Protest This!
OttO on Aug 26 2008 at 7:39 am | Filed under: Jihad Watch, Radicals, Uncategorized, War On The War On Terror
Recreate 68?
“I can’t figure out why, for the life of me, that somebody would want to re-create ’68. Is it the riots or tear gas — or perhaps the assassinations? Or maybe the election of a Republican president? I’m not sure the name was completely thought out.” - Rep. Diana DeGette (D) Denver 02/27/2008
"Let us be clear: the name is not “Recreate Chicago 68” or “Recreate the DNC 68.” The idea that “Recreate 68” refers specifically to the events of late August 1968 in Chicago has been put out by those who wish to discredit an organization planning peaceful, nonviolent protests by associating it with what they would have us believe was a violent protest 40 years ago." - Recreate 68 website
“We’re having our protest at Civic Center [upon learning their permit request had been denied]. We’re not going to give up Civic Center park to the Democrats. They are creating a very dangerous situation.”
“When things blow up because the police have to enforce a permit that the Democrats got, don’t blame us for that. Blame the Democrats for trying to silence dissent in the city of Denver."
“If the cops try to stop us, we’ll see what happens.” - Recreate ’68 spokesman Glenn Spagnuolo March 2008
Borrowing from Pastor Jeremiah Wright, perhaps we could call it 'the chickens coming home to roost', fitting since the Democrats in Denver have, for all practical purposes, built chicken coops to hold unlawful protesters, which the professional whiners have dubbed 'Gitmo on the Platte'.
Recreate 68 is the 'umbrella' organization protesting the Democratic National Convention in Denver this week. What they want to recreate is obviously up for interpretation. I've long struggled with the observations that professional protesters are either adult children or narcisistic psychopaths. Protester-turned-bureaucrat Tom Hayden, in 1988 , confirmed the lunacy: "In the sixties we always made decisions by consensus. By 1970, when you had 15 people show up and three were FBI agents and six were schizophrenics, universal agreement was getting to be a problem."
Recovered activist Jerry Rubin, in the 1980s, described the counter-culture as "a scary society in itself".
Well, the counter-culture is now merely a parody of it's glory days. Today's activists bring nothing new to the cause and are infiltrated by old-time activists who haven't had a fresh idea in 40 years. You have old and new (often the louder and more obnoxious they are the younger they are); YIPpie wannabe's (lacking the talent and the will of the originals); anti-establishment types; 9/11 Truthers; anti-capitalists; people still hell bent on impeaching George W. Bush; and of course, the pointless troublemaker - if there wasn't this convention-thing going on, they'd be trying to draw attention to themselves in some other mediocre way.
Of course we can't leave out the so-called peaceniks, who talk about peaceful protests out of one side of their face while planning disruptions, permit violations and law-enforcement challenges out of the other side. These people are described as anti-Iraq War protesters. So then…what are they protesting?
The country is largely under control, violence is down, the dreaded 'civil war' never really materialized, factions are working with the US to secure their communities, the government is finally resembling some form of leadership, refugees are returning home, Al Qaeda has been marginalized and the Bush Administration appears poised to accept a proposed withdrawal plan by the Iraqi government. Everything these people have been protesting for the past five years is seeing fruition and the end may be in sight. So, what's the beef?
Well, not everything they have been protesting for is coming to realization.
It comes down to what I have made clear for years now: they aren't protesting the war; they are protesting success. The goal all along has been to see America shattered and fallen, to see our enemies have a victory that would reign in the aggressive Americans. I've told protesters and their defenders that success in Iraq would be the fastest and surest way to end the war and reduce the loss of life. I suspect that the professional protesters involved in anti-Iraq War demonstrations are demoralized by the sight of victory and believe it's still not too late to cave-in and lose this war, to lose Iraq to Al Qaeda or to Iran.
For better or for worse, it seems that only the schizos bothered to show up to Denver. In grand demonstration fashion, the organizers predicted 10 to 50 times the number of protesters than what actually showed. Recreate 68 had hoped for 10, 20, even 50,000 people to march and demonstrate. Estimates of the initial protests put the number at a gracious 1200. Recreate 68, in one lame attempt to appear clever (if unoriginal) by levitating the US Mint building, failed when only about 70 protesters showed up.
Most gatherings were outnumbered by cops and/or reporters. Cops already started relaxing restrictions and re-opening streets that had been blocked off. Roughly two dozen people have been detained thus far, most stemming from a clash between police and about 300 protesters who described the incident as one where they were just standing there, whistling, minding their own business when these psycho cops just showed up and attacked the crowd.
There are several theories as to why the showing has been so underwhelming: some say that Barack Obama's appeal de-motivated much of the passion among more mainstream would-be lunatics. Some fringies, like the Communist Party USA have tentatively thrown their support behind Obama, acknowledging that he will move things in the right direction. Others, like Sunsara Taylor of the Revolutionary Communist Party (apparently the radicals in communist circles), is upset that so many of her brethren have bought into the Obama hype.
Some protesters blame the sparse crowds on the intimidating police presence and the 'freedom cage', a fenced in protest zone close to the DNC arena, as well as the Gitmo on the Platte holding cells.
Other people cite the notion that more moderate and mainstream supporters of the protests stayed out of Denver due to the extremist and violence-prone language coming from some of the radical organizations.
Another theory is that the success of the Iraq War and the approaching departure of President Bush has taken a lot of the wind out of the sails. Without Iraq in chaos and people caring less and less about hearing anti-Bush rhetoric, the passion fizzled for some.
Me? I think that people just don't care. There is no military draft in place. The Iraq War is not (and has never been) akin to the Vietnam War. Political leaders aren't being gunned down in the street.
Nobody cares. The mission has failed. The only people at this point drawn to these get-togethers are the hardcore who have planned their family vacation schedules around it months ago.
The rest, I hope, are busy yawning and tuning in to the DNC, where the real rallies are taking place.
