The 2020 election altered my viewing habits, though not tremendously. Due to his increasing lack of balance and leftism, I had, for some time, been pulling away from anything involving Chris Wallace. Since the debate where he did all he could to rescue Gropin’ Joe Biden, I’ve had nothing to do with him. I also have completely ignored Bret Bair’s “newscast,” and limited my Fox exposure to the occasional Internet news story—as long as I can confirm it with other, more reliable sources—and while I regularly watch and enjoy Tucker Carlson, I am all but done with Sean Hannity.
This is something of a shame, as he has had a role in upholding the Republic, but he’s become far too full of himself. It is, I suppose, mostly a matter of style. If a guest has a three-minute segment, Hannity will blather for two minutes. Virtually every show, Hannity will be doing an interminable set-up, talking about his views rather than asking a question, and a guest will be patiently waiting, never sure if Hannity is done so they can begin speaking. He often interrupts guests to blather more, and in general, doesn’t let his guests speak. Stylistic, to be sure, but I view these shows not to reinforce my own beliefs, but to hear interesting viewpoints I have not yet considered. Hannity, more and more, is getting in the way of that. Carlson, on the other hand, after a usually insightful and interesting monologue, lets his guests speak.
On his April 13, 2021 show, Hannity was speaking about the apparently accidental police shooting in Brooklyn Center, MN, a town on the NW border of Minneapolis, and the continuing rioting and looting in response. The mayor of that city, a Black man, fired the City Manager, another Black man, because he dared to suggest the officer involved should be afforded due process. Bizarre, and dangerous that in 2021, merely suggesting one of the pillars of the republic ought to be honored is controversial. Then the Mayor and the City Council, lifted the curfew aimed at limiting damage to their city, and removed the ability of the police to respond with non-lethal means, essentially disarming them and giving criminals free reign.
On the same show, the Mayor—who cares what the idiot’s name is?—actually said he didn’t think police officers should be allowed to carry arms on traffic stops, and in most other circumstances either. Oh, in case you haven’t heard as yet, gentle readers, the person shot by the unfortunate officer, a 20 year-old black criminal wanted on a felony armed robbery warrant, died.
Hannity’s commentary was, as usual, repetitive and overly long, but reasonable, until he got very much outside his knowledge base and began prescribing use of force policy for the nation’s police. His solution? Byrna.com: 
Byrna is a company marketing nothing new, but in a somewhat new way. The police have, for many years, had available air powered pepperball guns, usually in rifle form. The Byrna product pushed by Hannity, who tells us he has one, is merely a five shot, CO2 powered pistol that fires three different types of projectiles:
None of these are new, but Hannity thinks them absolutely amazing and infallibly effective technology. He showed what is obviously Byrna-produced video, showing slow walking “attackers,” including one heavily muscled and tattooed, bare chested police officer, immediately stopped and incapacitated by the application of a few projectiles at close range. Hannity thinks this technology is far more reliable than a Taser, works at longer range, and will incapacitate an attacker, or give an innocent the opportunity to “run away; run away!”
He couldn’t be more wrong.
In the Brooklyn Center case, it appears the officer believed she had a Taser in her hand when she was actually holding her Glock. The bodycam footage suggests there was no one more shocked than she after she pulled the trigger and realized she was not holding a Taser. There is no reason to believe that were she carrying a Byrna pistol, there would have been any difference, except a Byrna pistol is far larger and more bulky than some Taser models.
There are many primary problems with Hannity’s assumptions, but to be completely fair, he’s far from the first to make these mistakes, and must be given the benefit of the doubt for good intentions. A great many police officers and administrators have done the same, and worse. And of course, we constantly hear from pundits and others shilling for various “alternatives” to handguns, some simply silly, all potentially dangerous–to the innocent.
The biggest problem, however, is what I’ve come to call the SPOIT rule, the Sober Police Officers In Training, rule: technologies and techniques that work splendidly on sober police officers in clean, dry, well lit training conditions often spectacularly fail in the real world of police work.
Why might this be so? Because police officers can’t afford to get seriously injured, nor can they afford to seriously injure another officer in training. They’re not hopped up on drugs, or in a homicidal rage. So Tasers, various restraint techniques, and various chemicals will virtually always work on them, for the aforementioned reasons, and because all environmental factors have been eliminated, and everything is done at known distances. The parameters of employment and limitations are known to all and observed.
In a restraint class I once took, the instructor, a cocky young state trooper, was demonstrating an arm bar takedown he bragged was infallible, until he tried it on a burly, small town deputy. The Deputy, a stereotypical good old boy, was about 6’ and 250 pounds, and was one of those guys who wasn’t a weight lifter, but had real upper body mass and natural strength. I had to suppress a grin as the state trooper struggled mightily as the Deputy merely leaned a little off center as the trooper fought to apply the technique. The slightly grinning Deputy didn’t have to fight him; he just didn’t play along.
I’ve seen a variety of people, police officers included, shrug off solid Taser jolts. Every experienced police officer knows when pepper spray is used, everyone, including the officer, gets sprayed. They also know pepper sprays, and tear gas, are annoying indeed, but they have little effect on some people, and others who are drugged, or simply angry and determined, push through them and do as much damage as they please while their eyes are watering, they’re coughing and their noses are running (been there, done that, got the Kleenex). Experienced officers also know chemical sprays are pretty much useless in moderate to high winds and when it’s raining or snowing.
