This is a great town, my friends. There was a festival next to the local library today organized by the police. Free hot dogs, free ice-cream, snacks, activity books for kids, face-painting, balloon animals, syrupy ices, bouncy castles, everything free. No money was exchanged at any time.
Kids got to climb into armored vehicles and fire trucks. A police officer gave a demonstration of how to fly a drone. Live music. Local farmers brought tiny cute calves for kids to pet, which I don’t know how it’s related to police work but hey, why not?
Just a regular Tuesday.
Last Friday, we had another festival in town where, again, everything was free including food from the local food trucks.
I ran into both events completely by chance. I’m sure there are others I don’t even know about. One truly needs to try hard around here to get one’s kid to veg out in front of the TV. There’s so much to do outdoors all the time. And again, much of it is free.
God bless America, is what I’m saying.
Clarissa's Blog 
It wasn’t “free”, though. It’s called copaganda, and your taxes paid for it.
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Gosh, I thought the hot dogs fell from the sky. Crap, what a disappointment.
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“I thought the hot dogs fell from the sky”
I thought maybe a rich plantation owner had donated some from his hot dog orchard… I guess I’ve got a lot to learn….
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I’m OK with my tax dollars paying for a bit of community outreach and PR by the local PD.
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Everybody pays taxes but we got a kids’ event out of it. I’m not complaining because the taxes get taken no matter what. What’s wrong with getting some of them back?
People can literally complain about anything.
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Exactly.
I think it basically comes down to “I don’t like the police, so anything they do to try and make people like them is yucky. But I’m gonna blame it on wasting tax money so I sound less petty.”
We live in a sketchy neighborhood, and I’ve had to talk to my local cops three times in the last year. They’re polite, professional, helpful, and I’d way rather have them take care of the problem, than have to get a holster and patrol the place myself. I personally don’t like the risk profile involved in confronting homeless addicts in my yard, dealing with young men who come to my door looking for people I don’t know who owe them money, or trying to convince random school parents not to drive 40 on our 25 residential street full of kids, cats, and elderly dogwalkers.
It’s fine to hate cops when you live in a nice boring neighborhood where you never need them. The rest of us don’t have that luxury, and it is fantastic that we have a good local PD that maintains a cordial relationship with the public.
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If kids associate the police with positive things, when they grow up, start driving and get stopped by the police (like everybody except people on the way to sainthood does), they’ll act in a calm, friendly way, won’t become antagonistic, and this will maximize their safety.
The demonization of the police force hurts regular citizens. It’s not helpful at all.
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Exactly!
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