peace protesters and free speech

In a conversation the other day about the Peace Vigil that takes place once per week here in Ashland, we wondered why we didn’t hear much, overall, about protests, either that they are held, or that they had anyone in attendance. Not about the small gathering here in Ashland, but on the National level, in bigger cities where thousands are in attendance. Seems like the colleges in and around Minneapolis/St. Paul, for example, don’t have anything going on and this war has been on for almost five years.One of my friends says it’s the draft and lack of it. “If there was a draft like when the Vietnam war was going on, you’d see the college students in the streets.” I believe there is some truth to that. I also do not ever want to see a Kent State massacre again.

I have also seen the reports about the way government handles protesters at rallies and events and keeps them out of sight and earshot. Creating holding pens where the protesters, with proper legal permits, can congregate and hold their signs. If found out of these temporary perimeters, they are arrested. This happened to Cindy Sheehan more than once. In fact, Mrs’ Spadoman, on a trip to Crawford with Cindy and Code Pink, found herself being held in a containment area when she was waiting for the release of someone who was arrested.

Daniel Ellsberg, of the Pentagon Papers fame, was arrested along with a few others for going into a ditch along side the road that the police said the protesters couldn’t go in to. Barb volunteered, as one of the few who had a car on site, to wait at the Crawford Court House to drive any of the arrested people back to their motel or vehicle. She had to wait in a designated area. She was not allowed to wait at large in the town.

We have been holding the Peace Vigil in Ashland for almost a year. We have had a small turnout. We discussed why this was so. In a small town, it is harder than a large city. Some people don’t want to be seen there, even though they support the theme of Peace. Some work. Some don’t think about coming and being a part of it. We get a lot of support in other ways, but also a lot of apathy.

Mrs. Spadoman has been marching forever it seems. Longer than I. When we lived in St. Paul, she went every Wednesday morning to a protest at Alliant Techsystems Inc., or ATK, the parent company that makes Depleted Uranium munitions. Through the internet, an e-mail from Alliant Action came and had a reference to a blog with an great article about protesters and the upcoming Republican National Convention, or RNC, that will take place in Minneapolis next September. Minneapolis, being in a very liberal part of the country, has many peace and protest groups of their own, and many chapters of National organizations. They have started early to assemble and plan an orderly large scale protest to take place during the RNC.

The article deals with what the FBI and Federal Government is doing at massive protests and is quite interesting. It is written by Charley Underwood. I am not sure of Mr. Underwoods background, but he seems to be one of the writers of the mnblue blog. MNblue is a great find for anyone, even if you don’t live in Minnesota. It covers Minnesota politicians, but also National issues. It is a unique perspective from the heartland. You can go HERE to read the article. I have also printed it below. It is entitled “The Republican Convention and the Illusion of Free Speech”

Peace to All, Here’s the article from mnblue:

The Republican Convention and the Illusion of Free Speech Submitted by Charley Underwood on November 16, 2007 - 12:32am.

Have you noticed how ineffective large public protests seem to be in recent years? As we in Minnesota approach the Republican National Convention in September 2008, I have found many comments to be naïve and lacking in background on how protests are now policed in the U.S.A. Serious, large protests are systematically marginalized and manipulated by the police and the Secret Service. I’d like to tell you how they do it.

First, a little background. The 1999 World Trade Organization (WTO) protests in Seattle were a watershed event. Previous mass demonstrations had involved violence by either police or protesters. But Seattle was the first time I know of when 40,000 or so protesters were able to actually shut down the business of the WTO by blocking the access of the conference attendees.

Every action produces a reaction, and Seattle was no different. In the next election, the Seattle mayor lost and the Seattle police chief was fired. But more importantly, a new set of crowd-control tactics began to develop. These tactics have come to be known as “The Miami Model,” named for their first use at the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA) protests in Miami in 2003.

The Miami Model has evolved as a set of actions designed to reduce the attendance, the power, and the public impact of large demonstrations. It has also evolved into a special cottage industry within law enforcement circles.

What are the characteristics of the Miami Model?

First, months prior to the public protest, there is a massive gathering of intelligence by both police agents embedded within various protest groups and by electronic surveillance. Prior to the 2004 RNC in New York, for example, police officers were sent to cities all over the United States and even some in Europe to pose as sympathizers or fellow activists in order to collect information from groups as diverse as the Ruckus Society, Planned Parenthood and the National Lawyers Guild. Websites, chat rooms and comments on blogs (such as that of cartoonist Ted Rall) were monitored.

