Obama targeted police
In the Oct. 20 Herald-Leader, a reader responded to my assertion that the Obama administration put a target on the backs of all policemen. The reader cited a couple of superficial and highly cherry-picked statistics from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund.
His statistics are skewed. The data cited conveniently excluded 2016, a high water mark in the Obama administration for the deaths of policemen, but does include 2002, a high water mark for the Bush administration from the delayed deaths of first responders from 9/11.
As reported by the NLEOMF, police fatalities increased substantially in the last three years of the Obama administration. The beginning of this upward trend can be traced directly to the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson and the fake news generated that led to a national “war on cops.” The Obama administration blatantly attempted to blame and demonize law enforcement long before the true facts were known.
The incidence of police ambushes and executions has never been higher.
According to the NLEOMF, there were 21 police ambush deaths in 2016. Two officers were gunned down in Las Vegas as a hostile act against law enforcement in June of 2014. In New York City, 15 police officers were fatally ambushed in 2014.
Pat Nussbaum
Nicholasville
This story was originally published November 8, 2017 at 7:22 PM with the headline "Obama targeted police."