Another topic where we spend three pages making overly complex mountains out of molehills.
99% of the time the following is going to be the case:
You get pulled over by Highway patrol. These guys get bad raps for being "major a$$holes" but in my opinion there is NO incentive to be one. These guys get the drug runners, the really dangerous people with a LOT to lose, and they deal with every jackhole in the STATE not just a county or city. These guys tend to not be very lenient because honestly, if you had to deal with the crap they do...the fact you are armed would not bode well for people.
However these are about the ONLY law enforcement officers who would be hearing directly from "the state" about their ticketing practices, and when you are already pretty strict, more strict isn't a big difference. So that ones moot.
You get pulled over by a county cop. Again these guys tend to deal with more crap than city/municipality officers but the thing you have going for you is they also tend to have what us smarmy jerks like to call "real police work to be doing". So probably 8 times out of 10 you have to be driving in front of them without plates or weaving in traffic or just generally drawing a few concentric circles on your a$$. These guys are also going to be getting direction from the county and not the state, AND in my experience tend not to be quite as strict as staties.
Now we come to the dreaded city/municipality cops.
THESE guys are why we have threads like this most times. Note I say most because, uh, saying "all" of ANYTHING is never going to be accurate. not all cops are bad, not all lawyers are bloodsucking leeches who are better off after a couple passes through a woodchipper, etc. etc.
These guys are the ones who are backed up by the city where you cross into their jurisdiction and suddenly the speed limit drops from 45-30 on a pristine flat straight stretch of road for only one reason, money. However these cops aren't the ones setting the speed limit that way, city council does that. And those are among the most rank and amateur of all politicians, which is handy info to know when it comes time to lean on them.
There never was a cushion in situations like that, so it will never "be reduced" and it has nothing to do with the recession (though they might use that as an excuse) and everything to do with some podunk jackass city council trying to grab money.
Out here there WAS (HAHAHAHA SUCKERS, knew you'd get yours!) an area, called St. George. Those cops were AWFUL, and the city council supporting them doubly so. I remember the first time I drove through St. George, they had FOUR cop cars to pull over one early 90's....toyota or something, just an average car. And they had two teenagers, a boy and a girl, up against the trunk with their hands on the trunk with TWO guys who had assault rifles pointed NEARLY at them.
I remembering thinking "wow, what a lovely place..." followed by "surely these kids must be hardcore drug mules with anuses simply overflowing with cocaine! (as it turned out, they didn't end up being charged with anything at all)
One of the ones that finally got St. George shut down (after literally YEARS of complaints and finally a change in the members of the city council) was this:
http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/19/1961.asp
So, to sum up. No, the states aren't telling officers to crack down. Yes, PLENTY of tickets are written for revenue purposes. No, it has nothing to do with the economy (or very, very, little). Yes, speeding is against the law so no matter what you shouldn't go out driving expecting a "cushion" so none of this SHOULD matter to you anyways as you SHOULD be an adult so you shouldn't NEED to be told this (but not shockingly many do). No, not all cops are a**holes so can we please stop acting like people who don't make HALF what I make for sitting on my a$$ not being shot at in the nice heated/air conditioned office environment and are the only ones you can RELY on to show up, BE shot at, and try to save your ass should you ever need it are just in it for a quick buck or to powertrip upside your head?
There are plenty of good and bad examples for everything. And most of the, frankly, pointless debate on should we be pissed, should we not, should there be a cushion, etc. etc. etc. (not everything here btw, just the dense bits) is just a waste of damned time.
And I for one am glad as HELL that there is a 0% chance of me having to go to a murder scene, or deal with domestic disturbances, or interact with drug dealers, or wear a freakin' bulletproof vest FOR A REASON when I go to work.
So lets all, with our nice sports cars, stop whining abut a $150 (or so) ticket that we can have fixed, we'll burn the bad cops when they out themselves, but lets give the rest of them a little slack huh?
Of EVERYTHING I'm spending money on these days, the fact that SOME cops MIGHT need to bring in a little extra money thanks to budget cuts they didn't cause, doesn't ruffle my feathers too bad.
Now when I can't fix tickets anymore, THEN I'll be pissed.
Anyway, I was bored, sorry about the length.