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Police Conspire to Shut Down OWS Nationwide
Similar Tactics in Use Throughout the Country
By Michael Chester
In recent days, a pattern has appeared across the country in the actions of police in dealing with the peaceful protesters taking part in the OWS movement. This coordinated effort leads many to suspect the dark presence of the Federal government in what should be a local event.
The recent police attacks in New York and Oakland are just the tip of the police state takeover. The protesters have received threats from police in many cities across the country, including Portland, OR, Chicago, IL, San Francisco, Dallas, TX, and Atlanta, GA.
Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who were present report that the police have used weapons and tactics on these peaceful gatherings that the military are prohibited from using in war zones. The police attacks show a pattern. They “justify” these attacks based upon fictitious claims that the occupiers are creating a health hazard, or a fire hazard, or a crime problem, based on no real evidence.
They also find old, obscure laws and vague anti-homeless statutes to justify their actions. Then the police attack in the middle of the night, dressed in riot gear and heavily armed with mace, pepper spray, clubs, hand cuffs, tear gas, assault rifles, and so-called flash-bang stun grenades–all potentially lethal weapons to be used against peaceful demonstrators.
Heidi Bogosian, executive director of the National Lawyers Guild, which has been providing legal services to the movement puts it this way.
“We definitely feel, especially in a movement like this that has arisen so quickly in a number of cities, that there will be a coordinated national effort to try and shut it down. We see the scapegoating of these movements, the attacks at night, and in general tactics designed to terrorize and to scare protesters away. I can’t see this as anything other than centrally coordinated.”
In a radio interview on San Francisco station KALW, Oakland Mayor Jean Quan admitted to being a part of a conference call among 18 city mayors. Quan’s former advisor, Dan Siegel, an Oakland attorney confirmed this call. After November 14 when Oakland police made a midnight attack on the protesters to drive them out of the park using military style equipment, Siegel resigned in disgust. It is not clear whether the conference call was initiated by one of the mayors or a Federal agency. No one who was involved is talking.
On Oct. 25, shortly after this call allegedly occurred, Quan ordered the first police attack on the occupy Oakland protesters. It was during this attack that Iraq war veteran, Scott Olsen was shot in the face with a hardened aluminum tear gas canister causing a severe brain injury. When others tried to help him, the police threw a flash-bang grenade into the middle of the crowd.
Both Siegel and Boghosian say they strongly suspect federal involvement in the planning of the recent rash of police violence against occupiers. Siegel states,
“It’s only logical to assume that the ‘Fusion Centers’ are involved, especially after the Oakland occupiers shut down the port in Oakland.” Says Boghosian, “What we are seeing here is the Miami model, with various levels of law enforcement, local, state and federal, all at work. It would be shocking if federal law enforcement were not seeing this occupy movement now as a national security threat
.”
For those who have not heard about the “Fusion Centers’ that Siegel mentions, 72 of them, located across the country were set up following 9-11 at a cost in excess of half a billion dollars. Under the Department of Homeland Security they are tasked with bringing the FBI together with local law enforcement departments. Their stated goal is to “both collect and share domestic intelligence, and serve as command centers to direct local law enforcement in helping implement national law enforcement goals.” There are also many Joint Terrorism Task Forces, which directly link the FBI with urban police departments.
Mara Veheyden-Hilliard, co-chair of the National Lawyers Guild’s National Mass Defense Committee, based in Washington, says.
“These crackdowns on the occupation movement certainly appear to be part of a national strategy to crush them. We haven’t yet found overt evidence of federal involvement, but the fact that in rapid succession local authorities have taken action raises the specter of coordination. There is absolutely no legal justification for the involvement of the Joint Terrorism Task Forces in this movement. These demonstrations are not terrorist activities, and police should not be treating them as such, yet all over the country the police are treating the protesters as if they are criminals. The similarity of the response everywhere to the movement makes it appear that there is a coordinated strategy.”
Former advisor to President Ronald Reagan, Paul Craig Roberts had this to say about government actions against anti-war protesters. The OWS people get the same treatment
Examiner.com reporter Rick Ellis is reporting that an unidentified US Justice Department official has confirmed what Boghosian, Siegel and Veheyden-Hilliard say they suspect is the case: that each of the recent brutal police evictions and attacks on occupation groups “was coordinated with help from Homeland Security, the FBI and other federal police agencies.” Ellis goes on,
“According to this official, in several recent conference calls and briefings, local police agencies were advised to seek a legal reason to evict residents of tent cities, focusing on zoning laws and existing curfew rules. Agencies were also advised to demonstrate a massive show of police force, including large numbers in riot gear. In particular, the FBI reportedly advised on press relations, with one presentation suggesting that any moves to evict protesters be coordinated for a time when the press was the least likely to be present.”
In a story published early Wednesday, The Associated Press reports that mayors and city leaders in as many as 40 cities were communicating about coordinating an attack on the occupy movement. Again, this appears to be at the direction of a Federal agency.
It seems cruelly ironic that so many of our sons and daughters have put their lives and health on the line to provide freedom for Iraqis and Afghans only to return home to a police state. There is something definitely wrong with this picture.
Short URL: http://www.veteranstoday.com/?p=163344
Posted by Michael Chester on Nov 18 2011, With 0 Reads, Filed under Civil Liberties and Freedom, Corruption, Economy, Editors Picks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
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After seeing a Vietnam Veteran die in the streets a couple years back, and another Vietnam Vet who was a good friend (2 tour “tunnel rat”) finally kick his heroin habit by himself because the VA said that wasn’t up to them to help him, I would tell every Vet who has returned home to the country they fought for to go occupy these vacant homes all across the country. