(WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS CONTENT BORROWED FROM GOP DEBATES. PLEASE DO NOT READ IF YOU ARE OFFENDED BY GOP DEBATE CONTENT!)
Back home in America, the highway traffic stop is probably the greatest display of power a state like New York, New Jersey, Hawai’i (or any of the 47 others and 1 district) can exert over an unfortunate traveler. There is an additional risk of nastiness if you happen to be driving while intoxicated, black, or as an American in the backroads of the USSR. I fell solidly in the last two categories.
Back home, the cop car that pulls you over on I-95 (or H-1) is typically a blazing high performance Ford Crown Victoria festooned with the great seal of the state under whose laws, you, the hapless driver have apparently transgressed. You get the whole show, complete with stylized hat, jack boots, ribboned trousers, shoulder brushes, leather pistol holster, handcuffs, the works. Every state has its own variant of this uniform. Be a very wary bear.
Russian bears do dance, but these ain’t Russian!
Wrapped in the aforementioned trappings of authority, US States perform traffic stops with overdone celebratory unctuousness. But everyone considers Connecticut or Alaska or the District to be relatively toothless. We know, for example, that Connecticut is not going to build a wall around itself or deport everyone of Rhode Island descent. Not that there aren’t criminals from Providence stealing algae from the Connecticut River. But I digress. The states flash a lot of power by way of shiny patrol cars and uniform embellishments (big bark), but rank low on the holocaust scale (little dick).
