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[00:00.000 --> 00:03.440]  Warning, the following show contains explicit language.
[00:03.440 --> 00:07.540]  Certain people should not listen to this show, such as children and panty waste adults who
[00:07.540 --> 00:15.320]  cry like 12-year-old little girls when they hear profanity.
[00:15.320 --> 00:18.680]  Welcome my friends to the Dr. Reality Podcast.
[00:18.680 --> 00:24.600]  I'm Dave Champion, defunding the police.
[00:24.600 --> 00:32.080]  That has got to be hands down the worst title to describe something that actually has some
[00:32.080 --> 00:34.400]  solid attributes.
[00:34.400 --> 00:40.000]  Describing those attributes or elements as defunding the police makes about as much sense
[00:40.000 --> 00:45.560]  as describing a semi-automatic rifle fed by a detachable box magazine as an assault weapon.
[00:45.560 --> 00:49.880]  Before I launch into the particulars, let's cover this first.
[00:49.880 --> 00:56.240]  If you're watching on video, yes, these are pictures of me in uniform on the street, badge
[00:56.240 --> 00:59.360]  and gun, decades ago.
[00:59.360 --> 01:04.440]  Point being is I have a frame of reference to speak about this, it's not just some arbitrary
[01:04.440 --> 01:06.520]  ill-informed opinion.
[01:06.520 --> 01:13.600]  So behind this terrible title, defunding the police, what does it really mean?
[01:13.640 --> 01:18.480]  It means reallocation of available resources.
[01:18.480 --> 01:21.600]  Those reallocations fall into two categories.
[01:21.600 --> 01:28.760]  Number one, using mental health care professionals in cases where mental health care professionals
[01:28.760 --> 01:34.360]  are a better choice than armed police officers, and secondly, taking a certain percentage
[01:34.360 --> 01:39.600]  out of the law enforcement budget to pay for community programs.
[01:39.600 --> 01:41.320]  We'll talk about that in a minute.
[01:41.320 --> 01:44.280]  Let me be clear with you right now from the start.
[01:44.280 --> 01:48.320]  Using mental health care professionals to deal with people who are having mental health
[01:48.320 --> 01:54.040]  care issues is a dramatically better idea than sending men with guns and badges and
[01:54.040 --> 01:56.400]  pepper spray and tasers.
[01:56.400 --> 02:00.480]  Let me give you a couple of prime examples of this.
[02:00.480 --> 02:05.040]  You may remember a couple years ago that there was a mental health care counselor and he
[02:05.040 --> 02:10.080]  was out in the middle of the street, he was laying on his back with his hands straight
[02:10.080 --> 02:11.280]  up in the air.
[02:11.280 --> 02:16.800]  He was trying to get the police not to shoot his mental health care patient, who, if I
[02:16.800 --> 02:18.840]  remember correctly, was autistic.
[02:18.840 --> 02:22.320]  And fortunately, the police did not shoot the patient.
[02:22.320 --> 02:27.240]  Instead, they shot the mental health care counselor, who was laying flat on his back
[02:27.240 --> 02:30.340]  with his hands in the air, a threat to no one.
[02:30.340 --> 02:35.680]  You do not want men with guns showing up to calls pertaining to mental health care.
[02:35.680 --> 02:40.600]  One of the big problems with having cops show up at mental health care calls is that
[02:40.600 --> 02:44.640]  the lion's share of them, believe me, I know, I've been there and done that, they do not
[02:44.640 --> 02:51.120]  have the proper mindset or mentality to deal with people who are mentally handicapped.
[02:51.120 --> 02:58.460]  One of the biggest problems is cops absolutely cannot cope with someone ignoring them.
[02:58.460 --> 03:02.320]  Just the other day I was watching a video, the law enforcement had pulled over this woman
[03:02.320 --> 03:08.640]  at night, went to the window and said, do you know why I've pulled you over tonight?
[03:08.640 --> 03:10.540]  She didn't respond.
[03:10.540 --> 03:16.760]  The cop says, if you don't answer my question, I'm going to arrest you.
[03:16.760 --> 03:21.800]  Every elementary school child probably has heard you have the right to remain silent.
[03:21.800 --> 03:27.560]  That is a constitutional, fundamental right to remain silent when questioned by a government
[03:27.560 --> 03:30.480]  agent, which law enforcement certainly is.
[03:30.480 --> 03:36.640]  So he's standing at her window, do you know why I've pulled you over tonight?
