@Nordlich
You generalize to an extreme point of your own view. People elect officials who make the laws. Those officals can make whatever laws they want for years after they are elected without any input from the people... Sometimes we vote directly to constitutional amendments; however, this is rare and only a lot of money can get the amendment to the ballot anyways. Secondly, you not respecting is fine so long as you deal with the consequences should a dispute arise. Society has been around before you, and it will be around after only because it follows laws as a whole.
Oh--and if you truly do not respect authority, then you do not respect the 1st amendment. And since you do not respect authority, you must love the cop because he did not respect those in authority over him--those who wrote his laws! Is Mr. No Respect Copperson your hero?

@Crosswords
You do realize he did not "get away with something so blatant as that," right? A ten day suspension (In law enforcement) is not getting off scot-free as you imply. It may seem like a slap on the hand, but even that is a weak assessment. Every termination in Civil Service takes three things, time, progressive discipline and documentation, or sans that, a lawsuits will follow and the wrongfully terminated cop, even at fault, will sue and win and the taxpayer will be left with the liability. A teacher with tenure is just as equally protected as law enforcement and most other jobs do not have cameras to catch people in the first place so that point is mute. What you should have said is that only a cop deals with people every day and because of that environment, would attempt something so blatant and dumb.

Out of the millions of cumulative hours law enforcement work --actually billions probably--constantly around criminals, I would say that the percentage of incidents is darn good... Yes, there are some mental cops, childish cops, arrogant cops... And yes, I am glad they have cameras and that the cameras are subject to public record. I just wish people would stop foaming at the mouth and scapegoating the good cops because of the bad cops. The average citizen is far worse than the average law enforcement official in my personal experience.

Lastly, I love how this guy is suing the taxpayers... The department seems to have laws against what the officer did and since they offically disciplined him, looks like Suer Mc Suerson won't get a dime from them... Still, they will probably settle out of court because that is cheaper for corporations and departments... I would not disagree with suing the cop himself... but, that's another debate.

"It's society's fault he was driven to desperation!"
"It's entirely his responsibility for making this choice!"

Why does it have to be one or the other?
All criminals are human beings. They're people. People who, because of their circumstances, have made poor choices. This is a statement that acknowledges the impact of their situation and their personal culpability.

The criminal here may have been driven to desperate acts by his situation, or he might just be a sociopathic opportunist. We can't be certain.
He may have been lured by the promise of easy money after hearing how someone else had gotten away apparently scot-free. He might feel that a few hundred or thousand bucks is worth a lot to him, but is effectively nothing for the corporation behind the counter, and that no one's really going to be hurt by his actions.
He might have been just high enough to talk himself into it, or be talked into it by someone else.
His starving family, or his kid that needs a kidney transplant, or the eviction notice that's probably coming in a few days, or the drug habit he's feeding - none of these make it "OK" to decide to commit a crime, but they're factors.

We're often very quick to picture someone who has committed a crime as nothing more than the crime itself.
It's a message I think gets a bit muddled in Eastwood's Gran Torino. We're shown how Thao is driven by peer pressure to attempt to steal the titular vehicle; he's not a criminal, but a person who made a very poor decision. A person who could potentially be rehabilitated from his "life of crime." At the same time, the gang members throughout the movie are vilified in typical "nothing more than criminals" fashion.

If this pharmacist was in violation of corporate policy by having the pistol at work (and I highly doubt CVS policy allows employees to arm themselves), then he'll probably be fired, or at least reprimanded.
I imagine he was probably "fed up" and angry about "these criminals preying on us and getting away with it." Does that make what he did right? Personally, I don't think so.
Here in Texas, I'm allowed by law to shoot someone if they're stealing my property. I don't think property is worth killing over. I do, however, think it's reasonable to use deadly force if my life or the life of a loved one is in imminent danger, or to prevent or stop a sexual assault against a loved one.
Beyond asking if he was "right" to do it, we can also ask if it was a responsible act. Unless the pharmacist saw something that convinced him the robber was preparing to shoot someone, I definitely think it was irresponsible, even if he'd fired one carefully-aimed shot that dropped the robber. The vast majority of robberies are bloodless affairs and criminals know that employees are typically trained to comply with demands. Confrontation with a firearm could have escalated the situation in an unpredictable fashion.

