I'll be honest, it all depends on the cop and situation.

There's cops out there that will ticket you for anything and everything. You'll see them if you go to traffic court and they have dockets with 50-100 people in them. The average, from what I've seen are officers that have maybe 2-4 people on a docket. Just luck of the draw when it comes down to which officer you get and when.

if the goal is to get out of the ticket, i think TT's on to the right idea. you just have to put yourself in the cop's shoes, he is more likely to let a ass-kisser off than someone who challenges them/exercises their rights. Its sucks thats how it works, but thats life

the only sure-fire way to almost guarantee to get out of a ticket is to volunteer for your local PD or FD as a reserve. You work a couple weekends a month, you get one of those blue-stripe stickers, youll never get pulled over

Almost got a ticket in VA for having a radar detector....but the cop was chill and he let me go with a warning :)