Here is the latest police shooting in my neck of the woods.
UPDATE: Manhunt continues for police shooting suspect - Breaking News, Local News, Local Weather, Local Sports
A police officer, an excellent one apparently, pulls over an SUV and is shot multiple times by the driver, who is at large in a wooded area of coastal Oregon and being hunted by SWAT teams. The officer is in the hospital, survival uncertain. It was apparently a routine traffic stop, like the dozens he probably did every week. The suspect was a normal-looking white guy. Every and any contact an officer makes with a member of the public can potentially end with his death. When we put soldiers in that situation for limited tour of duty in Iraq or Vietnam, the result is that sometimes people are killed who maybe shouldn't have been, by young men who we nonetheless respect, as a group, for their service. When we put police officers in that situation for year after year, I believe it is unrealistic for us to expect that the same thing won't sometimes happen, and unjustified for us to withhold our respect for that group of men.