- to remedy its disfunction.  

See the first thing I quoted, about private security forces being a sign of disfunction.  In those countries, it's usually NOT the case that they have no police.  They often have LOTS of police.  But those police cannot be trusted.  They are corrupt, serve only their own needs and/or those of the ruling caste, and leave everyone else on their own when it comes to security.  That's the direction we've been headed, and are continuing to head with breakneck speed.  The rail lines are now learning what a lot of other Americans have already learned: don't rely on the cops.  They aren't on your side.  They are on their own side, that's it.

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Mole

Mole 4338

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1. Those pictures definitely hit at a visceral level and suggest a lot of broken things in our culture. You could blame it on many things political and not political and be correct, but only partially so.

2. I wonder how much of this is a new problem vs. a new manifestation of an ongoing problem. What’s the base level per capita theft in our culture? Is this reflective of a change or have the rails just become the big box store for thieves? Essentially, I wonder if this has always been a similar problem but now it’s scaled up and concentrated due to the changes in how we buy or if there’s been an actual increase in this type of crime. Neither scenario is good, but it reflects a different problem.

3. Partisan hacks will make broad proclamations about what this means. They won’t necessarily be entirely wrong, since it’s a complex problem, but they won’t be right either; and they won’t be interested in solving the problem, just benefiting from it. 

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Guest Lobo

Guest Lobo

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I blame the Reno Brothers for making a train heist look so damn easy and so damn profitable.  Also millions of Americans are now finding out in real time that Amazon ships an unbelievably high percentage of its items by rail.  Just because there's no smiley logo on the side of those train cars you see every morning, doesn't mean they're filled with coal and hobos.  

I always thought the Reno Gang would make for an interesting movie.  Although there had been some disruption/robberies of military trains up until that point, nobody had ever thought to stick one up for the money and valuables inside.  I imagine the briefing at the gang hideout would have been pretty funny. 

"It's too guarded at the stations, so how the hell are we gonna ride up on the train when it's going 50mph on open track boss?"

"Dammit Jack, not now.  Back to my coy Ocean's 11 speech."  

 

 

Edited by Lobo
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Sbbruin

Sbbruin 22067

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Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Bravo said:

You dont think there is a connection between less propensity by liberal DAs in these cities to lessen bail or convict and the real defunding of local police to the increase in crime?

LA DA George Gascon is under huge fire for his soft-on-crime policies. No bail, no prosecution of "petty theft", etc.  It's demoralizing to the LAPD.  Crime is way up in LA.  This was on the news today.  British tourists robbed at gunpoint.  

https://www.nbclosangeles.com/on-air/armed-robbery-caught-on-camera-in-west-hollywood/2797374/

I have a buddy in Manhattan Beach whose house was robbed while he was visiting his kids last month at UT.  Last guy I would think would buy a gun, but he just did.  I got rid of the .38 I had when my now 18 yo was about 1, as I just wasn't comfortable having it around.  May have to change my thinking on that.

Edited by Sbbruin
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PenelopeWitherspoon

PenelopeWitherspoon 19277

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1 hour ago, wildcat09 said:

Well, before modern policing the police departments that weren't started as slave patrols were started because businesses wanted to offload the cost of protecting their businesses onto taxpayers. So it's sort of natural at this point for many to expect taxpayers to foot the bill.

I do find it funny that LAPD chooses not to do anything about this, though. Maybe they've got a policy of not doing anything with trains unless asked, I dunno. But it seems like it would be beyond fucking easy to just set up next to the one place all the train cars get broken into and catch some criminals. But I'm sure catching speeders in LA's constant gridlock is more important or something. 

It is probably perpetrated by one of the organized criminal orgs in LA, and the LAPD is looking the other way because the LAPD has a known issue with cops getting paid.  That has been a problem with the LAPD for decades.

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