On my blog at Excited-Delirium.com (with the dash) I bring you news of the recent Canadian Braidwood Inquiry into taser use that conclude that tasers are capable of causing death, via any of several taser-death mechanisms, even in healthy adults. Please use Google or my blog to guide you to the Braidwood Report and read the summary.

Also, for those that haven’t already figured it out for themselves, there is the taser’s “Curious Temporal Asymmetry” that uses a simple and obvious observation to indicate the real truth about taser / death cause and effect. Please Google the phrase and think it through.

Interesting question. I see it as a fairly vicious cycle. The more the police militarize and engage in blatant assaults on liberty, the more social disorder and contempt then can expect to reap. Over the last decade I have noticed a real shift within the police force in the small city I live in (150k people), and it has not been for the better. What disturbs me the most about this shift is that it is not in response to any increase in crime (we really don’t have much violent crime here). Some changes were subtle and some were not. Our officers went from light blue uniforms to a navy (almost black) uniform, from shoes to combat boots, from shotguns to M16s. In this small city we even have 2 swat teams (one city and 1 Sheriff). 10 years ago it was rare to see them called out, now it’s a regular thing (for fairly minor situations).

I know several officers on both the city police force and that work with the Sheriff’s office. I break them down into 2 groups. Those that live “the cop” lifestyle and those that don’t. out of the 10 or 11 officers that I know, the only ones that are decent human beings are the ones that don’t hang out with other cops. When they punch out at the end of their shift they are done. The 8-9 guys are just miserable human beings. The big chip sits on the shoulders all of the time. It’s a real us vs them attitude. The problem is the “them” is not the criminal element, it’s all non cops! That’s not healthy for any free society.

How much police militarization and excessive force is encouraged by social disorder and cultural contempt for the police?

In Portland, Ore, late 70′s, a streetwalking drunk knocked off one of my external rearview mirrors, I got out of the car and was beginning to give chase, when a policeman pulled up. I quickly explained, and he got on radio, and said to dispatcher, “We have a piece of shit, who knocked a citizen’s mirror off…”. A minute later, dispatcher’s voice said, “Your piece of shit is one block over…”

I got a quick lecture about getting out of my car in that part of town, and the policeman was gone. I was left vaguely offended, but not enough so to file a complaint. Only 10 years before, I had left Roseburg Oregon, who had a law on the books in the 60′s that no black people were allowed within the city limits after dark. I had never known about that law, until much later in life.

After a lifetime of computer-based accounting, remembering the calculus physics and statistical analysis, and set theory, I can confidently that any good accountant can LIE using statistics.

But if you’re REALLY going to LIE, use anecdotal evidence. Don’t you agree, Ms Vlahos?