Radley Balko, civil liberties crusader and blogger published a book called “Rise of the Warrior Cop.” Scott H. Greenfield shares some thoughts on Mr. Balko’s work –

Starting in the 1960’s, Radley takes us decade by decade down the road to

perdition. As he wears his libertarian politics on his sleeve, it came as no

surprise that he gave the politics of law enforcement special scrutiny. His

hatred of Richard Nixon for manipulating the silent majority’s hatred of hippies

and counterculture into the War on Drugs is palpable. On the other hand, there

is no reluctance to blame Bill Clinton for his deceitful abuse of the COPS

program, and its infusion of billions into the drug war a few decades

later.

Radley is a surprisingly good story teller, generally low key in

recounting tales of individual harm interspersed with broad influences that gave

rise to putting heavy weaponry into the hands of children. There are times when

the narrative gets a bit breathless, trying hard to capture the confluence of

political deceit on the part of some and ignorance on the part of others. Then

again, the alternative would be to simply call out the liars and morons for

their contribution to a state of affairs that served to put a naïve American

public at grave risk for such puny and transitory purposes as winning an

election.