Read and Watch if You GIVE Half a Fuck about Your Country

[Derek V]

Last edited Mon Dec 8, 2014, 02:48 AM - Edit history (1)

From Slate:
Dec. 7 2014 5:07 PM



It began as a peaceful gathering against the recent grand violence on Saturday night. But the protest in Berkeley took a violent turn as windows were smashed and stores were looted by a small group of demonstrators. Another group of protesters threw rocks and bottles at police officers. One officer suffered a dislocated shoulder when he was hit by a sandbag, according to the Oakland Tribune.

Police hit back and used rubber bullets as well as tear gas to try to break up the protests, reports Reuters. A total of six people were arrested, and three officers were injured.

Protesters complained of excessive force by police, insisting those who looted stores and became violent were a tiny minority of those demonstrating against police violence. And it wasn’t just protesters who suffered the effects of the tear gas. The San Francisco Chronicle explains:

Minutes before the police dispersed the crowd at about 10:30 p.m., several concerts had let out in the area. Well-dressed concertgoers waiting to pay in a nearby garage were enveloped in a cloud of stinging gas, sending them running into elevators.

“I’m not sure that’s necessary,” said Elaine Dunlap, 74, who had just attended a Paul Dresher concert at Zellerbach Playhouse. “I think people have a right to protest, certainly for an issue as big as this.”

She was sitting with her husband, Greg, tears streaming down their faces.

“I’ve never experienced that and I’m an old hippie,” she said.

Today's resisters need to talk to some of the surviving 1960s "radicals," because I don't think "The whole world is texting!" or "The whole world is tweeting!" can ever evoke the mental imagery of unseen judges, gazing upon the authorities, and finding them wanting.

[RKP5637]

1. It sounds like agent provocateurs have infiltrated to discredit the protests, yet again. I

think we will see a lot more of this as they work to systematically destroy it like OWS. I would not be surprised if DHS is doing centralized coordination.

[Derek V]

2. I neither saw nor heard anything from the protesters.....

...which would not constitute an entirely normal reaction, based on the shit they were getting!

[Historic NY]

4. like these...

[Enthusiast]

10. I feel certain that DHS is in control.

I imagine they are coordinating a lot we find distasteful about the contemporary police response to protest.

[truedelphi]

13. I have the same feelings. n/t

[demosincebirth]

3. Oh no, not in ultra liberal and progressive Berkeley

[Derek V]

5. It's either their Future, or their Funeral

I'll be dead before the real shit has sex with that fan. You may be, as well. (If you're 30 or younger, simply deposit me in the Ranting Old Fool drawer.) But our problems cannot and will not be solved via Facebook.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

6. I'm the type to photoshop this to give the cops raging boners.

[DeSwiss]

7. The last gasps.....

...of the nascent POLICE STATE. Or it's beginnings.

- Solely our choice.

K&R

[truedelphi]

8. Since i am way over the top paranoia wise, maybe I shuldn't comment -

But it seems like someone somewhere is preparing the beginning stage of open warfare on people. Major race war on the horizon, or what? (And a person's white skin won't save them, if they are poor.)

Look at this incident:

http://deadspin.com/santa-clara-police-attack-fan-at-pac-12-championship-ga-1667994556

It is scary to me that his man was attcked by police, for no discernible reason, and even more scary that the police seem to know they can't be taken to task for this.

[MrMickeysMom]

12. The one percent solution...

If there's one percent of a problem, take the advice of Dick Cheney and blast the motherfuckers over the head with your "authority"!

Jeebus..

[Enthusiast]

11. Stormtroopers—making the world safe for Fascism.