"Boston Police Arrest 100 Anti-Wall Street Protesters"
Good. At least these folks will have a place to wash their nasty asses; a first for most of them in quite some time.
On Wed, Oct 12, 2011 at 5:34 PM, excalliber stevens <excalibur.stevens.biswas@gmail.com> wrote:
Boston Police Arrest 100 Anti-Wall Street Protesters
By Kate Randall
12 October, 2011
WSWS.org
Boston Police arrest protesters PHOTO COURTESY OCCUPYBOSTON.COM
Boston Police carried out an early morning raid on anti-Wall Street
protesters Tuesday, arresting 100 people in a violent attack on the
Occupy Boston protest. The police operation began at about 1:20 a.m.,
when officers in uniform and riot gear moved in to clear protesters
from a section of land in the city's financial district.
The police action followed a day of protests Monday in which several
thousand Boston-area students came out to rally in support of Occupy
Boston. As in protests that have spread to dozens of cities across the
country, participants are being driven by a profound anger over
unprecedented levels of social inequality and the domination of
corporate power over all aspects of social life.
The brutal police assault on the Boston protesters expresses the real
attitude of the ruling elite to this growing movement, and is an
indication of the methods that will be utilized against protesters in
other areas as it continues to gather momentum. Boston Mayor Thomas
Menino, a Democrat, stated, "I understand they have freedom of speech
and freedom of expression, but we have a city to manage… civil
disobedience will not be tolerated."
Boston Police arrest protesters PHOTO COURTESY OCCUPYBOSTON.COM
Now nearing its second week, the Boston protest has steadily grown in
numbers. Occupy Boston protesters have set up a tent city in Dewey
Square on a section of the Rose Kennedy Greenway, with hundreds of
people sleeping overnight on a regular basis. On Monday, protesters
began expanding their occupation to an adjacent area of the Greenway,
erecting new tents.
Until Tuesday's early morning raid, the Boston Police Department had
adopted a generally hands-off approach to the protest. But on Monday
afternoon, protesters began to notice a heavy police presence in the
area. Police told protesters Monday evening that they would face
arrest unless they vacated the area of the Greenway where they had
expanded their protest.
At about 1:20 a.m. Tuesday, Police Superintendent William Evans and
Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis stood across the street from the
new occupation area. Speaking over a bullhorn, Evans gave the crowd
two minutes to disperse, warning they faced arrest if they did not
comply. Police lined up on Atlantic Avenue and minutes later dozens of
sheriff's vans and police wagons arrived. More than 200 officers
surrounded the section of the Greenway occupied by the protesters.
An Occupy Boston protester told the World Socialist Web Site later
Tuesday, "They came down with dogs, batons, riot gear, scare tactics.
It was just disgraceful!" The group responded with chants of, "The
people united will never be defeated," "This is a peaceful protest,"
and "The whole world is watching."
After about 10 minutes, the police entered the park and surrounded the
protesters. Evans gave one more warning, and police then began the
arrests. Each protester was shoved to the ground on his or her
stomach, cable-tied, and dragged off to waiting police vans. Members
of Veterans for Peace had formed a line in front of the mostly young
protesters and police broke through their barrier. Vietnam Veteran
John Niles, 74, was knocked down, but evaded arrest.
Protester James Woods, 52, told the Boston Globe that he saw police
"aggressively manhandling women," and that police had used pepper
spray on some people. As protesters were hauled away, their tents,
clothes, cameras and other belongings were thrown into a dumpster.
Police use stick on Occupy Boston protester PHOTO COURTESY
OCCUPYBOSTON.COM
Urszula Masny-Latos, who was on the scene as a legal observer, told
the Globe that the police "really attacked. They used force that was
completely unnecessary… it was just brutal. I have no idea why they
arrested us with such force."
To her surprise, she was arrested herself, although she was wearing a
green hat with the words "legal observer." She said the Boston police
usually respect the rights of legal observers at public protests. Four
medics were also arrested.
Masny-Latos also said that the violence of the arrests was contrary to
the technique routinely used at other peaceful protests, in which
police approach the protesters, inform them they are violating the
law, and the protesters may then submit to be taken into custody.
The male arrestees were held in custody or ordered to appear in court
Tuesday. The first group of men made appearances yesterday afternoon
in Boston Municipal Court. All of the women arrested were released by
police and were due in court Wednesday or Thursday.
