This is getting silly.  Police deal with deadly assailants at times.  They need protection.

In the wake of the faux scandal ginned up by the Obama administration and race hustler, tax cheat, anti-Semite pogrom leader and welcome guest at the White House and among Democrats, Al Sharpton, comes the latest blow to police departments.

The Washington Post reports that police in Ferguson, Missouri have begun to test a new “less lethal” attachment for guns – involving ping-pong ball-like attachments:

Browsing a California company’s Web site, Eickhoff  [Ed. Note: Ferguson’s assistant police chief] found pictures and videos of an odd-looking, blaze-orange device docked on a normal handgun barrel. When a bullet fired, it melded with an attached projectile the size of a ping-pong ball that flew with enough force to knock a person down, maybe break some ribs, but not kill him, the product’s makers said — even at close range.

Its name: the Alternative.

The critics respond:

But others consider the product dangerous because officers must take time — if only a few seconds — to remove it from their belts and affix it to a service weapon. That “exposes police officers to greater risk” and “turns policy on its head,” said Steve Ijames, a former Springfield, Mo., police major and training expert.

“I am all about less lethal,” he said. “What bothers me is we will allow an officer to face immediate deadly jeopardy with a less-lethal round. Deadly force is the most likely thing to repel deadly force.” (snip)

Some bloggers and gun enthusiasts have excoriated Ellis’s product; one labeled it “terrifying,” the worst less-lethal force idea ever. They have gleefully taken note that the business end of the Alternative resembles a clown’s nose.

“The Bozo Bullet,” one critic called it.

The jury is still out (ha ha), since it is being introduced on a trial basis.  It may be a good idea (though I doubt it), but again, this just casts aspersions on people who serve and protect.  Again.