BOAR THE FIFTH
by The Boar
Merry Xmas to all. I hope the New Year brings much riding (of both types!)
I try to comment on all your responses to me, so if you have sent me something, I should enter into verbal intercourse with you. Eventually.
Klink, I read Boris's article. I got an entirely different read on it. I saw it as bureaucracy gone mad (again). Clearly good old Boris was up to something in Victoria, he admits it himself. I'm almost betting the drone behind the counter couldn't progress through that system until that matter was cleared by an inquiry to Victoria. I'm sure you understand the bureaucratic way of thinking, i.e. 'the box must have a tick or cross before we proceed'. Having dealt regularly with these interstate inquiries I know they take time. I think it's funny actually; Boris would have been sweating like a rapist waiting to get that little square of plastic with his ugly dial on it so he could go out and try his best to blow away 18 months of confinement.
I never suggested anyone should grovel to the cops. I can assure you grovelling is almost as bad as trying to put the cops on. What I did say was use some common sense. I'd be guessing you'd be a skinny bloke throwing around the 'fatgut' comments. 80 in a 60? Don't you mean 140 in a 60? As for the cops doing the same thing as you, I refer you to Boar the First. I don't care, not my problem, welcome to the real world, etc. If they get caught doing that shit it's a lot worse for them, I can assure you.
And finally, what's got the bug up your arse about what cops wear? Are you some type of fashion sheriff? The field pants and boots they now use were as a result of trying to work out what was practical to carry all the shit they have to carry (needle-stick gloves, reflective vests, first aid kits, etc) and jump over fences (not the fatguts mind, the young ones), wrestle with drug-ridden pieces of shit, wade through accident sites, and so on. Not to mention what else they have to carry. Have you ever actually seen all the crap they have on their belts? Very soon you will probably start seeing vest's like the Pommie cops wear. Do I like the look of the outfits? No. But it's about being practical.
No, there is no such thing as a 'colonel of police'; you've got to stop watching so much TV. There is a Commander of police. Is that what you were hearing? And finally don't start squawking about separation of power (military v police). The real problem is the total lack of adherence to that principle by politicians. There is very little, make that no chance of the NSW police leading a coup (bloodless or otherwise). I think you're jumping at shadows with that one. No one is trying to militarise the cops, it doesn't matter a shit what they wear, it's all about what they do. By the way, my pleasure re the info about radars, etc.
Kev11e, can't help you with what works and what doesn't insofar as radar detectors are concerned. As far as we were aware all our radar detector detectors worked just fine. Judging from how many we caught up front I'd say our advice was accurate.
Maladaptive, Piet and I crossed swords on at least one occasion (indirectly). I won. I cannot comment further as my true identity might become apparent, and, if I started talking about that here, what would happen to my book deal?!
Speedbandit, thanks for the reply, mate. The driving school used to be at St Ives. Many a good lap at Warp Factor 5 put in around that joint, I can tell you. Again I stress that any of these unofficial tolerance limits are just that, unofficial. I wouldn't be staking my house (or my licence for that matter) on what is clearly an unwritten rule.
MedicJohn, excellent point made about Navmans. Your argument holds merit as to the comparisons with radar detectors. You could almost say that the latest street directories are doing the same thing by indicating fixed camera locations. In the alternative, of course the fact they have bloody great huge signs warning of fixed speed cameras ahead seem to negate the argument a little. Let's hope that no wanker legislator starts to think as smart as you.
Scrambles, if you'd like to keep reading I will relate a story about 'young cops' that will probably explain why the older and wiser guys and girls have to forehead slap them at times. Let's look at this point a little more in detail. Do you and I, as citizens, want some 19-year-old snotty-nosed, no-life-experienced boofhead with a brand new uniform and a flash piece of lethal Tupperware (Glock .40 cal) putting the bounce into you or me for no reason, or worse telling you or me clearly incorrect information? I hazard a guess the answer would be 'no, of course not'.
Policing is a lot like any apprenticeship. Have you heard a mechanic or a carpenter or a plumber setting things straight with their apprentices? Of course you have. I am not advocating belittling someone, but the difference between those other occupations I have mentioned and the cops, could be life and death. Certainly you have to ensure accuracy and common decency is forthcoming from young police. Should be more of an arse-kicking for some of them if you ask me. In fact, prior to my retirement there was a significant loss of discipline over a number of years which flows through to how police behave with the public. Fuck me, if you look sideways at some of these Y-Generation kids they start to cry and make a complaint about 'bullying'. I don't think they lose their authority; if anything they learn to use it appropriately. And, if you want to see someone getting a head-kicking go into the District Court in front of certain judges and watch how some young lawyers are belittled (make that smashed), by some old half-pissed cretin who has no concept of what it's like to try and live on anything less than $160k - $200k per annum! I have seen some of the most savage lessons taught by judges to lawyers. Ask Piet, I'm sure he will back me up.
