I once overheard a respective member of my high school football team use the word philosopher. Secretly, I was ashamed I didn''t know what he was talking about. It was then I realized the importance of having a better vocabulary.
After high school, like so many in the south, and other places, I joined the military as it was a poor-man''s-college. A place to learn a trade and have a respected position in society. The basic requirement that one had to take responsibility for his own actions was quickly, and unceremoniously, taught to those unfortunate enough not to already know. To ''pack your own mud'', meant that it was your duty to be ready for what comes. Being a cop, basically, means the same if you''re to occupy a respected position in the society. Life''s boot-camp soon teaches, however, that you''re not exempt from the law''s of circumstance because of some title. And, though you would like to be ''all things to all people'', you''re soon awakened to the fact that only politicians can play at that game. One that has unfairly burdened police-work beyond sensible accountability-A real threat to all, in fact.
As a cop, you have to settle for being ''just'' a representative of the law; not the law itself. Your job is important enough as you stand in the ''rawest'' of positions, literally, ''where the rubber meets the road''. That being, where the citizen gives over his freedoms to you by giving-into your demands/requests. Mistreat a good American too harshly, and he/she just may want to kill you, or wish someone else would. Certainly not in the best of circumstances; the worst being that one may be intent on killing you anyway just because you are a cop.
Regrettably, the above lesson isn''t well taught in the academy. You have to learn at your own peril also, not sufficiently taught, is there are no ''fun fights'' with the cops. If someone will fight you, and should overcome you, he/she can then kill you with your own gun! What''s to stop them? It is only the cops that are accused of using excessive force by too many political-minded folks! In short, there are too many boots parading around that didn''t have to endure boot-camp; learning that rights/responsibilities are wedded by the law''s of nature, not by the whims/fantasies of fools-on either side of the badge!