Second, permits are withheld for legal protests, or the conditions of those permits are altered in order to discourage widespread citizen participation. Again from New York 2004, city officials withheld permission of use of the Great Lawn in Central Park, which would have accommodated the many expected protesters, telling the permit-seekers to instead mass in several smaller locations somewhat distant from the convention.

Third, there are direct visits to friends and families of key potential protesters, leaving various direct or implied warnings in an attempt at intimidation.

Fourth, there are massive pre-emptive arrests or “sweeps” of protesters and others during the event itself. During the New York RNC, for example, around 1,800 were arrested and held for up to three days without charges in what police had dubbed “Operation Overlord.” The New York arrests actually began with the massive, violent arrests at a Critical Mass bike ride just before the convention (similar to the arrests in Minneapolis on August 31).

Fifth, there is a massive, costly “security” presence at such large gatherings, often with police officers dressed in anonymous paramilitary gear and often including the use of private “security” contractors (the company Wackenhut had a large presence in the Miami FTAA protests of 2003). In this garb, police officers resemble nothing so much as an army deployed against its own citizens.

One notable aspect of this intimidation has also been the use of “less lethal” weapons. The police in Minneapolis used mace and tasers at the Critical Mass in August. If you are curious about these details, Wikipedia has 56 pages on “less lethal weapons.” An early weapon of crowd control was the cattle prod, used by Southern sheriffs during the Civil Rights era. Current intimidation weapons include tear gas, pepper spray, tasers and rubber bullets. A newer one was the bean-bag weapon used in Miami. Experimental weapons include the use of sound or lasers to incapacitate protesters. “Less lethal” weapons aren’t necessarily “non-lethal”; there have been nearly 300 documented cases of deaths from tasers, for example.

Last, there has been a greatly increased control over the press coverage given to large protests. As with Iraq, a great deal of press sympathy is gained by “embedding” journalists with police, giving the appearance of great openness, but actually merely creating the camaraderie necessary to write a story favorable to the police. Embedding also helps keep reporters away from protest spokespeople, who might actually explain WHY everybody is protesting in the first place. Under ideal circumstances, embedding can actually keep the press photographers far enough away that they can’t get a picture of the full scope of the protest.

There is also a framing used to marginalize protesters by describing them all as anarchists; it also makes a much more interesting picture to show a masked fellow in black shaking his fist rather than a group of nuns kneeling in prayer. If it is possible to get a good action shot of someone breaking a window (even if it turns out later that that person was paid by the police), then so much the better. And never, never, under any circumstances should the police give an accurate number for the protesters in attendance. That allows the large corporate media to say “thousands” for 70,000 people or to say “tens of thousands” for a half-million. Not only can the report make the protest seem pathetically small, but it also justifies giving equal coverage to the half-dozen counter protesters who show up to offset the tens (or hundreds) of thousands.

All in all, the Miami Model has been fairly successful in diminishing the impact of large public protests. By identifying any disagreement with government policies as crazy or violent, large numbers of citizens have been discouraged from participation. (Who wants to get tased, after all.) By denying permits and delaying their approval, protest organizers have had greater difficulty in mobilizing national resources. By placing agents within targeted groups, the police have been able to neutralize those groups by selective arrests, selective harassments, provoking groups to irrational actions or sewing discord within or between allied groups through rumors and betrayal. (This tactic is often known as COINTELPRO, named for the FBI operation against leftist groups in the 60’s and 70’s.)

Once the protest begins, care is taken to keep it far away from the event that the press is covering. Large numbers of protesters are arrested on the eve of the event or in its early hours. (I will never forget the 70 paper mache folks arrested in Philadelphia 2000 RNC, just before they were due to bring out their puppets, or the over 1,800 people rounded up and held for days at that pier in New York in 2004.)

After the event come the inevitable lawsuits for police brutality and unlawful arrest. The awards given to protesters can be quite expensive, but those almost never get much press coverage, coming five or six years later. Even then, it is hard to get numbers, as I can attest from spending hours with Google trying.

The net effect of the Miami Model is that protest gets discounted and marginalized, new weapons get tested, and the authorities get to keep their jobs. Mayors don’t lose their elections. Law-enforcement officers don’t get fired. There are no more worries about having to be accountable to a bunch of angry citizens.

For months now, many in the Twin Cities have been startlingly naïve about the coming Republican National Convention. Even now, looking on the websites or listening to various officials, it is treated as nothing more than an economic decision. According to our city fathers, everybody’s going to get rich and nobody will be inconvenienced in the slightest. According to our police spokesmen, the entire city of St. Paul will be a free speech zone and every single person will have their rights respected. According to even our Democratic political leaders, we will put St. Paul on the world map, showing those cold-hearted Republicans what Minnesota nice can do to bring love into their lives.

