Edited for your approval.

And again (because apparently it's something I love to say, given how often I say it in this thread) nobody here has said that those cops/agents are not doing something bad, nor that cops/agents do not ever do anything bad.

Also: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=cop. Check out the second definition for cop.

I trust dictionary.com about as much as I trust wikipedia these days.

That is to say; not at all.

Meriam-Webster doesn't even have a definition for "cop".

So you'd rather believe that cop is not a word, or you're just denying the veracity of my source because you can't find anything to contradict it and it goes against your post?

If cop isn't a word, then why did you use it in your post? If it is a word, dictionary.com is as good a place as any (except apparently Miriam-Webster) to look up the definiteion.

I think it's short for copper, which is what they were called back when they all had copper buttons over in England. I'm too lazy to look it up, but it's definitely short for copper.

actually it came from an old french word Capere, to capture

so the caperes, or capturers
became coppers
then cop

I knew I was only half right.

It isn't prohibition or the laws that were the problem. In fact, the laws were generally more Libertarian then than today. The problem was the tactics used. This was back before Miranda when there was little judicial scrutiny of police tactics. Police then were every bt as brutal as the gansters they fought in some jurisdictions. There were few qualms about torturing suspects (real rubber hose and testicle clamps style torture, not just lone interogations). There were also plenty of shoot first don't bother with any questions tactics. There were no qualms about killing suspects and machine guns were used liberaly. In some cases, patrol boats would open up on rumrunners with mounted .50 machine guns rather than make any attempt to pull them over peacefully.

And they still haven't figured out who killed Lindburg's baby.

As a general rule, stories claiming that common words derived from acronyms are false. There are a few exceptions (laser and radar are acronyms), but they're always of recent origin, usually technical terms, and seldom have cute stories accompanying the etymology.

There's also sonar and scuba

Not to quote V for Vendetta or anything, but...

The thing about V is that she didn't believe that government should have a monopoly on force. For that matter, she didn't believe that governemnt should use force at all, ever, under any circumstances. For that matter, she didn't believe that governments as we know them should exist at all.

But V's anarchistic ideals were downplayed for the movie.

I stand corrected on the cop front... the other answers make more sense.

props to SL James, I hear you cluckin' big chicken. Been down that road with some of my professors on gov't legitimacy, use of force, and crim law/crim proceedure.

hyzmarca- good point on the lack of judicial oversight... unfortunately our checks and balances don't always work out the way they were planned.

point of interest on the miranda warning actually, not that it has much if anything to do with this line of conversation, but something I learned this semester; there was nothing inevitable about miranda warnings... the courts found that miranda was only necessary in the absence of another compelling method of informing a subject of his rights. at the time, the 5-0 thought it would cut down on confessions, but it really hasn't.

re: V for Vendetta