Goodman has already been released. That would make one wonder if, as Democracy Now contends, she had been unlawfully arrested.

It's one thing that you never post anything worth reading, but what makes you truly insufferable is you horrid sense of what you like to believe is humor. Maybe they love the smell of your thunk-turd droppings at RedState but you're stinking up the joint over here.

Ah, no, Kitt. Here, maybe this will prove my credentials to the likes of you. Walking with these protesters - and for the most part, and as the first part of my photos will show you, enjoying the hell out of it - I ran into some of my friends and neighbors along the way, and we were all having a good time, until the damage started, and one of my pals wondered what pissed them off. I told him I thought it was because most of these kids are of soldier age (I'm 40), and they're pissed because they have friends or brothers and sisters in the war, or maybe they're really scared about military expansion in the middle east, and afraid of the draft - which I know people in their late teens and early 20's are indeed scared of. I was too back in the Gulf War days, where I had a brother in law and my oldest friend, both who came back a little screwed up. That's why I said they were pissed off to the point of violence. That's all I really need to offer. I don't need to prove myself to you.

I think if any of you who don't want to look at the totality of a story were here, saw what I saw, talked to the people I talked to - probably about a hundred strangers over the course of the afternoon - and weren't sitting around speculating idle theories, or weren't spazzed out because one of your colleagues was arrested - you'd probably be thinking differently. There are plenty of good people in this town worried about a large crowd getting out of control. The cops are planning on it going on all week. I want people to protest, I don't want them to screw my town up.

So STFU, Kitt.

Right. I actually think I understand why police arrested Goodman, and I agree she failed to obey (though I have no legal expertise).

The youtube videos I was referring to were the ones GG and others have posted regarding the preemptive police-state tactics.

Sorry. Here's the link from the excerpt above on Amy Goodman & Allan Nairn enduring another U.S.-allied 3rd world military using murder & repression to try -- and this time to fail -- to avert political action.

http://contemporarylit.about.com/od/firstchapters/a/exceptionRulers.htm

After the invasion, and after the, well, genocide to be more or less accurate, East Timor is now free from Indonesia.

I haven't seen the footage you talked about, but I doubt that a provacateur would be indistinguishable from a douchebag trying to fuck up public property. I can't see why you would even try to make that distinction visually, unless of course you are also scrutinizing photos of Palin to see if she looked pregnant four months ago. If there were no people at the Republican convention in black masks who wanted to set fire to garbage cans, break windows and tussle with police, it would be the first major national demonstration that I have ever heard of or been to where that was the case.

It seems obvious that the police violated the right to free speech of many of those assembled. But that doesn't mean that there wasn't a legitimate danger from unbalanced thugs who had joined the protests.

This does bring up interesting issues that would be worth discussing. Given that the RNC would bring together many hated politicos, just what should the police and city have done to protect them and to protect civilians from being caught up in any violence directed at the RNC? I'm not saying that the police were right, but one way to try to figure out how to solve problems is to put yourself in the place first of the people you perceive to be causing them. Just what should the mayor have done? We're all adults, we know that every protest is about 90% great people, and about ten percent violent jerks who want to destroy thngs. And that's a pretty loud and active ten percent. What should the police have done instead? This isn't a rhetorical question. If you can't answer that question, then critique, beyond initial rage, isn't very valid.

There were many justified complaints about China's overkill security during the Olympics.

But I didn't see anything from there like the scenes from Denver, and now even worse from Minneapolis-St. Paul: police and soldiers in maximum riot gear, tear gas canisters and gas masks, wielding batons and assault weapons, marching enmasse in manner to intimidate and provoke, and seemingly mistreating and arresting people in order to intimidate others.

What we saw in China were police in clean dress uniforms, unarmed or bearing only sidearms if any, and soldiers in dress uniform standing at attention. For the most part they reacted only when demonstrations or trouble occurred. The riot gear, assault weapons, tear gas and other implements were kept well out of sight, if they existed at all.

Perhaps the foreign reporters will pick up on the contrasts.

If someone could tell me how to compress one of those in order to upload it to You Tube, I'd appreciate it.

Wasn't getting hauled off more or less the point?

What is all this 1968 stuff about if not to bring back 1968?

-- Cat vs. Roomba

Funny. I thought the purpose was to exercise what are supposed to be Constitutionally guaranteed rights.

The "1968 stuff" is, by my reading, strictly comparisons between then and now. Clearly four decades hasn't been long enough for our society to get beyond this sort of thuggery.

But then you approve of such thuggery, so you must be very happy.