That woman must have chained smoked cigs or perhaps she is just sick.  Either way she sounds like she has small balls.

"Charles J. Kelly, a former Baltimore Police Department lieutenant who wrote the department's use of force guidelines, said pepper spray is a "compliance tool" that can be used on subjects who do not resist, and is preferable to simply lifting protesters.

"When you start picking up human bodies, you risk hurting them," Kelly said. "Bodies don't have handles on them."

After reviewing the video, Kelly said he observed at least two cases of "active resistance" from protesters. In one instance, a woman pulls her arm back from an officer. In the second instance, a protester curls into a ball. Each of those actions could have warranted more force, including baton strikes and pressure-point techniques.

"What I'm looking at is fairly standard police procedure," Kelly said.

1.  According to Charles Kelly, it doesn't hurt to have chemicals sprayed into your eyes and face that are designed to incapacitate you. 

2.  If you see you're going to get chemicals sprayed in your face and curl into a ball, that means Baltimore police get to hit you with sticks and hit your pressure points [edit: for massive damage].

[edit:  Fixed, TOS.]

You missed a great chance to use the "attack its weak point for massive damage" meme.

It was really the perfect move by the UC Davis protestors. Any tactic used if the protest is actually peaceful is going to be a PR nightmare for the opposing side

The rest of Occupy needs to sort this out and straighten up their conduct if they want to be more effective

why is he spraying them while they're down ?

Cause he can?

It's sad to see what the USA have been turning into over the last couple of years.

Maybe it's just me, but the way they are oppressing peaceful protests etc. doesn't look very different to the images I've seen from some regimes/dictatorships oppressing peaceful protests in their own country.

And the fact that the police's behaviour may be legitimate doesn't make this okay. Even when the most brutal regimes/dictatorships are oppressing their citizens, there's always some law that can be overstretched to justify the police's behaviour.

People who are standing up can fight back silly!