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Police Intimidation by MSP Police

Comments

i'm so glad i don't live in a place like china.

oh wait.


First they came for the dirty, communal hippies and I did nothing because I am selfish and can't stand the smell of patchouli (though I laud their goal of ending war).

Who says this isn't ALREADY a police state?

The judge who signed that flimsy warrant should be spanked bare bottom by the hippies in question.


Really -- what country do we live in?!? MPR has some videos of police in riot gear -- if it didn't say that it was in St. Paul, I swear it could have been China or East Berlin ca. 1981.


just wait until the lawsuits and the people get to pony up double for what the police as the RNC lapdogs have wrought. that is, unless it turns out that hiding their badges and arresting journalists turns out to be an effective way out of paying the millions that have been paid in all the other cities where the police have behaved in this way. turns out that when the people turn their heads and focus only on the minority of punks on the prowl, all kinds of shit goes down.

i really wish the commanders and police chiefs had to pay when the lawsuits cam around, instead of the city itself. but then, the politicians never pay for what they ask for.


food not bombs has been the target of governmental interference for years. i think they're even on some sort of 'terrerist' watch list or something.


Are you trying to equate the police treatment of slash & burn anarchists with China's treatment of Buddhist monks and political dissidents? The St. Paul police have said they had no problems with the peaceful anti-war marchers, it was the splinter idiots with no real purpose other than to create general chaos.

Would you be so open minded about property destruction and rioting if this were an anti-abortion group? Or would you call the police to make them stop?


I like 10,000 others, was protesting the war at the RNC in St. Paul yesterday. It was surreal, marching through streets I know so well, but on this day blocked by rows of riot police, batons in their hands, ready to beat the shit out of me. Most of us were Minny Nice, but a few anarchists did some rioting, and it seems that's all the mainstream media picked up on. And journalists --like AMY GOODMAN for god's sakes, were arrested. This does not bode well for the future of our democracy and it scares me that the media does not report the whole story.


I used to think that protesting had somehow just morphed into a stupid hobby that people have and thereby belittled the protestors from 40 years ago (back when people really had something to protest about). I'm now at the point where I'm thinking that there's almost more of a "hobby" mentality to bitching about how you were treated after the protest as there is about the protest itself. I'm sure the busrides back to Duluth were filled with daydreams of how fun it's going to be to come back to town and tell everyone online how scary the nazi-like police were and how brave and righteous all the peaceful protesters were. When you break it down, I think I have (very slightly) more respect for the anarchist groups that were getting all the attention. At least they were DOING something. When you break it all down, modern protesting consists of the following:

1) Show up somewhere.
2) Say stuff loudly and then repeat that stuff
3) Hold sign or play guitar
4) Bitch about experience

And why is it that the modern protester is almost always severely unattractive? I've never understood that. Other than the ones wearing their dumbass little bandana's over their faces (bandana's that were likely imported from some poor, repressed third world country, by the way) every protester I could see had serious, serious physical "issues". I just don't get that connection. If I was a psychologist I could probably come up with a theory that it's the ugliness that makes people angry and that anger draws them to the world of protesting. Good thing I'm not a psychologist, huh?

And one more thing..."batons in their hands, ready to beat the shit out of me" is a LOOOOOOONG way away from "batons in hands, beating the shit out of me". Get off your cross.

Troll out.


Trolling is the morphed hobby. People have always gathered to protest injustice. The difference between now and 40 years ago is the only real coverage happens on the internet- certainly not in the mainstream media. Channel 3 ran a piece that claimed that the Poor Peoples group were breaking stuff (they weren't).


I know, I know: I shouldn't be feeding the Troll, I've been trying hard to ignore his rants and ravings, but the Troll's latest spewings are just so idiotic. This time, Duluth's most pitiful citizen is criticizing other people who actually get off their asses and do something with their lives and are reporting their experiences -- it's esp. irritating, coming from a lazy bum who obviously has no friends, must not have a job (or is cheating his employer by spending all his time trolling the web instead of working), who sits at his computer all day every day, posting crap on every blog in town -- doing his best to piss off people on DCB, making enemies on PDD. Danny, turn off your computer for once: get a life. Maybe you wouldn't be so pathetic, so social inept, and feel so compelled to take your anger and jealousy out on people you don't even know. Life is passing you by, Danny, it's a beautiful world out there. Too bad you're missing it all.


