To all Canadian TFSers:

What do you think of our Royal Canadian Mounted Police? Are you ashamed or proud of them? They seem to be in the news a lot lately with one mistake after another. To name a few: Arar, Dziekanski, the Montréal couple who sent three SOS messages before the RCMP decided to do anything about it.

Do they need a good "check-up" or are they acting like normal cops?
Just curious!

What we see about the RCMP on the news, for the most part is a result of the news media's agenda.... I suspect sometimes that they have a daily script for the news and they look to fill that script with events that happen that day.

Personally I have few complaints about the RCMP or any police force for that matter . Their's is often a thankless job... the firemen and paramedics get most of the glory and seldom any of the condemnation.

We deal with the RCMP...i think they are tasked with too many operations

they're being stretched too thin

Yeah, I know. I guess we're only getting one side of the story eh?
And, yes, it's a job I would NOT want to do.

Oh, wasn't aware that the U.S. delt with our Mounted Police. In what matter, may I ask, do you deal with them? Just curious

Since his state is a border one, I would think it would have to go with customs.

I would rather deal with RCMP than a city police officer. I think they are better trained and more effective peace officers. Remember, that is their job, to keep the peace.

An affective police officer isn't one who would pull out a taser and use it 5 times while he has 3 other armed cops behind him. Some of our RCMP are little more than cowards and bullies. Take the tasers away from these guys and have them learn a little about self defence and how to control a situation. If he or she feels they don't want to do that or cannot do that, then go work at Tim Horton's where they already spend most of their time. The RCMP are Canada's latest embarrassment !

Most of the time the horror stories you hear about cops are a tad exaggerated by the media, I think.
Often, in anything that's gone through the media route, you hear all the evil and none of the good because that's what sells the papers.

I totally disagree with you, Whitewood. While I think there are certaintly officer's of the law like you suggest (such as there would be in any local police force, the FBI, CIA, Military officers, etc) I think the good far outweight the bad.

Canada's a huge country. Massive. Unfortantely, we just don't have the necessary RCMP recruitments to deal with everything the most effective way that would be desired.

I think they are trying to the best they can with what they got, and yeah, maybe sometimes things get out of control and they use a touch of their training to act like humans and get too aggressive.
If I had to deal with idiot people, child rapists, and murderers, I'm sure I'd get over-whelmed and give them an extra kick if they made my life miserable during the investigation.
Morally correct? No.
But I can forgive them their human indiscretions when we civillians can massacure a population and not create half the uproar as when an RCMP uses his Taser in an iffy situation.

I recently read in a novel (by Robert Ludlum) the the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are equivilant to the US's FBI. I hadn't really thought it about it until then, but yeah.
I wouldn't have any doubt that the RCMP deals with the United States Forces to deal with international concerns/investigations.
New technologies, ideas, wanted lists, conferences... I can see lots of reasons whey US Forces would deal with the RCMP.

The RCMP have made some bad choices lately which IMO has affected their creditability.
First was sending four unarmed officers after a known person who had guns, they were all shot and killed. Then there was the tazer thing at the airport.
And I do not think any police force should be allowed to investigate their own force.
Now they have someone in charge who has never been a police officer.
Yes I still respect them but I have to tell you, they had better smarten up or risk becoming a laughing stock of the country.

Do they still ride horses? If so where do they mount their computers or dash cam?