Billo left another pro-taser comment in a previous post [LINK]. I really dislike 'comment wars' because they're too much of a time-sink for too little benefit. But I do enjoy shredding pro-taser arguments.
Billo billo billo...
What am I to do with you? (By the way, any response to [LINK]?)
The paper you referenced reveals the sad, sad state of the "science" surrounding tasers. The "science" is immature in the extreme, and rife with external (internal?) influences. It is also based on a house of cards of early taser 'science' built by Taser fan-boys before the issue was noted by others.
The referenced paper has 38 explicitly listed assumptions, and hundreds more implicit ones. One of the worst assumptions is the utter crudeness of their computer model as compared to the human body. By my estimation, the detailed structure human body is probably about 100,000 times more complex than their crude-by-comparison finite element model (FEM). Their model assumes isotropic blocks of a number of tissue types which leads to predictions of a smooth distribution of current. Not included are any small details such as veins, arteries, nerves, and the millions of other small detail that make a human body distinct from a Ken-doll.
In high-current electrocutions (power lines, not tasers) the outcome is normally not broad sections of cooked meat (as this type of computer model would indicate). The outcome is often a current track (often just one), a thin wire-like path of burnt tissue, running from entry point to exit point. This current track indicates that the current primarily followed a distinct path, and was not distributed in smooth waves though each chunk of tissue. The smooth distribution of current shown in this paper does not jive with this well-known reality. And there is nothing to suggest that the taser would be any different.
Also of note, this thesis contains material literally cut-and-paste from the mothership Taser. Not just for reference, but as input.
The findings are ludicrous and (given the numbers) even one taser-associated death linked to the taser as a contributing cause of death would reveal the paper's conclusions to be incorrect or overstated. Since we have many more than one clear examples (about 30 [?] at last count, including a $6.2 judgment), the real world is not explained by this "science".
Let me summarize it this way. If your computer model predicted that a prototype automobile was going to get a million miles per gallon, would you believe it?
G.I.G.O.
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Billo. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Billo. Sort by date Show all posts
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Monday, June 30, 2008
Billo talks of 'naked skinny guys'
Billo wrote: "The bottom line is that to induce ventricular fibrillation, it is necessary to get the probe very close to the myocardium. That means, essentially, that it is necessary to shoot a naked skinny guy between ribs in the lower chest on the left just next to the sternum."
Taser proudly states that the taser can penetrate up to two inches of insulating clothing using the 50kV arc phase to generate an ionized path. They claim that the device works in exactly the same manner up to this two inch limit. Therefore the words 'naked skinny' are in direct contradiction to the manufacturer's product specification and claims. In this instance I believe that Taser is correct and Billo's statement ("naked skinny") is therefore obviously not correct.
Also, once the current enters the body, it will travel in a path (or paths) set by Kirchhoff's circuit laws. And anyone that claims to have made a computer model of the human body sufficiently complicated to achieve an accurate outcome, complete with Monte Carlo variations of all variables... I seriously doubt it. And the current path can be set with only one dart landing in a critical area. The second dart placement would be less critical by those same circuit laws.
IIRC, Taser has made tests that demonstrate the superior accuracy of the taser of the similar products from Stinger Systems. In other words, if the officer aims at the chest, the top barb is likely to land on the chest. To claim multi-million odds of having a dart land in the sensitive location is simply very poor math. A subject would have to be 10m wide and 10m tall to get a 0ne-square cm location into the 1-in-a-million odds. And that assumes that the aim is random. It is just nonsense.
And finally, if you're now admitting that the taser waveform is capable of causing ventricular fibrillation and that a major part of the safety factor is simply dart placement (literally, the luck of the draw), then we are finding something that we can agree on.
Consider your arguments shredded.
Taser proudly states that the taser can penetrate up to two inches of insulating clothing using the 50kV arc phase to generate an ionized path. They claim that the device works in exactly the same manner up to this two inch limit. Therefore the words 'naked skinny' are in direct contradiction to the manufacturer's product specification and claims. In this instance I believe that Taser is correct and Billo's statement ("naked skinny") is therefore obviously not correct.
Also, once the current enters the body, it will travel in a path (or paths) set by Kirchhoff's circuit laws. And anyone that claims to have made a computer model of the human body sufficiently complicated to achieve an accurate outcome, complete with Monte Carlo variations of all variables... I seriously doubt it. And the current path can be set with only one dart landing in a critical area. The second dart placement would be less critical by those same circuit laws.
IIRC, Taser has made tests that demonstrate the superior accuracy of the taser of the similar products from Stinger Systems. In other words, if the officer aims at the chest, the top barb is likely to land on the chest. To claim multi-million odds of having a dart land in the sensitive location is simply very poor math. A subject would have to be 10m wide and 10m tall to get a 0ne-square cm location into the 1-in-a-million odds. And that assumes that the aim is random. It is just nonsense.
And finally, if you're now admitting that the taser waveform is capable of causing ventricular fibrillation and that a major part of the safety factor is simply dart placement (literally, the luck of the draw), then we are finding something that we can agree on.
Consider your arguments shredded.
Billo the blogger
Who is Billo the blogger? We first met him here [LINK].
Fairly right-wing. Seems to dislike liberals and socialist countries like Canada. Seems to be a 'law and order' type (which can be dangerous). Seems to love Bush. Spouts words that sound exactly like those coming from well-known Taser spokespuppets. Also treats the word taser carefully, writing it in all uppercase letters like he was told to. Religious, but might be flummoxed by the question, "What would Jesus do, with a taser?"
And he's on the NIJ panel. Which explains a lot.
And given his middling qualifications, how did he end up on the panel? Hey, I'm just asking!
He denies that there is any possibility of the taser causing any internal risks. Only allows external risks. Might as well be another Kroll.
Be advised that I'm not going to get into a back-and-forth argument with Taser spokespuppets. Waste of time.
But I will continue to shred pro-taser arguments.
[Update: toned down a notch]
Fairly right-wing. Seems to dislike liberals and socialist countries like Canada. Seems to be a 'law and order' type (which can be dangerous). Seems to love Bush. Spouts words that sound exactly like those coming from well-known Taser spokespuppets. Also treats the word taser carefully, writing it in all uppercase letters like he was told to. Religious, but might be flummoxed by the question, "What would Jesus do, with a taser?"
And he's on the NIJ panel. Which explains a lot.
And given his middling qualifications, how did he end up on the panel? Hey, I'm just asking!
He denies that there is any possibility of the taser causing any internal risks. Only allows external risks. Might as well be another Kroll.
Be advised that I'm not going to get into a back-and-forth argument with Taser spokespuppets. Waste of time.
But I will continue to shred pro-taser arguments.