What's hilarious about everything you just said is that I could easily make the exact same assumptions about you. I don't, but I could. Gee...how do you know that I "post on every blog in town"? Could it be that you spend way too much time yourself on every blog in town? Something else that's funny about this little "you vs. me" issue is your assumption that I am angry, jealous, friendless, socially inept, and on and on and on. It amazes me how incredibly wrong your assumptions are about it. Part of me thinks you are some sort of reverse sooth-sayer who is desperately trying to get a mental picture of me and are coming up with the exact opposite of what I really am. It's incredible Claire. How do you do it?

I just don't get it. I never, ever, ever criticize anyone on here, especially you, just for the mere fact that you're coming on here, DCB, the News Tribune, buzz.duluth, or any of the other blogs in town that you spend countless hours on for the mere fact that you are spreading your opinion and speaking up when you personally feel the need to do so. But do you me? Yes. If I do the EXACT same thing you are doing, I all of a sudden become Duluth's most pathetic citizen troll just because my point of veiw differs from yours and is maybe outside of the norm that you are used to. And on top of all of that, I've actually tried to reach out and give you a forum for your point of view.

Your last post is quite possibly the most "wrong" thing I have ever read on here. It's amazing, really. Am I jealous? What the hell could I be jealous of? I am a very, very happy person. When I do jump in it's usually with a big smile on my face laughing at the silliness of all of this. I have a great wife and kids, a nice home and am a pretty damned happy guy. I am employed full-time and you have no clue what my schedule, duties, ANYTHING are in regards to that job. No clue. I have many, many close friends...BAH! Forget it. I'm done defending myself. Your ignorance in your assumptions are just amazing. AMAZING!


and yet, here you are writing a ~400 word reply.

Dude, you come on and slam people, call them whiners and then act all hurt when someone calls you on it.

"but but I have a wife and kids and my friends love me... I'm so ... happy"

If you so fucking happy stop trying to make other people miserable.


If an idiotic post on a message board is making people "miserable" then those people are more pathetic than I am being perceived.


The St. Paul police have said they had no problems with the peaceful anti-war marchers, it was the splinter idiots with no real purpose other than to create general chaos.

it is this divide and conquer nonsense that leads to people standing by and thinking it's perfectly okay that cops with assault rifles bust into peaceful gatherings and homes, making *all* the inhabitants lie on their faces while handcuffed for extended periods of time, insisting that their rights don't exist because an agent-provacateur or a police infiltrator who IS PAID to come up with something/anything to justify his/her existence said the inhabitants are "planning something". if i were a police informant you'd better believe there'd be something there to find. however, what did they find? (and do i, mild-mannered, forty-something homeschool bonus mom, have said terrorist device?)
wrist rockets. (yup. got one, along with a bucket of taconite pellets.) paint. (yup.) bottles and rags. (we recycle, so yup.) buckets of urine. (depends on the time of day, but definitely one bucket, since i have a combinet in my non-plumbed studio--like a chamber pot.) everyone keeps talking about the supposed "buckets of urine", but i haven't heard of any urine being used. i have read in the mainstream press that at least one of those houses had disconnected their toilets and was using grey water to flush (saving the environment, doncha know.)

having been to many "anarchist" planning gatherings in my youth, there is a bit of performance in it, a bit of bravado talk, and certainly an understanding that there are infiltrators everywhere. brainstorming always includes outrageous things along with the reasonable. it is usually accompanied by laughter. police said that the RNC Welcoming Committee had about 30-35 members. At LEAST three of those members were cops or paid by cops. so does this justify our taxpayer expense? how many of those cops were the ones making the "suggestions" that got those houses busted into? because that's what they do. they make outrageous suggestions to see who bites, who cheers, who looks thoughtfully serious. having been targeted by an agent-provacateur myself back in the day for an offhand, reckless comment about Ted Kaczynski, i can relate.

