First paragraph: I'm not here to discuss your political views on things like the patriot act or NSA. Don't associate these things with local law enforcement or government. They are so far removed.
What? If there were a "terror event" in your area, you could be a first responder. You're the first line of government enforcement. Politicians write the laws, legislatures pass them, and police enforce them. That's literally your job.
They're not at all removed as far as public perception is concerned, and my politics have nothing to do with the fact that just the threat of "terrorism" has opened the floodgates on militarizing domestic law enforcement and the revenue necessary to fund it. (Dumb) People blindly support the idea of giving up liberty for security (theater) because they don't want to be part of the next 9/11, Boston bombing, etc.
It's precisely this irrational fear of terrorism that not only literally funds police departments to arm themselves to the teeth, but enables law enforcement to wage war on citizens that are deemed a "threat" -- like veterans, individual liberty advocates, and gun enthusiasts, just to name a few. The fed literally pays law enforcement to detain, arrest, and imprison citizens, and seize their assets. This results in men being choked out on the street over untaxed cigarettes, unarmed citizens being gunned down in the name of "officer safety", and perfectly innocent citizens having property and cash seized from them for absolutely no reason whatsoever ($12.1 billion since 9/11 and counting). This is not "protecting and serving" and it sure as shit isn't justice, but you never seem to hear any LE speaking out against it.
Second paragraph: it isn't inherently dangerous to deal with law enforcement. There were less than 1000 law enforcement related homicides last year. That's significantly small.
In a country that prides itself on due process and the rule of law? I'd say we have a different idea of significant.... and I'm even pretty conservative on this issue. That's one citizen -- innocent or guilty -- every eight hours. You won't see me at a Mike Brown rally, because rational members of society respect the authority of law enforcement that operate within the law and with the public's best interest in mind.
Law enforcement that harass peaceful citizens exercising their rights (legal gun owners), pursue victimless crimes with zeal, and commit abuse breeds public resentment and contempt. That's what we're currently seeing, because LE is protecting and enforcing the interests of the elite and politically-connected, rather than serving the public at large.
Third: I'm not sure what you're getting at. It is dangerous to be a law enforcement officer. Deaths are down because of better training and equipment. Violent assaults on officers haven't changed that much. There has only been one OIS in my county recently, but there have been numerous close calls only prevented by good officer safety.
My point was more of an abstract one, and your comment about politics and policing not mixing might apply here. Can you expand on "violent assautls on officers haven't changed that much"? Statistics? Links? Just curious. My point was that even with violent crime down, and officer deaths declining due to better training and equipment as you say, the rhetoric that is fed to the public is that it's still as dangerous as ever out there (so help us pass this new law ensuring more safety!), and that simply isn't true.