The People's Sound System - NYC Speeches Will Broadcast Citywide on Radios

February 14, 2003

RALLY AGAINST FEAR
Stand up to the warmongers this weekend!


The Washington Times headline said it all: "Hysteria runs riot; networks fuel the fear." London’s Heathrow airport is surrounded by what one UK newspaper called a ring of steel, and anti-aircraft missiles are in position around Washington to defend against a terrorist attack CIA director George Tenet avers could come this week. And the Department of Homeland Defense is doing its part to jack up the panic level by telling Americans to stock up on duct tape and plastic sheeting: the idea is to seal up your house or apartment so that biological agents can’t get through.

Too bad we can’t find a substance impervious to war propaganda. That duct tape, in any case, is put to better use plugging up the speaking orifices of our public officials.

It is pure coincidence, of course, that all this hysteria is being generated by the same governments that are ratcheting up the war rhetoric. At the very moment Colin Powell assures us that Al Qaeda and Iraq are one and the same, and the ghostly voice of Bin Laden rises out of the ether, we go to "code orange." Stampeded into war, we’re too scared out of our wits to utter a bleat of protest. Or so they hope.

But Americans are not easily intimidated. Resentment against this administration’s rush to war has been building in the country for months, and this weekend’s antiwar protest – Saturday in New York, Sunday in San Francisco – promises to be the largest and the loudest yet. In the Big Rotten Apple, where Mayor Benito Bloomberg has just declared victory in his jihad against smokers, antiwar protesters are next on the list: Saturday’s march has been banned. As if to symbolize the image of a citizenry frozen in fear, the protest organizers have been told they must hold a completely stationary protest.

By confining the demonstration to a relatively small area, Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, Bloomberg and his friends over at the New York Sun are hoping to keep the numbers down. As the Sun editorialized:

"Mayor Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Kelly are doing the people of New York and the people of Iraq a great service by delaying and obstructing the anti-war protest planned for February 15. The longer they delay in granting the protesters a permit, the less time the organizers have to get their turnout organized, and the smaller the crowd is likely to be."

Although it is unlikely that the Mayor and his cops will take up the Sun’s suggestion to

"Allow the protest and send two witnesses along for each participant, with an eye toward preserving at least the possibility of an eventual treason prosecution. Thus fully respecting not just some, but all of the constitutional principles at stake."

This plan, while ingenious – in the sense of "evil genius"—is just not practical. Since well over 100,000 are expected to jam the plaza and spill out into adjoining streets, this Saturday, the cops would need twice that number to take names and social security numbers. Would they take advantage of the "Patriot" Act’s gutting of the Posse Comitatus law and call up the Army, or hope to make do with the National Guard?

But there was no need to call in the feds, since they showed up at the permit hearing on their own initiative. As Jimmy Breslin reports:

"During a break, I went up to one severely dressed young man and he identified himself as Andrew O’Toole of the United States Attorney’s office. He was there to make a statement or file something to remind the court that the UN was the responsibility of the city. He was pleasant. The people who sent him over did not tell him to say ‘Ashcroft.’ He didn’t have to. He was at the city’s table and a United States Marshal who had arrived with him and was holding a hand radio stood at the door."

Police chief Rocco Esposito, in explaining why it was impossible to hold a march in Manhattan, said several times:

"We don’t know who is coming here for the march. We don’t know who they are."

To which march organizer Leslie Cagan replied:

"Since when in free speech do you have to say who’s coming to an event? Do you have to give the names?"

Sure you do. Just ask the editors of the New York Sun.
cont'd
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/j021403.html

Look at this. It's 25F in New York, and the police are going to herd protesters into pens that they set up, and then close each pen once it's full so people can't go to the bathroom or come and go. They are telling people not to drink water so they don't have to pee:

http://nyc.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=47197&group=webcast

I'm glad to see someone is posting over and over for people not to go into the pens.

The police are going to TRY TO herd protesters into pens.