[03:36.640 --> 03:41.200]  She declines to answer and he says, he doesn't say it in these words, but what he says to
[03:41.200 --> 03:46.640]  her essentially is, if you exercise your right to remain silent, I'm going to arrest you.
[03:46.640 --> 03:48.640]  And then he did.
[03:48.640 --> 03:52.660]  Well, that was a mistake because she was an attorney, but you get the point.
[03:52.660 --> 04:00.360]  Cops cannot tolerate it when you are not obedient and people who have mental health care issues
[04:00.360 --> 04:04.000]  almost the last thing they ever are is readily obedient.
[04:04.000 --> 04:11.520]  One of my favorite stories, if I can call it that, of cops not being able to tolerate
[04:11.520 --> 04:15.360]  being ignored or not obeyed is a couple of cops driving down the road and they saw a
[04:15.360 --> 04:18.440]  car that appears to have run off the side of the road.
[04:18.440 --> 04:21.680]  They got out of the unit and they went over to the car and the guy is sitting in the driver's
[04:21.680 --> 04:26.480]  seat, his head is lolling back, and they start dialoguing or attempting to dialogue with
[04:26.480 --> 04:27.480]  him.
[04:27.480 --> 04:28.480]  Excuse me, sir.
[04:28.480 --> 04:29.840]  Why are you parked here?
[04:29.840 --> 04:30.840]  Did you run off the road?
[04:30.840 --> 04:33.300]  Are you having mechanical problems?
[04:33.300 --> 04:34.300]  No response.
[04:34.300 --> 04:39.280]  Instead of considering that something might be amiss with him, they start getting aggravated.
[04:39.280 --> 04:41.600]  Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to step out of the car.
[04:41.600 --> 04:43.120]  Sir, I need you to step out of the car.
[04:43.120 --> 04:45.200]  Sir, put your hands on the steering wheel.
[04:45.200 --> 04:51.200]  Zero response, which is just making them more and more nuts because they can't tolerate
[04:51.200 --> 04:52.200]  that.
[04:52.200 --> 04:54.120]  Eventually they pull the taser out.
[04:54.120 --> 04:56.400]  I'm not kidding.
[04:56.400 --> 04:57.400]  They're pointing the taser.
[04:57.400 --> 05:03.280]  Sir, if you don't comply immediately and step out of the car, I'm going to tase you.
[05:03.280 --> 05:07.000]  He didn't comply and they did tase him.
[05:07.000 --> 05:13.280]  He was sliding into a diabetic coma, but the rocket scientists couldn't slow down enough
[05:13.280 --> 05:19.660]  in their angst over his non-obedience to consider there might be something going on here that
[05:19.660 --> 05:23.040]  does not require violence on the part of the police.
[05:23.120 --> 05:26.920]  That is a perfect example, I think, of why you do not want cops responding to mental
[05:26.920 --> 05:28.760]  health care issues.
[05:28.760 --> 05:31.560]  Another issue was Arizona several years ago.
[05:31.560 --> 05:32.560]  Family had called.
[05:32.560 --> 05:38.640]  They were having some difficulty with a large mentally handicapped teenager in the house.
[05:38.640 --> 05:42.000]  The cops show up and they're walking up the driveway and they almost to the door.
[05:42.000 --> 05:49.380]  When the door opens and out comes the parents and the mentally handicapped teen.
[05:49.380 --> 05:52.800]  He's holding a screwdriver in his hand.
[05:53.360 --> 05:58.360]  The cops immediately tell him, drop the screwdriver, drop the screwdriver.
[05:58.360 --> 06:01.000]  He's mentally handicapped.
[06:01.000 --> 06:02.720]  He doesn't drop the screwdriver.
[06:02.720 --> 06:05.360]  He keeps walking.
[06:05.360 --> 06:08.840]  The cops then backed off behind a position of cover and called for a mental health care
[06:08.840 --> 06:09.840]  worker.
[06:09.840 --> 06:14.440]  Oh, I crack myself up.
[06:14.440 --> 06:15.680]  No, that's not what they did at all.
[06:15.680 --> 06:20.840]  They turned him into a bullet sponge and killed him as he was walking away, holding a screwdriver,
[06:20.880 --> 06:24.040]  having harmed no one and threatening no one.
[06:24.040 --> 06:27.320]  These are just a few examples that stand out in my mind and that I can share with you at
[06:27.320 --> 06:29.320]  the time we have allowable today.
