Now that we’ve had a few weeks to settle, a look back at Labor Day in the Twin Cities. Labor Day was of course also Day One of the Republican National Convention. Video was released today of an apparent mass arrest of utterly peaceful concert goers at the SEIU Labor Day concert.
My personal favorite moment in the tape is an off-camera exchange. Police in riot gear have surrounded loungers in a waterfront park. They announce, “Ladies and Gentlemen, You’re Under Arrest” and you hear one young woman say incredulously “Are you serious?”
Yep, I’m afraid they are.
Here’s the press release that came with the video, from the Glass Bead Collective:
BURIED TAPE REVEALS USE OF FORCE AND AN UNWARRANTED MASS ARREST OF BYSTANDERS DURING THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION
ST. PAUL, Minnesota (September 18, 2008) Video released today shows the indiscriminate arrest of a crowd of two hundred at the waterfront across from a concert on Harriet Island Regional Park during this month’s Republican National Convention in St. Paul. The video includes multiple angles of the event as well as an interview with the cameraman who buried his footage and was one of almost two hundred people arrested for rioting without probable cause.
More than eight hundred people were arrested in St. Paul during the Republican National Convention. This video shows that at least twenty percent of the eight hundred plus arrested were seized without due cause.
Fear is an effective tool
If you scare people who have not done anything the way they did it here, you will definitely prevent people from even thinking about doing anything against the establishment.This is how the fascists have ruled in many places all over the world, but it is now that it is coming home to your backyard after learning how to do it in many countries around the world. You are lucky they are not doing what they thought the south American military, because if they did that, most of you would have been dead by now, but on the other hand, people in other countries actually stand up and put up a fight rather than go back home and write on their blog or buy 2 more “I Hate Bush” bumper stickers and mugs.