The wold is watching us as we watched all the Middle East and Asian protests. Caroline Hepker of the BBC News writes: "Is America taking a leaf from the European protest manual?" To read her article, click here.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
THERE WILL ALWAYS BE GREATER STRENGTH IN NUMBERS
The wold is watching us as we watched all the Middle East and Asian protests. Caroline Hepker of the BBC News writes: "Is America taking a leaf from the European protest manual?" To read her article, click here.
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Here are two other perspectives on the "Occupy ..." protests. In the Boston Herald, civil rights attourney Harvey Silverglate objects to the special treatment that the "Occupy Boston" protests have received:
http://news.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view/2011_1007occupys_pass_steams_tea_party_city_state_ok_with_lack_of_permits/srvc=home
In the past, Boston has required fees for large protests. The Boston Tea Party events have paid these fees. But the city has not levied a fee for the Occupy Boston protest. Now even though Silerglate is more sympathetic to Occupy Boston than he is to the Tea Party, he objects to the city's use of the fee system to favor one protest movement over another.
Several commentators, most notably Jon Stewart, have compared the "Occupy ..." protests to the Tea Party. But Judge Andrew Napolitano has taken this angle one step further. On his show "Freedom Watch", he interviewed protest leaders who have participated in both the Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party events. These protester want to get the message out that corporatism and bailouts are wrong, and they are willing to join people on either the left or the right to get that message out. I'm glad to see that we now has a bipartisan consensus against the bailouts. (Sorry, I don't have a link to an on-line version of this "Freedom Watch" interview).
Interesting that we have to pay to make our feelings heard. I can understand if an organized group is asking for a gathering but when an unorganized movement is starting with no singular leader or real commonality defined as yet, I can see that it can fall in the cracks.
Harvey Silverglate is a staunch defender of the first amendment. He founded F.I.R.E., a group that fights college speech codes. Silverglate does not believe that any protest group should be charged a fee should be charged for exercising their rights, but he especially objects to using the fee system to promote the "right" kind of speech.
With the extra cost to tax payers in this kind of mass protest. I can see a fee for the extra police duty though, I understand, that the protesters have organized their own clean-up committees which is working well as they are on private land.
I could not see charging a fee for the lone speaker on a soap box in the Common which costs no one anything.
I found the "Freedom Watch" interview on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6j4yZKvkqE
I like Dustin Reid's critique of the "Occupy Wall Street" media coverage: reporters tend to focus in on the most fringe elements of the protest and use the fringe to characterize the whole movement.
I need to remember that YouTube is also a news source! There is great stuff on it that I have not thought to look for.
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