Yesterday on MSNBC, California Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein made a startling claim. She claimed that “I think we’ve got all the police,” backing her latest “assault” weapons ban, adding that “we have all the mayors virtually.”

Is that true? Feinstein may have the support of most big city mayors, liberals like Michael Bloomberg foremost among them, but what about police officers?

This afternoon I spoke with former Rep. Sandy Adams (R-FL). Sandy Adams has one of the most interesting backgrounds of anyone in politics. She dropped out of school at age 17 to join the US Air Force. She married at 18, but that marriage turned out to be an abusive one. She ended up studying and becoming a deputy sheriff in the Orange County (FL) Sheriff’s Department. That was in 1985. She served in law enforcement for 17 years, losing her second husband in the line of duty in 1989. Her life and work propelled her to become an advocate for crime victims’ rights, which led her to study criminal justice, and eventually, politics. She spent eight years in the Florida House before her election to Congress.

Fast forward and Adams is elected to Congress in the 2010 Tea Party class. She has a strong opinion, as a former law enforcement officer, on the subject of firearms and an armed citizenry. They don’t square at all with Sen. Feinstein’s take.

“I can tell you she doesn’t have all the police because I just met with a large group of rank and file police and they don’t agree. None of the ones I spoke with were supportive.”

She also spoke recently with Dallas police officers, who “recognized that it doesn’t address the real problem. The real problem is criminals.” In general, Adams says that rank and file officers do not agree with police chiefs and mayors who publicly push for gun control. The reason is simple: Rank and file officers understand that the police cannot be everywhere guarding against criminals, so citizens have to be able to defend themselves.

“Response times are getting longer. You may have to defend yourself until someone arrives to help you.”

She cited the case of the Georgia mom who found herself and her children under attack from a home invader in January.

“She had to defend herself and her baby because help had not arrived,” Adams said. “The woman in Georgia did everything right,” Adams said, noting that the woman called 9-1-1 before retrieving her pistol. “She didn’t want to have the confrontation. She retreated but the bad guy kept coming. So she defended herself and her children.” When the attacker broke into the hiding place where the mom and her 9-year-old twins were hiding and confronted them with a crowbar, the mom emptied her .38 revolver, hitting the assailant with five of her six shots. He was later arrested, and it turned out that he had a long rap sheet.

“When I was on the streets in law enforcement, we just didn’t have the resources to respond to each call,” Adams said.