This is truly in the "un-fucking-fucking-believable category:
- Dear SCC,
"You ain't going to believe this shit..."
Every good copper story starts out with that phrase, but this one is anything but good.
I was assigned to the downtown area yesterday. For part of the day, my group was on high visibility patrol. Sweet gig, nice scenery, beautiful day, walk and talk with the citizens, made a lot of people happy. The other part of the day we sat around Navy Pier, did some drills, saw some demonstrations from the MFF, and got the speeches from the gold stars. The theme was "we're all in this together, let's watch each others' backs." You've probably heard them before.
Then we sat and listened to the radio as downtown and Rahm's neighborhood descended into chaos. We watched our brothers and sisters downtown confronting/being confronted by these assholes on the live helicopter feeds from the various news stations.
And we sat. We listened to the calls for EMS and paramedics for a couple of injured P.O's and hoped everyone was OK.
And we sat. We listened to the bike teams race from one end of the protest to the other after being bused all the way from Rahm's house to downtown, set up and block streets, and then redeploy when their efforts failed - again and again and again, probably 5-6 times.
And we sat some more. Two hundred cops sitting around listening to the situation devolve. Finally, we got the word we were loading the buses. We got on, started prepping equipment and were told that we were headed.....home. Back to Sox Park. Released for the night, while our brothers and sisters were being run to the point of exhaustion, assaulted and lord knows what else. Not only that, but the buses to take us back drove within sight and sound of the demonstrations up and down Michigan Avenue.
I have never been more disgusted with the leadership of this Department. I can only figure that in the name of nickels and dimes, my fellow officers were put into harms way. Two hundred coppers could have made a big difference, cost be damned.
So Tobias and Gulliford and Kirby? Your speeches to the supervisors we were told about all of us being a team and we're in this to make sure no coppers get hurt? You're full of shit. You had a ready force of 200-plus cops set to deploy, even blocking traffic to allow you greater freedom of movement of the meager forces at your disposal and you failed in the name of nickels and dimes. That isn't leadership. That's an accountant with a badge. You fucking beancounters ought to be ashamed. Any trust I had left is gone.
We are speechless.