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"New York Police Department officer Patrick Pogan, 23, was a budding new cadet (just three weeks out of the police academy), when he used linebacker-force to tackle a man off his bike during a Critical Mass rally in Times Square. The officer, who appears to have picked his victim out of the crowd of cyclists at random, then wrote a bogus police report accusing the cyclist of resisting arrest, disorderly conduct and obstructing government administration.
Unfortunately for the officer, the entire incident was videotaped and posted on YouTube. He now faces up to four years in prison for assault, harassment and for filing a misleading police report."
That's what you get for joining the unionized, "good 'ole boys club".
As I say, police work should only be for those that are concerned with upholding constitutional laws and local ordinances, not for dickheads interested in union benefits and getting off the hook all the time.
Unions might've been good in the past, but from what I've been seeing now, all they do is allow employees to make big bucks and sit on their ass doing nothing for the most part.
Roadway/Yellow, USF-Bestway, ConWay, and maybe FedEx are under the Teamster Umbrella, but the rest of the long-haul industry does 401k, regular benefits, and pay per mile for OTR, and a decent hourly for local.
Oh and as it pertains to LE, just look at how bankrupt most cities and states have become after caving into union demands.
Part of the reason I'm glad I failed getting with CDCR is because of their own leechy union.
Thanks in no small part to them, this state is continuously getting sucked into the hole.
Better working conditions my ass, more like line the pockets of the bigwigs.
How the heck did your understanding of this thread get turned into union bashing? blue collar Republican party supporters shoot themselves in the feet everytime they bash unions unwittingly against their own interests. It's laugh-able if it wasn't so sad.
The fact is Unions have progressively become weaker and weaker over the course of the last 60 years. Consequently, so have worker's rights. Workers in the US get the least amount of vacation time ever, lesser and lesser legal rights. Weak labor law enforcement. Little to no health benefits... It's now to the point where city jobs look really good in comparrison to the shiesty compensation available from private companies. In the grand days of unions, such as my pop's IBEW membership, they got treated well. Today private workers are treated worse and worse.
Roadblock responding to a comment by bentstrider
12.4.09 - 3:35 pm
Via gawker ......Chris Long, the bicyclist who was famously shoved off his bike in Times Square by an asshole cop last year for no reason, was arrested in Brooklyn yesterday for drunkenly kicking a car. Looks like that cop is vindicated.... I dont agree.... Im glad the cop got what he deserved .....
I don't know, maybe I'm just one of those guys who lives to work.
I require very little to keep myself satisfied when it comes to compensation.
But, then again, I might've thought differently if I was actually working during the "olden days" when these trade unions were in full-force.
Since those days are all but long gone, I'm used to what was offered to myself when I first came to the table.
If workers want more rights than they have now, then more power to them, just don't expect me to get involved in any of that protest/picket-line nonsense.
I have nothing against anything as long as I'm not dragged into it, I want to sleep, work, and eat at the end of the day.
Good thing I'm not involved in politics, although some people said I should, too many complications to play around with.
Well then you'll be fine... That is until you hit your middle age phase of life when things have worn you out for a decade or two and the job options get important. Health care, work hours, inflation to compensation ratio. You will by then of course understand what all the union nonsense is about. I think you might not believe in it now, but You will picket about work issues I predict. Mark my words in fact. The worst of labor abuse is yet to come.... Workers rights will diminish to a certain point and then people will fight back a little-if they have time to take off from work....
Roadblock responding to a comment by bentstrider
12.4.09 - 4:41 pm
Ever since I started working, 40 hours and no more has been the standard routine for me.
I'll be okay with unions once they start implementing their own "opt-out" options.
From what I've seen, the local hospitals, teachers, and other professions all have unions where membership is mandatory.
And as far as myself reaching middle-age, I keep saying to myself that I won't.
i worked for a very brief time at UPS. i felt like the union did a lot to improve safety, provide a good standard of living and prevent the management from abusing the employees. sure, they take some dues, but they save lives.
plus, if youre in a union, you get a vote and a say as far as how the union is run and how they will direct the company. you don't get a say in how the company is run. why don't people complain about that?
I guess it also depends on what sort of occupation you have as well.
If you work some type of heavy labor job, of course a union would do some good for it.
Perhaps if most unions gave more incentive to work as opposed to sitting around and collecting a wage for laziness, then I would have a better view of them.
I dunno about other states, but the police and fire unions here in California seem to have made those occupations as a nice club to get into as opposed to being an actual career to partake in.
The UAW eventually turned alot of automotive factory workers into the lazy slobs that I was complaining about earlier.
Now as far as trucking goes, you could blame concerned citizens groups for implementing things like the 11/14/10 HOS rules that many truckers and transportation outfits are supposed to abide by.
If a trucker feels those rules are being violated, a simple contact to the FMCSA and USDOT will straighten the bigwigs there out right.
