Activists Challenge Democrats' Plan to Restrict Protests at Boston Convention

Newsmax ^ | 2/20/04

[Libloather]

Activists Challenge Democrats' Plan to Restrict Protests at Convention
NewsMax.com Wires
Friday, Feb. 20, 2004

BOSTON – Attorneys are challenging a preliminary security plan for this summer's Democratic National Convention that would limit protesters to a small patch of land virtually out of sight of the convention hall. The plan would restrict protests to a triangle-shaped site near FleetCenter, which attorneys fear could be obscured from view by buses and television satellite trucks, making demonstrations useless.

"What's the point to just have a rally when you don't have an audience for whom the rally is organized?" said Urszula Masny-Latos, executive director of the Massachusetts chapter of National Lawyers Guild.

A spokeswoman for Boston police said the department was committed to accommodating protesters, but because of the urban setting, there are few open areas near the arena suitable for demonstrations.

"Our first priority is public safety, but people have a right to come and be heard, and we totally understand that, and we're supportive of that," police spokeswoman Mariellen Burns said.

Oh Dear, Walk Past That Rabble?

If protesters are restricted only to the small pen without fear of arrest or harassment, attorneys will take their challenge to court, said Carol Rose, executive director of American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts. ACLU has joined with the lawyers guild to ask police to change the plan so delegates will have to walk past protesters.

Convention organizers are asking groups that want to demonstrate to use a proposed "free speech zone" at designated times, with limited protests allowed outside the zone.

A similar situation arose during the 2000 Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles, where protesters were initially restricted to an area blocks from delegates. A federal judge ruled the protest area was unconstitutional and ordered that protesters be allowed to demonstrate in a parking lot across the street from the convention's entrance.

[Libloather]

...limit protesters to a small patch of land virtually out of sight...

I'm sure John Effin' Kerry wouldn't want it any other way...

[JennysCool]

The implosion continues ...

[Lunatic Fringe]

I'm ready for the shadow convention! Let's roll!

[freebacon]

This is a case of blatant hypocrisy among the left. On one hand everyones view have the right to be heard, but no one is allowed to say anything which contradicts them. I think it stems from a pattern of systematic denial that lies in the subconscious of every liberal.

[finnman69]

i imagine protesters at the GOP MSG convention will get a nice protest area in NJ.

[GeronL]

Democrats are evil

[mcenedo]

If the Pubbies tried to restrict "protesters" like the 'Rats, the media would blaring the story 24/7. When the 'Rats do it, media is , .....um, yeah, they report it and, ... kinda throw in that this is exactly the same crap the 'Rats did at their LAST convention.

[Duke Nukum]

I don't know, who wants to waist their time protesting protesting these living corpses anyway? The Greens? Deaniacs? PETA?

I hope it's one of those groups, I want to see the mainstream media chronicle this blatant censorship :)

[the lone wolf]

Let me get this straight:

John Kerry, junior Senator from Massachusetts, is the front runner for the DemocRATic Presidential nomination.

The DemocRATic Convention is going to be held in Boston, Massachusetts.

The Supreme Court of Massachusetts has ruled that "gay" marriage should be valid.

And the DemocRATs are going to try to deny that Kerry is a "liberal".


Thank You, God.

[Cicero]

Time for a repeat of the 1968 Chicago Convention. Send in Allen Ginsberg and Henry Miller.

---

Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997)


Howl

For Carl Solomon

I

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,

angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,

who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz,

who bared their brains to Heaven under the El and saw Mohammedan angels staggering on tenement roofs illuminated,

who passed through universities with radiant eyes hallucinating Arkansas and Blake-light tragedy among the scholars of war,

who were expelled from the academies for crazy & publishing obscene odes on the windows of the skull,

who cowered in unshaven rooms in underwear, burning their money in wastebaskets and listening to the Terror through the wall,

who got busted in their pubic beards returning through Laredo with a belt of marijuana for New York,

who ate fire in paint hotels or drank turpentine in Paradise Alley, death, or purgatoried their torsos night after night . . . .

[Hon]

Vietnam Veterans Against The War block Collins Avenue in Miami Beach during the Republican National Convention in August 1972, demanding a meeting with Richard Nixon.

[White Eagle]

Haven't the protestors ever heard of "civil disobedience"? Then John Kerry can ask, "What trees do they plant? What programs do they bring?"

[Chu Gary]

"Vietnam Veterans Against The War block Collins Avenue in Miami Beach during the Republican National Convention in August 1972, demanding a meeting with Richard Nixon."

Which one is John F'in Kerry?

[Hon]

This is called by some the "Battle Of Miami". The battle that the VVAW caused is regarded by many to have been far bloodier than Chicago '68.

[Imal]

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

[CaptIsaacDavis]

Damn you all to hell!!!! The barbarians are running this convention. "Speech zones?" Check out thefire.org -- they are waging a very succesful campaign to eradicate this totalitarian concept from the campuses. The Federal judge in LA was right on. When are these socialist scum going to learn?