Well, maybe. St. Paul isn’t Miami and (thank goodness) our police chiefs don’t reach the level of John Timoney (who masterminded the Philadelphia ugliness, the Miami debacle and consulted on the “free-speech cage” for the Democratic Convention in Boston in 2004). Maybe we actually will be able to voice our opinions, and even get press coverage (if there are any paid reporters by then) and even use those convenient porta-potties and drinking fountains. Maybe.

But so far, the evidence is mixed. St. Paul Assistant Chief Matt Bostrom says that the idea of protecting our civil liberties is what gets him out of bed in the morning, but he also says he can’t give us march permits yet, since St. Paul’s city ordinance stipulates that permits may be granted no more than 180 days before the event. He says that there will be no mass round-ups and that people will only be arrested as individuals if they specifically break some law, but Sheriff Fletcher asked for $4.4 million to build a pen to hold 3,000 of us. Bostrom says that there is no plan to infiltrate or otherwise intimidate any citizen groups, but that certainly hasn’t been the experience of those organizing large protests during this century. Much has been said about the “free speech” advisory groups that have been set up by both Minneapolis and St. Paul, but as I understand it the St. Paul group hasn’t met for months and the Minneapolis group has been meeting without any public notice or participation, in apparent violation of the Minnesota Open Meetings law.

There is a lot that depends on how this all plays out.

On the most minimal level, there is the question of how citizens interact with the police. If protesters are accorded their constitutional rights without being tased or maced or beaten over the head, if only those who break things or harm others are arrested, then we will have one sort of relationship. If we try to express our opinions peacefully, only to be confronted by a menacing SWAT team armed with high-tech weapons and wearing “Norm for Senate” buttons (as I saw 6 years ago at the Xcel Center), then we will no longer see police as those who protect us. We will see the police as those paid to oppress us, and all of our lives will be more dangerous because of it.

On September 1, 2008, we have yet another chance at democracy. If our politicians won’t read the polls, if they won’t vote for our interests, well then we can peacefully take to the streets.

What we want is already ours by right of the American Revolution, ours as enshrined in our Constitution. We want the right to change our government. We are the people and it is a right that resides precisely in us. We want to get rid of the war profiteers who benefit from the death and suffering of others. We want to get rid of the politicians who send young and frequently poor people off to die in needless wars. We want to banish those who would deliver the entire treasure of our country to a few billionaires, while children go without healthcare and young people cannot afford college.

So far, Minnesota preparations haven’t included very many Minnesotans. There have been expensive police junkets to New York to learn from their experience during the 2004 RNC (as if we would like to repeat that disaster). There have been requests for large amounts of money to build large holding pens for demonstrators. There have been initial preparations to recruit law enforcement officers from many jurisdictions and initial work on coordinating those people. There have been a total now of four public meetings, where many vague assurances and optimistic predictions have been made, but with no specifics given whatsoever.

There have been no permits issued, despite at least three separate requests submitted. There have been no indications about how large a security area would be set aside and forbidden to ordinary citizens, nor public spaces made available for mass gatherings or assemblies. There has been virtually no involvement by the peace and justice community in the two municipal “free speech” committees that have been set up.

It is difficult to know how much public outrage there will be in nine months. At this point, a bewildered and frustrated country watches in disbelief as the country heads in precisely the wrong direction, with twelve billion dollars spent every month on a senseless and sinful war, with nearly four thousand American lives and well over a million Iraqi lives sacrificed to the whims of a few beltway insiders, with bridges falling and our schools sagging under the weight of so much indifference, even as we edge closer and closer to another delusional war. It is easy to imagine that there might be a certain pent-up anger with our government, by the time next Labor Day rolls around.

Here are some things that could be done:

St. Paul could change the law and allow the police to negotiate reasonable protests, protecting the rights of the majority to disagree with their wrongheaded government, while protecting the safety of the few at the convention.

Conversations might be started with the larger protesting groups, with specific signed assurances about police as well as citizen accountability and transparency during any public actions.

We want our country back. We want it back by next Labor Day, September 1, 2008. Let’s issue the permits, already. If the St. Paul city council wants, they can change that law tomorrow. Enough with the expensive police junkets to New York; we already know what the New York police think of civil liberties. Talk to us. Give us our permits. Stop buying all those expensive weapons and lining up all that statewide police overtime. Be our police. Just don’t get in the way of our free speech.

cross posted at round circle

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