“Anyone who shows up to counter a permitted demonstration should be ejected and arrested.”
What are you saying here? Free Republic was founded to counter demonstrate left-wing demonstrations. That is the original meaning of “to freep”. When I was younger, and healthier, most of the Free Republic events I attended were counter-demonstrations. Sometimes we were vastly outnumbered; on a few memorable occasions we outnumbered the original protesters (Ah! Good times; good memories!)
The difference is that right from the start we eschewed violence (altho’ I confess to losing my temper once, and waving my cane about. I swear I never touched the pun...er kid, ‘tho’.) No bricks; no knives, no box-cutters; no sap-gloves; no fireworks, no empty glass bottles, no frozen bottles of water. No roughing up opponents; no sucker punches, no ‘knock-out games’; no throwing old people to the ground and kicking them. But the Left didn’t follow those rules, and I could see what was going to come: sooner or later, it was going to end in street fighting. And now it has, but not by our doing. “The (right-wing) is vicious, they fight back when attacked.”
“Please put brain in gear before putting mouth in motion.”
My brain is in gear. We are no longer a nation of respectful, thoughtful debate. Yes, the left is largely to blame but the result is that no message beyond pithy chants and obscene signs is getting out. Both sides should allow the other to have its say and then counter with the other side in a respectful, civilized manner. When a demonstration permit triggers a counter demonstration at the same time and place, it becomes merely a street fight, as you noted. The left can win by shutting down the right’s right to be heard. The right cannot win by being silenced when we have facts and history and common sense on our side and are prevented from speaking them. Conversely, thanks to media complicity, the left can win by being silenced by the right. It is a lose/lose for the right and a win/win for the left.