Maricopa County Sheriff's Office controversies. The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office (MCSO) is a law enforcement agency in Maricopa County, Arizona that has been involved in many controversies since 1995.
It was then used to mean 'a sudden state of activity (or inactivity) or state of mind', as in this early example, taken from William Warner's Albion's England, 1586: His seruants fear his solemn fittes.. The phrase 'fits and starts' is somewhat tautological, as both allude to sporadic activity.
Indeed, many suggest that the phrase originated from the fantastical stories of the adventurer Baron von Munchausen (circa 1785) who had, among other fantastic feats such as riding on a cannonball, pulled himselfâand his horseâup from a swamp by his bootstraps (or his hair, depending on the person telling the story).