[Update: toned down a notch]
Friday, June 27, 2008
Misadventures in nomenclaturism
'billo' recently left an otherwise well-written comment [LINK] about the so-called medical condition 'excited delirium' on an older post [LINK] on this blog, and I responded with my own fairly gentle rebuttal comment [ibid].
I then took the time to follow the tracks back to his own personal blog (Billoblog [LINK]) to see who he is, and to learn more about his interests (just innocent curiosity, not stalking). Yikes...
There was one taser-related post on his blog, posted in August 2005. Here is an extract: "A person hit with a taser stands a one-in-a-million chance of significant injury..." Yep - he actually wrote that, "...one-in-a-million...", regarding the risk of significant injury. (Keep in mind that Taser claims 700,000 total taser deployments. You do the math...)
Now, Billo is (according to his blog) quite well educated and he seems to be involved with medicine (pathology of some sort). I present this as an example of someone having a good education, but their ignorance of the taser issue is immense. Or perhaps he just hasn't been following the news...
I must add that we did seem to agree on this: 'Excited Delirium' is just a placeholder name. It marks the spot where expert knowledge ends and professional ignorance begins. It's a name for nothing except a collection of symptoms that occurred BEFORE the death. It leaves no postmortem clues, otherwise it wouldn't be such an unknown.
And therefore, logically, it shouldn't be assigned as a cause of death. If the expert cannot connect the dots (leading to the exact mechanism of death), then they shouldn't be permitted to slap a name on the unknown, blame the name, and thereby lay the blame at the feet of nothingness.
The real culprit's escape may be aided by such a misdirection.
And that's the crux of the complaint about Excited Delirium.
I then took the time to follow the tracks back to his own personal blog (Billoblog [LINK]) to see who he is, and to learn more about his interests (just innocent curiosity, not stalking). Yikes...
There was one taser-related post on his blog, posted in August 2005. Here is an extract: "A person hit with a taser stands a one-in-a-million chance of significant injury..." Yep - he actually wrote that, "...one-in-a-million...", regarding the risk of significant injury. (Keep in mind that Taser claims 700,000 total taser deployments. You do the math...)
Now, Billo is (according to his blog) quite well educated and he seems to be involved with medicine (pathology of some sort). I present this as an example of someone having a good education, but their ignorance of the taser issue is immense. Or perhaps he just hasn't been following the news...
I must add that we did seem to agree on this: 'Excited Delirium' is just a placeholder name. It marks the spot where expert knowledge ends and professional ignorance begins. It's a name for nothing except a collection of symptoms that occurred BEFORE the death. It leaves no postmortem clues, otherwise it wouldn't be such an unknown.
And therefore, logically, it shouldn't be assigned as a cause of death. If the expert cannot connect the dots (leading to the exact mechanism of death), then they shouldn't be permitted to slap a name on the unknown, blame the name, and thereby lay the blame at the feet of nothingness.
The real culprit's escape may be aided by such a misdirection.
And that's the crux of the complaint about Excited Delirium.
Monday, June 30, 2008
NIJ findings are not '1-in-a-million'
Billo claims that the risk of significant taser-induced (internal) injury (I think he intends to include death in this figure) is "1-in-a-million". But that isn't what the interim NIJ report stated. The NIJ report uses words that are more compatible with risks in the range of 1-in-100. The report uses words like "low", the report doesn't use words like "extremely low".
In fact, they said almost the opposite: "...found no conclusive evidence of a high risk..." [LINK]
Billo is vastly exaggerating the NIJ's findings of safety (in spite of him being on the panel).
And to be clear - some taser critics might settle for a risk figure in the single-digit percentage range.
The NIJ panel was forced to conclude that multiple taser hits are possibly dangerous. These must be the steepest bell curves in history if two or more hits are sufficiently dangerous to be worth mentioning, while one taser hit is essentially perfectly safe ("1-in-a-million"). Does not make sense on its face.
This eagerly-awaited 'major' study fails to make any distinction between drive-stun mode or dart-firing mode. Even for an interim report, this is a mile-wide hole.
And here are the NIJ safety findings in graphical format. The areas are approximately in proportion to the population. And if you think that tasers are less likely to be used on children and the elderly (weighting), then they're more than compensated for by the population of drug users with heart problems or those 'at risk'. The graphic speaks for itself.
In fact, they said almost the opposite: "...found no conclusive evidence of a high risk..." [LINK]
Billo is vastly exaggerating the NIJ's findings of safety (in spite of him being on the panel).
And to be clear - some taser critics might settle for a risk figure in the single-digit percentage range.
The NIJ panel was forced to conclude that multiple taser hits are possibly dangerous. These must be the steepest bell curves in history if two or more hits are sufficiently dangerous to be worth mentioning, while one taser hit is essentially perfectly safe ("1-in-a-million"). Does not make sense on its face.
This eagerly-awaited 'major' study fails to make any distinction between drive-stun mode or dart-firing mode. Even for an interim report, this is a mile-wide hole.
And here are the NIJ safety findings in graphical format. The areas are approximately in proportion to the population. And if you think that tasers are less likely to be used on children and the elderly (weighting), then they're more than compensated for by the population of drug users with heart problems or those 'at risk'. The graphic speaks for itself.
Monday, December 29, 2008
2008 - a year in review...
The Year 2008 In Review
(And this is just a sample. It's not even all the major highlights.)
We started the year 2008 with a review of an "article" in IEEE Spectrum written by Taser's leading braintrust member, Dr. Mark Kroll. We more-fully exposed Dr. Kroll's extreme financial ties to Taser. [LINK] & [LINK] Then we dissected his Taser mouthpiece article more fully. [LINK] It was also noted that Dr. Kroll is a serial non-discloser of his close ties to Taser. [LINK]
Also very early this year, we noted that the X26 taser has a electrical waveform with characteristics that are the exact opposite of those characteristics that were claimed to be the reason that the M26 taser was 'safe'. The older 1999-era M26 taser is high frequency and low duty cycle. The 2003-era X26 taser is low frequency and very high continuous 100% duty cycle. I've not seen this critical technical distinction high-lighted in any other source. Taser's own data sheets mention the raw information, but not a word about this critical change to the waveform. [LINK] [LINK] and [LINK]. See also [LINK].
Some of the basics of Canadian law jumped out at me. I'm not a lawyer, and perhaps there is 'case law' that has taken away some of our fundamental rights (I doubt it). But some of the mistakes being made are (quite literally) elementary. Lawful 'force' is a noun. It's not a damn verb. Police officers and officials that think that they're allowed to use painful electric shock as a form of on-the-spot torture to coerce (force - verb) someone to obey are morons. Let me repeat - morons. The language used to forbid such behaviour is crystal clear. If 'failure to obey' is an offense, then add it to the list of charges and bring the subject before the court. You're not allowed to torture. And Tasers-R-Torture. [LINK]
By the 6th day, it had been noted that former Taser Board of Director member Mr. Bernie Kerik was facing charges that might result in him being jailed for up to 142 years. [LINK] [LINK] (Update: now facing just 28 years. [LINK]) In Canada, we have Sgt Darren Laur (Victoria, BC) and his 'apparent and perceived conflict of interest' [LINK], and coroner James Cairns' jaunts [LINK]. There are quite a few more ethical lapses associated with Taser and/or Taser-associated folks - eg. [LINK] - review the whole blog for more.
