It was still a shit-ton of cruisers. They usually only put two officers at a time in them.

Even if they all rode four to a car, you're still talking fifteen cruisers.

It's not a surprise. I knew a girl who dated a cop. The reason you see five cruisers at the scene of a flat tire or some other minor event is because they're bored and want an excuse to go somewhere and shoot the shit (or people, ba-dum-tish).

Now multiply that by a factor of "hey, there's a-killin' gonna happ'n!" and I'm amazed that there weren't more.

I'd also love to see what the crime stats were for when this army of police weren't where they normally would have been if there hadn't been a rallying call to spontaneous target practice.

They were suspected of shooting at officers. They did not have a gun, so at the very least the two people killed were innocent. It looks like they were, in fact, trying to evade the police but that meant driving directly toward them. It does look like they placed officers in danger with their car, however, the police kept firing long past the point where it made any sense to. Then officer Ereg came in late so they fired another volley into the car so he could be a part of it too.

*innocent of the original charges, I mean.

Blue's right. There's no possibility WHATSOEVER that the weapon was dropped during the chase. If it wasn't in the car, there's no way a gun was ever in that car. Thanks for your expert testimony Blue.

They were being followed the whole time so it isn't likely they ditched it. There were a lot of cops following them and it is very difficult to toss something out of your car while they are following you without it being seen.

Also, they died in the police chase. Why would they successfully ditch the weapon and then keep running?

The cop who jumped on the hood of their car and fired until he was empty, reloaded, and fired again until he was empty - he swore they had a gun. And that was when the chase was over.

If they had anything short of a dirty bomb this was overkill.

This would be overkill on a late season episode of 24, much less reality.

You make the mistake of assuming everyone in the NRA is exactly like their horrible spokespeople. Some people are actual gun owners who (gasp) only use their guns responsibly. What a fucking crazy concept, right?

You know what a spokesperson does? He SPEAKS FOR PEOPLE.

If the NRA does not speak for you, don't remain part of their organization, or else you will rightly be seen as tolerating the crazy at a minimum.

Exactly. You don't have to be in the NRA to be a gun owner, and being in the NRA doesn't mean you're an irresponsible gun owner but it does mean that you're willfully aligning yourself with (and funding, assuming there are membership dues) idiots who make responsible gun owners like you look bad. So best case scenario you're completely out of touch.

I'd call Gmork the Cena Mark of guns, but all gun owners really are big weepy vaginas who collapse into tears at the thought of their one manhood prop being restricted.

Obviously, this is a false flag operation by the Obama administration to confiscate everyone's guns by ordering the police to be reckless and irresponsible thereby furthering their conspiracy to show that even those with training can't be trusted with guns WAKE UP SHEEPLE!

EVEN THE PASSENGER GETS IN TROUBLE

It's apparent that the LAPD has more homicidal sociopaths with delusions of grandeur than just the ex-cop they're chasing.

Right. I was reading an article that purported to reveal Dorner's alarming personality traits (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=171508949). They could have applied to basically any police officer I've ever met. This guy is the norm. He just decided to direct his lethal force in a direction it's not supposed to be.

From what I was told by both friends who sadly became lawyers (I blame their upbringing) as well as those who either tried to become cops or dated/were related to cops, there's a real sociopathic black-and-white mentality they try to screen for and hire.

I'm not saying that this means every cop is a hair-trigger loon, but by and large, they've decided a certain mindset is what's desirable when you're dealing with lots of bad guys on a regular basis.

Unfortunately, it seems that this is one of those "yeah, it works most of the time, but then you get screaming and bodies every so often" things. Coupled with temptation to corruption, policies that encourage lying and violence against the innocent (quotas, closing cases no matter what), it's not a great formula for producing stalwart protectors of justice.