6 officers shot in Utah

[bigwheeler]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

You live by the sword you die by the sword. Cops are not soldiers and citizens
are not the enemy. There has been a turn for the worse in the way people think.
Clearly cops running around in battle gear is way over the top. And clearly shooting
at them is equally over the top. But there are idiots born every minute.
I sure don't have any answers, and I sure wouldn't live where the LEO's and the people they serve aren't friends. I do agree that to lose one life over pot is plain
ridiculous, at least as long as booze is legal as well.

 

[Grump]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

Dreadful lack of updating info here.

Facts developed later indicate that the shooter was a cop-hater who at least once told a friend that he would not go quietly.

For the life of me, I thought I heard a radio report about some religious group thinking it was the end of the world when law enforcement had their compound surrounded. Couldn't find any written quote of it later, but that was also before much older news had been indexed. My thought then was "DON'T make their 'prophesy' come true!!!" We all know how Waco then played out. If (all hindsight criticisms acknowledged) LE had just backed off and waited it out once their surprise element was shown to be compromised, the starting firefight would have not happened and the initial death and injury of LEOs would have been averted.

One fact common to both situations--a suspect walking towards his car is quite unlikely to be packing a rifle. Utah in 1978-79 had a survivor of the Nazi Youth who hated public schools get taken down as he walked the mountain path (50 yards or more) to his mailbox after days of siege. His handgun was no match for the LEOs when he decided to fight, but he was also far enough from the house to "save the children". All over the home-schooling being substandard.

Regardless of tactics and possible intel and/or planning failures, remember that the advantage goes to the defense.

Reports I heard were that the shooter opened up on the first few officers inside, then followed them outside with an aggressive charge. No word from my sources whether the shooter was wounded at that point, but a fair conclusion is that there was no *effective* return fire in those critical first moments.

As for legalizing drugs, I used to weakly favor it, but our post-Prohibition successes with alcohol still don't seem to add up. As fictional Police Captain Furillo said, that would leave a [larger] portion of our population narcotized, and that's unacceptable. Addictions change the brain, and now I just reluctantly believe the best compromise would be to trade tobacco for dope, and cordon that off with alcohol as the only two drug concessions our society makes for self-destructive behavior which *really does* affect the rest of society for the worse. At least pot isn't physiologically addictive and it appears less poisonous than alcohol.

The Netherlands sure doesn't seem like a shining model of high-productivity citizenry who advance science and make the world a better place. Yet they seem to contribute more to the world than the nations/regions which *used to* make great discoveries, like Yemen (I think they had some great astronomers and mathematicians once upon a time).

One officer died and others were seriously wounded at the hands of a very evil man who didn't just break the law with contraband, but who had every intention of selling it to make a profit off of numbing his fellow citizens. The criminal did so with every intention of killing any LEO who tried to interfere.

Perhaps the only lesson from this we can all agree on: Let's be careful out there.

 

[old95b10]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

Holy shit have we all gone mad? This dumb shit never had to happen at all. I dont care what he was accused of doing .dope ,murder,rape ect , He had a job that you know where he will be .Show up and have HR go get him ,meet him in the office and put him in handcuffs. Done this shit more than one time back in the day. Everyone shittin themselves about pickin up this bad guy or another. Hell have a nice lady from the office go get him for a problem with his W-2, aint nobody in the office but me and him. NO SHOTS FIRED!!!! As I had my M9 pointed at his head when he walked in ( Nice lady was behind and left fast ). Never wore all black and kicked in doors but we brought a bunch of guys in. Shit like that dont make the news so you aint gonna know about it. Not sayin there aint a need for a SWAT team but ( And this is just me ) they are doin alot of dangerous shit for no good reason. I hate to see officers die when the bad guys could have walked themselves to jail.
My prayers are with his familey.