is the fact that anarchist kids got arrested for property crime "like China"? no. but busting into homes with assault rifles drawn, breaking down doors, arresting people before they commit a crime, and arresting journalists is most certainly "like China." so is confiscating buses and arresting people who are driving permaculture-education buses, steam-rolling kids on bikes that "look like punks" or breaking into gatherings of people watching movies, and confiscating boxes of literature. in D.C. recently, they confiscated the lunchtime soup at a protester house, saying it was homemade pepper spray. this kind of shit is insane, and getting worse. i saw the beginnings of it at the DNC in Chicago in '96, where whole neighborhoods became zones where residents needed to show their papers to get home, and the legal squat i was staying in was surveilled and busted into more than once. in my *extensive* experience, demonstrations almost always get out of hand because of police behavior. it is supposed to be THEIR JOB to de-escalate bad situations, not exacerbate them. but when you have all those cool rubber bullets, and tear gas, and truncheons, there's an itch to use them. how many of these cops are still PTSD-ing from Iraq? how many of them are itching for a fight?

this is all about spending money. about getting huge federal grants for weapons and police overtime and justifying it all by building unnecessary huge fences to intimidate peaceful protesters, surveilling peace groups for months on end, and facing down protesters dressed as if they were in a war zone. this all costs us MILLIONS in taxes, and it isn't justified by a couple dozen teenagers throwing rocks. (besides the fact that i think a "couple dozen" is an overestimation of the truly violent hooligans.) every single act of window-breaking is multiplied into vagueness in the reports, so who knows how many windows actually got broken? was it two? was it ten?

and shame on the actively peaceful protesters who fall all over themselves to separate themselves from "those punks", most of whom did absolutely nothing wrong but yell and intimate they were going to "do something" and ride their bikes without following the rules of the road. getting your face busted because you ride a funny bike is not justice. it is almost certain that the vast majority of the violence is welcomed by the police so they can play too. it wouldn't be a demonstration if they didn't get to bust some ass. which is exactly the OPPOSITE of what they're supposed to be doing.

and so we taxpayers get to pay for all this twice: once for the snazzy black riot-suits and non-lethal weaponry and crazy unnecessary overtime, and once for the lawsuits that are sure to come and sure to be won. the constitution, after all, counts for punks too. and i hope they win millions so that all we oldsters can bite our knuckles with the injustice of it all and hate them just a little bit more.

and PLEASE, can everybody get a SMIDGEN of sense, and STOP RESPONDING TO THE TROLL.


I saw a few clips of police officers getting hit and body slammed by some protestors (probably the anarchists, but it was hard to tell in some cases; lot of people running around and yelling). This begs the question: if one doesn't like the "gear" the law enforcement folks are wearing, what should they wear? However one feels about their actions, I think it should be noted the body armor, shields and helmets are meant to keep them safe when having to dive into a melee. When all is said and done, there may be charges against the departments for certain acts. People Like this Amy Goodman, or the ACLU probably have their lawyers on speed dial. That's fine. I just hope one doesn't try to sue because the riot police looked scary.


Just a point: "Anarchists" does not mean "people throwing rocks through cop car windows and tossing buckets of bleach."
"Anarchy" is a theory of government (or lack thereof). Anarchists (like any other group in existence) can choose to be either peaceful protestors, or riotous punks who fuck shit up. I've known many anarchists in my day who were happy vegans and wouldn't hurt a fly. I've also known many right-wing wackos who are itching for a fight.
Just because someone has a particular political belief, this does not mean they are necessarily "violent". It's the expression of those beliefs that can be violent assholes or as peaceful as posies.