Shooting holes in Taser propaganda is a continuing theme of this blog. After Smith's appearance before SECU, I blasted away at the pure BS Taser propaganda. [LINK][LINK][LINK] There is so much propaganda from Taser that is so weak that almost anyone with a modicum of skepticism can instantly see the logical and technical flaws.
By early February, I'd tracked down a certain Taser fan-boy, (apparently) named David E. Zuskin, who (it seems) had been spamming the Internet with his nonsense trademark 'TASERS SAVE LIVES EVERYDAY' (in all caps) - which is both factually and grammatically incorrect. He has since installed a brain and now keeps a much lower profile (now he's 'Bob'). But he's still out there spamming the Internet - and nursing his investments [smirk...]. He got his bum smacked by his ISP [LINK] after clumsily entering my blog e-mail address into many investment-related news letters as some sort of punishment. Typical... ...these law and order (sic) folks are the ones that will break the law to maintain their order. LOL.
Another theme of this blog is taser abuse, misuse and overuse. For some reason [LINK], tasers are constantly being used where there is little to zero justification. Honestly, I don't care if the police are equipped with flame-throwers, so long as everyone is being perfectly honest. But if the manufacturer of flame-throwers starts claiming that they're perfectly safe, and that the burnt-to-a-crisp subjects are simply examples of Spontaneous Human Combustion, then those flame-throwers need to be put away until the brains are reinstalled and lawsuits settled.
By March, we had had a visit from Grettir, who may or may not be Dr. Mark Kroll himself (it certainly sounded like him). [LINK] The flawed thinking by Grettir was crystal clear - some of the logical errors were shocking in their simplicity - such as double-dipping for the natural protection of everybody's shared anatomical characteristics. The other points were equally easy to shred. It's clear that even self-styled big thinkers sometimes make small mistakes.
I note with interest that as these sorts of pro-taser arguments have been shredded by this blog, they tend to disappear from the Taser PR machine. The only argument that they've been using recently has been the 'reduces injuries to the police officers'. Yeah, so would a 'shoot first and let God figure it out' policy. They've very few arguments left standing.
By April, I had noticed that the higher RMS current values had been expunged from the later data sheets. [LINK] Taser would probably say that it was to reduce confusion. Yeah thanks for thinking of us. Nothing to do with ~160 milliamperes RMS being well above the safety limits, eh?
BC Transit Police revealed their empty-headed policies in April. Tasering fare-cheats for gawd's sake. [LINK] Idiots!
Safety margins were examined here [LINK]. They didn't stand-up very well to even a modest application of scrutiny.
But the most important contribution of this blog might be highlighting the relationship between the M26 waveform, and the X26 waveform, and the potentially huge impact of the seemingly-minor change to the waveform. A little DC offset changes everything - it lowers frequency (more dangerous), and it VASTLY increases duty cycle (to 100% continuous). It really seems that Taser forgot about Fourier. [LINK]
See also the guesstimated spectrograms [LINK].
We started plotting the number of taser-associated deaths per month, by month. The running average jumped up from much less than 1 per month before the introduction of the X26 taser in 2003, to a fairly steady 7 per month after that point. Perhaps it's just a coincidence. Perhaps all these deaths are just coincidences. [LINK] and others... [LINK]
In May, the brave BC Mounties tasered an 82-year old man in his hospital bed. Because he had a knife. It was 'a very dangerous situation'. So the frightened officer walked up really, really close to the elderly man and zapped him at close (zero) range. Yeah, it makes no sense to me either. [LINK]
Taser chairman Tom Smith more-or-less accidentally admitted that tasers takes one life for every 70 'lives saved'. [LINK] Well - ah - that's nice. Except that they claim that almost every time a taser is deployed, it counts as a life saved. Which is nonsense. And that just leaves the lives lost. Not to mention the Karma issue [LINK] of saving some lives at the expense of instituting a street level "death lottery" [LINK] on everyday citizens that do not deserve such risks.
We've reported incidents where diabetics in comas [LINK], people sleeping [LINK], and those having epileptic episodes [LINK] are tasered. These sorts of examples, which are almost endless in number, shred the old stale argument about 'just obey the police and you won't be tasered'. If you see that argument, please be gentle to the weak and ill-informed mind that houses it.
Another theme is the extraordinarily bad Taser-certified training. Given the actual behaviour of some supposedly-trained police officers, the only possible explanation is that the Taser-certified Trainers are brainwashed numskulls, and the Taser-certified training material is so poor as to be considered evil. [LINK] How else can you explain this nonsense? [LINK] !!!
This issue is (far and away) more than sufficient to fully justify a moratorium to allow time to surgically removed all the Taser propaganda from the skulls of those that have been Taser-certifiably brainwashed. It might take a year or two to sort out.
It's probably time to remind the readers that this taser issue is not just in the cross-hairs of a few outrage civilian bloggers. People with PhDs are also pointing out that some of Taser's so-called studies are useless. [LINK] And a more skeptical mind might ask, 'Wouldn't the pro-taser 'researchers' be familiar with the basics of Statistics 101?' Are these uselessly-small sample sizes an innocent mistake? ...or a sign of deeper issues?
Inconvenient facts like this [LINK] must annoy Taser: "...people with heart problems are about 5% of the general population (2% to 8% averages to 5%), but they represent 54% of the (tasered-then-dead) victims. That's about an 11-to-1 ratio that needs to be explained. Well obviously [sic] there's no connection [sic] between the taser and the heart. None at all...[ROLLS EYES]..."
Mid-way through 2008, the NIJ released a report that found no evidence of a high risk from tasers. Well DUH! What about low to moderate risk? And NIJ excluded huge swaths of the population, which add up to most of the population. [LINK]
Then a truth-stretcher named Billo turned the NIJ statement around to claim that this proved that Tasers-R-Safe. [LINK] Which it doesn't. [LINK]
Oh my! Then it was noted by another blogger that Billo the Blogger is a certain William Oliver and he is sitting on the same damn NIJ Taser Study panel!! Oh my gawd. [LINK][LINK] and especially [LINK] !!! Isn't that amazing!! This unabashed taser fan-boy is sitting on the NIJ panel "studying" tasers. And then he systematically twists the NIJ findings to suit Taser. What a bunch of clumsy clots.
On the subject of clumsy clots - I discovered by accident that Taser's lawyer Micheal Brave was registering domain names that promote "Excited Delirium" and he points these URLs to a seeming-front organization. Read it here [LINK] and [LINK] You're either in on it, or you're being played like a trumpet.