And for all intents and purposes, my stepdad's currently a member of the California Teachers Association and was a member of the steel workers union back in Indiana in the mid-70's, so I already get an earful from him on my standing as well.
bentstrider responding to a comment by oodlesofpoodles
12.4.09 - 6:19 pm
the way i see it, there is a disincentive for corporations to treat workers well, and there is a disincentive for unions to admit that their workers are lazy. yeah, it is a problem--one that threatens US competitiveness in the world. my solution? worker-owned companies. it's a socialist idea that works in a capitalist framework. it's that or serfdom in our future.
awesome link the shows perfectly what it unions have done for people. now that unions are weak, the 8 hour work day has slowly but surely crept into 9 and 10 hour work days... if we stuck to 8 hour work days MORE people would be employed rather than a select few getting all the hours. in the web and visual graphics industries its pretty ridiculous how many hours you are working... pulling "all nighters" to meet an insane deadline can happen every other week... and not getting paid overtime.
On the issue of overtime, it's not uncommon for members of law enforcement and emergency services to be pulling doubles on a mandatory basis.
Yeah, you could make alot of money doing these jobs and civilian jobs where deadlines are a way of life, but in the end you become too pissed off at the world to do anything with it.
If unions want to start being taken more seriously, they should get back to the basics of making sure employees are in the proper state of mind to perform work, not creature comforts and other shit that could easily be acquired by an employee themselves.
As much as I complain about job-hopping, I've been guilty of it at one time or another due to conditions changing from good-to-bad at any given company.
2-3 years at any given company for me until they began to suck.
I guess you could say I'm a sucker for monotony, when it comes to work anyway.
Bents. do you really think the job conditions for union workers are all that kick back?
Of course there is down time with fire fighters, but when they have to work they are seriously earning their salaries. That is life and death work that they do. Plus the exposure to unhealthy air and unknown chemical soups burning that they could and most often do, end up breathing. Talk with firefight phil. He comes out on a davinci tandem with his wife. He has to use his weekends to rest up from the back breaking work that he does when he is on duty.
You do see police sitting at the side of the road, but they do have to log down everything that they do. It is cheaper for municipalities to pay overtime then to hire a new officer. I do think both of these classification of workers earn their keep.
UAW workers that I have talk to tell me it the body stress positions that they have to put themselves into that tear them apart. One guy was having to get into a car to screw something in on a assembly line all day, and then get out and climb back into the next car, over and over. When he got done with the day he said he couldn't move certain parts of his body. I know of plenty of auto manufacture workers in the 70's that just couldn't hang with the strenuous conditions of the job.
People should get paid a living wage to be able to afford a place to live, food and be able to purchase the little nice things for their family. If these companies couldn't afford the salary they would go under.
You of all people should know what a difficult job being a truck driver is. Because you are younger and in better shape then most who drive trucks you probably don't suffter from the back aches and other aliments that come with the job, but I'm sure you talked to enough people that deal with it. I know how stressful it is and how alert you have to be when operating such a huge piece of equipment. The job of a truck driver is no joke.
Union workers are not lazy. I worked with LADWP which had a strong union. We got good pay and benefits, grievances representation and where protected from being frivolously fired. You could get terminated, and it wasn't difficult to happen. Your actions had to be documented by supervisors what you where doing that needed to change, and if you didn't rectify your behavior or work ethics you would be terminated. Of course there is jobs that on more laid back and there is some built in advantage taking situation that happened. We worked, and we worked hard, most all the workers do. If a company didn't need workers they wouldn't hire them.
I get what you're saying and I probably tend to think about myself too much.
Yes, when I drove a truck, I took it upon myself to work out more than I do now, just to prevent the said back injuries and other ailments that come with the job.
Now, as far as a living wage goes, one could argue if you want to live in an expensive-ass place like this state, then higher pay is something worth fighting for.
But, if you're like me and would rather see how far your dollar could take you elsewhere, stick it out until you're able to move out to an area with a lower-cost of living.
The way I see it, the paramedic thing I was talking to you about earlier on may pay cheaper than an actual, muni-firefighter, but the salary's still more than good enough for myself to live on.
I require less, but there are plenty of others out there that wish to seek much, much, much more out of life.
More power to them, just quit shoving your petitions in front of my face like my signature alone is the "Hand of God" or some shit.
It was supposed to be a one-off comment about my disdain for over-compensated employees, but it gets overblown into a defensive argument.
Think about it, most cops only have a high-school diploma like everyone else, yet in most cases, they're paid far more and wield more power than someone who's still paying off loan-debt over their university education.
Oh, and the reason why Jimmy Hoffa was never found was because he was eaten by Ed Gein during a brief escape attempt from prison.
He disappeared around the same time Gein was locked up in Wisconsin and Detroit's only a several hour drive away, it's the truth, but TPTB don't want to admit!!
Hey don't look at me for turning in this into a union argument thread.
I honestly thought everyone else was going to ignore my comment due to giving two ratshits about it.
Yeah, but to my main argument, I think cops get paid way too much in this state to warrant them acting like jackasses.
