The Mounties

CBC reports that BC Attorney General Wally Oppal is saying they might re-visit the question of laying charges against the four RCMP officers who killed Robert Dziekanski at the Vancouver Airport in October 2007.

Alison at Creekside is already on top of the story, stating that Oppal has just realized an election is coming up and that's the source of his hints about actually seeing that justice is done. Furthermore, these "hints" are actually pretty empty statements. Oppal claims that he's only speculating about theoretical possibilities because there's nothing in the Inquiry that hasn't built upon the discrepancies between the RCMP's initial lies and the citizen video recording, which in Oppals' twisted worldview, weren't enough to justify laying charges.

I'm not sure how clueless Oppal is. It's possible that (as Alison says) he didn't think that there'd be a political cost for covering up for this example of the RCMP's thuggishness and now the reaction to the Braidwood Inquiry has opened his eyes. Is Oppal really so fucking stupid that he thought Canadians were so enraptured with the "Musical Ride," "Dudley Do-Right," "Due South" and "Nelson Eddie" that they would give the RCMP a pass on inflicting torture and death on a distraught man who came as a guest to this country?

I guess Oppal is that fucking clueless and stupid. Given that he imagines his half-assed blatherings might calm an enraged electorate.

Those four goons should be fired and prosecuted.

And here's what I have to say about them. I don't like the present institution of police forces in our society, but I recognize there's a need for some sort of professional law enforcement. The police we have didn't create the system that we all live with and they're not all thugs. But there has to be a realization that the more the police get it into their heads that they're a "thin blue line" saving a corrupt and contemptible humanity from itself, the more they'll behave like a pack of bullies who the public fears and hates.

I don't think that cowardice was the motivating factor in what Robinson, Millington, Rundel and Bentley did that fateful day. I think it was mostly laziness. Here's a big guy, obviously in a bad mood, let's electrocute him, turn him into compliant jelly and get him handcuffed and the hell out of here. Negotiation? Too hard. Physically escorting him from the building? Too hard. Simpler just to torture him into submission.

I've said it before. I'd be perfectly willing to debate my position with any four of the constables in question. Should tempers become heated I'm prepared to get physical. My only proviso is that I get body armour and three similarly armoured friends, and we all have tasers. And constables Robinson, Millington, Rundel and Bentley have to face us all alone, and unprotected. It seemed fair to them in a different set of circumstances.