Metro needs to address gaps in training

To the editor:

The choice by Metro to use an AR-15 on unarmed Stanley Gibson was completely inappropriate and shows a severe gap in Metro training standards.

These weapons were placed in trunks of many patrol cars after the infamous Los Angeles bank robbery shootout in the 1990s when the police were outgunned by automatic weapons. However, that scenario is the only one those weapons were meant for -- one where you need to counter overwhelming firepower.

It is obvious that Metro has gaps in both command training and coordination and lacks more non-lethal weapons such as long-baton stun guns and beanbag shotguns in each patrol car.

When you continue to have incidents like this in which police have cleared the area of citizens and then as a first level response must resort to a lethal weapon to protect themselves, you will always have outcomes like this.

Resorting to overwhelming force is what you do as a strategy on a battlefield, not as a blanket policy to deal with a changing set of tactical situations.

As they saying goes, "If you arm and train them like soldiers, they'll act like soldiers."

Andy Spurlock

Las Vegas

We're in trouble

To the editor:

Two articles in your Dec. 15 edition lead me to ask: Is it any wonder our country is in such trouble?

First you've got Carrier IQ that has installed tracking ID on more than 150 million smart phones that can tell them every keystroke that is made. The article states, "Carrier IQ has said its software is not designed to capture keystrokes or the content of messages, but in some cases that may have happened by accident."

What a crock.

When it comes to computers, they do nothing by "accident" because they cannot think; they can only do what they are programmed to do, nothing more and nothing less.

This is invasion of privacy at its finest and I hope the FCC will stop this practice and fine them millions for invading consumers' privacy.

Then you have the city of Henderson kowtowing to Sen. Harry Reid by hiring his son, one of the least qualified candidates for the city attorney position, and then having the audacity to pay him almost the maximum allowed the position. This audacity leaves $9,000 to cover any step increases before he maxes out at the position pay and they have to increase the pay scale available for the position -- probably by laying off another city employee.

This debacle involving Sen. Reid, Mayor Andy Hafen and Josh Reid illustrates beyond a shadow of a doubt why America needs term limits.

Our country is not just financially bankrupt, but the above demonstrates that our country is also morally and ethically bankrupt and the time is rapidly approaching when the note is going to be called for payment.

Is it any wonder the United States is no longer respected by so many other industrialized nations?

Kathleen M. Stone

Pahrump