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Owsley Co, Citizens For Fiscal Court Oversight
We will let you be the Judge!!
" We are strong supporter of local law enforcement. Imagine what would happen to communities without the constant threat of being arrested and thrown in jail for committing crimes: you'd see a near-total breakdown of society. We've seen this from time to time in the United States with small, localized breakdowns of law enforcement. What happens is that when the local population figures out that law enforcement is no longer effective then the equation of opportunity vs. risk changes in the minds of many people, and they decide that there's very little risk associated with destroying property, stealing, looting and committing other crimes against persons or property. It is only the immediate threat of arrest that keeps most people relatively civilized. People are capable of a lot in terms of criminal activity, but the fear of jail time keeps most of that behavior restrained. There are a surprising number of law-abiding citizens who can suddenly switch over to being violent, out of control opportunists if the scenario changes. People do strange things when they feel they are anonymous and that there is little or no risk of being caught and punished. In essence, what I'm saying is that if we did not have local law enforcement, our county will be in a state of chaos. A lot of people say "Oh, that's ridiculous, that couldn't happen in Owsley County... people are polite and mild-mannered." People will do things as part of an anonymous grope that they'd never even consider doing on their own. And it's not that I don't have faith in human kind, it's that for most people, when they're given an opportunity to steal from a person, or to harm someone else for their own personal gain without the risk of getting caught, far too many people will pursue that line of action. What are you capable of doing if you were guaranteed you'd never get caught? I'm sure psychologists can argue one side or the other on this issue all they like, but the bottom line is that human nature really is hardwired in a way that motivates individuals to primarily think about themselves -- to put themselves first, rather than the good of the community. The way that plays out, when there's a lack of law enforcement capacity is that people go on rampages, they commit crimes, hijackings, rapes, burglaries and so on. And part of the evidence supporting this argument is the very fact that some people are so motivated to exploit others for their own personal gain that they will engage in these types of illegal activities even when law enforcement is operating at a high level and the threat of arrest is imminent. Some people will risk jail in order to steal a TV or a VCR from someone's home. Some people will risk a 10-year jail sentence to steal a vehicle. Some people are so violent that they will risk physical harm and imprisonment in order to rape or murder or physically harm another human being. It is local law enforcement that keeps these people in line, and if the pressure of local law enforcement were removed, we have see a rapid expansion of the criminal element in our local communities. (JUST ASK OUR SHERIFF) Criminals would seem to come out of the woodwork, and they would pursue all sorts of activities that would cause both physical harm and damage to private property. So that, in a nutshell, is why we strongly support local law enforcement. We all know the difference between right and wrong, and we don't need a stack of law books to explain it to us. But the mistake that we tend to make is thinking that everyone else is like us. Because they aren't. This is why our communities need to invest in law enforcement. I think we owe a great deal to our local law enforcement officers in this county and all across this country -- these are men and women who are putting their lives on the line to keep our communities safe so that we can have the luxury of talking about subjects like nutrition, healthcare, physical exercise and how to be healthy, creative, productive human beings rather than spending time defending our homes. local law enforcement provides a tremendous benefit to communities for which they are rarely recognized. Police get no thanks when the streets are safe, but they always get blamed for law enforcement lapses. In law enforcement, it's easy for the public to see when things go wrong, and almost impossible to notice when things go right. After all, if the police are doing their jobs, the community is peaceful and nobody really notices a crime problem. Thus, it's easy for the public to forget that it was, in fact, the local law enforcement presence that made peace possible in the first place." Monday, March 07, 2005 by: Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, Natural News Editor.
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