cleduc
cleduc's JournalAs a child born in the 50s,
there was still a fair amount of discussion about World War II. A key thing said repeatedly at the time (in the 60s for me as to when I can recollect it as a boy) that supposedly separated the Allies from the Nazis or Japanese was our position on torture.
So I don't get the poll and I'm having trouble believing it or accepting it. It certainly wasn't what people seemed to feel widely about torture when I was growing up.
Maybe I'm naive. But my feelings about torture haven't changed in 50+ years. It's just simply wrong.
Even if one accepted everything Wilson had to say about
this (and I absolutely do not), I cannot accept any officer discharging 12 shots in a residential neighborhood to bring down an unarmed shoplifting suspect. One of those 12 pistol shots (many that missed and often do because pistols are not very accurate) could have killed an innocent person. The bigger picture of public safety has to come first and I strongly suspect all decent police forces on the planet would agree on this.
For randomly selected examples from a google serach:
Florida police fatally shoot innocent bystander during bar altercation
http://www.torontosun.com/2014/08/20/florida-police-fatally-shoot-innocent-bystander-during-bar-altercation
There will be no charges laid against police who shot and killed two people in Montreal last year, including an innocent bystander on his way to work.
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2012/05/17/montreal-police-shooting-charges_n_1525842.html
NYPD officers fired three shots on a crowded Manhattan street near Times Square on Saturday night, missing the man they believed had a weapon but striking two bystanders, police said.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/times-square-shooting-nypd-officers-shoot-two-innocent-bystanders-near-times-square/
etc, etc
Wilson should have been fired for that alone - for carelessly putting the public at risk.
My sense of it is he got pissed off and murdered the kid - so I'm not oblivious to that outrageous behavior either. I'm pointing out (again as I did months ago) that the cowboy shootout-at-the-Ok-Corral conduct was also way over the top - and the officer in the top post might have pointed that out.
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Member since: Fri Jul 13, 2012, 12:38 PMNumber of posts: 653
