Seinfeld Police Officer Bit

I remember one of my favorite bits from Seinfeld was about police officers. It went something like this:

That bit made me laugh - and at the time, I had no context. I was young. I only knew New York City through comics I collected. I lived in a city where there was only 1 million people.

I thought: why can’t politicians just solve two problems at once?!

The politicians of NYC probably found that bit funny and just moved on.

I couldn’t understand why?!

Now when I am older, visited and lived in NYC - I totally understand why politicians never went for this great idea.

If police officers were cleaning up while they were on the beat and you were a criminal - the easiest way to take advantage of the situation to commit a crime would be to:

Litter around the police officer.

That would effectively pre-occupy the officer. When the officer is cleaning up - the crime can happen. The officer would be two steps behind.

It’s interesting to me that what I found that made sense (and funny) when I was younger doesn’t make sense to me now. Is it because I’m a politician?! I hope not!

What’s changed is that I have perspective - a lot more, even from point of views of police officers and politicians.

Or am I just getting old?!