Volunteer cops?!?!

Another detail came out about the killing of Walter Scott (or details). Something called a reserve police officer in his 70's mistook his gun for his taser, going for the wrong hip to draw. And on top of it, the department falsified his training records so he'd be eligible. 

There are so many questions that need to be answered.

How does one become a volunteer- is it a large donation, is there an interview or application process, something that qualifies one besides desire to shoot people?

What are their duties- crowd control or making arrests and being issued a service weapon?

What SHOULD their duties be? Minimal I'd say! Be there for that old fashioned idea of asking directions, helping people with groceries or to cross the street. Maybe crowd control at festivals or road races or something. They should NOT be armed.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/04/13/the-73-year-old-reserve-cop-who-mistook-his-gun-for-a-taser/

http://www.npr.org/2015/04/21/401296066/too-often-some-say-volunteer-officers-just-want-to-play-cop

If you want to play cop, there should be a CrossFit for police where you can do physical tests, obstacle courses, shoot inanimate dummies, do self defense, but I guess that doesn't quite satisfy those who want to hunt down and arrest people whether they need it or not.

Walter Scott murder in SC

Since overall very little action is really taken (yeah, a point of contention) when police officers kill, one Congressman entered a list of recent victims for the record:

Hank Johnson: ‘It feels like open season on black men in America’

In one of the recent murders, a man who was late on child support was shot in the back 8 times. Police originally released a version of the story that included a struggle, the victim grabbing the taser and putting the officer in danger.

In other cases, this police version of a life or death struggle and the fact that the victim had committed an offense (late child support, shoplifting, smoking pot, holding a toy gun, or the very general "troubled"  in other cases) in the distant or recent past eclipses the main fact of a man being executed without trial for a crime (and there's not always a crime!) that doesn't carry the death penalty. 

A good interview  What if There Was No Video

This time, there was a continuous video and the police had to recant that story:

http://www.democracynow.org/2015/4/9/after_cops_shooting_of_unarmed_walter

A handy guide to your rights in filming police officers publicly:

https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/photographers?redirect=kyr-photo

Don't say bomb on a plane...

...or "safe" while "looking Muslim", apparently! Or was it "engine" or "wing" or " the" that scared the woman so much?

Here are a few incidents I read about recently that were pretty ridiculous.

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This family was extra suspicious because the guys had beards and the women wore headscarves…not only that but wait til you hear what they were talking about!

http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/01/01/family.grounded/

"We were (discussing whether it was safest to sit near) the wing, or the engine or the back or the front, but that's it. We didn't say anything else that would raise any suspicion."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7809193.stm
"Mr Irfan said when he boarded Thursday's flight, he mentioned something to his wife and sister-in-law about having to sit in the back."

After the FBI questioned and cleared them and spoke to AirTran for them, the airline still wouldn't book them a later flight.

No one else would ever discuss safety on a plane unless they were going to blow it up, right? Keep your eye on those flight attendants who do the safety demo next time you fly.


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“…an Arabic-inscribed T-shirt in an airport was like "wearing a T-shirt at a bank stating, I am a robber…”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090106/ts_alt_afp/ustransportairsecuritymuslimsrights_090106002219

??? No. Sorry. That's not an analogy at all. They are absolutely nothing alike. Had the T-shirt said in any language "I have a bomb" or "I'm a hijacker", that would be like going into a bank wearing a "I'm a robber" shirt.

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