Keep policing and politicing separate

The use of force by police is something the nation continues to wrestle with. This comes in the wake of highly publicized shootings of unarmed men by police, something we have seen recently in both Wisconsin and Minnesota. Now some lawmakers in Madison think Wisconsin’s police officers should change their tactics. Rep. Chris Taylor of Madison is working on a bill she plans to introduce in the next legislative session which would tighten the standards for the use of deadly force. Her bill would set specific standards for when deadly force by police can be justified. Typically, such cases rely on the objective reasonableness standard, established by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1989. That standard basically gives police the right to use deadly force if they believe the suspect poses an imminent danger to themselves or others. Taylor thinks that is too broad. She also wants to emphasize more de-escalation tactics during police training. But the fact is, police work is hard work. Police have a lot to consider, sometimes making split second decisions in a life-or-death situation. Police go through thousands of hours of training throughout their career. They want the situation to be resolved without incident, and typically work hard to make that happen. Those officer who make the wrong decision need to be held accountable of course. But lets let the police do the police work, and keep the politics out of it.