Playing with guns

Full gunmetal irony

Today's Taipei Times brings us this appallingly ironic story:

Lawmaker presents shocking police photos

[...]

A police cadet standing to the left in a photograph has the muzzle of a handgun in his mouth, while a classmate standing next to him, in full uniform and smiling, levels a second handgun at the cadet's temple.

Other grainy photographs show similarly disturbing scenes of what Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chiang Lien-fu (江連福) said yesterday were police cadets fooling around with guns during training.

"I received the pictures as a file attached to an anonymous e-mail from a Taipei police academy and I was just appalled," Chiang told the Taipei Times after displaying the photographs at a press conference in the legislature on Friday.

The file contained 30 photographs of cadets playing with guns by pointing them at one another, at a salamander and at other random targets.

[...]

Even if the firearms shown in the photos are merely pellet guns, the cadets' actions reveal a disturbing lack of discipline in handling sidearms and are indicative of a severe lack of gun training among police officers nationwide, Chiang said.

The target of Chiang's accusations is actually a notable example of police incompetence in which an officer's gun was stolen resulting in the death of an innocent victim who became caught up in the situation. However, how can such accusations be made by a person who does this?:

In lieu of a smoking gun Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chiang Lien-fu aims a gun at a Chen Shui-bian doll in the legislature yesterday, saying that the president should "end it all" after pan-green camp legislators boycotted the second day of recall proceedings. PHOTO: SEAN CHAO, TAIPEI TIMES

Even if the firearm shown in the photo is merely a BB gun, I guess what Chiang is really trying to say is this: "Do as I say, not as I do."

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Smoking guns: Taiwan, 台灣, irony, 諷刺, Chiang Lien-fu, 江連福

Cross-posted at It's Not Democracy, It's A Conspiracy!