Danny Boy -- watching a protest on TV is a LOOOONNNNGGGGGGGGG way from actually being there. Get a life already, you fuckin' troll, always stirring up trouble, then crying victim when people call you out on your shit.


I never cried victim. I just pointed out how amazingly wrong "C-Word" was in her personal analysis of me.

And I've been to protests. I stand by my description.


Leave Danny from Duluth alone you pricks.

Let's protest Mayor Ness and the City Council. Oh wait... this is a pro lay off web board.

lol


the body armor, shields and helmets are meant to keep them safe when having to dive into a melee.

yes. but respected people (and most police departments around the world) understand that riot gear should be worn when confronting *rioters*, not trotted out at every opportunity, and worn at all times. in other countries, riot squads are kept out of sight until an actual riot begins, because they *know* that the appearance of these devices/protections *welcomes* and in fact, *creates* confrontation. not just because excitable youngsters want to feel tough, but because they're hot and itchy and make the cops irritable. it is in fact a provocation to carry weapons. friendly, relaxed cops breed friendly, relaxed demonstrators.

I just hope one doesn't try to sue because the riot police looked scary.

what a specious comment. do you really believe a lawyer is going to take a case because the police "look scary"? cases have been won over and over again, at just about every major demonstration since 1999, because police departments consistently overreact with rampant human rights violations. no one won a case because they were "intimidated"--they won because they were treated like subhumans. which we supposedly don't allow in this country.


Rioting can break out any time in such cases. Not all the time, but the police need to be prepared. I've been in situations that started out just fine, then the next thing you know rocks and other stuff is being thrown at you. I was glad to have my kevlar on.

The other comment wasn't meant to be taken seriously.

Overall, I'm merely defending the police use of protective gear when dealing with large events like this. I'll let the actions of the police and protestors speak for themselves.


hbh and scribbler both make good points --it's a tough issue, you 've got to maintain the peace, but you don't want to violate people's Constitutional rights. We were peaceful marchers walking from the Capitol to the X and back on one of those gorgeous late summer days that makes you glad to be alive, glad to be outside, glad to be hanging out. I was lucky enough to march alongside Rachel Kilgour and Sara Thomsen -- two most beautiful women and professional musicians -- who were singing as we marched. We were in a good mood. Life was good, damn, life was great. It was quite jarring to see these cops in full riot gear lined up along the route, blocking the streets into downtown, esp. when the cops around the Capitol area during the rally weren't all dressed up for battle, they treated us with courtesy and we returned the favor.

As for the anarchists who raised hell and rioted, they were such a small part of the protest. It really pisses me off that the media focuses on them, and overlooks the rest of us. For instance, Fox News showed up and interviewed some people, including an unemployed woman who was incredibly articulate and passionate about why she was marching. Instead, the Fox News coverage focused on some delegates who'd been attacked by some of the anarchists. I do feel like the actions of a few overshadowed the message that 10,000, maybe 20,000 people were trying to get out there. And it's happened before -- remember Seattle?

But I've got to say -- those kids had guts to try to do their thing when they were outnumbered by the huge numbers of cops with billy clubs. Gotta give them credit for moxie. I got mixed up with them at one point during the march and liked their spirit, but knew I'd better stick with my middle-aged compadres, or I'd end up in the pokey too.

I did hear on MPR that the RNC was told by the cities of Mlps and St. Paul before they came to town to buy insurance against lawsuits and property damage, so we Minny taxpayers, aren't totally aren't on the hook, and the RNC is going to pony up for all the damage and the lawsuits that the victims of the illegal preemptive raids as well as illegal arrests had to deal with. And I hope they do get their asses sued.


Thanks for the SECOND Protest Report Claire. By the way...nobody asked. Including this troll.


another classic example of a RNC taking a big shit on the bill of rights using Minneapolis and St. Paul's Finest as armed thugs....fourth amendment my ass.

