I understand your point jpinpb and I think it is incredibly valid. My snarkiness in the original post was not appropriate for the level of tragedy this story amounts to. My point for linking the story was not to show that the firemen or police are bad, so much as the unionized bureaucratic litigative culture that is spreading like a cancer through some of our most beloved, important, and fundamental city sevices.

These people, I am sure, became police and fire because they wanted to serve and protect. But the rules are so corrupt that they are turned into monsters.

That is how they acted on that day, laws be damned. I would even venture to guess that most police or firehouses in the state would not act like this.

A freaking bystander waded in to fish the body out after he had drowned.

edit: The firemen and medics I know would not act like this! But we can not continue down this path.