I have been thinking carefully about how to craft a response to this topic.
I don't feel that the gear that the police have, from M-16s to Apache Longbow attach helicopters, matters all that much. Indeed, if my next door neighbor drives an M1A2 Abrams with live ammo for it's turret I wouldn't be bothered. As long as they want the gear, I don't have an issue.
The difference is your neighbor has to spend his own money to uselessly fly his helicopter repeatedly over your sub-suburban home. The police get to spend
your money to do that.
(Speak of the devil! Right as I wrote that the local PD uselessly flew a helicopter below the civilian floor over my house, disrupting my quiet enjoyment of my own property for "important" police [strike]money-wasting[/strike] business... What a bunch of self-important, inconsiderate scumbags. They should all be fired and their helicopters auctioned off.)
Anyway, I truly don't see how you can cleanly and conveniently separate attitudes, budgets, and yes, equipment when the changes in all of the above are part and parcel of an explicit and intentional militarization of police in the name of fighting various "Wars".
Are you aware of the extent to which the Federal government provides free equipment (but no maintenance costs for the same), thus incentivizing departments around the country to increasingly engage in unconstitutional asset forfeiture practices, and to call out the SWAT routinely and needlessly for the sole purpose of justifying its existence on paper (and because the officers find it "better than sex")?
The reality is that police don't need this equipment, and their desires ("as long as they want the gear...") are irrelevant; only the desires of their employers - the citizenry - ought to be of any concern.