I'm not sure what the law is in Georgia, but here in Texas one of the clauses for use of deadly force is that the "actor did not provoke the person against whom the force was used." This clause gives me pause because it seems like displaying a gun in the first place might be considered provocation.

>> ^schmawy:
I must again say that all the fanatical religious psychopaths bear the full ire of the Sift, yet we let the sports nuts off scot-free. It's slavery and war and it represents the very worst and the most primitive elements of the human psyche.
I. F'ing. Hate. Sports.


Professional sports* ?

I must again say that all the fanatical religious psychopaths bear the full ire of the Sift, yet we let the sports nuts off scot-free. It's slavery and war and it represents the very worst and the most primitive elements of the human psyche.

I. F'ing. Hate. Sports.

Thanks to Blankfist for the playlist. He wants to make sure that everyone knows he got away with his obnoxious freedom-loving civil rights having attitude scot-free, We'll get you next time you America-hating terrorist .

I think he's really just describing Braveheart. The scots were way ahead of their time, still are.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scots_Wha_Hae

'Scots, who have with Wallace bled,
Scots, whom Bruce has often led,
Welcome to your gory bed
Or to victory!

'Now is the day, and now is the hour:
See the front of battle lower (threaten),
See approach proud Edward's power -
Chains and slavery!

'Who will be a traitor knave?
Who will fill a coward's grave?
Who's so base as be a slave? -
Let him turn, and flee!

'Who for Scotland's King and Law
Freedom's sword will strongly draw,
Freeman stand or freeman fall,
Let him follow me!

'By oppression's woes and pains,
By your sons in servile chains,
We will drain our dearest veins
But they shall be free!

'Lay the proud usurpers low!
Tyrants fall in every foe!
Liberty is in every blow!
Let us do or die!'

Faith and Reason are natural enemies. Like brothers and sisters. Or British and Scots. Or Welsh and Scots. Or Scots and other Scots!

Tags for this video have been changed from 'amy macdonald, this is the life, scot, amazing' to 'amy macdonald, this is the life, scot, scottish, amazing' - edited by calvados

This was great. And by the way, my experience is that the Irish get upset if you call their living language gaelic either. Irish and Scots are living languages, and Gaelic sounds archaic to them, I think.

title is wrong... it's not in Gaelic, it's in (old) Scots. Written in Scots, spoken in Scots.

Gaelic is a totally different language.

The scots get very upset if you get the two confused.

>> ^spoco2:
I really enjoy QI... but MY GOD, how many of these shows ARE THERE?
It's like a plague.
And they all seem to have the same people on them anyway.
Weird.
Or just really slack tv execs


To be fair, they only get maybe 9-13 shows per "season," and the people they have on them are genuinely funny. Plus, the "quizmaster" format is very familiar to anyone who attended school in the UK. "Have I got News for You" and "QI" are, I think, the best of the bunch.

And while they make fun of Americans for being fat, the Scots come in for quite a lot of overweight humor, as do their fellow countrymen (half of their politicians appear to be of the Sta-Puft variety). And its not like we're slim and trim as a nation anyway.

http://www.videosift.com/video/Halo-video-game-Scots-Wha-Hae

Fine with putting away dealers of hard drugs, but people smoking a bit of weed here and there are doing nothing wrong.. excess of ANYTHING is going to be bad for you, but largely weed is better for you than smoking and drinking..

People around my rough area in england, usually young lads, get very drunk and go around looking for fights. They'll probably stab someone or punch someone or vandalise someone's expensive property, the victim didn't deserve it and most of them will get away scot free, occasionally they'll get caught by sheer fluke and get a slap on the wrist.

People smoking weed will usually chill the hell out, laugh their heads off at something moderately funny, eat a pizza and go to bed.

Legalise it.

It seems to me the bald guy totally did not deserve that.. It was the arsebutt plugging the guy with the nightstick and some hits by the other two. The bald dude looks like he was trying to stop Mr. Nightstick.

And it looks like Mr. Nightstick more or less got off scot-free..