 

[desertrat1979]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: old95b10</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Holy shit have we all gone mad? This dumb shit never had to happen at all. I dont care what he was accused of doing .dope ,murder,rape ect , He had a job that you know where he will be .Show up and have HR go get him ,meet him in the office and put him in handcuffs. Done this shit more than one time back in the day. Everyone shittin themselves about pickin up this bad guy or another. Hell have a nice lady from the office go get him for a problem with his W-2, aint nobody in the office but me and him. NO SHOTS FIRED!!!! As I had my M9 pointed at his head when he walked in ( Nice lady was behind and left fast ). Never wore all black and kicked in doors but we brought a bunch of guys in. Shit like that dont make the news so you aint gonna know about it. Not sayin there aint a need for a SWAT team but ( And this is just me ) they are doin alot of dangerous shit for no good reason. I hate to see officers die when the bad guys could have walked themselves to jail.
My prayers are with his familey.</div></div>

Until the nice lady from the office catches a bullet. Maybe "back in the day" putting untrained personell in harms way was an acceptable coarse of action, but I could not do it to someone if I werent willing to do it myself. This isnt someone who skipped on bail, committed identity theft, or a traffic stop gone wrong. Do you think they were serving a warrant for a dime bag of mj? Look at it this way. If the warrant is for marijuana, it must be pretty high level trafficking for there to be a warrant. There is no police action that can be taken in a critical situation where anyone, but God, knows EXACTLY how it is going to end. Take a guy I use to work with, did a traffic stop, pulled a chevy over since the plates belonged to a ford. As soon as he got out the driver opened on him and he caught a ricochet to his shin. Using the line of thought (or lack of)in this thread, then the whole situation my friend went through could have been avoided as well. Whether passive or aggressive, if the SUSPECT (sorry ELEAF, once you open fire and kill a cop, ALLEGED is an improperly used word)wants to kill a cop, then things will go bad.

 

[Tunanut]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

"The War on Drugs" decades old and over 50,000 dead fighting a war that we are no closer to winning. Over 173 million americans have smoked pot, and 17 million smoke it at least once a month. How can so many people get away with breaking the law. We need to spend alot more money building prisons and hiring law enforcement and attorneys to procecute these criminals. A 10% national sales tax would be a good start, but probably won't be enough. We can't continue to let this many criminals continue to get away with breaking the law.

 

[old95b10]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

Sorry about your buddy but I still would rather catch someone off their game where they feel safe, than where they are slingin dope and lookin for cops and and other dope dealers tryin to rob them.
If you dont think the same I'am ok with that and have no hard words for you. I just hate to hear of officers gettin killed when there may be a safer way.

 

[eleaf]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: smokshwn</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

Assuming that (pick your drug of choice) is made legal, what is your prediction of the behavior of the former criminal activity? Do you see them becoming law abiding, tax paying citizens? or do you see them just finding new illegal activity to participate in? </div></div>

Your thesis that the vast majority of drug users aren't, with the exception of their drug use, law abiding, tax paying citizens is naive, to say the least. In fact, over half of all Americans have tried marijuana at one point or another. The idea that because one uses drugs means that one has some sort of contempt for the law and is nothing but a common criminal is ridiculous on its face. It's you framing drug use of some kind as a moral issue, when most drugs users don't use drugs any differently than you do alcohol, except that they'd rather smoke a joint rather than couple of drink a beers when they get home after that long day at work, or do a line rather than guzzle 1/2 bottle of tequila on a Friday night. It's no more than a choice to do substance X instead of substance Y or Z.

As with any prohibited substance, the vast majority of the violence is attributable to the prohibition, not the substance itself. How many times do people kill others in order to get a 6 pack of Bud Light or a pack of Marlboros, drugs that are readily available at virtually any corner store in (non-blue law) America? The only time you ever see the kind of violence associated with drugs in either of those cases was during prohibition. As soon as prohibition ended, so did the violence. Almost overnight. It wasn't the alcohol that created a culture of violence with bootleggers and criminals with the means and incentive to use violence in order to protect a very lucrative market segment. It was prohibition that created that atmosphere. If one can go to the store and buy Marlboro Greens rather than having to find some shady guy in a shady part of town while trying mightily to dodge notice of the police, there is no incentive for thugs to use violence to protect their government guaranteed profits.

 

[battle-scarred]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

are you kidding? or just stupid.

 

[eleaf]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: battle-scarred</div><div class="ubbcode-body">are you kidding? or just stupid. </div></div>

Said the guy who brings no substantive argument to the table other than ad hominem attacks.

When you can combat ANY of the points I've made with some sense of intellectualism, get back to me. Otherwise run along and play.

 

[desertrat1979]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: eleaf</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: battle-scarred</div><div class="ubbcode-body">are you kidding? or just stupid. </div></div>

Said the guy who brings no substantive argument to the table other than ad hominem attacks.

