August 7, 2009

Bill Bratton’s Future

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Superstar police chief Bill Bratton has announced he’ll be leaving the LAPD at the end of October.  Mark Kleiman would like to see him move up in the world:

As for Bratton’s own future, here’s hoping that his move to Altegrity is a just a quick cash-in on his way back to public service. The FBI would be a stretch: agents aren’t really cops, counter-terrorism isn’t policing, and any fight to change Hooverville would run into serious resistance from the Ba’athist dead-enders at on the north side of Pennsylvania Avenue. So I wouldn’t put the same sort of odds-on bet on Bratton’s success at the Bureau that I would if he took over another police department. Still, given the stakes, it’s a gamble I’d like to see happen.

Well, Mueller’s term is up in 2011, so that would give Bratton a couple of years to earn some private sector dough before returning to the trenches.  He’d certainly be an interesting choice.

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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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