Prairie Hipsters FTW

TJ for our legal beagles: Who do I call if the cops start beating people tomorrow/usurping peaceful redress of guv’mint during our National Protest on Fucktardery?

As for Omaha: Who knew?

@rptrcub: Best bet is to contact your local chapter of the National Lawyers’ Guild and see if they’re going to have their trained legal observers there at the protests. They cover most of the protests here – they are covered in gear that says “Legal Observer” and they’re generally in teams videotaping the protests. They’re the group that helped expose the NYPD’s shenanigans during the 2004 GOP convention protests. I’ve gone through their trainings for legal observers.

Basically, it means to bring your notepad and/or a video camera. If you see stuff going on, stay out of it and don’t interject yourself in the situation (because you’re preserving yourself as a potential witness), but take copious notes (esp. of badge numbers) of details, and try to film and photograph what’s going on.

You could still do that as a civilian. Carry your reporter notepad in your back pocket and take notes if you see shit going down, and take pics with a camera or cell phone. Have the phone number for the ACLU of Georgia programmed into your cell.

@SanFranLefty: Thank you. I think the best way I can help is not to protest myself but keep an eye on this stuff. Should I wear something that says “observer” just to make it clear?

Who polices the police?

@rptrcub: Are you sure you can keep yourself from protesting? You don’t want the other queens there hassling you about being an “observer” – leave it to the Emory law school OUTLAW and NLG chapter to be legal observers. Or just carry your notepad and throw down your protest signs if shit happens and become an “observer” – nowadays with cell phone video, everyone is an observer.

Speaking of protests, outrage over Mormon support for Prop 8 has generated perhaps the greatest internet comment of all time–and I don’t say that lightly–though I wish to baby FSM that I could take credit for it:

“Amen. Fuck Utah with a barbed fuckstick.”

Posted by: Hacktober at November 13, 2008 2:14 PM

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/archives/2008/11/salt_lake_weekl.php

Not to oversell it, but this is truly the comment by which all others will be measured.

@SanFranLefty: Prolly not. I’ll just take my camera, audio recorder and pad with me and see what happens.

@Original Andrew: As much as I’m not wanting to give into the “oh we need to follow Dr. King and Gandhi and Jeebus and et. al.” and “you protesting queens aren’t helping” crowd (and I do think that non-violence is the right thing; just loving thine enemies is a real motherfucking problem with me right now), I seriously am not sure if fucking the entire state of Utah would work. Comment is totes funny, though.

@rptrcub:

Tell me about it. I went into a rage blackout for like two days after Prop H8 passed (and fucking Florida, Arkansas and Arizona). I’ll be marching tomorrow to channel that anger.

As far as protest signs, I’m partial to “Jesus had two daddies!”

Which, uh wow, is true!

It enlightens AND enrages.

@Original Andrew: One of my ghey friends has picked out a sign that says “I love Gay Mormons” to carry tomorrow. Sign ideas, if you need them, and find your local protest here. There are protests in several countries, so our foreign correspondents can join in, though nothing listed yet for T&C or the South of France.

@Original Andrew: My advice is just don’t direct your rage at the cops. If you are faced with one single cop, no matter how rude and nasty, just say, sorry, sir, of course, I will do as you say, respect his authoritay, they like that, and retreat, and wait 2 minutes, until he walks on, or walk beyond his location, and go back to doing what you were doing.

If you should face a phalanx of cops, if they are walking in line with shields and face shields and batons, retreat, its over, they will win, move slowly and calmly if possible, drop signs and think self-preservation, try to look like a bystander caught up in it, and if necessary, run like hell. They will hurt you, they know that any charges they bring will be dropped, the only jollies they will get will be giving you a few whacks on the head, and they will do so no matter how polite and compliant you are, if they grab you in a situation in which they feel the least threatened.

I gotta go off topic, it just hit me what Hills McKankles as Secretary of State will mean. It means Bill will set himself up as unoffical shadow SOS, and they will be off doing their own rogue diplomacy at every opportunity, looking for opportunities to upstage and take over foreign policy. Will Obama possibly be able to control them? When Bill starts doing his shadow diplomacy so as to set up Hills with suprise solutions and agreements that are not part of the Obama administration goals, not part of their plans, their playbook?

How can that not be whats gonna happen? Can’t you see it, Bill working behind the scenes whenever there is a “situation” to come up with some pre-worked out agreement that Hills can swoop in on and force on Obama, you know how that happens, the ostensible underling who embarrasses the boss into a situation where he cannot smack him or her down for going off the reservation.

If it was just a strong and narrowly defeated primary opponent, bringing her in as SOS would be one thing, but no, he is bringing in The Clintons, the ex-president and Hills, and they will, as we all know, be spending their every waking and sleeping moment dreaming of ways to embarras, thwart, and stab Obama in the back.

@Original Andrew: I think there was a national GLBT and allies’ bursting thrombosis that day. Lord knows I was mad. But, you know, even though violence ain’t cool, we still have a right to be mad, and we don’t have to be told to be nice.

