“We don’t understand what’s the law,” one league member complained. “The league’s been going on for years, and all of a sudden it’s against the law?”

This is what happens when tyranny is afoot the tryants and their lackeys make up the rules as they go along.

While I’ll cop (no pun intended here) to my comments about the Messinas as being less than, shall we say, couth, I still stand firmly by my assertion that they are as responsible for their son’s death as the cop who put the fatal shot into him. For any Amerikan parent in this day and age –an age of rampant, systematic, and in-your-face violence practiced by those who claim to “protect and serve”– to put their child in harm’s way by forcing an encounter with these predatory creatures is the very epitome of reckless endangerment. In an ideal universe in which justice and reason prevailed (unlike the one in which we are unfortunate enough to now find ourselves), the Messinas, their obvious and understandable grief at their loss notwithstanding, would still be held to answer for the reckless negligence that caused their son’s unnecessary death in the first place, just as the cowardly and psychotic cop who callously and recklessly fired the fatal shot would held to answer for murder (or at the very least, manslaughter). But of course there’s a greater chance of Andrew Messina arising from the grave than of any kind of justice emerging from this tragedy.

What is it going to take, people? How many more innocents (especially innocent children) are going to die at the hands of the neo-Waffen SS before 1) so-called “adults” wake up to reality and cure their rectal-cranial inversion and 2) those who have already awakened decided that ENOUGH IS FINALLY ENOUGH? Dare we hope that maybe, just maybe, this incident can be the proverbial spark that ignites the haystack, the catalyst for that change? Let us hope so. I don’t EVER want to read or hear about another Andrew Messina again!

“Had that officer not taken the action, there is a good chance one of those negotiators that was there who also has a family, also would not be going home before supper,” Garrison said.

Perfectly understandable in that light. The sniper had to act fast to resolve the situation before dinner got cold.

* They responded to a suicidal teen with a tank, sniper, and riot shields
* They cut the line, on which his father was attempting to talk him down, and replaced it with someone shouting belligerent orders
* They ignored pleas from both sides to put the father back on
* They shot him while he was facing away from him
* The chief then struts about how it was a ‘Good shoot’, and how it was all the victim’s fault. Bonus points for trotting out the “Our officers have families they want to go home to.” Implication as usual, better 100 dead innocents than 1 dead cop.

Only thing missing was for them to tie poor Andrew’s body to the hood of a squad car afterward.

Your words, Hoss, not mine. It is said that Beria wept as he filled out the lists of those to be executed in Stalin’s purges. Do those tears mean Beria wasn’t a psychopath? Just a sensitive, gentle soul who ruthlessly ordered & arranged for the deaths of millions? Oh! Well then! Problem solved!

Notwithstanding your remarkably blatant attempt to have it both ways, I think we’ll leave the final word on this to the late great Douglas Adams. “If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have to at least consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family anatidae on our hands.” Same with psycho cops, say I. (LOL)

I’m not sure arguing with you is worth it anymore (LOL), but here goes (LOL).

First, do you know what a pyschopath is? Can you provide me with a standard definition that would be widely accepted by, say, psychologists who actually study real psychopaths. I noticed in your post you used the terms psychopath/psychopathic, but at one point also you also said “non-pyschotic.” This suggests to me that you may not be familiar with the difference. Psychosis is not the same as psychopathy. A person with psychosis would be out of touch with reality. A psychopath is not delusional, but instead has a total lack of empathy for others.

Though psychopathy is more prevalent in our society than we would like to think, the aforementioned Dr. Hare (perhaps the most recognized current expert on psychopathy) estimates that about 3-4% of the population may qualify as a psychopath. There are places where psychopathic personalities congregate: prisons, for one. And, I have also come to the conclusion, unfortunately, that psychopathy is probably more present in policing than some other areas. I also think that psychopathic personalities–based on the actual commonly accepted cluster of signs/symptoms–are overrepresented in politics and in the ranks of corporate managers.

With this being said, I stand by my statement that most cops are probably not psychopaths. However, some people–in their institutional roles–are essentially trained to act like psychopaths (cops who participate in cover-ups, corporate executives who rationalize horrific actions based on the profit motive). This is the larger problem. And as for your reference to the NYPD cannibal guy, I never, ever made the “bad apples claim,” so kindly tear down that strawman.

Too true. That’s why “left” and “right” mean very little to me. The majority has an unshakeable faith in government as the solution to all problems, and in many cases, they agree on what those problems are (i.e., prohibition of everything they don’t personally enjoy). When the “left” is pro-war, and the “right” is for massive bailouts and entitlements, who could take such a paradigm seriously?

Re: the sports chart, I couldn’t find any mention of boxing. Maybe it’s been subsumed into the MMA category.

The vast (but ever-shrinking) majority of the public still sees cops as good guys – that’s why Andrew’s parents called them for help: they thought the good guys “trained for situations like that” would be able to talk some sense into the boy & peacefully defuse the situation – but for those who pay attention, or read this blog & others like it, it’s crystal clear that’s not the case. From rampant militarization to ever-more blatant brutality disguised as ‘procedures for officer safety’ to killing the first dog they see….cops are psychopaths. Simple as that. And as for the standard blanket “defense” (LOL) that ‘most cops aren’t psychopathic’ (“Most NYPD cops aren’t planning to murder and eat random women! Just a few bad apples!”)….how do you know ‘most of ‘em are OK’? How exactly do you KNOW this??

Consider just 2 things: 1) a semi-reasonable estimate would be that for every one story of police brutality/misconduct/corruption that gets reported, there are probably at least 500 that *don’t* get reported. So what we know of cop thuggery is _actually about .02%_ of what’s really out there. 2) all these ‘non-psychotic’ cops: they all still adhere to the Blue Wall of Silence Code of Omerta, don’t they? Meaning even if *they* didn’t actually gun down the dog/innocent bystander/unarmed guy and then drop a throw-down piece on the body, they know damn well the shooter cop did. Yet they almost always say…..nothing. Then they help delete the on-car video. What do you call someone who covers for & hides the crimes of a psychopath? No….not “an enabler”….

The word in question….. the *Legal Concept* here is “accomplice.”

That’s not a ridiculous irrational generalization at all.

Seconded Omar!

Hey liberranter, not everyone reads The Agitator or other sources that continuously document the routine abuses of law enforcement. Plenty of people out there would have made the same assumption as these parents. Most people don’t think the police are armed psychopaths. And while they are armed, most officers are certainly not psychopaths. Don’t overuse the word please. Hell, with calloused, glib comments like that, people might confuse YOU for a psychopath. Feel free to read “Without Conscience” by Dr. Robert Hare in order to develop a more informed view of who is and isn’t a psychopath.

Very few people would consider themselves to be libertarians or anarchists. And if libertarians conduct themselves like you just did, this is unlikely to change. Maybe you don’t care. Maybe it’s all about purity tests and stone cold logic for you. Fine. Go live on an island or some gated community that will keep the “rabble” (read: all non-believers) out.

But most of us want to engage with other people and persuade them of the wisdom of making this society more libertarian. And it will be really hard to do that if people associate the freedom movement with dicks.

RIP, Andrew. My condolences on your choice of parents. It’s a wonder that either one of them survived beyond the age you were when you were murdered.

This is a pretty vile thing to say to someone who just lost their kid.

Apparently Lisa and Nick Messina have only recently rejoined (what passes for) the civilized world, having lived either on another planet or in a cave for the last several years. Otherwise, assuming that both are of at least average intelligence, they would have known better than to even CONSIDER requesting the services of armed psychopaths to talk their suicidal son out of killing himself (I mean, c’mon folks, seriously – chew on that for a second).

RIP, Andrew. My condolences on your choice of parents. It’s a wonder that either one of them survived beyond the age you were when you were murdered.