Now if you're a cop in New Orleans making $25,000/year starting, with many parts of that city still shaken 4 years post-Katrina, then I could see the use-of-force then.
Here though, it's like they're all a bunch of spoiled children.
I can't speak for everybody else, but I do give three ratshits about what you have to say. And yes your signature may not be the hand of God, but your writing is certainly the closest thing we have to "the hand of God" coming to speak to us.
getting back to the orignial topic of this thread with a little response to the bentstrider salt. It's not the union job protection or your opinion of high pay in which ,at least in this situation is the problem. It is the fact that a law officer is always believe over a defendant no matter what. If this person didn't take this video tape, that guy on the bike would have had a conviction on his record and would have had to deal with the repercussions of the court. The officer would have just been recognized for doing good police work. Thank God for this video recording, this cop may have gone on to abuse more people and made false arrest and got unwarranted convictions against those that didn't belong in the criminal justice system. The video recording his going to bring justice to this lawbreaker of a police officer, take away his job and hopefully he will see prison time for act of abuse under the color of authority
Part of the reason why it's better to be a trucker than a cop.
Driving a truck takes you out of the urban drama and puts you in a relatively peaceful place where no one really gives a damn about how you do your job, as long as you keep it under the radar.
Policing is just stress that I don't really have the time of day to deal with.
You got to do everything right to satisfy anyone that will be watching, because there will be those that say you did your job too hard, or too soft.
Like many other jobs, this is one that is under consistent scrutiny and there are far too many people going into it and forgetting that simple fact.
I used to praise people for going into this job, now I read cross my heart and say "best of luck pal!!!"
I've officially given up on getting into this profession, too much bullshit to put up with everyday.
Don't know how they do it and manage to live without heart problems.
well, if you don't the defense counsel for the BART murderer in san francisco did. they asked to have their trial moved to LA County. I guess they figured it was the next best thing to Simi.
I didn't want to start it, but there's many more union-conscious persons out here than I thought.
Seems like any time I slip my lip, IT ALL goes to shit.
As far as Reginald Denny goes, that fucker was too oblivious to the ongoing situation at the time, coupled with the rowdy pieces of shit that used his skull as an anvil.
He should've been hauling ass and laying on the throttle, it's not like he was gonna get pulled over.
In that case, the cops in general were too busy trying to save their own asses from ending up someones dinner plate.
Honestly, you ever drive one?
I'm going to make you drive one next time I'm in command of one.
Same goes for everyone else, free air brake and 10-speed/double-clutch lessons for all!!!
Fuck it, if I hate unions so much, maybe it's high time I create my own and then get someone else to run it!!!!
As for this guy, I'm crossing my fingers the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association will completely throw in the towel on this guy.
No one should be getting any special treatment until they've had some time, fucking N00bs, thinking their shit don't stink once the academy's is completed.
okay so this judge is an asshat but how did i miss the news in april of the jury clearing him of assault? pogan looked pretty assaulty to me. was the youtube video deemed inadmissible? even long said he didn't think he intended to assault him, whatever that means. sounds like the jury needed more proof of intent and they didn't like long's pot smoking and protesting. maybe the cop thought long was pointing a gun at him and we just couldn't see it from our angle.
What gun? He's got
a f**kin' hero sandwich here!
- What do you want? It's pitch black.
- Pitch black!
- It's tinfoil. It looked like a gun!
- You f**kin' moron!
- I'll be fillin' out paperwork
for the next two months!
- What are we gonna do?
- I'm sorry!
- You jerk-off!
fine, whatever...long got some cash, the wannbe is a never-gonna-be. let him go defib some people, i guess...probably wind up running his ambulance over some critical massers.
supersano responding to a comment by DJwheels
07.15.10 - 10:00 am
I'm starting to come to the conclusion that it is not cops (generally) that are the problem (there are good and bad apples on the force... I have had some good experiences with officers lately). The problem is that an evil judicial system allows the bad apples to perpetrate evil with impunity, however and whenever they want.
If my son did this, I would shame him publicly, then accept my own shame as a failed father. Would it have been a simple mistake, a one-time slip-up, if someone had assaulted Pogan? It is so hard to contain my anger sometimes.
this is such a laugh. the video is so clear. the video for oscar grant is so clear.... peace is war. war is peace. these arent the droids your looking for...
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Ridazz Roulette!
getting back to the orignial topic of this thread with a little response to the bentstrider salt. It's not the union job protection or your opinion of high pay in which ,at least in this situation is the problem. It is the fact that a law officer is always believe over a defendant no matter what. If this person didn't take this video tape, that guy on the bike would have had a conviction on his record and would have had to deal with the repercussions of the court. The officer would have just been recognized for doing good police work. Thank God for this video recording, this cop may have gone on to abuse more people and made false arrest and got unwarranted convictions against those that didn't belong in the criminal justice system. The video recording his going to bring justice to this lawbreaker of a police officer, take away his job and hopefully he will see prison time for act of abuse under the color of authority
Not sure if being a truck driver is so hot either.