[06:29.320 --> 06:35.640]  I think it should be manifestly obvious that we should not want law enforcement to show
[06:35.640 --> 06:45.640]  up on calls that require mental health experts, not hair trigger, angry, quick to be irritated
[06:45.640 --> 06:48.620]  guys with guns and other forms of weapons.
[06:48.620 --> 06:50.520]  That's not advantageous for the public.
[06:50.920 --> 06:56.280]  Why would anybody want that when there's an alternative, which is to have mental health
[06:56.280 --> 06:59.160]  care workers who are not sworn peace officers, are not carrying weapons?
[06:59.160 --> 07:02.600]  They are first responders.
[07:02.600 --> 07:07.440]  When there's a mental health care issue, they are called rather than the guys with the guns
[07:07.440 --> 07:10.080]  and the tasers and the batons and the pepper spray.
[07:10.080 --> 07:12.320]  It's not like the calls are going unanswered.
[07:12.320 --> 07:15.400]  They're being answered by the right people.
[07:15.400 --> 07:20.920]  That is one element of the horrible name defunding the police.
[07:20.920 --> 07:25.240]  Before I get into the second element, I do want to take a moment and comment that defunding
[07:25.240 --> 07:29.840]  the police is a separate ideology.
[07:29.840 --> 07:37.120]  It's a separate movement from people who want to hold police officers more accountable for
[07:37.120 --> 07:39.040]  improper conduct on the job.
[07:39.040 --> 07:40.040]  Those are two separate.
[07:40.040 --> 07:43.880]  Now, they might share some participants and people who believe in both, but they are not
[07:43.880 --> 07:44.880]  the same.
[07:44.880 --> 07:51.640]  The second element of the horribly named defund the police program is to reallocate
[07:51.640 --> 07:52.640]  resources.
[07:52.640 --> 07:55.480]  Here's the thinking behind it.
[07:55.480 --> 08:01.920]  The thinking is we have a number of identifiable community problems.
[08:01.920 --> 08:07.880]  We believe as long as those problems remain unaddressed or unresolved, we're going to
[08:07.880 --> 08:14.120]  constantly have the police having to be in contact with members of the community.
[08:14.240 --> 08:19.040]  That may not be advantageous for either the cops or the community, so let's see if we
[08:19.040 --> 08:23.160]  can address some of these factors that exist in the community.
[08:23.160 --> 08:31.200]  The thinking is if we address them, we won't need as many police officers responding.
[08:31.200 --> 08:33.240]  What we're going to do is we're going to take some money from the police department.
[08:33.240 --> 08:35.760]  We're going to put it into these programs.
[08:35.760 --> 08:43.080]  I am no fan of the ever-growing police state in the United States.
[08:43.080 --> 08:50.360]  When I hear that a local municipal government is going to take a percentage, say, seven
[08:50.360 --> 08:56.200]  or eight or nine percent of a police budget, and they're going to allocate it to programs
[08:56.200 --> 09:02.640]  that may require, that may end up resulting in less of a need for police response and
[09:02.640 --> 09:07.960]  therefore less of a need for police officers generally, as long as the problems are in
[09:07.960 --> 09:14.040]  fact resolved, wouldn't that be a good thing?
[09:14.040 --> 09:18.120]  If your community was working smoothly and working well, so instead of needing, I'm just
[09:18.120 --> 09:21.560]  going to throw out an arbitrary number, instead of needing 120 cops, you could get away with
[09:21.560 --> 09:27.040]  99 cops because you just didn't need 120 anymore.
[09:27.040 --> 09:28.040]  Wouldn't that be great?
[09:28.040 --> 09:35.280]  Of course, ever-growing police departments increase your property taxes, so why wouldn't
[09:35.280 --> 09:37.800]  you want there to be fewer cops?
[09:37.840 --> 09:40.200]  Will those programs work?
[09:40.200 --> 09:42.240]  Will they achieve the goal?
[09:42.240 --> 09:47.360]  Will they smooth things out in the community so that there is less of a need for interaction
[09:47.360 --> 09:51.720]  between law enforcement and the community, especially where the community and law enforcement
[09:51.720 --> 09:55.920]  may not get along so well and that's a constant source of friction?
[09:55.920 --> 09:59.880]  Will those programs actually achieve the agenda, the goal?
[09:59.880 --> 10:02.360]  I don't know, and neither do you.
[10:02.360 --> 10:06.000]  If you're criticizing the whole defund the police thing that we're talking about today
[10:06.480 --> 10:11.480]  and you're saying, those programs won't work, okay, so first of all, you're an ignoramus.
