Ken Nelson

What do you feel when a police car pulls in behind you on the highway or street:

This morning a St. George police car pulled in behind me after I dropped the kids off at school. He was just driving somewhere. I was driving to work.

My thoughts were not “oh, look, an awesome public servant”. Or “gosh, they do a hard job and I appreciate it”.  Nope…. I thought “what kind of penty anty bs is he looking at my truck for?”.

It isn’t so much “police” as the St. George police specifically that inspires my admittedly dim view.  I was up in Salt Lake City this weekend and didn’t feel that way when I saw a cop.   My brother is a cop and neither he or his department  hunt around for ways to bother average citizens.  It’s just that SGPD seems overly interested in driver’s money.  So when I see one on the road, I just think they are out for a public payday not to do any public good.

I wish I felt different, but their actions send the message and I’ve definitely received it.

They will say their penty anty traffic stops are for the public good, but that seems dubious to me.  Most traffic safety problems are caused by drunks and reckless. Fine, pull them over.  Hint… they are usually out after midnight, not at 8AM trying to get to work. 

Highwaymen of old made travel expensive. Modern day variants patrol on behalf of local governments.