Jim,
If you cast the net widely enough,
everybody can be a professional. If you define it narrowly
enough only the governmentally employed will qualify. You and
I are probably debating at cross purposes. My notion and
speculation was and is that the world of hard-boiled "needs"
a largely independent protagonist whose principle strengths
are courage, a strong code that he/she lives by, wits and
resourcefulness, and that the more "scientific" professional
crime fighting becomes, the further it moves away from the
hard boiled world. I believe that much of the best hard
boiled stuff we'll see over the coming years will feature
characters like Easy Rawlins, Sorotes Fortlow, the raw dudes
of George Pelacanos, and the bad boys of Elmore Leonard's
books, none of whom can really be thought of as
"professionals," even by the independent standard established
by the Op.
Jim
Blue
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