Police opened fire Monday morning with wooden
dowels, "sting balls" and other non-lethal weapons at anti-war
protesters outside the Port of Oakland, injuring at least a
dozen demonstrators and six longshoremen standing nearby.
Most of the 500 demonstrators at the port were dispersed
peacefully, but police opened fire at two gates when protesters
refused to move. The longshoremen, pinned against a fence, were
caught in the crossfire.
The port protest was one of several anti-war demonstrations
Monday in the San Francisco Bay area. Twelve people were
arrested at the Concord Naval Weapons Station, and seven were
arrested after temporarily blocking an off-ramp from Interstate
280 in San Francisco. (...
more + photos)
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NYC IndyMedia
POLICE SURROUND AND ARREST 100 PROTESTORS AND BYSTANDERS ACROSS
THE STREET FROM M27 ANTIWAR CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE. NINETEEN
ARRESTED BLOCKING ENTRANCE TO 712 5TH AVE, OFFICE BUILDING OF
THE CARLYLE GROUP.
New York, NY. At 8:40 this morning, approximately 19 protesters
were arrested for blocking the entrance to an office building at
712 5th Avenue in protest against the Carlyle Group for
promoting and exploiting the war against Iraq for profit. Soon
after, a double row of riot police quickly surrounded a group of
approximately 100 protesters and bystanders as they stood on the
sidewalk across the street, gave no order to disperse, and
arrested them.
Attorney Karen Moulding, an attorney with the group Glamericans
for Peace, observed the arrests. "Pedestrians were able to get
by without any impediment. Police gave no warnings to disperse.
I've been a legal observer for many demonstrations for years and
I've never seen anything like it. Police behavior seemed
calculated to silence or deters peaceful demonstration. Police
should be proud to protect the First Amendment right to
demonstrate peacefully, rather than use scare tactics to
pre-empt it."
One protestor, Jennifer Jaeger who witnessed the arrests of
bystanders, said, "I noticed one man thrown to the ground and
another bystander was cuffed so tightly that she started to cry.
The police were brutal and its obvious their actions were meant
to stifle protests."
Smaller independent actions were planned throughout the day to
target the New York City offices of other war profiteers.
The protests were part of a National Day of Direct Action
against the war. New York City activists chose Carlyle for the
main action to help expose a much larger problem, the corrupting
influence of powerful profit-seeking corporations on decision
making in Washington. With a roster of associates that includes
George Bush Sr. and former Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci,
Carlyle has access to the innermost circles of power. Carlyle
gains information from this privileged access, and uses its
influence to manipulate US foreign policy and short-circuit
democratic institutions, in order to profit from war.
Other companies to be targeted in today's demonstrations include
manufacturers of weapons systems as well as corporations
jockeying to get a piece of the many-billion-dollar windfall
from the American occupation and reconstruction of Iraq, and the
astronomical profits from exploitation of Iraqi oil.
Right now, in ways that are off the radar screen of most
Americans, corporate players in key industries are working hand
in hand with Bush administration officials and advisors, using
this war -- and wars now being planned -- to push for an
unprecedented expansion of American military power and global
economic dominance. Decisions are being made not on the basis of
what is good for Americans and for the world, but on the basis
of what is most profitable for a tiny elite; and not by
democratic means but behind the closed doors of private
institutions like the Carlyle Group.
With the attack on Baghdad underway, and the death toll
predicted to be well into the thousands, we adopt the peaceful
tactics of Martin Luther King and Gandhi to demand an immediate
end to the war on Iraq.
For more information, check our website:
www.m27coalition.org .
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By Lee Douglas
PORTLAND, Oregon (Reuters) - An Oregon anti-terrorism bill would
jail street-blocking protesters for at least 25 years in a
thinly veiled effort to discourage anti-war demonstrations,
critics say.
The bill has met strong opposition but lawmakers still expect a
debate on the definition of terrorism and the value of free
speech before a vote by the state senate judiciary committee
(news - web sites), whose Chairman, Republican Senator John
Minnis, wrote the proposed legislation.
Dubbed Senate Bill 742, it identifies a terrorist as a person
who "plans or participates in an act that is intended, by at
least one of its participants, to disrupt" business,
transportation, schools, government, or free assembly.
The bill's few public supporters say police need stronger laws
to break up protests that have created havoc in cities like
Portland, where thousands of people have marched and
demonstrated against war in Iraq (news - web sites) since last
fall.
"We need some additional tools to control protests that shut
down the city," said Lars Larson, a conservative radio talk show
host who has aggressively stumped for the bill.