When you can combat ANY of the points I've made with some sense of intellectualism, get back to me. Otherwise run along and play.</div></div>

Aside from the starting post, there hasnt really been any posts with wisdom or intellectualism as part of its contents. Armchair quarterbacks that all think they have the answers, and cannot be proven wrong, common sense and reality be damned.

 

[BALLISTIC]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

Eleaf is spot on, and I have tested both alcohol, and marijuana extensively with self experimentation.

I have friends with professional degrees, and 60K+ a year jobs, who smoke marijuana often, and rarely drink. They are more upstanding citizens than those of whom I know who drink as often as the others smoke. If I could I would too, as I believe that marijuana is less harmful than alcohol in both personal health, and that of society. I know a large number of people who would agree that they prefer me high, rather than drunk.

'War is a racket' and the war on drugs is nothing more than a war between the .gov and the people.

PS: the idea of, "We need to spend alot more money building prisons and hiring law enforcement and attorneys to procecute these criminals." This is so profoundly stupid, and against all of those who truly enjoy freedom, that it isn't even worth arguing against.

 

[Grump]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

"As with any prohibited substance, the vast majority of the violence is attributable to the prohibition, not the substance itself."

Well, the alcohol prohibition experiment was politically fueled by stories about the evils of drink itself.

The quote above is demonstrably wrong. Legal alcohol is a "factor" in a rather large number of homicides every year in this great land, and none of your "prohibition" or gangland-related objections have anything to do with it. That drug addles the brain, lowers inhibitions, and unleashes murderous demons.

Take out the "drug violence" that is prohibition-related, and you'll still find that the easiest ways to put yourself in front of a bullet or knife or blunt object to the head generally requires at least one of the following:

A. Getting drunk or loaded;
B. Being around people who are drunk or loaded;
C. Having sex with someone else's wife or husband or boyfriend or girlfriend (last I checked the FBI Uniform Crime Reports [yeah, it has a newer name I don't remember] has a whole separate "love triangle" category for the circumstances of killings), or someone else having sex with YOUR squeeze; or
D. Taking someone else's stuff away from them either in person or by stealth.

C. and D. are quite often combined with A. or B. or both.

I just with the drug legalization lobby would talk honestly about the marginal benefits to overall *violent crime* levels that can be reasonably expected.

Sorry for contributing to the thread drift. Whether you personally agree with the specific law(s) being enforced at the moment, I firmly believe that good citizenship at this stage of the proceedings demands that we close ranks with law enforcement and wish them well, despite their failings and sometimes-misguided actions.

A sense of proportion demands that we recognize that the greatest evil and greatest mistakes made in the Ogden shootout were perpetrated by a bitter and evil man who preferred to make his fortune with a large indoor MJ grow and corresponding sales to dozens of people with a possibly unhealthy attachment to dizziness.

And don't try to stack the statistics with numbers of people who "tried" illegal drugs. Maybe there are reasons other than prohibition why the vast majority of pot-smokers don't do it any more.

Something was different here. Most MJ grow perpetrators don't open fire on the cops.

Let's be careful out there.

 

[eleaf]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">That drug addles the brain, lowers inhibitions, and unleashes murderous demons.</div></div>

Seriously? Demons?

Sounds like someone has been watching a bit too much <span style="font-style: italic">Reefer Madness</span>.

 

[Tunanut]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

Sorry Ballistic, next time I will use my <sarcasim> <end sarcasim/>. It would cost roughly 1.7 Trillion/yr just to punish the monthly users with prison time. Not to mention how much it would cost to build the new prisons to hold the 17 million new customers. Granted, some will call this "job creation." Would someone who thinks mj should remain illegal please tell me how they think this "war on a plant" is going, how many more people are going to die because of it, and how do they think it will end?

 

[old95b10]

Re: 6 officers shot in Utah

Yes Raids are good things!!
Saw one go down for a warrent guy had got caught selling a dime bag!!!! Door kicked down shots fired 3 fuckin kids in the house!!!! All this is better and safer for those we protect.
Never had a shot fired or any one hurt when I picked them up.
Must not have known what I was doing!!!! Hell I brought in Rangers, SF and you name it. Gettin sick of this crap.
COPS aint the be all and end all! From what I have seen in the last 10 years folks on sidewalk are scared of them ,and dont want to speak to them. Goddamn shame if you ask me.
But keep your blackvests on and you will get them back in order!
Subjects should be kept in order.