Taser likes to highlight its legal record, but not that fact that they actually settled many cases to make them go away. [LINK] [LINK]
By September, the RCMP had been body-slammed by an independent report [LINK]. But by mid-December, the RCMP thumbed their noses at the Parliamentary committee SECU that directed that the RCMP recategorize tasers as impact weapons (to cut back on the abuse, misuse, and overuse). [LINK][LINK] I guess the RCMP doesn't take them seriously, but they should... [LINK]
Still in September, the Canadian Police Research Center (seemingly acting as a branch of Taser sometimes, sat beside Taser at SECU for gosh sakes!) report failed to note that tasers are already considered to be firearms. [LINK] You'd think that might be worth noting. They had their chain yanked in August [LINK].
Taser's French distributor got himself arrested. [LINK] For some reason, Taser seems to be occasionally associated with people (Di Zazzo, Kerik) that are not as far above the law as they thought.
There is so much more. The above tidbits are just a sample of the issues that we've discussed. I've made some very interesting findings along the way.
It's been a crazy year for Taser. Their stock has tanked "due to oil prices", but I believe that the next year is when the perfect storm of cold hard facts will intersect with the legal system to make the year 2009 even more interesting for them.
(And this is just a sample. It's not even all the major highlights.)
We started the year 2008 with a review of an "article" in IEEE Spectrum written by Taser's leading braintrust member, Dr. Mark Kroll. We more-fully exposed Dr. Kroll's extreme financial ties to Taser. [LINK] & [LINK] Then we dissected his Taser mouthpiece article more fully. [LINK] It was also noted that Dr. Kroll is a serial non-discloser of his close ties to Taser. [LINK]
Also very early this year, we noted that the X26 taser has a electrical waveform with characteristics that are the exact opposite of those characteristics that were claimed to be the reason that the M26 taser was 'safe'. The older 1999-era M26 taser is high frequency and low duty cycle. The 2003-era X26 taser is low frequency and very high continuous 100% duty cycle. I've not seen this critical technical distinction high-lighted in any other source. Taser's own data sheets mention the raw information, but not a word about this critical change to the waveform. [LINK] [LINK] and [LINK]. See also [LINK].
Some of the basics of Canadian law jumped out at me. I'm not a lawyer, and perhaps there is 'case law' that has taken away some of our fundamental rights (I doubt it). But some of the mistakes being made are (quite literally) elementary. Lawful 'force' is a noun. It's not a damn verb. Police officers and officials that think that they're allowed to use painful electric shock as a form of on-the-spot torture to coerce (force - verb) someone to obey are morons. Let me repeat - morons. The language used to forbid such behaviour is crystal clear. If 'failure to obey' is an offense, then add it to the list of charges and bring the subject before the court. You're not allowed to torture. And Tasers-R-Torture. [LINK]
By the 6th day, it had been noted that former Taser Board of Director member Mr. Bernie Kerik was facing charges that might result in him being jailed for up to 142 years. [LINK] [LINK] (Update: now facing just 28 years. [LINK]) In Canada, we have Sgt Darren Laur (Victoria, BC) and his 'apparent and perceived conflict of interest' [LINK], and coroner James Cairns' jaunts [LINK]. There are quite a few more ethical lapses associated with Taser and/or Taser-associated folks - eg. [LINK] - review the whole blog for more.
Shooting holes in Taser propaganda is a continuing theme of this blog. After Smith's appearance before SECU, I blasted away at the pure BS Taser propaganda. [LINK][LINK][LINK] There is so much propaganda from Taser that is so weak that almost anyone with a modicum of skepticism can instantly see the logical and technical flaws.
By early February, I'd tracked down a certain Taser fan-boy, (apparently) named David E. Zuskin, who (it seems) had been spamming the Internet with his nonsense trademark 'TASERS SAVE LIVES EVERYDAY' (in all caps) - which is both factually and grammatically incorrect. He has since installed a brain and now keeps a much lower profile (now he's 'Bob'). But he's still out there spamming the Internet - and nursing his investments [smirk...]. He got his bum smacked by his ISP [LINK] after clumsily entering my blog e-mail address into many investment-related news letters as some sort of punishment. Typical... ...these law and order (sic) folks are the ones that will break the law to maintain their order. LOL.
Another theme of this blog is taser abuse, misuse and overuse. For some reason [LINK], tasers are constantly being used where there is little to zero justification. Honestly, I don't care if the police are equipped with flame-throwers, so long as everyone is being perfectly honest. But if the manufacturer of flame-throwers starts claiming that they're perfectly safe, and that the burnt-to-a-crisp subjects are simply examples of Spontaneous Human Combustion, then those flame-throwers need to be put away until the brains are reinstalled and lawsuits settled.
By March, we had had a visit from Grettir, who may or may not be Dr. Mark Kroll himself (it certainly sounded like him). [LINK] The flawed thinking by Grettir was crystal clear - some of the logical errors were shocking in their simplicity - such as double-dipping for the natural protection of everybody's shared anatomical characteristics. The other points were equally easy to shred. It's clear that even self-styled big thinkers sometimes make small mistakes.
I note with interest that as these sorts of pro-taser arguments have been shredded by this blog, they tend to disappear from the Taser PR machine. The only argument that they've been using recently has been the 'reduces injuries to the police officers'. Yeah, so would a 'shoot first and let God figure it out' policy. They've very few arguments left standing.
By April, I had noticed that the higher RMS current values had been expunged from the later data sheets. [LINK] Taser would probably say that it was to reduce confusion. Yeah thanks for thinking of us. Nothing to do with ~160 milliamperes RMS being well above the safety limits, eh?
BC Transit Police revealed their empty-headed policies in April. Tasering fare-cheats for gawd's sake. [LINK] Idiots!
Safety margins were examined here [LINK]. They didn't stand-up very well to even a modest application of scrutiny.
But the most important contribution of this blog might be highlighting the relationship between the M26 waveform, and the X26 waveform, and the potentially huge impact of the seemingly-minor change to the waveform. A little DC offset changes everything - it lowers frequency (more dangerous), and it VASTLY increases duty cycle (to 100% continuous). It really seems that Taser forgot about Fourier. [LINK]
See also the guesstimated spectrograms [LINK].
We started plotting the number of taser-associated deaths per month, by month. The running average jumped up from much less than 1 per month before the introduction of the X26 taser in 2003, to a fairly steady 7 per month after that point. Perhaps it's just a coincidence. Perhaps all these deaths are just coincidences. [LINK] and others... [LINK]
In May, the brave BC Mounties tasered an 82-year old man in his hospital bed. Because he had a knife. It was 'a very dangerous situation'. So the frightened officer walked up really, really close to the elderly man and zapped him at close (zero) range. Yeah, it makes no sense to me either. [LINK]
Taser chairman Tom Smith more-or-less accidentally admitted that tasers takes one life for every 70 'lives saved'. [LINK] Well - ah - that's nice. Except that they claim that almost every time a taser is deployed, it counts as a life saved. Which is nonsense. And that just leaves the lives lost. Not to mention the Karma issue [LINK] of saving some lives at the expense of instituting a street level "death lottery" [LINK] on everyday citizens that do not deserve such risks.
