>Plus, who's going to buy all that nifty "war on drugs" gear when the police no longer have "free money" to purchase?
The federal laws that grants military surplus to local police is very, very generous. The sunk cost is next to nothing. Maintenance costs are pretty much it. The militarization of police continues even without this money.
My uncle was a police commander and some of these donations actually became onerous. The one I remember him mentioning were gas masks. As I remember the force was required to have them and while they were given the masks through some grant there's some part of the mask (filter cartridge) had to be replaced every N months and actually cost the department a considerable sum
The federal laws that grants military surplus to local police is very, very generous. The sunk cost is next to nothing. Maintenance costs are pretty much it. The militarization of police continues even without this money.