Dumbya's right...the Constitution IS just another piece of paper.


http://www.rushprnews.com/2008/09/02/my-17-year-old-was-beaten-by-police-at-rnc-devastated-mother-says/

A 17 year old pacifist was beaten to the point that boot prints were imprinted on his back. What has this country come to?
Why do we support a goverment that assualts nonviolent protesters? People need to pull their heads out of the ass of their neighbor and put some glasses on.
THIS IS NOT OK


about this troll thing. i usually don't agree with everything danny has to say, but to label him a troll in this thread is incorrect. internet trolls typically come on to boards, spout a bunch of crap anonymously and usually only reply with more incoherent crap. danny doesn't hide who he is. he's offering counterpoints to arguments and is stating why he feels that way. i've always thought pdd was about free exchange of ideas. danny seems to enjoy an exchange of ideas with intelligent people (something you don't get on the other duluth blog).

so yeah, danny may have a different viewpoint on issues but at least he backs it up. call him what you want but i don't think troll applies here. (usually)

however danny, i'm calling you out on calling claire "C-Word". i know what you are implying and that is treading on troll territory my friend.

to all of you. argue on. it's your god damned american right to do so.


I take back the c-word line. I honestly wasnt going for what you imply I was going for there, but I knew the implication and I should have been smart enough to not have used it.


Hi, this is Danny's shrink weighing in -- Danny is bipolar. He can't help himself, it's a chemical imbalance that causes him to act out. He needs compassion and better meds, not attention. Just ignore him.


Hey Doc. Your fired.


Another note on Danny's pathology:
Besides being bipolar and a Republican -- he's got a very small dick and his wife fakes it.


Wow, Danny's Psychiatrist, you must really feel threatened by Danny to sink to name calling and size comparison. Don't have anything really important to say, huh? I find you mildly amusing in a 3rd grade-ish sort of way!


Speaking as someone who routinely insults Danny's grotesque and atrophied genitals, I think we have to keep in mind just how universally reviled Danny is.

Here we have someone identifying himself as a troll saying he didn't ask for a second protest report from Claire. See Danny, the opinion of degenerate scumbags like yourself are meaningless.

Don't you know that?


I'm sorry I didnt repy earlier. I was busy disappointing my wife with my tiny wang.

What the hell, man! What am I supposed to come back with here? No, you have a tiny dick! I know you are but what am I? Na na na na boo boo...stick your head in doo-doo. What you say is what you are...you're a naked booby star.

You kids are so silly.


1) Show up somewhere.
2) Say stuff loudly and then repeat that stuff
3) Hold sign or play guitar
4) Bitch about experience

In what appears to be the first use of criminal charges under the 2002 Minnesota version of the Federal Patriot Act, Ramsey County Prosecutors have formally charged 8 alleged leaders of the RNC Welcoming Committee with Conspiracy to Riot in Furtherance of Terrorism. Monica Bicking, Eryn Trimmer, Luce Guillen Givins, Erik Oseland, Nathanael Secor, Robert Czernik, Garrett Fitzgerald, and Max Spector, face up to 7 1/2 years in prison under the terrorism enhancement charge which allows for a 50% increase in the maximum penalty.

Affidavits released by law enforcement which were filed in support of the search warrants used in raids over the weekend, and used to support probable cause for the arrest warrants, are based on paid, confidential informants who infiltrated the RNCWC on behalf of law enforcement. They allege that members of the group sought to kidnap delegates to the RNC, assault police officers with firebombs and explosives, and sabotage airports in St. Paul. Evidence released to date does not corroborate these allegations with physical evidence or provide any other evidence for these allegations than the claims of the informants. Based on past abuses of such informants by law enforcement, the National Lawyers Guild is concerned that such police informants have incentives to lie and exaggerate threats of violence and to also act as provacateurs in raising and urging support for acts of violence.