We've reported incidents where diabetics in comas [LINK], people sleeping [LINK], and those having epileptic episodes [LINK] are tasered. These sorts of examples, which are almost endless in number, shred the old stale argument about 'just obey the police and you won't be tasered'. If you see that argument, please be gentle to the weak and ill-informed mind that houses it.
Another theme is the extraordinarily bad Taser-certified training. Given the actual behaviour of some supposedly-trained police officers, the only possible explanation is that the Taser-certified Trainers are brainwashed numskulls, and the Taser-certified training material is so poor as to be considered evil. [LINK] How else can you explain this nonsense? [LINK] !!!
This issue is (far and away) more than sufficient to fully justify a moratorium to allow time to surgically removed all the Taser propaganda from the skulls of those that have been Taser-certifiably brainwashed. It might take a year or two to sort out.
It's probably time to remind the readers that this taser issue is not just in the cross-hairs of a few outrage civilian bloggers. People with PhDs are also pointing out that some of Taser's so-called studies are useless. [LINK] And a more skeptical mind might ask, 'Wouldn't the pro-taser 'researchers' be familiar with the basics of Statistics 101?' Are these uselessly-small sample sizes an innocent mistake? ...or a sign of deeper issues?
Inconvenient facts like this [LINK] must annoy Taser: "...people with heart problems are about 5% of the general population (2% to 8% averages to 5%), but they represent 54% of the (tasered-then-dead) victims. That's about an 11-to-1 ratio that needs to be explained. Well obviously [sic] there's no connection [sic] between the taser and the heart. None at all...[ROLLS EYES]..."
Mid-way through 2008, the NIJ released a report that found no evidence of a high risk from tasers. Well DUH! What about low to moderate risk? And NIJ excluded huge swaths of the population, which add up to most of the population. [LINK]
Then a truth-stretcher named Billo turned the NIJ statement around to claim that this proved that Tasers-R-Safe. [LINK] Which it doesn't. [LINK]
Oh my! Then it was noted by another blogger that Billo the Blogger is a certain William Oliver and he is sitting on the same damn NIJ Taser Study panel!! Oh my gawd. [LINK][LINK] and especially [LINK] !!! Isn't that amazing!! This unabashed taser fan-boy is sitting on the NIJ panel "studying" tasers. And then he systematically twists the NIJ findings to suit Taser. What a bunch of clumsy clots.
On the subject of clumsy clots - I discovered by accident that Taser's lawyer Micheal Brave was registering domain names that promote "Excited Delirium" and he points these URLs to a seeming-front organization. Read it here [LINK] and [LINK] You're either in on it, or you're being played like a trumpet.
Taser likes to highlight its legal record, but not that fact that they actually settled many cases to make them go away. [LINK] [LINK]
By September, the RCMP had been body-slammed by an independent report [LINK]. But by mid-December, the RCMP thumbed their noses at the Parliamentary committee SECU that directed that the RCMP recategorize tasers as impact weapons (to cut back on the abuse, misuse, and overuse). [LINK][LINK] I guess the RCMP doesn't take them seriously, but they should... [LINK]
Still in September, the Canadian Police Research Center (seemingly acting as a branch of Taser sometimes, sat beside Taser at SECU for gosh sakes!) report failed to note that tasers are already considered to be firearms. [LINK] You'd think that might be worth noting. They had their chain yanked in August [LINK].
Taser's French distributor got himself arrested. [LINK] For some reason, Taser seems to be occasionally associated with people (Di Zazzo, Kerik) that are not as far above the law as they thought.
There is so much more. The above tidbits are just a sample of the issues that we've discussed. I've made some very interesting findings along the way.
It's been a crazy year for Taser. Their stock has tanked "due to oil prices", but I believe that the next year is when the perfect storm of cold hard facts will intersect with the legal system to make the year 2009 even more interesting for them.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Endless deception by Taser International et al
It just goes on and on. More examples of deception by Taser International (not an exhaustive list by any stretch):
Example 7: Taser International and their minions have repeatedly claimed that tasers do not affect the heart. As late as May 2009, Taser International sent their unwashed hired help, on expenses I'll assume, to a meeting of the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) to try to defend this insane position (their mere attendance being an obvious 'red flag' if there ever was one...). See [LINK]. Meanwhile, buried in their legal paperwork is the admission that the taser "...can produce... changes in... heart rate and rhythm..." - see [LINK].
Example 8: Taser International and their minions and fan-boys have a nasty habit of failing to disclose that which should obviously be disclosed. I could find no mention of "Braidwood" (or anything similar) in their most recent Annual Report (15 March 2010) [LINK]. Or Kroll's Mole-Role Trolls [LINK]. Or William Oliver (a.k.a. Billo the blogger) was discovered to be sitting on a NIJ panel "studying" (LOL) the safety of tasers, while actively promoting tasers in his spare time [LINK]. Or the seemingly-slimy connections, both direct and financial, between Taser International, the IPICD, and those promoting "excited delirium" [LINK][LINK][LINK] and more.
[Part 1]
[Part 2]
[Part 3]
Example 7: Taser International and their minions have repeatedly claimed that tasers do not affect the heart. As late as May 2009, Taser International sent their unwashed hired help, on expenses I'll assume, to a meeting of the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) to try to defend this insane position (their mere attendance being an obvious 'red flag' if there ever was one...). See [LINK]. Meanwhile, buried in their legal paperwork is the admission that the taser "...can produce... changes in... heart rate and rhythm..." - see [LINK].
Example 8: Taser International and their minions and fan-boys have a nasty habit of failing to disclose that which should obviously be disclosed. I could find no mention of "Braidwood" (or anything similar) in their most recent Annual Report (15 March 2010) [LINK]. Or Kroll's Mole-Role Trolls [LINK]. Or William Oliver (a.k.a. Billo the blogger) was discovered to be sitting on a NIJ panel "studying" (LOL) the safety of tasers, while actively promoting tasers in his spare time [LINK]. Or the seemingly-slimy connections, both direct and financial, between Taser International, the IPICD, and those promoting "excited delirium" [LINK][LINK][LINK] and more.
[Part 1]
[Part 2]
[Part 3]
Friday, July 2, 2010
Taser International (TASR) et al - shades of deception
Examples of deception by Taser International et al. Potentially very useful for shredding their corporate or personal credibility in court. This is not a complete list by any means.
