A few weeks ago: "regime change is bad" was updated to "regime change is good". This was a great success, so now new updates are being released.
Now, there is a new update: "must not be infringed" now means "if you're carrying a concealed gun at a protest, you are a domestic terrorist and will be summarily executed after being disarmed and restrained."
Please prepare for your next update, due to be released in a couple of months. In "We oppose Middle Eastern quagmires", strike the word 'oppose' and insert 'support'.
Thank you for your attention to this matter, and remember to keep trusting the plan.
I think Pretti was a bad shoot.
I also think there is no reality in which a law enforcement agency engages in tens of thousands of tense interactions with deliberately provocative protestors over the course of several weeks and no one gets shot.
So where does fault lie?
With the democrat politicians who first flooded the country with illegal aliens and then organized and inflamed their voters into open rebellion against border/immigration enforcement. Democrats knew the math. They wanted bodies.
Agreed wholeheartedly. But instead of being upfront and honest about that reality, many are trying to frame it as the shooting was justified because he had a gun. I think that needs to be nipped in the bud whenever possible.
Another consideration is the unfortunate reality that the American people are probably too stupid to understand the nuanced reality, so from a PR standpoint digging in one's heels and pretending there was no wrongdoing may have been the correct move.
Sticky situation overall. When the initial backlash has died down I think there should be an investigation and if they want to claim the officer thought the guy reached for the gun, that's one thing, but I don't think it's good for them to maintain it's justified because he had a gun.
Also it is hard to shake the feeling that everytbing is being handled this way to achieve a poor results to backlash ratio so that they lose the midterms without making all that much ground on deportations.
It's not just "he had a gun." It's also where and when he "had a gun." "Had a gun" is a funny kind of re-framing of "Armed himself before wading into a conflict."
Those are very different things.
I think having a gun in such a situation is and should be protected by the Constitution though. Don't get me wrong, I'm not losing sleep over it. He was almost undoubtedly a terrible person. But the administration needs to get its messaging right.
It is protected. Just because it is protected, doesn't make it not a bad idea, and the fact that it is protected doesn't mean you're not a piece of shit for exercising that right in bad faith. It's for self-defense. This doesn't cover aggression. If you're armed for aggression, it's not self-defense.