December 4, 2014

When Jeff Roorda agreed to appear on Chris Hayes' show, I'm betting he was expecting the usual Chris Hayes who is unflaggingly polite and allows his guests to filibuster at will.

Instead, he was asked whether or not he believed the Ferguson Grand Jury would have been conducted in the same way if Michael Brown had shot Darren Wilson. Specifically, what Hayes was getting at is whether, in that scenario, Brown would have been allowed to testify without any kind of cross-examination. That question was ducked by Roorda, who just did the Republican talking-point dance, with one key distinction.

Roorda admits that right from the start "[McCulloch] didn't think Darren Wilson acted in a criminal way." This is his justification for the farce they called a Grand Jury proceeding.

When confronted with the reality of the Thin Blue Line, Roorda denied it vigorously, asserting that if Brown and Garner had just complied with police officers, they would be alive today. He then went on to describe the "most tragic outcome" as one where the police officer dies.

Anyone dying is a most tragic outcome. It was unnecessary to minimize the lives of two unarmed men because they objected to being detained by police.

You can really see Roorda's blood pressure rise when former NYPD detective Marq Claxton points out that Roorda and others in the media are pretending that some of the evidence presented is now fact after the Grand Jury decision. He also called the process flawed, which elicited about 30 seconds of everyone talking over everyone else while Hayes jumped over the top of both of them.

Bottom line: Roorda came out with what he truly believes. Darren Wilson should not have been accused of anything and the case should never have gone to the Grand Jury. Period, end of discussion.

There's no Blue Line, police officers always tell the truth, and unicorns fart rainbows.

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