Example 1: Claiming that the tasers (M26 and X26) emit only 2mA "average" and implying that this is relevant. This claim is utter deception; it is obviously intended to confuse and mislead those that are not educated about technical topics. See [LINK] for detailed explanation. Further details available upon request - blog e-mail address is in the right hand column.
Example 2: Do you remember when Smith4Brains testified at SECU that the X26 taser is powered by a couple of wee-little harmless [-looking] batteries of the same sort (CR123A) used in digital cameras? He was trying to leave the deceptive impression that those batteries wouldn't hurt a flea. Those claims were intentionally deceptive. Those are powerful lithium cells and they drain them at a rate that is literally off-the-scale of the battery application notes. See [LINK] for an explanation using their own deceptive numbers.
Example 3: Claiming that their legal win/loss record was unblemished, when in fact they had quietly settled some lawsuits. They described these settlements as "dismissed" and (apparently intentionally) left a false impression with many. And they did nothing to correct the false impression when the misinformation was spread by ill-informed taser fan-boys.
Example 4: For years there existed a discrepancy in that all taser training and demonstration taser hits were only ever fired into the subjects' backs, or connected to the same area, or clipped to one leg. Trans-cardiac (chest) applications were intentionally avoided. (Now they advise "avoiding the chest" for all.) And yet they claimed that these "FAKE" taser deployments were evidence of safety. They counted them as safe deployments (my term is "denominator washing"). This was deception on a grand scale.
Example 5: Claiming that the X26 taser's waveform consists of just short pulses, and claiming some sort of magical "chronaxie" safety advantage of the "short pulses". In fact, the X26 taser has a waveform with significant low frequency spectral components, and those spectral components are continuous 100% duty cycle for as long as the trigger is held down. To be fair, this false claim by them probably started out as an elementary technical oversight; it was probably not deception at the outset. But their failure to correct this dumb-ass technical error is clearly pure deception.
Example 6: Taser International fights the various acidosis taser-death mechanisms. They cannot deny acidosis, but they gamely try to downplay the self-evident role that the taser deployment would play. The deception involves their struggling to maintain a straight face while trying to pass-off their position as reasonable. See [Kroll] and especially [Ho].
Example 7: Taser International and their minions have repeatedly claimed that tasers do not affect the heart. As late as May 2009, Taser International sent their unwashed hired help, on expenses I'll assume, to a meeting of the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) to try to defend this insane position (their mere attendance being an obvious 'red flag' if there ever was one...). See [LINK]. Meanwhile, buried in their legal paperwork is the admission that the taser "...can produce... changes in... heart rate and rhythm..." - see [LINK]. This is a huge discrepancy between their various statements (marketing lies, false claims, and legal warnings).
Example 8: Taser International and their minions and fan-boys have a nasty habit of failing to disclose that which should obviously be disclosed. I could find no mention of "Braidwood" (or anything similar) in their most recent Annual Report (15 March 2010) [LINK] - a matter clearly worthy of SEC investigation. Or Kroll's Mole-Role Trolls [LINK]. Or William Oliver (a.k.a. Billo the blogger) was discovered to be sitting on a NIJ panel "studying" (LOL) the safety of tasers, while actively promoting tasers in his spare time [LINK]. Or the seemingly-slimy connections, both direct and financial, between Taser International, the IPICD, and those promoting "excited delirium" [LINK][LINK][LINK] and more.
Example 9: Kroll's repeated and infamous reassurances of taser safety. His utterly-deceptive IEEE Spectrum article in which he repeats his many technical mistakes, including forgetting about Fourier (Hint: There's no such thing as 100 microseconds of 19 Hz). His claim of a reassuringly large "15-to-one" (sic) safety margin (self-evidently a vast overstatement). His claim that tasers are "safer than Tylenol". His evil comparison of being repeatedly being tasered to being repeatedly hit with "a ping ping ball" - at one time prominently published on Taser International's website under "Cardiac Safety" (sic), since then mysteriously pulled (?). All of these claims have misled people and organizations. The actual safety margin is much lower than they've claimed. And they've utterly failed to contemplate other Taser-death mechanisms.
Example 10: Taser International often makes claims and statements that appear to make sense in the limited context of the moment. But a wider view (and a better memory) reveals their statements to be at odds with their previous statements. (10a) They claimed at the time that the 1999-era M26 taser was "safe" BECAUSE the output waveform is high frequency and thus very low duty cycle. But the newer less-safe 2003-era X26 taser has a waveform that contains a DC pulse after the arc phase. When repeated at 19Hz this is low frequency and is thus continuous 100% duty cycle. In spite of the lower peak amplitude of the X26, there's no disagreement on either side that the X26 taser is the most dangerous of the two. But even well past 2003, they were still claiming the characteristics of the M26 waveform as safety factors. (10b) When asked about variations in taser current given inevitable variations in the resistance of humans, they immediately claimed that the taser is "a constant current source" and is thus insensitive to variations in the resistance of the target. Later, when investigators finally became curious about taser output, it was noted that a high percentage of units were out of spec, some were above spec. The response from Taser International was to start nitpicking the exact value of test resistor used. The contradiction is self-evident. Their habit of ever-changing stories aren't even good deceptions.
Example 11: The entire "excited delirium" (explain-away in-custody-death for hire) industry. Taser International and the IPICD (...Lawsuits) are connected right from the initial "start-up funding" for IPICD. These connections were not exactly highlighted (they were hidden, downplayed, and denied). The slimy connections were revealed by outside investigators one-by-one, including too-direct-to-be-ethical web-links to the University of Miami. Their insane claim that "excited delirium" (as might apply to a taser-death) has a history that goes back 150 years to a previously-described condition, Bell's Mania - where mental patients would starve themselves to death over a period of several weeks, is obviously utter nonsense. There are so many irrational aspects to their claims about "excited delirium" as a handy excuse for In-Custody Death (always in-custody) that the entire industry falls apart under its own illogic.
