My wife and I still quote lines from this like "aim high sister!" and "pills pills where are the pills"

Cheers for the talking down-to at a personal level mate, really top notch community member.

A single bullet aimed at a skyscraper wont bring it and all its inhabitants into a catastrophic implosion event.

Conflating the two is just a touch silly, no?

I always have a tendency to think "let's not be hasty" when considering stuff like this. There's always (at least) two sides to every story.

For example, with Philando Castile (man shot in the car):
He *did* have a gun in the car.
His girlfriend said that he told the officer about it and did not do anything threatening at all, but there is/was at least *some* potential that the cops would tell a different story.
The video of the event didn't show how things escalated, so we have to figure it out based on the reports of two potentially biased reports -- the girlfriend/family and the police.

Honestly, that was enough to look quite bad for the police, BUT my "don't be hasty" tendencies were still in play.


And now, we've got this. Like @newtboy has been saying, I just can't fathom the level of incompetence required to make this an "oops" situation. If they were trying to shoot the autistic man and missed and hit Kinsey by mistake ... that's fucked up.

A) If they were trying to "protect" Kinsey, how about listening to him? Did he sound nervous, like he needed protecting? NO. He calmly explained the entire situation, and was obviously NOT afraid of the autistic guy doing him any harm. And this time, they've got a lot of the lead-up on video, so we can actually hear him explain the situation. Any cop (or anyone) with 2 brain cells to rub together would holster their firearm if they listened to his explanation. Maybe they would stay behind cover and let Kinsey either talk the autistic guy into dropping the toy truck in his hand or let him get up and show them clearly that it was not a weapon (since they were responding to a report about someone possibly having a gun), but there's clearly no need to keep the guns aimed on either of them -- and Kinsey told them as much.

B) If they were trying to "protect" him, then why did they cuff him? With 3 sets of cuffs, apparently. After shooting, once they approached and figured out that there was no weapon, any decent human being would jump into action to try to mitigate the fallout of their dumbass mistake. Don't cuff the guy you "accidentally" shot -- call for an ambulance, try to stop the bleeding, etc.


For fucks sake, if that is the story the police are coming up with to explain / defend (hah!) their actions, it is just utterly pathetic. Charge the shooter and the entire police department with something criminal, and throw the law book at every single one of them. My normally strong "let's not be hasty" impulse is looking at this entire mess with a double /facepalm.

Very glad that Mr. Kinsey is expected to fully recover. Maybe the silver lining beyond his survival will be that an event this blatant almost has to force us to acknowledge that there is a serious problem with how our police are operating.

Absolutely the officer should be charged. I think it's a huge disservice to everybody that these things are so often dealt with behind closed doors. It breeds contempt and distrust, and it eliminates an important opportunity for the public to understand some of the issues inherent in policing, and it seems to let horrible crimes go largely unaddressed.

But 'triple cuffed' can only mean a daisy chain of cuffs. Nothing else makes any sense, and to do so means that they are making some kind of attempt to accommodate the comfort of the individual during the cuffing. Or do you think it means having 3 sets of hand cuffs individually applied to your wrists? Come on... Doesn't excuse the cuffing of the guy, obviously, but thinking that triple cuffing is some heinous extreme version of cuffing is absurd.

You acknowledge that he had bad aim, and that the majority of shots missed the intended target, whichever target that was. You acknowledge that poor leadership, training, and protocol may have contributed to this outcome, but then you make the leap that because these this incompetency, it must have been intentional. It simply doesn't follow. You might ask them to be held responsible, but it doesn't mean it was the intent.

Saying 'I don't know' in the immediate aftermath of a charged situation where you are just coming to realize you made a huge mistake and nearly killed an innocent seems reasonable. It does not mean 'I meant to kill you and missed." It seems to indicate a state of confusion or shock.

I heard absolutely no reference to any time frame, or them preventing medical assistance for more than 15 minutes. I'll just remain agnostic on that angle.

I'm no lawyer, but I would have thought that intent combined with action was the very core of attempted murder. Murder is all about intent, and attempted is all about action. Attempted manslaughter of some degree seems the most realistic charge to make, but that's up to people that better know the law, and are willing to spend hundreds of hours analyzing the situation.

A huge problem with the system is the way that justice is delayed for so long (assuming it is ever meted out). People want instant karma, immediate redress for wrongs committed. People see something, get heated, and feel that a strong reaction is called for in the moment. The system on the other hand is meant to be about dispassionate discussion of the details of the situation, and can take a long time to play out. This is a big part of why it seems so reprehensible when it's carried out behind closed doors; it looks like it's being swept under the carpet. Similarly this is why media coverage over sensationalizes crime. But that's a discussion for another day.

