Only a cowardly man would “taser” a woman.

What happened to policemen who were “men”, and not chickens?

I have heard her but not in the pieces you describe. I’ll look those up. These are genuinely scary times!

Are you familiar with Naomi Wolf? Some of her talks have been recorded on YouTuube. Her “End of America” lecture is scarier than Halloween III. There’s also another interview on YouTube that’s more up to date and beyond scary. When I listen to her I keep hoping she’s crazy, but I don’t think she is.

Here is the link:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/09/24/army/

Here’s a whole ‘nother set of tools for the toolbox. This time the ARMY will use them on our population: (Glenn Greenwald, Sept. 24)

“Several bloggers today have pointed to this obviously disturbing article from Army Times, which announces that “beginning Oct. 1 for 12 months, the [1st Brigade Combat Team of the 3rd Infantry Division] will be under the day-to-day control of U.S. Army North” — “the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment to NorthCom, a joint command established in 2002 to provide command and control for federal homeland defense efforts and coordinate defense support of civil authorities.” The article details:…
They may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios such as massive poisoning and chaos in response to a chemical, biological, adiological, nuclear or high-yield explosive, or CBRNE, attack. . . .

*** The 1st BCT’s soldiers also will learn how to use “the first ever nonlethal package that the Army has fielded,” 1st BCT commander Col. Roger Cloutier said, referring to crowd and traffic control equipment and nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals without killing them.

“It’s a new modular package of nonlethal capabilities that they’re fielding. They’ve been using pieces of it in Iraq, but this is the first time that these modules were consolidated and this package fielded, and because of this mission we’re undertaking we were the first to get it.”

The package includes equipment to stand up a hasty road block; spike strips for slowing, stopping or controlling traffic; shields and batons; and, beanbag bullets.

The brigade will not change its name, but the force will be known for the next year as a CBRNE Consequence Management Response Force,…”

I am confident that most LE situations resulting in escalated anger, violence, etc., could be avoided with a LEO’s proper employment of verbal and body language skills.

I would withhold any statements of “deserved what she got” until we learned from the other witnesses (and possibly a dashboard camera) that she did indeed charge. This was, by the officer’s own admission, a confusing situation. Even assuming the officer is describing events as he perceived them to be happening, eyewitness testimony isn’t 100% reliable, including that of witnesses who happen to be cops. There are some discrepancies, if the officer was going to grab her and she charged him, how did he get the taser up quick enough to use it? If he went to grab her, he probably was within a few arm-lengths. Also I’m sure the officer had been trained in several “holds” that would have been applicable in the situation.

Also why was it necessary to taser her not just once, but three times before handcuffing her? If Tasers are so ineffective that they require multiple uses to subdue this woman, then the police officers would be less likely to use them in situations where their lives were at jeopardy.