Today's Action In Campus Martius [Ferguson/Eric Garner Protest]

[Wesley Mouch]

If we step back from these dramatic individual situations and look at the whole of what's happening, I wonder what forumers think about the state of urban policing in general.

Whitey Mouch wonders if the typical black experience with cops is as negative as the protesters claim.

We've reached a point where there's a general impression that cops are bad. And they know it. You can look at the police vs. St. Louis Rams, or more interesting at the current NYPD vs. DeBlasion at police funerals issue and see that this charge of pervasive racism is taking its toll. [[“We’ve had to literally train <Dante>, as families have all over this city for decades, in how to take special care in any encounter he has with the police officers who are there to protect him,” the mayor said.")

Does the problem of latent racism required a dismantling and re-education of cops, or were the police departments doing enough to handle things?

Stats seem to universally suggest that police violence on citizens continues to decline. Do we need this 'war on cops'? Will it be a benefit to urban policing, or will it pull the cops back from the front lines?