the talking heads on the cable channels , babbling away on shows joining in their titles the words `` pizza , '' `` shootout , '' `` terror , '' `` confrontation , '' and `` ambush '' in various unimaginative combinations , endlessly debated whether a police informer was truly a `` rat '' as the term was commonly understood , why illegal guns seemed to proliferate at such an alarming rate in american cities , and whether it was politic or merely politics to have a black-and-white in detective team investigating a case involving a black and a white shooter .