The Guardian has been maintaining The Count, a running tally of the number of people killed by cops in America this year, and the number as of today is 515. The Guardian took on this task largely because America has never taken the responsibility to do this itself.
My understanding is this Count is what motivated Congress to introduce legislation to mandate transparency regarding these killings but I have not verified that. The current status of that legislation is unknown.
The Washington Post has also been running a similar program to that of The Guardian but the numbers are significantly different and the breakdown by race of those killed is radically different.
The conclusion I draw from the disparity is that no-one really has a full knowledge of how many people have been killed by cops this year and you can write your own editorial for the outrage of that.
The number of killings by cops is claimed to be justified based on the number of cops killed by so-called criminals and, as you will discover below, that number is wildly-exaggerated by the GOP.
Yesterday it was claimed a thousand cops have died in the line of duty this year and thanks for the contribution from the GOP tool who wrote it but that number is exaggerated by a factor of twenty as the actual number is 56: Officer Down Memorial Page.
If you review what killed these officers, you will find a large percentage were killed in automobile crashes, some by accidental discharge of a weapon (i.e. self-inflicted), others by heart attacks, and the remainder of fourteen cops were killed by gunfire. Add two more if you wish to include cops who shot themselves as a result of an accidental discharge of the weapon.
When the actual number of cops killed is used relative to the number claimed yesterday, the exaggeration is by a factor of over fifty. As always, the GOP is first with the facts, especially when those facts are utter hogwash.
If you prefer a heavier dose of propaganda, here's a CNS News report on 38 Police Officers Killed in Line of Duty Since Jan. 1. This one is a beauty as there's a paragraph for each cop who was killed by criminals, all seven of them, and then a tiny section at the end which summarizes all the others were killed in car crashes, by heart attacks, etc.
My understanding is this Count is what motivated Congress to introduce legislation to mandate transparency regarding these killings but I have not verified that. The current status of that legislation is unknown.
The Washington Post has also been running a similar program to that of The Guardian but the numbers are significantly different and the breakdown by race of those killed is radically different.
The conclusion I draw from the disparity is that no-one really has a full knowledge of how many people have been killed by cops this year and you can write your own editorial for the outrage of that.
The number of killings by cops is claimed to be justified based on the number of cops killed by so-called criminals and, as you will discover below, that number is wildly-exaggerated by the GOP.
Yesterday it was claimed a thousand cops have died in the line of duty this year and thanks for the contribution from the GOP tool who wrote it but that number is exaggerated by a factor of twenty as the actual number is 56: Officer Down Memorial Page.
If you review what killed these officers, you will find a large percentage were killed in automobile crashes, some by accidental discharge of a weapon (i.e. self-inflicted), others by heart attacks, and the remainder of fourteen cops were killed by gunfire. Add two more if you wish to include cops who shot themselves as a result of an accidental discharge of the weapon.
When the actual number of cops killed is used relative to the number claimed yesterday, the exaggeration is by a factor of over fifty. As always, the GOP is first with the facts, especially when those facts are utter hogwash.
If you prefer a heavier dose of propaganda, here's a CNS News report on 38 Police Officers Killed in Line of Duty Since Jan. 1. This one is a beauty as there's a paragraph for each cop who was killed by criminals, all seven of them, and then a tiny section at the end which summarizes all the others were killed in car crashes, by heart attacks, etc.
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