For those of you who don't feel like watching the video (ie, dialup users), here's yer new rooles:
All guns are loaded until proven otherwise.
Keep muzzle pointed in an appropriate direction.
Keep the finger off the trigger until firing.
Fire when reasonable in view of the circumstances.
Well, its nice to know that #3 met Chief Tim's requirements and wasn't changed to "keep finger off the trigger unless you think they're really bad, then its OK."
I dunno, I think it almost serves to lessen the impact of things when you add disclaimers like, "until proven otherwise." The original statement is much more...authoritve, I guess. Then, I'm not an idiot, so I can understand that "all guns are loaded" isn't exactly a truism, but more in lines as a reminder that even when you don't think its loaded, it might very well be.
Without being construed as police bashing, if this is how they have to dumb down simple things for people then we're in for a serious change in community-police relations, coz anyone who's too stupid to grasp what "be sure of your backstop" really means shouldn't be incharge of my safety with a gun.
I hold out higher hopes for the thin blue line.
gfen, often an optimist.