Anyways, I've already typed too much about this I think.

Well, the level of incompetence required for this to be 'accidental' is SOOO incredibly high that it's not reasonable to assume the police are that incompetent....but if they are, that's intentional on the part of their supervisors, no? So still the responsibility of the police as a whole.

There IS doubt that they could have killed him and made it look unintentional. He shot 3 times, and only hit once. Clearly, he's not a good enough shot to kill on the first shot, because cops ALWAYS shoot to kill, and he failed, no matter which target he was aiming at.

We can assume that because he said "I don't know" when asked why he shot the caregiver....not "I missed", or "I wasn't aiming at you" or any other mitigation. If, as you suggest, he was firing at the sitting, unarmed, severely mentally challenged man (also completely inexcusable, btw) then the negligence in discharging his firearm with an innocent victim between him and the target is not just gross negligence, it's intentional negligence. Shooting someone because you don't care that they are between you and your target makes you an attempted murderer. Period.

Um....if a cop was shot in the foot, medical care would be instant, there would be no handcuffing, much less TRIPPLE handcuffing. What was reported was they didn't call for medical attention for >15 minutes while the victim lay handcuffed bleeding in the street (probably with officers standing on top of him). Medical care was provided while the shootings were still happening in Dallas, so "the scene wasn't secured yet, we couldn't allow medics in safely" falls completely flat as an excuse anymore and won't even be considered by me.

That level of incompetence from a police officer MUST, by definition, be intentional. They are well trained and equipped to avoid exactly this kind of fiasco. Ignoring that training is intentional, and that must be prosecutable if there is to be any effect. I don't have to ascribe intent to murder to claim culpability. That is not the metric by which the law is applied. If your actions are grossly negligent and end in near death of another, which is the absolute least criminal possible interpretation of the actions of this officer, that's criminal attempted murder/manslaughter1. Because (inappropriately) using a firearm is not unintentional, and officers ONLY use them to kill, this was not attempted manslaughter, which only applies when the intent is NOT to kill, it was an attempted murder.
Either way, that's a question for a jury to answer, not his superior, not the DA that he works with daily.

Yeah, if that's the best they have, and I think its giving him WAY too much credit, it's absolutely no excuse and he should be prosecuted for 3 attempted murders, and his partner(s) should be prosecuted for accessory to attempted murder if not simple attempted murder for not supplying treatment instantly.

If he couldn't tell it was a truck, he clearly couldn't tell if it was a gun, so shouldn't shoot.
If he couldn't hit the intended target, he shouldn't ever shoot.
If he missed the intended target, a mentally challenged boy playing with a non threatening toy sitting down and not moving, with all 3 shots, he should never be allowed to touch a gun ever again.
But, I don't think they were aiming for the boy, I think they hit exactly who they intended to hit, the prone black man with his empty arms outstretched begging "don't shoot". When asked why he shot the unarmed, prone, surrendered, non threatening caregiver, the cop didn't say "I missed", or "I hit the wrong guy" or "I feared for my life" or "I thought I saw a gun" (not that seeing a gun is a reason to shoot, like they seem to think), he said "I don't know".

Under no circumstance was there a reason to shoot in this instance.
Under no circumstance was there a reason to triple handcuff the unarmed, non threatening man they just shot.
Under no circumstance was there a reason to withhold medical treatment for >15 minutes.
This was an attempted murder, not a mistake.

I second that...why aren't we funding this already? @00Scud00, how good is your aim? ;}

I figure it's the difference between empathetic and non-empathetic humour. Laughing with someone, as opposed to laughing at them. Jefferies shtick is non-empathetic. Getting angry at things and people. So when he "jokes" about rape victims, he's laughing AT them. Otherwise, when he's joking about people we don't like, we're ok with it, because we're all a bit narcissistic. When he aims at people we have empathy for, it falls flat.

@ChaosEngine mentioned Louis CK's SNL paedophile bit. That, even with it's dark and sick subject matter, is empathetic. He's causing us to laugh WITH the paedophile, not AT them. We're laughing at ourselves. He's bringing us, kicking and screaming, to the view the paedophile is merely ill, not evil.

(I don't think paedophiles are merely ill, I think like cancer, they should be bombarded with chemicals and radiation until they disappear. But that's just me.)

"The game we are playing we know as 'black jack', it bears no resemblance to the American game 'blackjack'.