"These charges are an effort to equate publicly stated plans to blockade traffic and disrupt the RNC as being the same as acts of terrorism. This both trivializes real violence and attempts to place the stated political views of the Defendants on trial," said Bruce Nestor, President of the Minnesota Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild. "The charges represent an abuse of the criminal justice system and seek to intimidate any person organizing large scale public demonstrations potentially involving civil disobedience, he said."

http://twincities.indymedia.org/2008/sep/breaking-rnc-8-charged-conspiracy-riot-furtherance-terrorism


MinnesotaIndependent.com has excellent coverage of the protests from journos who were there -- and were arrested too, in the police's heavy-handed attempts to not only clear the streets of people exercising their constitutional rights this past week, but also to prevent alternative media from reporting on what's going on by arresting them too. I have to admit, I initially strongly disapproved of the property damage inflicted by protesters, like breaking windows downtown, but hbh's thoughtful postings on PDD, as well as this excerpt below from an intv with a member of Anti-Flag really makes me re-think my initial anger towards those protesters. I think their actions took away from the message all the protesters were trying to make, but I better understand where it came from. And I salute the protesters on the bridge last night, that took a lot of guts. After all, who wants to get pepper sprayed or beaten up? I compare what happened in St. paul this past week to the protests in Duluth when Pres. Bush came to town. The cops were great, and nobody was afraid of being teargassed or beaten up if they walked too close to the DECC or by the Radisson.

From MinnesotaIndependent.com:
JS: That said, there’s a few dozens kids breaking windows and stuff. Is there a place to draw the line with illegal protest?

PT: I’m actually a fan, [laughs] I have to say. When you’re there, you see what’s happening. You see the frustration of the kid on the sidewalk who’s just there chanting, and the cops pull him off and throw him on the ground and start pepper-spraying him in the face.

JS: At that point, when kids start breaking windows, then it makes sense. Rarely does a group of kids just show up and start knocking shit over and breaking things for no reason. It’s almost always something that’s instigated by the police. And there have been cases where undercover police are in the audience instigating things, so that’s certainly an issue.

PT: I’ll take a number of Starbucks windows to get the troops out of Iraq.


At the risk of feeding PDD's resident Troll, I have to say, any comments about his "family jewels" -- or lack thereof -- seem to me to be well-deserved. After all, he opened the door to it by assessing the physical attractiveness of protesters he saw on TV, calling me "The C-word," posting videos mocking deaf people. And that's only in the past week. I could go on, but I really, really find Danny's childish antics tiresome.


OK, I have to make one more comment about the protests in St. Paul. i just learned on MinnesotaIndependent.com that Philadelphia cops were among those roaming the streets of St. Paul. Those cops don't mess around. When I lived in Philly in the mid-80s, the Philly cops *bombed* a city block to get a group called MOVE to leave their barricaded house. Half the people killed during this operation, as I recall, were children. Joel Kilgour's mother told me last night that the Duluth police chief did not want to send cops from Duluth to St. Paul b/c he feared this kind of heavy handed shit would happen. Apparently, all the Duluth cops were posted *inside* the Xcel Energy Ctr. Our tax dollars at work.


Well...you've fed the troll Claire. Congrats.

Now allow me to retort.

I am truly sorry about the "c-word" comment. I wish I could take it back. I regret ever posting it...which I said yesterday. Doubt you'll accept this since you see everything so black and white (sort of an "everything that anyone against me says is evil and wrong" mentallity), but it's true.

Now on to the more-important topic at-hand:my junk. If you want to compare the allegation of the size of my unit to my assesment of the attractiveness to the average Duluth protestor then you are missing a very important point. My opinion of the physical appearance of these fine folks expressing their freedom of speech is based on the impressions of what I have actually seen with my own eyes. Is the opinion wrong? It very well could be. It is my opinion based on my tastes of what is and is not attractive. In contrast, to the best of my knowledge none of you have ever laid eyes on my glorious member. Therefor, what I said about the attractiveness of protestors is: Opinion. What you kids are aledging about my tool is: Blind speculation.

There. Glad we could work together and bring this topic back to a sensible discussion. Nobody is happier than me that there are so many people fantasizing about my genitals.


Since Claire has no problem posting 3 times in a row on the same topic, I guess I don't feel bad about this...

