> A policeperson is trained to see citizens,
> a soldier is trained to see threats.
>
> It's a totally different mindset.
It's blurring all the time, though. I blame a down-market in 'community policing' and the drive for specialization: there are whole organizations within (especially the bigger) police forces who never speak to citizens as a regular part of their daily job. The trend started small in the 70s with the LAPD SWAT team and has filtered over into many small-town forces as well: para-military in training, weapons, and tactics. 9/11 has made this much, much worse. "Task force" groups who focus on one issue: drugs, gangs, terror, "crime" ... They have different organizations, different budgets, and of course, see little actual action, so they wind up 'pumped up' when they actually interact with the citizenry. Stuff like that has to stop; departments say they need full-timers on the project to maintain proficiency, but rotation through the whole force would be a) better overall for raising awareness of all officers and b) lowering the tempo of operations when they come up.
/jordan