The aim of the game is to get rid of your cards.
You remove one black jack from the deck, it plays no part in the game.
You start with 7 cards
Take 4 cards from the deck and lay them face up, these are your start cards, you then lay either the same suit or the same number on one of the start cards. If you have two or three of the same card, you can lay them all down in a single turn, if you cannot lay a card, you pick up from the face down deck.

If a player lays a king, the other player has to pick up 3 cards, a queen 2, a jack 1, an ace 4 and the 'black jack' 5. If the 2nd player lays a king on top of the 1st players card, then the 1st player has to pick up double the amount, in the case of a king, 6 cards, if the 1st player then lays yet another king, then the 2nd player would have to pick up 9 cards and so on."

@Phooz

(I edited, and some stuff pertains to your reply)

Regarding well regulated, here's the sauce :
http://www.constitution.org/cons/wellregu.htm

Keep in mind that the 2nd amendment is 2 part.
1st the motivation for why the rule exists, 2nd the rule.

The rule exists, whether or not the motivation is provided (and it's nice of them to provide context - but not necessary).

Even if regulation was meant in the modern sense, it would not change the fact that the rule does not depend on the motivating factors.

But if you insist on motivational prerequisite, here's Hamilton regarding individual right to bear :

"The project of disciplining all the militia of the United States is as futile as it would be injurious, if it were capable of being carried into execution. A tolerable expertness in military movements is a business that requires time and practice. It is not a day, or even a week, that will suffice for the attainment of it. To oblige the great body of the yeomanry, and of the other classes of the citizens, to be under arms for the purpose of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection which would entitle them to the character of a well-regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people, and a serious public inconvenience and loss. It would form an annual deduction from the productive labor of the country, to an amount which, calculating upon the present numbers of the people, would not fall far short of the whole expense of the civil establishments of all the States. To attempt a thing which would abridge the mass of labor and industry to so considerable an extent, would be unwise: and the experiment, if made, could not succeed, because it would not long be endured. Little more can reasonably be aimed at, with respect to the people at large, than to have them properly armed and equipped; and in order to see that this be not neglected, it will be necessary to assemble them once or twice in the course of a year. "
[etc]

(That last sentence - there's your training requirement, tee hee. Not only that, but that they should assemble people 1-2 times a year to make sure that everyone is armed and equipped. That's more than an individual right to bear, that's an individual requirement to bear. Let's just be happy with it being a right.)


Laws are supposed to be updated by new laws via representative legislators (who may need to be coerced via protest facilitated by freedom of assembly).
Or challenged by juries (i.e. citizens, i.e. members of the state) via jury nullification (i.e. direct state democracy). That's why there are juries. You need direct state involvement so that the legal system can not run amok independent of state sanction. It's not just for some group consensus.
The system was architected to give the state influence, so that government can't run off and act in an independent non-democratic manner.

-scheherazade

I agree that the restriction on the CDC shouldn't be happening.

As far as the limitation of what type of weapons we can have, I'm fine with the system in place. Civilians can own machine guns if they get the proper papers and tax stamp. If we want to classify semi auto rifles in the same class, sure. We can even go back to the Assault Rifle ban if we need to. I just don't see it stopping mass shootings, but that's my opinion.

As far as AR-15's specifically go, they aren't what I would consider to be the best weapon to kill people. At short range and with the shorter barrels most of the civilian ones have, the bullet isn't close to being as effective as a handgun. A Glock 22 has a 15+1 round capacity in a .40 caliber. Carrying 2 of them, firing one empty and then the other (not at the same time), assuming you are remotely able to aim, would net you far more DRT people than a 30 round .223 rifle. Tuck one under your arm, swap clips, release the slide catch, repeat for the second, and you are ready to go. Heck, even a pump or semi auto shotgun with the limiter tube removed and using buckshot is likely to get you more dead people.

And now I'm starting to wonder if YOU played the original Doom.

There was no reloading in the original doom, and there was no autoaim either (unless you count the fact that you couldn't aim up or down, but that was an engine limitation, it wasn't autoaim).

@Payback, it's well worth your time. I just finished it last week and instantly dove straight back into nightmare mode. It's the most fun I've had in a game for ages. It's just so .... metal. It's as if Dethklok made a game. It ams brutal!

@ChaosEngine

I don't think this ad is aimed at Trump supporters -- I had the very same thought as you, that this would not sway them.

But Trump supporters are a tiny portion of the electorate. There are many people who haven't been paying attention. They haven't seen what we have seen.

So this will be news to them.

Well, that is the hope, of course.

I taught myself machine code the commodore Vic 20 and used the Rockwell Aim 65 and the PET computer in collage which also used the 6502.

After collage I went into medical field service and never looked an another line of code.

Fond memories.