Jandkhc, Victoria's speed camera limits are an absolute disgrace and do nothing more than steal revenue. I ride to Phillip Island each year and I can tell you I am absolutely paranoid about their camera policy. Hiding the fucken things in garbage bins and old bomb cars! How can anyone ride safely when they are so intent on having to check their speedos every three seconds to make sure they don't drift two km/h over? The whole Victorian Government's approach to this issue is abominable. I might add that the tolerance for NSW is 10% plus 2 km/h. During my time I very rarely saw anyone set radar at anything less than 15 km/h over, but as I have said numerous times now, you can't rely on the common sense of any particular cop.
Drunkwombat, thanks for your questions. Firstly, asking why you are speeding isn't a requirement. No it's not a trick. I (used to) ask it every time as well. Why? Fucked if I know. Maybe I was looking for an excuse not to book someone. Or on occasions I was just waiting to hear another all time great bullshit story on why you were riding/driving like some type of bonehead. Genuinely, if there was a reasonable excuse, most would either give you a caution or progress in some other manner. But it would have to be a fair excuse, let me tell you.
Swapping of training and techniques with interstaters? I don't know if there's anything formal these days. Police driver-training has national competencies so I'd imagine that of course there would be some exchange. Some of our instructors have been lucky enough to go to Britain for training, so exchange must occur through that process. I've been on other driving courses (Close personal protection, etc) where the course participants were from all Australian police forces and from the military, so information and techniques are exchanged there as well. NSW seems to rely on unmarked cars more than Victoria?! BULLSHIT. All I have to do is pay a bit of attention when riding to the MotoGP to know that Victoria has a hard-on for unmarked shit including camera cars.
There is generally one unmarked car per command in New South Wales, it may have got to two, so I'm told. They certainly aren't utes with bullshit plumber's tools in the back (subterfuge seems to be the Victorian creed in regards to speed (revenue) enforcement. NSW doesn't run low profile (almost unmarked) BMW police bikes either! Having said that, the guys and girls in Victoria get to play with the toys the Government give them, no criticism of them at all is intended.
Best pursuit car? Well I'd lean towards Holden. But, I go back a long way you know. Are you asking me whether a Torana XU1 was better than a Ford GT or are you asking me whether a Commodore SS is better than a Ford XR8 or XR6 turbo? And don't forget the good old Valiant Charger. Of the current crop I got to use before I left I would go the Commodore, followed by the XR6 Turbo (they take off like a cat with a red hot poker up its arse!) The XR8 had a good top-end but the Commodore handled the best.
In the old days, the Charger went like shit off a shovel but didn't handle. The early Fords, XA - XD all were really strong. The XU1 was insane. But give me a Holden, I reckon. The current NSW HWP are bluing like buggery about the reliability of the XR8s, they are having electronics problems with them.
I think you've answered your own question about driver training. Let's extend it to rider training as well. Of course any training is better than none at all, but how on earth do we train all the new drivers? Sheer volume presents issues. The P-plater problem at the moment, in my view, is again linked to the sheer volume of new drivers. Our population rises, with it does the number of people who want to use cars and bikes on antiquated road systems. I can't think how to fix it, however I have mentioned previously that trying to change a P-plater's attitude is probably half the problem. They get a licence and try to do everything in the first five minutes. We were all the same too! Maybe they think they'll miss out when we reach peak fuel, who knows?
Okay, war story time??
I had the misfortune of working with a young cop during a period in the mid 1980's. We'll call him Al. Al was some nine stone, about 5'9" and looked and sounded about 12 years old. He wasn't a bad bloke, just had a lot of trouble adapting to the power thrust upon him after uttering those famous words at the end of the oath of office (So help me, God.) Some might say he had 'little man's syndrome'.
I think that syndrome's bullshit because I've seen plenty of big men with the same problem.
He was just a boofhead whose mouth kept writing cheques his body couldn't cash. He had more fights than any bloke I worked with and won none. It always fell to the poor old workmate to wade in and carry the flag for Queen and country. On this particular night I was working on the truck with him. In those days we used to do seven nights straight on nightwork with the same crew, so by the end of the week you were absolutely rooted after having to fight from one job to the next as a result of Al's 'meek and mild' demeanour and professional approach to the public (not). Fair dinkum he could go to a convent full of nuns and start a riot, and by our last night I was sick of it.
He was driving and I was dozing in the passenger's seat trying to ignore his inane fucken chatter about this and that. He drew my attention to a bloke walking up the middle of the road in a poorly lit area.
"Look at this fuckwit, he'll get run over for sure."