As of mid-Tuesday, 10 men who had been released by police and nine who
were still in custody were notified that Suffolk County prosecutors
had requested that charges against them be changed from criminal
violations to civil infractions. The protesters were ordered to pay a
$50 assessment fee to the court.
Boston Police move in to arrest Occupy Boston protesters PHOTO
COURTESY OCCUPYBOSTON.COM
The day after the arrests, Police Superintendent Evans defended the
heavy-handed methods of the police. Elaine Driscoll, a spokesperson
for the Boston Police Department, justified the repressive tactics
used on the peaceful protesters saying the police "have the right to
protect themselves" and claiming that "all our officers were
respectful and proportional."
Mayor Menino defended the police while at the same time claiming to
sympathize with those who had been arrested. Echoing the comments of
other Democratic politicians on the anti-Wall Street protests, Menino
said, "I agree with them on the issues. Foreclosure, corporate greed.
These are issues I've been working on my entire career."
However, he said protesters had "crossed the line" Monday, when they
marched on a bridge in Charlestown following the student rally and
threatened to block traffic, and then expanded their campground to the
newly renovated area of the Greenway and refused to leave.
The police crackdown in Boston, following mass arrests in New York,
Des Moines and other cities, represents one element of a two-pronged
strategy being employed by the ruling class against the burgeoning
anti-Wall Street protests. On the one hand, the Democratic Party,
utilizing the services of the trade unions and their pro-Democratic
pseudo-left allies, have sought to co-opt the protests and channel the
genuine outrage expressed by the participants behind that big business
party and President Obama's 2012 reelection campaign.
This would render the incipient movement against social inequality and
the domination of the banks and corporations politically harmless and
transform it into a another prop for the capitalist two-party system,
just as the movement against the war in Iraq was subverted and then
shut down by tying it the Democratic Party and its various election
campaigns.
After three years of right-wing, pro-corporate policies, the Obama
administration is engaged in a demagogic public relations campaign to
portray itself as a populist friend of the "middle class." The
centerpiece of this effort is Obama's "American Jobs Act," a pro-
business bill that would provide only a token number of jobs and do so
by draining Social Security of funds and extending more tax breaks to
the corporations.
This measure is linked to an austerity plan that would cut hundreds of
billions of dollars from social programs, including Medicare and
Medicaid. And in Orwellian fashion, Obama is pretending to support
higher taxes on the rich even as he pushes a bipartisan tax "reform"
scheme that would slash tax rates for corporations and the wealthy.
Obama is combining campaign-style town hall meetings in various cities
to promote his phony "jobs bill" with fundraisers at which he collects
pledges and checks from multi-millionaire corporate executives and
bankers.
Typical of the cynicism of the Democrats' attempts to portray
themselves as allies of the anti-Wall Street protesters were the
remarks of Obama senior adviser David Plouffe. Interviewed Tuesday on
ABC's "Good Morning America" program, he said, "If you're concerned
about Wall Street and our financial system, the president is standing
on the side of consumers and the middle class."
In their effort to corral the anti-Wall Street movement and prevent it
from developing into a broader movement of the working class outside
the control of the Democratic Party, forces allied to the Democrats
are seeking to take organizational control of the protests. The New
York Times on Tuesday pointed to the role of the Center for American
Progress, headed by former Clinton White House Chief of Staff John D.
Podesta, in "sometimes working in recent weeks with labor unions… from
talking points to the realm of organizational guidance."
But as the anti-Wall Street movement spreads, the political
establishment is becoming increasingly concerned that the protests
will move out of the orbit of the two big-business parties and in an
increasingly anti-capitalist direction. Thus the supposed "support"
for the movement is combined with violent police attacks intended to
terrorize and intimidate, and deter new forces from becoming involved.
In Des Moines, 32 demonstrators were arrested Sunday night and charged
with trespassing after Republican Governor Terry Branstad ordered
state police to enforce a requirement to close state capitol grounds
at 11 p.m. In Grand Rapids, Michigan, the city manager has threatened
similar action against Occupy Grand Rapids demonstrators.
On Tuesday, in Washington DC, six people were arrested at the Hart
Senate Building after about 100 protesters filled the building's
atrium, chanting, "End the wars, tax the rich." Demonstrators had
marched from their occupation of "Freedom Plaza" downtown to the
Capitol.
http://www.countercurrents.org/randall121011.htm
www.realindianews.blogspot.com
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