"Apparently, all the Duluth cops were posted *inside* the Xcel Energy Ctr. Our tax dollars at work."

Hasnt it been established that our Duluth tax dollars were not used to pay the Duluth cops at the convention?


Once again the troll dons his fake halo to deny attempts to provoke emotional responses with his 'protesters are ugly' line, passed off as 'opinion' to anyone who calls him on it. Can we ban him now? I propose a suicide pact whereby both Danny and I will lose all ability to post or comment here. That way it won't seem 'unfair' to Danny's enablers. Starfire, Barrett, your thoughts?


Why don't you just stop commenting voluntarily? No one wants to read any of this bullshit. Frankly, I don't even like visiting this site anymore, it's so boring and tedious.

ALSO: Claire and Candidate, I've deleted your comments wherein you copied and pasted articles from other publications. How many times do we have to have that discussion? If you want to comment about another publication, link to it, don't steal it.


Whoops, sorry about that, Barrett. I post to two listserves where we often cut & paste, the rule is as long as we give proper attribution, it's cool, so I forgot this is a no-no here. I write myself for a print/online publication and I see my reports cut & pasted all the time, esp. my seminal investigative piece on Harry Potter 7 being printed in a top-secret location in Crawfordsville, Indiana. As long as I'm given proper attribution and no one steals my idea and then writes their own report -- like one of the TV networks did with my Harry Potter expose -- I don't mind.

Anyway, I thought this intv with punk band Anti Flag who opened for Rage Against the Machine was pretty interesting and topical to the discussion we're *trying* to have on this thread.

http://www.minnesotaindependent.com/7559/anti-flag-qa-police-at-ripple-effect-dangerous


The author might not mind when you "borrow" their material, but the business that paid for the creation of that content for the express purpose of generating ad revenue on their website definitely minds.


I'm happy to mellow out on the bullshit. Just thought I'd make the offer. Consider this my last word on the subject.


On a more serious note: Amy Goodman's arrest was more of a political statement than the act of journalism she might have you believe it was. She tried to rush past a cop who wanted her to back up, all the while shouting "don't arrest me!" You don't have to know much to know what the cop's gonna do, and I think she knew.

That's like saying "don't tase me bro" at a Kerry speech: you're gonna get tased.

Support journalists and journalism! With money! Nothing is more important to a healthy Democracy.



On a more serious note: Amy Goodman's arrest was more of a political statement than the act of journalism she might have you believe it was. She tried to rush past a cop who wanted her to back up, all the while shouting "don't arrest me!" You don't have to know much to know what the cop's gonna do, and I think she knew.

That's like saying "don't tase me bro" at a Kerry speech: you're gonna get tased.

Support journalists and journalism! With money! Nothing is more important to a healthy Democracy.



It looks like Danny's sock puppets and meat puppets are now bent on polluting Perfect Duluth Day. I guess having all those pseudonyms over at the vile DCB is not enough for Danny. But this last post is truly offensive. Shame on you Danny!


Amy Goodman was doing what she should have been doing: standing up for what's right when a wrong is being done. "unarresting" is something that can be done not only by credentialed journalists by asking nicely but firmly, but also mild-mannered regular folks and black-clad punks.

i've done this once, and i didn't get arrested--though it was early in the game. they're a lot less sympathetic to argument these days. there's nothing like the Very Surprised Look of a cop when he has to decide between letting go of the camera you're both hanging onto, or go after the indy-journalist he was trying to arrest in the first place. i didn't win, and he got the camera, but it was a good fight nonetheless, and he had to promise not to damage/destroy the film.

it helps if you look like me.

i came back to this thread to correct myself: it appears that the RNC was forced to take out a huge insurance policy to pay for the lawsuits that are sure to come. i'm still skeptical that the people won't somehow end up paying for that, but there ya go.


Just to close up this thread: there's a stimulating discussion about the RNC on the Progressive Action listserve, including reports from Duluthians who were in St. Paul this past week, for people who want to discuss -- or just lurk.


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