[10:11.480 --> 10:16.080]  You have to understand the community in which they're being employed.
[10:16.080 --> 10:23.880]  You have to understand exactly what the programs are intended to do, and then you can form
[10:23.880 --> 10:29.520]  an opinion as to whether the stated goals can be achieved.
[10:29.520 --> 10:33.280]  But the people who are saying, oh, that will never work, they don't know any of that.
[10:33.280 --> 10:34.280]  They don't know the communities.
[10:34.360 --> 10:37.720]  Usually, they don't even live in this state, but they're criticizing them anyway.
[10:37.720 --> 10:42.000]  If you don't know the particulars of that community and you don't know exactly the fine
[10:42.000 --> 10:47.240]  detail of what the programs are that the money is going to be used for, you have no idea
[10:47.240 --> 10:49.160]  whether it's going to work or not work.
[10:49.160 --> 10:53.060]  If the people who live there have elected people to their city council and the city
[10:53.060 --> 10:55.700]  council says, let's try this.
[10:55.700 --> 10:57.480]  Let's see if we can make this work.
[10:57.480 --> 11:00.720]  Let's see if we can reduce friction between the community and police.
[11:00.800 --> 11:04.840]  Let's see if we can solve some problems so we don't need as many cops.
[11:04.840 --> 11:05.840]  You know what?
[11:05.840 --> 11:09.480]  Unless it's an absolutely boneheaded plan, I can actually read through the elements of
[11:09.480 --> 11:12.280]  the plan and determine it's completely boneheaded.
[11:12.280 --> 11:17.480]  Unless it's boneheaded, I'm all for giving it a try, and why wouldn't you be?
[11:17.480 --> 11:26.280]  In closing, I want to address the narrative that defunding the police just means slashing
[11:26.280 --> 11:28.560]  their budget because we're mad at them.
[11:28.560 --> 11:31.080]  First of all, no one's doing that.
[11:31.080 --> 11:32.600]  Let's be very clear about that.
[11:32.600 --> 11:33.600]  Nobody's doing that.
[11:33.600 --> 11:37.400]  I know there was some discussion about that after the George Floyd thing.
[11:37.400 --> 11:42.120]  There were some hot tempers, and some people were saying, oh, we're so angry at the cops.
[11:42.120 --> 11:47.300]  We're just going to slash their budget, but it's not being done.
[11:47.300 --> 11:54.200]  Even in Minneapolis, which is where that emotional dialogue first got blurted out and shared
[11:54.200 --> 11:59.080]  by the press, even in Minneapolis, a couple months after the Floyd incident, when they
[11:59.080 --> 12:06.160]  were called upon to vote on the budget, including the police budget, they did not slash the
[12:06.160 --> 12:07.960]  police budget.
[12:07.960 --> 12:13.120]  You have to separate what people who are angry and vomit something emotional out, the press
[12:13.120 --> 12:14.120]  runs with it.
[12:14.120 --> 12:17.240]  You have to separate that from what is going to happen in real life.
[12:17.240 --> 12:21.760]  I actually said on social media back at the time when a couple of those city council people
[12:21.760 --> 12:27.440]  from Minneapolis were making those statements, I said, you watch, it's not going to happen
[12:27.440 --> 12:33.280]  because their constituents are going to tell them, wait, wait, wait, no, no, no, no.
[12:33.280 --> 12:36.600]  These other elements, mental health professionals, we like that.
[12:36.600 --> 12:40.540]  Perhaps reallocating some funds to community programs, we're willing to talk about that,
[12:40.540 --> 12:44.120]  but just slashing the police budget, hell no, we live here.
[12:44.120 --> 12:47.120]  And sure enough, they didn't slash the budget.
[12:47.120 --> 12:50.760]  So the fact that it was splashed over the media when a couple of people vomited some
[12:50.760 --> 12:54.500]  emotion, yeah, don't run with that.
[12:54.500 --> 13:03.160]  If you want to affect some real change, real change in your life, go to DrReality.News,
[13:03.160 --> 13:06.960]  pick yourself up a copy of Income Tax Shattering the Mist or Body Science.
[13:06.960 --> 13:14.140]  Either one of them will be one of the two most fascinating, intriguing, and life altering
[13:14.300 --> 13:17.100]  books you've ever read.
[13:17.100 --> 13:17.700]  Thanks for being here.