All cops are not bastards – but this one was

We had a classic Friday news dump last week. A Portland cop who behaved extremely badly during the riots two years ago is not going be prosecuted for committing an obvious unjustified assault, right on camera. His name is Craig Lehman. 

That's Mr. Tough Guy with his back to the camera. He's about to shove the guy in the reflector vest on the right, from behind, with great force and knock him hard to the ground. Even the cop facing the camera is horrified, and he gestures to Lehman to stop.

OPB has an excellent version of the story, which you probably didn't see, here. It includes the video.

What bothers me most is the rationale for letting the matter slide: The officer in question was hungry and tired. Boo hoo, he needed a Snickers bar. And that gave him a license to just slam a guy?

This is why they riot, folks. This.

After our boy wonder D.A., Mike Schmidt (lifetime batting average .046), indicted anther policeman for similar behavior, the local force went on a de facto strike and hasn't really showed up for work since. I guess Mikey's decided to play along with the union for a while, to try to salvage his career. 

Most likely it will be a short while, because any credible alternative is going to crush Schmidt the next time he's up for re-election. I believe that's in '24. It can't come soon enough for me.