In the September 22 issue of NR, we published an article called “A Job Like No Other.” In it, I gave some thoughts on policing (spurred by the shooting in Ferguson, Mo., and the subsequent debate about policing). To read this article, go here.

I wish to publish two letters.

Dear Mr. Nordlinger,
. . . I spent nearly 22 years in the U.S. Army as an officer in the JAG Corps (Army lawyers). As such I had many encounters with military policemen, as a defense counsel, prosecutor, and legal administrator. What I never experienced was that they were omniscient. It has become a mantra that a policeman shot an “unarmed” man. How, I wonder, can a policeman without X-ray vision determine in advance whether a person is armed? If someone is stupid enough to attack an armed policeman, he deserves whatever he gets. We had an expression in Army legal offices to the effect that a soldier was “too stupid to live.” . . .

And a second letter:

Dear Mr. Nordlinger,
. . . I was ready to stand up and applaud — but being supine in warm-water therapy for my pain made such an action unwise. . . .
I am a retired chief of police after a spinal disease, exacerbated by an on-the-job injury, overtook my ability to police. I have a brother who was a cop. My son-in-law is a corrections officer, and my son just retired at the age of 20 from the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne, coming home a wounded warrior after a bad training injury. He expects to find some type of work in law enforcement, and I imagine he will.
We bleed blue, I suppose — not Democrat blue but police blue — in my family. Even with my own injury and pain, I cannot imagine having done any other life’s work, and I would do it all again in a heartbeat. . . .