@Promnight: It’s not the Atlanta Police Department I’m worried about. Mayor Shirley Franklin is on a shortlist for Presdnint Obama’s HUD secretary, so she knows to play it cool (that, and she’s generally very gay friendly considering it’s our asses who are gentrifying her city and raising her prop vals and tax collections).

It’s the Georgia Capitol Police, who are controlled by Gov. Dumbbutt Prays For Rain Sonny Perdue and his General Assembly of Republican Whores, who I worry about.

@SanFranLefty: I’m partial to this one.

@Original Andrew: How about: “Jesus is MY Fiance!”

@Promnight: Oh, he’ll be the permanent advance team, seen running through hotel hallways the world over – always 2 days before Hills hit town – with his pants around his ankles and a bottle of Jim Beam in each fist.

@FlyingChainSaw: And his hand out to make biz-ness arrangements a la Kazakhstan. That’s why I think that Hillbot will turn down SoS at the end of the day – (a) Billy C will have to stop the Clinton Global Initiative/Slushfund while she’s in office, and (b) she’s serving at the whim of the President. One embarrassing scandal (courtesy of Billy) and she’s toast. If she’s smart she’ll want to become the heiress to the Kennedy legend in the Senate, or hold out that she will be picked for SCOTUS. She loses a lot of power and security by giving up that Senate seat.

And can I just also note that there have been more leaks than in a fucking spaghetti strainer since Rahm Emanual and the rest of the Clintonistas signed up w/ the transition team? Obama and Plouffe and Jarette ran a tight ship – but now that the Clinton crew are sniffing around it’s blab central. It’s not Unicorn blabbing about what he and Hillbot chatted about, let’s just say that’s classic Clinton.

@SanFranLefty: Oh, they’d turn it down if they had morals and a sense of shame. Thats why she won’t. Egos too big, in their hearts, they are the pros from Dover and Obama the Babe in the woods, they have supreme confidence that they can play it the way they want, that Obama would never fire her.

Much as I love all three of you, SFL, FCS, and Promnight, I have to protest. I can’t agree that Bill and Hillary are swine. I think we all owe them a lot.

OT, but I’m on a computer not my own and W’ette won’t let me on to say that “Lady Lynn de Forester Rothschild and Sarah Palin are sisters under the skin.” In both their cases, the word “mind” is a courtesy title for their cerebral arrangements.

I’m in the middle of reading, for the first time, Dreams from My Father. Somewhere on the blogosphere in the last few days, I read someone’s description of Barack Obama as having “a sublimely elegant mind.” [Well, maybe the adverb was “supremely.”] Certainly, “elegant” is on target. “Hybrid vigor” is another descriptor that keeps popping up in my thinking about him. [And, on the Daily Show on Election Night, Charles Ogletree characterized Obama and Abraham Lincoln as “two skinny guys from Illinois.” I love that!] Anyway, Barack Obama has always been trying to figure out just where he fits in, what his destiny is, and without grandiosity, with remarkable true-heartedness, he has dowsed his way here, to pulling us out of the Slough of Despond.

T/J. I’m back from an internet-free parallel universe. The hills are on fire again in So Cal. Our Gov is trying to fuck with environmental protections while pretending to be green. The guardians of the Mormon Temple in West LA are peeing in their magic underwear. The Dodgers haven’t re-signed Manny.

@FlyingChainSaw: not that there’s anything wrong with that.

@lynnlightfoot: I don’t think the Clintons are swine. I think that they implemented some good policies and some not so good policies. But a lot of what they achieved was by throwing hundreds of people under the bus, and with time they’ve gotten sleazier and sleazier (or greedier) with amassing money. They are two of the smartest people around, and I don’t think they’re evil on the level of the kleptocrats running the country. I just feel that their time is passed, and their continual narccistic behavior harms forward progress for my party and therefore to my country.
@Dodgerblue: Welcome back. Our Gov is also trying to shut down much of the state government again but this time more on the sly.

@SanFranLefty: Thanks for the feedback. I truly value your opinion. Winding up in this community of high-spirited and intelligent opinion is one of the best things that has ever happened to me. I forgot to add “irreverent, the most important word of all.]

@SanFranLefty: Yeah, the upcoming lame-duck budget session will be a laugh riot as the Repugs see how badly they can roll the Demos this time. Note to non-Cal readers: in CA we need a 2/3 vote to pass a budget and don’t have a 2/3 Demo majority; nor can Arnold control his own party.

@lynnlightfoot:
“cerebral arrangements” good one!!

@rptrcub: Forgive me for being a bad gay rights advocate today. I rolled out of bed at 1:30, hungover, did the math, and figured that by the time I showered, had a quick bite to eat, and made it across town it’d be nearly 3. Sending good thoughts your way for a peaceful, visible protest.

@mellbell: I was bad too. Had hoped to make it to Portland or at least Corvallis, but overspelt, have a hangover, and since it’s beautiful weather it will take twice as long to get anywhere in the Valley because of all the wine tasting tourists.

@baked: “cerebral arrangements” not original with me, alas, but I get some credit for being one of the most appreciative audiences, ever. An anthor now dead, I think, a New Zealander, pen-named Ngaio Marsh.

@mellbell: It was. I appreciate your good vibes/spirit/prayers/etc. It was peaceful and uplifting.