Predictably, he covers it in shit and buries it again: 

In an era of riots and hijackings, the SWAT model understandably spread nationwide. But as the riots died away and the threat of domestic terror receded, SWAT tactics — helicopters, heavy weaponry, the works — became increasingly integrated into normal crime-fighting, and especially into the war on drugs.

This was phase one in the militarization of America’s police forces, as described in Radley Balko’s essential 2013 book on the subject, “The Rise of the Warrior Cop.” Phase two, in which the federal government began supplying local police with military hardware, began in the 1990s and accelerated after 9/11, under the theory that Islamic terrorists could strike anywhere, and that it might take a cop with a grenade launcher to stop them.

Why yes, that in fact happened. And as I recall, conservative columnists jumped up and down, eager to spread the Gospel of George W. Bush. Eager to give the world the Bad News about dirty bombs and nukes in shopping malls, they encouraged the erecting of barricades outside every Little League ballfield, because anywhere two or more of you were gathered in America’s name, there the terrorists would be also.

The people who pointed out that this was just the most egregious bullshit, and that that fearmongering nonsense did nothing other than make people want to vote Republican (oh wait, I think I cracked their code here), were derided as traitors, fifth columnists, and general scum on the bottom of the Decider’s paratrooper boots.

Continue reading “Ross Douthat Finds a Nut”