Larson said protesters should be protected by free speech laws,
but not given free reign to hold up ambulances or frighten
people out of their daily routines, adding that police and the
court system could be trusted to see the difference.
"Right now a group of people can get together and go downtown
and block a freeway," Larson said. "You need a tool to deal with
that."
The bill contains automatic sentences of 25 years to life for
the crime of terrorism.
Critics of the bill say its language is so vague it erodes basic
freedoms in the name of fighting terrorism under an extremely
broad definition.
"Under the original version (terrorism) meant essentially a food
fight," said Andrea Meyer of the American Civil Liberties Union
(news - web sites) (ACLU), which opposes the bill.
Police unions and minority groups also oppose the bill for fear
it could have a chilling effect on relations between police and
poor people, minorities, children and "vulnerable" populations.
Legislators say the bill stands little chance of passage.
"I just don't think this bill is ever going to get out of
committee," said Democratic Senator Vicki Walker, one of four
members on the six-person panel who have said they oppose the
legislation.
...CheO, 4/5/03
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Show The Whole Truth
t r u t h o u t | Response to reader.
http://truthout.org/docs_03/040503A.shtml
By John Cory
Editors Note: The following letter was written by TO
contributing writer John Cory in response to a TO reader who
questioned the patriotism of the TO staff. The reader, Steve is
a Vietnam veteran, as is John Cory.
Dear Steve,
I read your letter to Truthout.Com and wanted to write to
you. I too am a Vietnam Veteran.
You wrote, "Show the whole truth.'' And I agree. Show the
World Trade Center and the Pentagon carnage and let the record
reflect that no Iraqi, no Saddam Hussein, was involved in the
despicable acts of 9/11. And in showing the whole truth, let us
ask again: Why Iraq?
You referred to Truthout as a "tree hugging liberal.'' As
soldiers, surely you and I share the tree hugging experience of
dodging shrapnel and RPGs. We know what it is to hug a tree or
wrap our ammo belt around a tree just to hold on as our legs
floated in the river and the unseen "enemy'' tried to do us
bodily harm. As I recall in Vietnam, tree huggers were not just
liberals.
You and I are veterans. Veterans of military service and
veterans of war. But I take exception to veterans who wrap
themselves in the flag as a means to judge and bestow freedom,
patriotism, and civil liberties on others. As soldiers, we did
our duty as required of all soldiers, to uphold the
Constitution. That was the oath we took. That oath did not
specify that only those who believed as we did were covered by
our tours of duty. In America, the freedoms enjoyed by its
citizens are inherent. They neither have to be earned or deemed
appropriate by anyone else. The American birthright was founded
on dissent and freedom of speech long before you and I slogged
through rice paddies. Black soldiers who fought in WW II served
in a segregated military. Native Americans served despite the
fact that many were not allowed to vote. And Japanese-Americans
served despite interment camps. All of these men served with
honor and heroism, fighting for freedoms that they were denied
in that place called America.
You are right to say, "It is usually the coward who has given
nothing to the protection of the freedoms you enjoy.'' But the
coward is the silent one who dares not speak or face the
ostracism of those who wish to bully and coerce. The coward is
the one who knows better but chooses the path of least
resistance in order to conform. The coward is the one who evades
his legal obligation to his country and yet demands that others
pay the price he was unwilling to pay. No my friend, dissent is
anything but cowardice. Ask our founding fathers.
I believe the VA Hospitals and the entire VA system has
failed its veterans miserably. I remember the horrors of VA
hospital stays in the Seventies. I remember that it took
national news stories to expose the often abominable conditions
in VA hospitals across the country. And those were staffed by
good old Americans, not "foreigners.''
Support the troops you say. Absolutely. But how? By cheering
the deaths of innocent civilians? By building memorial walls to
the fallen? We know better, my friend.
You and I know what waits for these troops in a war where
they cannot delineate between civilian and military combatants.
We both know that the media that now howls for more and faster
war will turn on the very men who fight today. They will call
them baby-killers and murderers and mercenaries. The modern
media will not hold the men who started this war accountable,
but instead will be judge and jury of the troops on the
battlefield.
My brother veteran, it is up to you and I to support the
troops by ensuring that this government is held accountable. By
making every effort possible to maintain our civil liberties and
the Constitutional rights set forth in the founding of this
country. We can support the troops by not turning a blind eye to
the "whole truth.''