Example 12: A pair of cases where Taser International's outrageous behavior resulted in a couple of legal face-plants. These are deception (very poor attempts) because of what they were trying to accomplish. (12a) A B.C. Supreme Court judge has roundly rejected attempts by Taser International to discredit a lawyer and a medical expert who participated in the Braidwood inquiry... Justice Robert Sewell said allegations of bias and dishonesty against lawyer Art Vertlieb and Dr. Keith Chambers were "unnecessary, scandalous and vexatious," and ordered Taser International to pay their legal costs. [LINK] (12b) In denying Taser International's Motion for Summary Judgment... Judge Almquist also found that a portion of Taser International's motion was "substantially immaterial and irrelevant to the substance of the motion and created unnecessary time and expense for the parties and the court" and was filed in "bad-faith". He ordered the scoundrels to pay plaintiffs' counsel the sum of $15,000 in attorneys' fees to compensate them for the time spent responding to the motion. [LINK]
Example 13: Back in May 2009, 'someone' (LOL) in San Jose, California arrived from search.yahoo.com on "www.Excited-Delirium.com: Presentation by Dorin Panescu" by searching for first:"dorin" last:"panescu". Gee, I wonder who that was? Perhaps someone that had just returned (all expenses paid) from testifying at the Braidwood Inquiry, and was checking the news? Then, the same anonymous Internet user, accessing the Internet at an ISP-reported location just blocks from the listed address for Dorin Panescu, fraudulently stuffed the ballot box on a poll I was running. Simplest explanation is that 'someone' was caught red-handed engaging in deceptive behaviour. Fresh off the witness stand at Braidwood (?). [LINK]
Example 14: Taser International's bought and paid-for expert witness presented 'evidence' to 'prove' that the taser current has no effect on the heart. Unfortunately the same defective computer model also showed that the taser would have absolutely no effect beyond, perhaps, making one pectoral muscle slightly twitch. This is deception; but it's just not very good deception. It's laughable. [LINK]
Example 1: Claiming that the tasers (M26 and X26) emit only 2mA "average" and implying that this is relevant. This claim is utter deception; it is obviously intended to confuse and mislead those that are not educated about technical topics. See [LINK] for detailed explanation. Further details available upon request - blog e-mail address is in the right hand column.
Example 2: Do you remember when Smith4Brains testified at SECU that the X26 taser is powered by a couple of wee-little harmless [-looking] batteries of the same sort (CR123A) used in digital cameras? He was trying to leave the deceptive impression that those batteries wouldn't hurt a flea. Those claims were intentionally deceptive. Those are powerful lithium cells and they drain them at a rate that is literally off-the-scale of the battery application notes. See [LINK] for an explanation using their own deceptive numbers.
Example 3: Claiming that their legal win/loss record was unblemished, when in fact they had quietly settled some lawsuits. They described these settlements as "dismissed" and (apparently intentionally) left a false impression with many. And they did nothing to correct the false impression when the misinformation was spread by ill-informed taser fan-boys.
Example 4: For years there existed a discrepancy in that all taser training and demonstration taser hits were only ever fired into the subjects' backs, or connected to the same area, or clipped to one leg. Trans-cardiac (chest) applications were intentionally avoided. (Now they advise "avoiding the chest" for all.) And yet they claimed that these "FAKE" taser deployments were evidence of safety. They counted them as safe deployments (my term is "denominator washing"). This was deception on a grand scale.
Example 5: Claiming that the X26 taser's waveform consists of just short pulses, and claiming some sort of magical "chronaxie" safety advantage of the "short pulses". In fact, the X26 taser has a waveform with significant low frequency spectral components, and those spectral components are continuous 100% duty cycle for as long as the trigger is held down. To be fair, this false claim by them probably started out as an elementary technical oversight; it was probably not deception at the outset. But their failure to correct this dumb-ass technical error is clearly pure deception.
Example 6: Taser International fights the various acidosis taser-death mechanisms. They cannot deny acidosis, but they gamely try to downplay the self-evident role that the taser deployment would play. The deception involves their struggling to maintain a straight face while trying to pass-off their position as reasonable. See [Kroll] and especially [Ho].
Example 7: Taser International and their minions have repeatedly claimed that tasers do not affect the heart. As late as May 2009, Taser International sent their unwashed hired help, on expenses I'll assume, to a meeting of the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) to try to defend this insane position (their mere attendance being an obvious 'red flag' if there ever was one...). See [LINK]. Meanwhile, buried in their legal paperwork is the admission that the taser "...can produce... changes in... heart rate and rhythm..." - see [LINK]. This is a huge discrepancy between their various statements (marketing lies, false claims, and legal warnings).
Example 8: Taser International and their minions and fan-boys have a nasty habit of failing to disclose that which should obviously be disclosed. I could find no mention of "Braidwood" (or anything similar) in their most recent Annual Report (15 March 2010) [LINK] - a matter clearly worthy of SEC investigation. Or Kroll's Mole-Role Trolls [LINK]. Or William Oliver (a.k.a. Billo the blogger) was discovered to be sitting on a NIJ panel "studying" (LOL) the safety of tasers, while actively promoting tasers in his spare time [LINK]. Or the seemingly-slimy connections, both direct and financial, between Taser International, the IPICD, and those promoting "excited delirium" [LINK][LINK][LINK] and more.
Example 9: Kroll's repeated and infamous reassurances of taser safety. His utterly-deceptive IEEE Spectrum article in which he repeats his many technical mistakes, including forgetting about Fourier (Hint: There's no such thing as 100 microseconds of 19 Hz). His claim of a reassuringly large "15-to-one" (sic) safety margin (self-evidently a vast overstatement). His claim that tasers are "safer than Tylenol". His evil comparison of being repeatedly being tasered to being repeatedly hit with "a ping ping ball" - at one time prominently published on Taser International's website under "Cardiac Safety" (sic), since then mysteriously pulled (?). All of these claims have misled people and organizations. The actual safety margin is much lower than they've claimed. And they've utterly failed to contemplate other Taser-death mechanisms.
Example 10: Taser International often makes claims and statements that appear to make sense in the limited context of the moment. But a wider view (and a better memory) reveals their statements to be at odds with their previous statements. (10a) They claimed at the time that the 1999-era M26 taser was "safe" BECAUSE the output waveform is high frequency and thus very low duty cycle. But the newer less-safe 2003-era X26 taser has a waveform that contains a DC pulse after the arc phase. When repeated at 19Hz this is low frequency and is thus continuous 100% duty cycle. In spite of the lower peak amplitude of the X26, there's no disagreement on either side that the X26 taser is the most dangerous of the two. But even well past 2003, they were still claiming the characteristics of the M26 waveform as safety factors. (10b) When asked about variations in taser current given inevitable variations in the resistance of humans, they immediately claimed that the taser is "a constant current source" and is thus insensitive to variations in the resistance of the target. Later, when investigators finally became curious about taser output, it was noted that a high percentage of units were out of spec, some were above spec. The response from Taser International was to start nitpicking the exact value of test resistor used. The contradiction is self-evident. Their habit of ever-changing stories aren't even good deceptions.
Example 11: The entire "excited delirium" (explain-away in-custody-death for hire) industry. Taser International and the IPICD (...Lawsuits) are connected right from the initial "start-up funding" for IPICD. These connections were not exactly highlighted (they were hidden, downplayed, and denied). The slimy connections were revealed by outside investigators one-by-one, including too-direct-to-be-ethical web-links to the University of Miami. Their insane claim that "excited delirium" (as might apply to a taser-death) has a history that goes back 150 years to a previously-described condition, Bell's Mania - where mental patients would starve themselves to death over a period of several weeks, is obviously utter nonsense. There are so many irrational aspects to their claims about "excited delirium" as a handy excuse for In-Custody Death (always in-custody) that the entire industry falls apart under its own illogic.