That in fact was a fair comment. I did notice however that our errant pedestrian was 6'4" and about 19 stone with shoulders like Ray Higgs and no neck. He wasn't so much as walking up the road as 'stalking' up the road. Any car that ran into him would have come off second best for sure!
"Just pull up next to him, Al; and ask him to jump off the road, mate." This I thought was a reasonable request.
Al brought the truck right next to him and the big bloke moved towards the window. Al said in his meanest 12-year-old voice: "Listen cunt, get off the fucken road before I get out and kick your arse."
This big bloke leaned his head into the window of the truck, a head that was roughly the same size as a large microwave oven and with a face that was not unlike a half-open bag of cement. He replied very calmly (which is much more frightening that someone who screams and rants): "Alright young fella, you think you're fucken good enough. Get out of that fucken van and kick my arse."
I have no doubt this bloke had the ability to rip Al's arm off and beat him (and me) to death with it. This bloke's bicep was as big as Al's waist.
It is very hard to describe the look on Al's face as he turned towards me. I can only say that his pride had been wounded and he fully intended to get out of the truck and 'deal' with this bloke. It was a look of disdain, intolerance, boredom and I had no doubt if Al got out of our vehicle, the look of a condemned man. Al slammed the truck into park and went to jump out. I grabbed him by the arm.
"Hang on Al, that bloke drops shits bigger than you."
Then all hell appeared to break loose. There were six of seven big blokes running at the truck screaming. All of them were of a similar build to our errant pedestrian. For all intents and purposes it looked like we had been set up and were about to get the flogging of our lives. I grabbed the radio and called for assistance, hauled out the small baton we used to carry in a specially made pocket in our trousers and jumped out of the truck thinking how much time off work I was going to get after being flogged senseless.
The group of men ran at the pedestrian, grabbing him and started pulling him away from the police truck. Clearly they had no intention of belting shit out of us (yet); the whole situation was confusing me. Amid cries of "Don't Robbie, it's the cops", they managed to settle the big bloke down.
I could hear numerous sirens heading towards us and I let them come because at this stage I still didn't know what the go was, in addition to the fact that if Al opened his mouth again we could both end up looking like the straight at Randwick (all tromped on and covered with shit).
Once it was clear these other blokes had some control over Robbie, I wanted to know what he hoped to achieve.
"Mate, what's the go? Do you normally want to fight the cops? I accept my mate is a fuckwit, but it's a fight you just can't win." I was lying here, he clearly would have won.Big time.
"Mate, I'm sorry, I'm blind."
"I don't care how pissed you are, don't start that shit with the cops."
"I'm not pissed, I'm blind, I can't see."
I stood there with my mouth agape. The silence was deafening, all I could hear was the ticking of the slowly cooling police truck motor.
His mates quickly filled in the blanks. Robbie was the sufferer of some rare malady that progressively diminished his sight until blindness was the ultimate outcome. He wasn't quite blind; he could make out shapes and shades. He had been a very successful professional sportsman and had maintained his physical fitness (he was still big enough to hold a bull out to piss). They had taken him out on the grog celebrating the fact that he was soon going overseas to trial some new and drastic treatment to attempt to restore his sight. Robbie had previously had some troubles with hoodlums paying out on him. That would only go on as long as it took for Robbie to work out where they were standing and he managed to get his hands on them. He had dealt out some 'good justice' to big-mouth hoodlums and hearing some 12-year-old in what sounded to him to be a panel van giving him a gob full for minding his own business walking up the road was always going to end up in Robbie sticking up for himself.
I have never been so embarrassed in all my time in the cops. Here we were looking like getting flogged by a blind man because my idiot mate couldn't even manage to ask a pedestrian to get off the road without causing a riot.
I told Robbie and his mates to hit the toe before the rest of the cops got there. I was already anticipating the absolute shit I would cop over this from the other car crews. I jumped on the radio and called the other cars off. Unfortunately the Sergeant and his offsider arrived as the group was walking away.
"What's the go, Boar?"
"It's alright Sarge, he's blind." (Hoping the semantics of my comment would hide the entire issue)
"Well then stick him in for IP." (IP being an intoxicated person, lodged in the cells until sober)
"No, he's actually blind, he can't see. He thought we were just hoodlums giving him a hard time".
The screech of the police cars tyres was deafening as the Sarge and his offsider rushed back to the station to tell the entire shift that Al and I had to call for help for a blind man. I never lived it down.
I had a quiet word with Al after that. I was speaking quietly. Al wasn't speaking at all. I had my hand crushing his larynx at the time and his feet weren't quite touching the ground.
We never really worked together after that night, something about him not feeling safe with me. I am told his attitude towards the public had improved immensely.
Anyway, ride safe and we'll talk soon.
Boar.