You and I are veterans. Veterans of the whole sum of war. We
have our medals and scars, and have spent more than our fair
share of sleepless nights doing the duffle bag rag. We know the
long aftermath of war never leaves those who have seen the demon
face-to-face. And you and I know that the men who build the
altars of war never sacrifice themselves upon it.
I wish you well my friend. We share the bond of war, and I
will always stand proudly beside you because we are brothers of
combat - veterans. We will lead the cheers for our returning
troops. You and I will spot the empty spaces in the parade and
we will share that sadness, because we know that the best use of
an army is not to wage war, but to keep the peace.
Welcome home my friend.
John Cory
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Survey suggests scary longing for a First Amendment lite
Does "the First Amendment go too far in the rights that it
guarantees"? Almost half of those asked said "yes" in a
poll released this week. --
It seems a lot of folks would replace "Congress shall make
no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech" with
"Congress shall make only a few laws . . ." There's a big
market out there for a First Amendment lite. 9/07/02
Democracies die behind closed doors'
- A federal appeals court last week upheld a constitutional
principle that a year ago we would have taken for granted:
In the United States, we don't secretly arrest people,
secretly jail them, and then secretly deport them.-
In a stinging rebuke to the Bush administration's efforts
to secretly deport hundreds of Arab and Muslim men who
were rounded up after Sept. 11, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals in Cincinnati told us, "Democracies die behind
closed doors. A government operating in the shadow of
secrecy stands in complete opposition to the society
envisioned by the framers of our Constitution."--
This articulate reminder of the need for open government,
which could have been titled "Democracy in a Nutshell,"
should not have been necessary.... 9/5/02
Is there a place for dissension during wartime?
We are now about four months into the war on terror and
national opinion still seems to be largely supportive of our
government's actions at home and abroad. However, if you
listen very carefully you can detect a few still small
voices of dissent in certain places.
School Board votes to lean on whistle-blower
An attorney advises the board that the district can legally
require employees to answer questions about work-related
issues.
Florida Gubernatorial Candidate Bob Kunst Discusses His Near
Arrest for Discussing the Stolen Election 11/16 --Have
you seen any coverage about Kunst's
campaign in your local paper? Wonder why not?
Sunshine cable TV Network show critical of JEB is taken off
the air
Stop Congress from Outlawing 'Civil Disobedience' as
'Terrorism'
"The U.S. Senate is preparing to vote on the 'Uniting
and Strengthening America Act (USA).' As an attempt to
enhance the ability of law enforcement and government
agencies to prevent terrorist acts this legislation is being
put forth with the best of intentions. But no matter how
good the intentions, the bill as actually written contains a
dangerous definition of terrorism that should concern every
American. As written, this definition could lead to
large-scale investigations of American citizens for
supporting and engaging in civil disobedience and have the
perverse effect of discouraging citizens from participating
in the very essence of our democracy -- the right to
peacefully protest." Send this letter from Greenpeace
to your Representatives! 10/12 http://www.greenpeaceusa.org
On June 4, 2001, three citizens were arrested at a public
presidential rally in Tampa, Florida for displaying negative
signs. The rally was held at the Legends baseball field and
was open to the general public. All three participants
entered the field, signs in hand, without incident. The
signs were letter size and read "BOOO,"
"Investigate Florida Votergate," and "June is
Gay Pride Month." Once on the field some republican
volunteers began to shout "Get Out of here!"
"Go Home!" The police were contacted and came down
into the field. The police told the participants, "Lose
the signs and you can stay." When the trio refused to
give up their signs they were forcibly removed and
subsequently arrested. Fortunately, the entire incident was
caught on video, the charges were dropped and now the trio
is suing. The video is now up on the Internet for everyone
to see.
(Top)
Robert Kunst, Candidate for Governor of Florida, was on the
Meria Heller Show this week. Robert talks about what is going
on in Florida today, and what Jeb is up to. Robert was at a
Voter Reform meeting in Tampa, Florida and was threatened with
arrest for speaking about the Stolen Election. Robert said
"why are we talking about voter reform, when we can't
even get the votes counted?" - he was then threatened
with arrest and forced to leave. This type of
"McCarthyism" is happening more and more in America,
and Mr.Kunst is not one to stand for it. Interestingly, Tampa
is the same town where 3 grandmas were arrested in last summer
for holding anti-Bush signs. Florida's tourism is drowning and
Jeb Bush says he "wants to read about it in the
newspapers". Roberts campaign slogan is "we won't
steal your vote." This is a great interview archived at http://www.Meria.net.
.... from demdailynews
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