Example 12: A pair of cases where Taser International's outrageous behavior resulted in a couple of legal face-plants. These are deception (very poor attempts) because of what they were trying to accomplish. (12a) A B.C. Supreme Court judge has roundly rejected attempts by Taser International to discredit a lawyer and a medical expert who participated in the Braidwood inquiry... Justice Robert Sewell said allegations of bias and dishonesty against lawyer Art Vertlieb and Dr. Keith Chambers were "unnecessary, scandalous and vexatious," and ordered Taser International to pay their legal costs. [LINK] (12b) In denying Taser International's Motion for Summary Judgment... Judge Almquist also found that a portion of Taser International's motion was "substantially immaterial and irrelevant to the substance of the motion and created unnecessary time and expense for the parties and the court" and was filed in "bad-faith". He ordered the scoundrels to pay plaintiffs' counsel the sum of $15,000 in attorneys' fees to compensate them for the time spent responding to the motion. [LINK]
Example 13: Back in May 2009, 'someone' (LOL) in San Jose, California arrived from search.yahoo.com on "www.Excited-Delirium.com: Presentation by Dorin Panescu" by searching for first:"dorin" last:"panescu". Gee, I wonder who that was? Perhaps someone that had just returned (all expenses paid) from testifying at the Braidwood Inquiry, and was checking the news? Then, the same anonymous Internet user, accessing the Internet at an ISP-reported location just blocks from the listed address for Dorin Panescu, fraudulently stuffed the ballot box on a poll I was running. Simplest explanation is that 'someone' was caught red-handed engaging in deceptive behaviour. Fresh off the witness stand at Braidwood (?). [LINK]
Example 14: Taser International's bought and paid-for expert witness presented 'evidence' to 'prove' that the taser current has no effect on the heart. Unfortunately the same defective computer model also showed that the taser would have absolutely no effect beyond, perhaps, making one pectoral muscle slightly twitch. This is deception; but it's just not very good deception. It's laughable. [LINK]
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Cults - Part 2 - The CSIS Cult Checklist
A Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) report contain a check-list to help determine if you have a cult on your hands. [LINK] Let's see how the Taser Fan-boy club stacks up against this list.
(Extracts, see complete list at [LINK])
Characteristics of Cults:
Apocalyptic Beliefs - Without tasers, we would have to shoot to kill many more people.
Dualism - "good versus evil" Black and white - no shades of gray. They claim that Tasers are (essentially) perfectly safe. In their minds, there is no room for any doubt whatsoever.
The persecuted chosen - The recent Kaye & Momy Show [LINK] had overtones that they thought they were being unfairly persecuted. [LINK]
Imminence - The end of the world is nigh.
Salvation through conflict - Must... taser... anyone...
Charismatic Leadership - the High Priests of the taser world. Nifty black turtlenecks and cool sunglasses. Weilding nifty taser toys; pointing them at the camera. Looking a bit like Satan's foot soldiers (oh, that part is arguably true). [LINK] [Goofy twits.]
Threats:
Weapons Acquisition - Must have more tasers. "All officers need tasers." [LINK]
Institutional Infiltration - Do I even need to provide examples? CPRC tried to put out a pro-taser report sans peer review. [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] Toronto Police holding hands with Taser. [LINK] Pro-taser studies packed with pro-Taser insiders like Dr. J. Ho [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] and many others [LINK]. The NIJ panel has unmitigated pro-Taser fan-boy, Billo the blogger [LINK], sitting on the panel (!) who exaggerates and twists the NIJ findings. Coroners and police officers [LINK] [LINK] in apparent conflicts of interest. Strange links from Taser to the IPICD. [LINK] It goes on and on and on and on and on...
Criminal Activity - Bernie Kerik, former Taser High Priest (Board of Directors), made $6M from Taser, now facing 142 years on unrelated charges [update: now facing only 28 years]. Taser's distributor in France arrested. Other very serious accusations (not proven).
Early warning signs:
Humiliating circumstances - LOL. See [LINK] and many others...
It's obvious that The Church of The Taser shares some characteristics of a cult.
"Cult" - it's just a label.
But it sort-of helps to explain some of the otherwise-inexplicable behaviour by some of the more rabid pro-taser fan-boys.
It also helps to justify the requirement for some serious intervention and deprogramming of the cult members.
In other words, a taser moratorium.
At least long enough to press the reset button and start all over again from the opposite premise - that tasers are potentially lethal. Then build up from that new starting point.
(Extracts, see complete list at [LINK])
Characteristics of Cults:
Apocalyptic Beliefs - Without tasers, we would have to shoot to kill many more people.
Dualism - "good versus evil" Black and white - no shades of gray. They claim that Tasers are (essentially) perfectly safe. In their minds, there is no room for any doubt whatsoever.
The persecuted chosen - The recent Kaye & Momy Show [LINK] had overtones that they thought they were being unfairly persecuted. [LINK]
Imminence - The end of the world is nigh.
Salvation through conflict - Must... taser... anyone...
Charismatic Leadership - the High Priests of the taser world. Nifty black turtlenecks and cool sunglasses. Weilding nifty taser toys; pointing them at the camera. Looking a bit like Satan's foot soldiers (oh, that part is arguably true). [LINK] [Goofy twits.]
Threats:
Weapons Acquisition - Must have more tasers. "All officers need tasers." [LINK]
Institutional Infiltration - Do I even need to provide examples? CPRC tried to put out a pro-taser report sans peer review. [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] Toronto Police holding hands with Taser. [LINK] Pro-taser studies packed with pro-Taser insiders like Dr. J. Ho [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] and many others [LINK]. The NIJ panel has unmitigated pro-Taser fan-boy, Billo the blogger [LINK], sitting on the panel (!) who exaggerates and twists the NIJ findings. Coroners and police officers [LINK] [LINK] in apparent conflicts of interest. Strange links from Taser to the IPICD. [LINK] It goes on and on and on and on and on...
Criminal Activity - Bernie Kerik, former Taser High Priest (Board of Directors), made $6M from Taser, now facing 142 years on unrelated charges [update: now facing only 28 years]. Taser's distributor in France arrested. Other very serious accusations (not proven).
Early warning signs:
Humiliating circumstances - LOL. See [LINK] and many others...
It's obvious that The Church of The Taser shares some characteristics of a cult.
"Cult" - it's just a label.
But it sort-of helps to explain some of the otherwise-inexplicable behaviour by some of the more rabid pro-taser fan-boys.
It also helps to justify the requirement for some serious intervention and deprogramming of the cult members.
In other words, a taser moratorium.
At least long enough to press the reset button and start all over again from the opposite premise - that tasers are potentially lethal. Then build up from that new starting point.
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