First, with all due respect (I know, that always means someone is going to disagree with you and don’t want to get off on the wrong foot), I don’t hear what you do. I don’t mean the words, I mean the intent and contributing circumstances.

I have no issue, whatsoever, with the police saying whatever it takes to scare the holy crap out of someone who just previously was likely a violent, hostile and non-compliant fool. Unless the arrestee was butt naked, jamming the rather friction rich end of a Taser into his exit hatch through fabric sounds a little more time consuming than what is on the audio tape.

Most people become very, very whiney once they’ve been either threatened with pain or once they’ve experienced enough pain to make them deeply regret being so uncooperative and hostile. (“Crap, that hurts more than I thought.”) The beauty of the Taser is it SAVES lives. Even the stinky, nasty, hostile, violent, abusive, life of career criminals. (If the arrestee in this case is not a career criminal, it remains true.)

See, I’m mostly confident the officer did not have the Taser literally up his ass, but in the vicinity, sure. Did he take advantage of the situation to influence the arrestee to BE cooperative? Sure, why not.

On more than one occasion I have watched an episode of “Cops” and marveled at a fool’s ability to *say* “I am cooperating officer! I am not resisting! I’m not gonna’ lie to you, I swear to God!” while they proceeded to lie, jerk, writhe, kick, buckle, push, pull, twist, turn, jump, run, spit, head butt, bite, wrestle, wiggle, cling, stiffen and go ragdoll. All with cuffs on.

The police officer was right when he said to the man if you’re talking, you can breathe. Whether or not he could take a full breath I don’t think you or I can say for certain because we weren’t there.

In any case, without seeing the video of this arrest, start to finish, not an edited clip, just listening to the audio is as inflammatory and sensationalistic as watching only part of a video and without the audio. I remember the Rodney King affair. I’ve seen the entire tape, not just what the media chose to show over and over.

The police are citizens and they have civil rights. One of them is free speech. They are as entitled as you and I to say ANYTHING to make an uncooperative person believe us and do what we want them to do. They have their lives to protect first. They are entitled to.

The mainstream media of America is anti-police. They’ve proven it, repeatedly. Have you seen the massive number of anti-police, criminal-sympathizing comments on YoothBoob? Letting that poison spread is not only simply wrong, it is corrosive.

Sorry to go on and on. In any case, for me, this audio and partial transcript simply does not tell the whole story. So, unless and until I see and hear the entirety of the events, I will withhold judgment.

Thanks for allowing comments and for your blog.