Stop Dressing Police Like Storm Troopers And TSA Workers Like Cops
Charlie Leocha writes about this at Consumer Traveler:

I had an opportunity to testify before the Aviation Subcommittee of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure in November 2012 about TSA and its effect on the traveling public. Back then, I suggested, to chuckles from committee members and the hearing audience, that TSA security inspectors be dressed in pastel colored polo shirts, rather than in the storm trooper outfits in which they parade through airports today.

TU_Ad_350-350After all, TSA inspectors are not law enforcement agents. They are simply baggage inspectors. TSA does not have the ability to arrest anyone. They cannot take anyone into custody. They don't carry weapons.

Real police are stationed nearby to take care of law enforcement issues when they arise.

He quotes "Stop Arming the Police Like a Military," by Dr. Tom Nolan, an associate professor and the chair of the Department of Criminal Justice at the State University of New York at Plattsburgh:

Have no doubt, police in the United States are militarizing, and in many communities, particularly those of color, the message is being received loud and clear: "You are the enemy." Police officers are increasingly arming themselves with military-grade equipment such as assault rifles, flashbang grenades, and Mine Resistant Ambush Protected, or MRAP, vehicles and dressing up in commando gear before using battering rams to burst into the homes of people who have not been charged with a crime. Perhaps more alarming is the fact that the Pentagon has played a huge role in this militarization by transferring its weapons of war to civilian police departments through its so-called 1033 program.

Many communities now look upon police as an occupying army, their streets more reminiscent of Baghdad or Kabul than a city in America. This besieged mentality created by the militarization of police has driven a pernicious wedge into the significant gains made under community- and problem-oriented policing initiatives dating from the late 1980s.

Leocha winds up with this:

Whether it is the police force dressed like storm troopers in Ferguson or your community; or, TSA security assistants masquerading as law enforcement officers in military uniforms; this militarization is not healthy for a democratic society.