This is a great comment. For all the handwringing about what Ms. Bland should or should not have done, and what an officer is or is not allowed to do, we seem to forget that the officer's job is to protect and to promote public safety.

In all of the recent cases that have made the news, this question seems to go unposed, when it should be a litmus test WRT the overall approach to policing.

Instead, we have a culture that shifts the conversation to one about what the officer and victim each did as the situation escalated.