Mike, thank you for the compliment….well received.
As for what the LEOs did during that protest (yes, peaceful protest with slashing of tires), I simply passed on information provided by a LEO on an aviation forum I’m a member of. Regarding this incident, there’s a very heated ongoing discussion taking place on that site among the pilot group with some being aviation LEOs. Truth is, none of us were in the ready room that morning for the day’s briefing regarding the upcoming protest; we don’t know what was/was not briefed. If vehicles were indeed parked inside the boundaries of a protest zone (media vehicles or other….doesn’t matter), such vehicles have the potential to be used as a deadly weapon by anyone who can/has access to the vehicle, thus turning a peaceful protest into a bloodbath. In the midst of everything that’s going on in this country right now, tensions are high; no excuse, just fact. I’m not advocating what happened as being right or wrong, only passing on what information was passed on to me. However, here’s a thought; if someone wanting to cause bodily harm to protesters that day had been able to access just one of those cars (assuming the car was parked inside a protest zone) and had been able to use it to run over protesters, the tone of the conversation would be quite different.
Having said that, was there any police department push back involved in their actions? I don’t know. Maybe, maybe not…it’s not for me to say…I don’t have the facts. Something else to consider is the article itself, and its author; not the most professionally written article (my words). Here’s an excerpt taken from another forum member's post on the aviation forum….
Questions linger; were these vehicles rentals by members of the media? If so, was the media briefed on where they could/could not park?....etc., etc.
Gun ownership...a whole other issue.