Ok, so I wanna try and help folks maybe take a step back from the current narrative about the actions of USCP on Wednesday. I haven’t spoken to any of the officers nor have I read any of the reports, so I’m speaking only from videos I’ve watched & my own LE/PPD experience 1/

A lot of folks are wondering why the cops seem to be acting so politely to the insurrectionists. The popular narrative is that it’s because these criminals were almost exclusively white. I won’t try to deny that may have played some role in the actions of individual officers 2/

But, I am seeing things differently & believe there is a much simpler and more basic explanation: they were trying not to die. Because of complete failures by LE leadership, the LE presence in the Capitol complex was woefully understaffed/resourced for what ended up happening 3/

Imagine being outnumbered 20:1 by an angry mob. Had that been in a combat environment, you may well have seen a massacre of epic proportions because the ROE are completely different in the two situations. So you’re a 32 year old cop. You have your sidearm which holds 16 rds 4/

and you’ve got 2-3 extra 15 rd magazines. In one of the famous scenes in the Wyatt Earp ethos, he faces off a mob trying to issue some street justice to a man he is guarding at jail. Earp freely admits that they’ll get him in a rush, but not until he takes 5-6 of them with 5/

him. That’s essentially the situation these officers faced Wed. Sure they could’ve indiscriminately opened fire but it’s likely they’d have been swarmed by the mob & killed w/their own weapons thus arming the thugs. All bad. Even if they do survive, they’re facing federal 6/

death penalty convictions for premeditated murder. They simply didn’t have authority to fire until lives were actually threatened. Which is when they did fire. But if you’ve ever worked as a bouncer or cop in an environment where it’s you and a small crowd of bad guys, you 7/

come to realize that sometimes the best answer is to keep things calm by posing for selfies and trying not to initiate an escalation in conflict. That’s what I see in this video. I see a bunch of LE who completely understood the tactical situation & realized that it would be 8/

better to be judged for the selfie in the media and online than it would be to risk pissing off a mob who outnumbers you 20:1 or more. Better to be judged by 6 than killed by 1. As for why they opened the barriers and “let them in”...what I see is them signaling to an overrun 9/

group of LE officers to do a tactical retreat to regroup to a better defensive position. This is bolstered by the stand they ended up taking in the rotunda before they were completely overrun again. Maybe there were some individual officers who were traitors to their oaths 10/

but I just can’t get on board with that being a wholesale reason when all is said and done. Full investigations will be done and every officer on duty will be interviewed multiple times by different people and assessments made about their actions. But, if any of us are being 11/

honest and we had a chance to be nice to a group of insurrectionists or end up in a firefight and charged with murder or dead. We would all make smart business decisions because our fundamental nature requires we pursue the most effective path to surviving any given moment. 12/

So I’m not going to try and demand that you give folks a break and I’m not gonna argue with you about your deep-seeded feelings about law enforcement. You follow me because of my access to information and my analytical abilities. That’s what I’m offering here. A chance to 13/

believe the better of a few options about your fellow man and a chance to benefit from a different worldview and set of life experiences. Where officers did act inappropriately they should be held fully accountable. Any traitors should absolutely face the death penalty. But, 14/

we are more likely dealing with a bunch of officers who were really scared and managed to limit things to a two intentional lives lost in a very dire security situation. That’s actually pretty impressive when you think about how many opportunities there were for things to 15/

go WAY more sideways than they did. It took a lot of nerve and courage to not simply do the easy thing and shoot their way out (I share your feelings about the officer-involved shooting travesties we’ve all witnessed & I’m NOT talking about those incidents or 16/

types of incidents, so please don’t start) but we’d be counting dead in the dozens. Including some lawmakers quite likely. Like I said, I’m not here to argue with anyone I’m just giving my $.02. Take it or leave it. I said what I said. But I’ve taken some time to reflect 17/

and I really think we should be commending the actions of the officers who were able to navigate a security nightmare with almost no loss of life. Let’s try and view it from the positive side while investigations continue - Jack 18/18