"Policing is broken... It has evolved as a paramilitary, bureaucratic, organizational arrangement that distances police officers from the communities they've been sworn to protect and serve. When we have shooting after shooting after shooting that most people would define as at least questionable, it's time to look, not just at a few bad apples, but the barrel. And I'm convinced that it is the barrel that is rotted."— Norm Stamper, former Seattle police chief

Please.

Somebody give Attorney General Jeff Sessions a copy of the Constitution.

And while you're at it, get a copy to President Trump, too.

In fact, you might want to share a copy with the nation's police officers, as well.

I have my doubts that any of these individuals—all of whom swore to uphold and defend the Constitution—have ever read any of the nation's founding documents.

Had they actually read and understood the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and Bill of Rights, there would be no militarized police, no mass surveillance, no police shootings of unarmed individuals, no SWAT team raids, no tasering of children, no asset forfeiture schemes or any of the other government-sanctioned abuses that get passed off as law and order these days.

We've got serious problems in this country, and they won't be solved on the golf course, by wining and dining corporate CEOs, giving local police forces more military equipment, locking down the nation, or pretending that the only threats to our freedoms are posed by forces beyond our borders or by "anti-government" extremists hiding among us.

So far, Trump's first 100 days in office have been no different from Obama's last 100 days, at least when it comes to the government's ongoing war on our freedoms.

Government corruption remains at an all-time high.

Police shootings and misconduct have continued unabated.

The nation's endless wars continue to push us to the brink of financial ruin.

And "we the people" are still being treated as if we have no rights, are entitled to no protections, and exist solely for the purpose of sustaining the American police state with our hard-earned tax dollars.

Just take the policing crisis in this country, for instance.

Sessions—the chief lawyer for the government and the head of the Justice Department, which is entrusted with ensuring that the nation's laws are faithfully carried out and holding government officials accountable to abiding by their oaths of office to "uphold and defend the Constitution"—doesn't think we've got a policing problem in America.

In fact, Sessions thinks the police are doing a great job (apart from "the individual misdeeds of bad actors," that is). 

For that matter, so does Trump.

Really, really great.

Indeed, Sessions thinks the nation's police forces are doing such a great job that they should be rewarded with more military toys (weapons, gear, equipment) and less oversight by the Justice Department.

As for Trump, he believes "the dangerous anti-police atmosphere in America is wrong" and has vowed to "end it."

Excuse me for a moment while I flush what remains of the Constitution down the toilet.

Clearly, Trump has not been briefed on the fact that it has never been safer to be a cop in America. According to Newsweek, "it's safer to be a cop than it is to simply live in many U.S. cities... It's safer to be a cop than it is to live in Baltimore. It's safer to be a cop than it is to be a fisher, logger, pilot, roofer, miner, trucker or taxi driver. It's safer to be a cop today than it's been in years, decades, or even a century, by some measures."

You know what's dangerous?

Being a citizen of the American police state.

Treating cops as deserving of greater protections than their fellow citizens.

And training cops to think and act like they're soldiers on a battlefield.

As journalist Daniel Bier warns, "If you tell cops over and over that they're in a war, they're under siege, they're under attack, and that citizens are the enemy—instead of the people they're supposed to protect—you're going to create an atmosphere of fear, tension, and hostility that can only end badly, as it has for so many people."

Frankly, if there's a war taking place in this country, it's a war on the American people.

After all, we're the ones being shot at and tasered and tracked and beaten and intimidated and threatened and invaded and probed.

And what is the government doing to fix this policing crisis that threatens the safety of every man, woman and child in this country?

Not a damn thing.

Incredibly, according to a study by the American Medical Association, police-inflicted injuries send more than 50,000 Americans to hospital emergency rooms every year.