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It's true that I am very opinionated, but I try to be fully transparent about why I believe what I believe. That way you don't have to have to take my word for anything and the foundation of my opinions are susceptible to attack (as intended). What phrasing are you referring to?
The rest of your post is difficult to respond to because I assume you're being intentionally hyperbolic with your phrasing. This can be fun/useful as a stylistic point sometimes, but too much and the lack of clarity becomes a hindrance to discussion. For example, I don't know what "zero support from cities" is supposed to mean. If I encountered the phrase "the government has increased its support to NASA", I think a reasonable interpretation is that NASA was given more resources in the form of a higher budget. But if we examine that facet, we see that the vast majority of cities are increasing their police budgets, including in blue enclaves like Los Angeles (up 9.4% from 2019 to $3.86B), San Francisco (up 4%), and Chicago (up 15%). I assume you'll respond to say that you were referencing something other than budgets, but it would be helpful for all if you just wrote plainly from the beginning.
I apologize if my comment wasn't clear. I should have been more explicit that I did not know what exactly you were referring to with the "zero support from cities" phrase. The reason I included the comment about budgets was to demonstrate the difficulties inherent in responding to ambiguous statements, such as: "I think by Y you mean X, but Z facts contradict X, so my interpretation of Y is probably wrong."
Fair point, I had a mistaken understanding of Chesterton's Fence and I either should've asked or looked it up. I definitely have examined why Qualified Immunity remains in force, but none of the theories paint the people involved in a good light. Put simply, QI exists because institutions have an inherent bias in favor of agents of the state and against the typical victims of state violence. The best steelman I can contemplate about QI is that there is a benefit to having a police force that errs on the side of too much force rather than too little, and that allowing victims of state violence to pursue compensation would harm everyone because it will result in a police force that is too skittish. I ultimately don't find this argument convincing for several reasons, namely because it's self-serving and because this hypothetical concern does not appear to be reflected in professions that lack QI. For example, if you asked doctors whether they'd support a law that made them immune from liability, I see no reason why any of them would say no, and I would expect them to raise similar objections (e.g. "why would anyone risk operating on a patient if they can sued?"). There may be problems with the medical industry, but I can't identify a concern that is a result of doctors being too afraid to do their job for fear of liability, so I don't see why this objection should be taken seriously when raised by other professions.
The best steelman I can come up with for qualified immunity is the same as what Butlerian pointed out above: If you make it possible to sue police officers for honest mistakes, that means that no competent people will go into policing, because they won't want to risk the chance that they make an honest mistake and get sued.
The main reason it doesn't work that way is the case law that makes "clearly established" interpreted unreasonably, and which also lets courts close the case without clearly establishing that anything is wrong for the nexttime an officer does it.
That's basically the same steelman I offered, but I don't understand this part. Who actually thinks that getting rid of QI means that cops can be punished for honest mistakes? My interpretation of "honest mistake" would be something less than negligence, but even if we assume the latter, is there a profession that is currently facing short-staffing because of worry over negligence liability?
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