Guntards.net

Calguns member: http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/show … mp;page=24

Here's the problem with Tuason's statements - even aside from his talk about killing gunnies...

He's used the flippant cop phrase "two weeks off" - with the undercurrent implying a reward (vacation) for shooting someone.  It sounds like he knows it's foreordained that any such investigation will come out in his favor, calling into question the whole shooting review process in his city/county.

And with this calling into question the whole shooting review process, this leads to an increase in taxpayer-paid expenses where even the most plainly legitimate usages of deadly force will litigated, just because an opportunity presented itself.

And Det. Tuason's  mentionof 'furtive movements' certainly sounds like a self-coached pretext to shoot and "be covered" - as opposed to a legit shoot being a trained, practiced, near-instinctive reaction to actual danger.  This is the wordplay equivalent to (in the old days) a cop having 'throwdown' or a 'drop iron' gun. 


N.B. -   If the Open Carry folks were to even think of being remotely useful, they would have all applied for CCWs in the city/ county in which they reside -- and, if and when denied issuance, pursuing the application thru any and all administrative remedies in the appropriate timeframes until final brick wall was hit.   Then, if popped after incorporation, things can get interesting...



Bill Wiese
San Jose CA

Last edited by bwiese (2010-02-10 12:46:22)

Well, our good friend Michael Zeleny has been going around claiming that carrying a gun visibly is a form of speech, and as such protected by the first amendment.  Which is why he is so interested in Pruneyard.

I find his argument specious.  If that were true, then any action that conveys a message to everyone becomes "speech", and the whole criminal justice system falls apart.  Just an example: Henry Bech (think Updike) kills the newpaper hacks who panned his books to make a statement about literary criticism, and fathers a child on a young lady to make a statement about how the infirmity of old age relates to the vitality of young age (and because the chick blackmailed him into sex, with her knowledge of the murders he committed).  By this line of reasoning, both murder and statuatory rape are constitutionally protected speech?  I don't think so.  (By the way, the book ends with Bech, now a literary hero as all his detractors are dead by his own doing, getting the Nobel price for literature, and accepting it while holding and burping a newborn; it's incredibly amusing).

Getting back to (soon-to-be-ex?) officer Tuason: His facebook comments are indeed incredibly stupid - and there are now two reasons why he has to quickly be stripped of his LEO state: First, he thinks of himself as above the law, and even above basic human rights (he can shoot and kill people with flimsy excuses).  Second, if the EPA PD keeps him, and doesn't make it very clear that they don't endorse his viewpoint by firing him for cause, then any good shoot (and there is enough crime in EPA, they'll have to do good shoots occasionally) becomes a terribly attractive lawsuit target, as Bill points out.

And about cops having a throwdown gun, here is a joke I heard from my BiL (who lives in Chicago).  The joke builds upon a true fact: Recently, an actual mountain lion was spotted in the city of Chicago.  Anycase, the police is called out, they hunt down the lion, and shoot it.  As the corpse of the lion is lying there, and before the press shows up, one officer quickly goes up to it, and carefully places a gun next to its front paw.  The sergeant calls him over, and says "Look Paddy, in this case you really don't have to do that".

But then, Chicago police is a world unto itself.

Last edited by treelogger (2010-02-10 15:15:00)

treelogger wrote:

Well, our good friend Michael Zeleny has been going around claiming that carrying a gun visibly is a form of speech, and as such protected by the first amendment.  Which is why he is so interested in Pruneyard.

I find his argument specious.  If that were true, then any action that conveys a message to everyone becomes "speech", and the whole criminal justice system falls apart.  Just an example: Henry Bech (think Updike) kills the newpaper hacks who panned his books to make a statement about literary criticism, and fathers a child on a young lady to make a statement about how the infirmity of old age relates to the vitality of young age (and because the chick blackmailed him into sex, with her knowledge of the murders he committed).  By this line of reasoning, both murder and statuatory rape are constitutionally protected speech?  I don't think so.  (By the way, the book ends with Bech, now a literary hero as all his detractors are dead by his own doing, getting the Nobel price for literature, and accepting it while holding and burping a newborn; it's incredibly amusing).

I found your counterexample specious. Any action that conveys a message to everyone is speech, but not all speech is Constitutionally protected. Think of yelling fire in a crowded theater, coming well short of murder and statutory rape.

Ralph, there is no legally cognizable distinction between "speech" in the purest form (words and sentences), and actions. Actions intended to communicate "messages of shared ideology" are protected under the First Amendment. For an extreme example, consider Virginia v. Black et al., 538 U.S. 343 (2003). This is not to say that any kind of action can automatically qualify as expressive conduct, q.v. Barnes v. Glen Theatre, Inc., 501 U.S. 560 (1991).