I’m not suggesting such technologies or techniques are useless—they’re not—only that they’re not infallible, and when they fail, far more often than their manufacturers and cheerleaders like to admit, officers had better be ready with serious backup. This is why smart officers commonly have at least one officer prepared with a handgun if “less lethal” options fail.
As for the Byrna system, again, it’s nothing new, just slightly repackaged in a smaller form. The company claims a range of some 60’—20 yards. Perhaps, but that’s really optimistic. In the videos Hannity showed, the “perps” all advanced–very slowly–on the shooter from no more than 20 feet, allowing the shooter to put two or three projectiles in their upper chest, which is necessary to disperse the chemicals into their faces. They advanced very slowly, at far less than a walking pace, and the atmospheric conditions were ideal.
Here’s the ugly reality. The police aren’t usually competent shooters.
Many civilians (that’s what the police call non-police) are far better shots. Under stress, most people, including the police, regardless of their abilities on a clean, dry, windless range, are terrible shots. There are innumerable recorded incidents of a police officer and a bad guy emptying their guns at each other at inside-a-coat-closet ranges and missing with every round. Nationally, police hit percentages are horrifyingly low, even at arms-length range. As range increases, hit percentage decreases to near zero.
Knowing this, imagine a determined attacker who is going to do whatever it takes to get to you. Even if you anticipated the attack—most bad guys aren’t going to politely announce their intentions and give you time to prepare–even if they were 60’ away, what is the likelihood you could hit them repeatedly in the chest as they rushed you? What if they simply held up their hands to intercept the projectiles, or held a portion of a jacket between their body and your pepper ball pistol? What if they ducked and dodged? Worse, what if the conditions for the use of deadly force were present—you’d be legally justified in shooting—and all you did was annoy your attacker by missing, or even hitting them…somewhere? And you’re standing there—momentarily–with an empty air gun…
I’m sure Hannity had good intentions, but he’s far outside his knowledge base, and giving bad advice, not only to the police, but to others. Worse, D/S/C politicians might just take his advice, disarm the police, and allow them only pepperball guns. I don’t begrudge any company marketing a lawful product, but the old saying applies: be careful what you ask for—or recommend—you just might get it—or force it on others.
I miss Rush.
Dear pie slapper:
As do all people of good will.
Tucker Carlson??
To her great credit, Governor Sarah Palin has graciously forgiven Tucker Carlson for his suggestion that she should be President of MILFistan.
Dear Elmer Fudd:
How crude of him. She should be queen at the very least.
Palin for President of the United States of America!
Yeah, same stuff annoys me about Mr. Hannity as well. I appreciate that Mr. Carlson allows his guests time to answer.
March Hare: I agree and tell him routinely via my poor TV.
Years ago, I decided that when Bill O’Reilly referred to the “no spin zone”, he really meant “no one else’s spin zone”.
I wonder if it’s something in the water at Fox News.
Dear karllembke:
I suspect it’s merely constant exposure to the contagion. People often think reporters get together each morning topcoat their headlines and reporting. It’s not necessary. They all think exactly the same way and have exactly the same political beliefs. Anyone not fully supporting the party line either won’t be hired or will be quickly fired. Even in organizations that aren’t virulently leftist, the pressure toward virulent leftism is unrelenting.
Hannity’s heart is in the right place, but he’s an annoying yammerer. That’s not why I’m commenting. Free rein. Not free reign. As a teacher, did you ever tell students that grammar and usage matter? If a man gives a great speech with a booger hanging out of his nose, people remember the booger. There was another example from a few days ago. Breathe is a verb, breath is a noun. I hope I didn’t make any egregious mistakes in this comment!
Dear Jeffrey:
As an English teacher, I did indeed tell the kids grammar and usage matter. As to “free rein” vs. “free reign,” that one was a considered choice. I’ve done that a bit more of late, because criminals and other vermin are being given free reign–as in the power to rule over normal Americans–as opposed to merely being allowed to do as they please–“free rein.” The other issue to which you refer was likely a spell/grammar checker issue, as I do understand the distinction you provided. One other thing I taught the kids was just how fiendishly hard it is to proof read one’s own writing. Thanks for your concern!
I used to listen to Hannity on my way home from work, simply because he was on at that time. I quickly learned he had a fixed set of talking points he would hit every day. For instance, at about 3:45 he get on to Hilary Clinton’s e-mails. The words ‘bleach-bit’ and ‘hammer’ would be spoken. Eventually, I gave up on him. It was like listening to a giant, right-wing parrot.
Dear RNB:
I had the same reaction during the 2020 election aftermath when he was say “they gave depositions under penalty of perjury” 75 times in an hour.”
I pretty much gave up on Hannity some time ago but last year was the tailgate. Not a day went by that he didn’t fail to give a lecture about the importance and efficacy of masking. This was in spite of the fact that a lot of information on the inefficacy of masks was available and from years ago. Of course he was only doing it to protect “us”, He wasn’t worried at all about catching the China Flu. The end of it all–for me–was his evening program on the day that St. George of Fentanyl was murdered by that racist gang of Minneapolis cops for no reason at all and while pleading for his life. Hannity spent an entire hour shouting and moaning and pandering and, quite frankly, slandering. If I were those four cops I’d hire Lin Woods to sue him for defamation of character–for starters. That was it. I haven’t watched him or FNC since about three days after the coup. I get my news on line and sometimes Newsmax.
Dear Kathryn of Wyoming:
Indeed. I accidentally tuned it for a few seconds as he pontificated about the majesty of the Chauvin verdict.