Reason Writers Around Town: Radley Balko Discusses SWAT Teams and Drug Raids With Vice Magazine

Yesterday, Reason Senior Editor Radley Balko sat down for an IM interview with Vice magazine. The topic was police militarization, SWAT teams, and the Columbia, Missouri drug raid that become a YouTube sensation last week.

Read the interview here.

Comments

[Jommy Joey]

Isnt it sad. After watching a video like that, it makes me rejoice every time some stupid cop gets clipped in the line of duty!

Lou
http://www.total-anonymity.se.tc

[Joe_D]

And, as posted in response to the original video:

Anonymous, on May 13, 2010 wrote:
It is stupid punk cops like this that makes me (and a lot of others) rejoice everytime some stupid cop gets clipped in the line of duty!

Lou
http://www.total-anonymity.se.tc

[Max]

When a SWAT team saves some innocent life, Balko closes his eyes and holds his hands over his ears likie some fucking see-no-contrary-evidence losertarin monkey. You asshole anti-cop fanatics can stick your idiotic market-worshiping ideology up your fat asses.

[ClubMedSux]

Yes, clearly Radley is arguing for no SWAT teams EVER under ANY circumstances. Reading comprehension: A+!

[Libertymike]

I am.

[The Gobbler]

Hello Shit Facktory!

[Lower GI tract]

I take offense to that comment.

[The Gobbler]

How so?

[CaptainSmartass]

Not bad. Your post manages to combine a strawman, reducto absurdum, and several ad hominems. Now if you could only throw in a little "poisoning of the well" you'd score a 100% on the Trollometer. As it is, it just barely gets to 82%.

Keep up the good work, you'll get there.

[joshua corning]

I think anyone would agree if say there is a known murderer hold up with hostages randy would not have a problem using SWAT. I know i wouldn't

If you watch the video you see a guy with his family asleep with a couple of house pets. There is absolutely no reason two detectives with a back of 2 more beat officers could not have knocked on the door at say 7:30 in the morning and peaceably served the search warrant on an unarmed pot smoker with no violent criminal record.

[Kool]

Didn't we establish that "Max" is Epi's little brother who is just angry because mommy loved Epi more and Epi would never play catch with him?

Weakest Troll Ever.

[Xeones]

Kool: Max is merely the latest incarnation of Edward/Lefiti/Morris/Forrest, Hit'n'Run's oldest and least intelligent troll.

[Kool]

Xeones, thanks for the clarification. I was going to join Big Brothers and take him for ice cream.

And then leave him in the woods.

I suppose ignoring him will have to do.

[Warty]

Didn't he have another name, too?

[Citizen Nothing]

His name is Legion

[Dr Duck]

Mine too

[Xeones]

I was going to join Big Brothers and take him for ice cream.

You could still take Max out for ice cream, if he hadn't been banned from pretty much every every food court in the land for violent public masturbation.

[Xeones]

Didn't he have another name, too?

I thought so, but i couldn't for the life of me remember what it was, and he is definitely not worth the effort of research.

[Warty]

Xeones, I commend you for you effort, homey, but it's time to face the inevitable and start using threaded comments. You lost this one, dogg.

[Pro Libertate]

Screw that shit. Keep up the fight, Xeones.

Yes, I know, but I'm not strong like X.

[Xeones]

Warty, yours is a funeral i'd fly to from anywhere, but with all due respect i don't have to face jack shit.

I will not break. I will not bend. If more people were willing to stand as unflinchingly against the little manifestations of tyranny as i am against this minor internet annoyance, we wouldn't need this website.

[Warty]

Your resolve is about as impressive as your micropenis, X. Meanwhile, the rest of us are going to keep licking Reason's delicious, delicious boots.

[CaptainSmartass]

I have to ask, what is people's problems with threading? Without it, comments could be in response to pretty much anything, just total chaos. At least this way you have some semblance of order.

[Warty]

We had conventions, n00b. Conventions that your n00b brain couldn't begin to comprehend. Don't investigate if you want to keep your sanity.

[Pro Libertate]

I'd blockquote or italicize whatever I was responding to. I might even address the previous commenter by name, adding a level of civility lost in this modern, yet oddly primitive, culture.

[Warty]

Those were the days, weren't they? How I miss them.

[Pro Libertate]

Yesiree. Why, I recall back in, oh, Aught-Three or so, we all had to fly to California and write our comments on a giant scroll.

[seanrude]

HEY YOU KIDS GET OFF MY LAWN!

[R C Dean]

Without it, comments could be in response to pretty much anything, just total chaos.

In sharp contrast to the current threads, I suppose.

[Pro Libertate]

I must not thread. Threading is the mind-killer. Threading is the little-death that brings total obfuscation. I will snub your thread. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the thread has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

[CrackertyAssCracker]

We don't need your oppressive nanny state fucking threading man. Sorry if your communinist little pea brain can't follow a narrative without it threading.

[Xeones]

Stand with me, Pro Lib, Cracker. We are not beaten yet.

[Warty]

Xeones, what is your profession?

[Xeones]

Xeones, what is your profession?

HA-OOH! HA-OOH! HA-OOH!

[T]

Does that mean circus chimp, or did I lose something in translation?

[Michael]

Hey, who the hell left anon-bot's cage open?

[Pro Libertate]

I should stand with you, Xeones. For each day that this nested, threaded atrocity continues I grow more angry.