The Thick Black Line

In the aftermath of the Virginia Tech debacle, much has been said and written about the police response. Or lack thereof. Vox Day had a rather thought-provoking little blurb about the phenomenon over on his blog a while back.

Without detracting from Vox's blog entry on the subject, one cannot help but wonder which the SWAT teams are more afraid of -- the nutcase with a weapon, or the idiot bureaucrats and their penchant for playing Monday morning quarterback? When every move by the police is removed from context and placed under a microscope and examined ad nauseam, it should surprise no one that they second-guess themselves into paralysis.

There was a case some years ago of some kook who was standing on a street corner, brandishing a Japanese sword. Naturally, the police were called. (Imagine that!) The usual nonsense ensued until ELEVEN HOURS LATER, he was brought down by a bean bag round from a shotgun. Eleven hours. Had any of us normal people been there, that stand-off would surely not have lasted eleven minutes. At any rate, no longer than it would take to load the aforementioned shotgun with a bean bag round while issuing ONE verbal warning.

Perhaps the great tragedy is that Americans have allowed themselves to be cowed into submission to the point where they're terrified of doing the obviously right thing.