Taking It to the Streets

By Don Hazen, AlterNet. Posted August 25, 2004.

Four days from now the Republicans will invade New York for their nominating convention, and a lot of people are holding their breath.

People certainly are not expecting much drama inside Madison Square Garden. Seems clear that the Republican convention will be a pep rally where the so-called moderates will be trotted out to do their thing, which is putting a patina of sanity on a radical right agenda that is far from the mainstream of America.

But that is all expected and predictable. No, the big drama in New York will be about how the protestors will greet President George W. Bush and his party.

Will things be peaceful or get violent? And in the end, who might look bad and how will it effect the election? Will it be the Republicans, blamed for causing the anger and division in the country that provoked the dissent? Or will it be the Democrats, blamed because the Republicans will be successful in using the electronic media to tar the Kerry campaign with the sins of the protestors?

Those are the questions and all sides are working feverishly to make things go their way.

The Specter of 1968

There is a lot of speculation – some of it dire – about what might happen in New York. The specter of the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, which nominated Hubert Humphrey after the peace movement forced President Lyndon Johnson to the sidelines (and after Bobby Kennedy's assassination), is one big buzz. Many veteran activists believe that Richard Nixon's razor-thin margin over Humphrey of less than 1 percent of the popular vote was due to the media coverage of the "Battle of Chicago."

This November election may be just as close as '68. And the irony is that long after the smoke cleared from Chicago, a commission found that there was a 'police riot' generated by Mayor Richard Daley's police force. The lesson is clear: The truth about public spectacles is usually on the slow track.

Michelle Goldberg, writing in Salon, quotes Todd Gitlin, former '60's radical and now professor and media commentator, saying: "I think the Republicans will probably do what they did in 1968 and make television commercials of people rioting in the street and then promote their guy as the superintendent of order. I sure wouldn't want to be explaining to my kid how it turned out that Bush won the election by three electoral votes because of some last-minute surge of opinion in West Virginia where that commercial played three times an hour."

Fears aside, no one knows what is going to happen outside the Garden on the streets of New York between Sunday, August 29th and Thursday, September 2nd. There is no clear indication that an angry, disorganized crowd, like the one that descended on Chicago in '68, is in the works for New York. In 2000, both political conventions (in Los Angles and Philadelphia) had large numbers of protestors and major confrontations with police. That was the post-Seattle, high point of political activism for a new generation. Many remember the shock when John Sellers, the creative Ruckus Society organizer, was arrested walking down the street in Philly, and bail was set at $1,000,000, immediately making him the most famous protestor in America. However, the level and energy of protest has faded since 2000. It was invigorated again in the build-up to the Iraq war, only to fall back again as many focus their energy on getting Bush out of office.

Roadblocks from the Mayor

On the other hand, in a situation that seems at times surreal, a bungling Mayor Michael Bloomberg and an intransigent police department have made it virtually impossible for the responsible leaders of United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ), the lead group organizing the big march on Sunday, August 29th to have a decent protest, in a city where protest has often been celebrated.

There has been a litany of ultimata by the city, a refusal to make Central Park available to marchers despite strong positive public opinion that it should, with the whole march being sent out to oblivion on the Westside Highway.

A New York State Supreme Court judge ruled against UFPJ today, saying that the organization was “guilty of inexcusable and inequitable delay” in their case against the city of New York. The New York Times reports that the UFPJ organizers still plan to hold the march up Seventh Avenue past the Convention site at Madison Square Garden.

The Bloomberg administration has undercut organizers of the march at every turn. Lisa Fithian, one of the UFPJ leaders, and a veteran of both LA and Philly clashes in 2000, says: "The city and the police's intent has been to minimize, marginalize, and squelch the voices of tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people, all here to express their constitutionally protected rights of dissent."

Another part of the buzz is that Mayor Bloomberg and Police Chief Raymond Kelly are taking their cues from Karl Rove and the Secret Service, which ultimately controls the police presence around the Garden. Their goal may be just as historian Gitlin suggests – create campaign opportunities for the Republicans in what has already become a very dirty campaign.

Don Hazen is the Executive Editor of AlterNet.

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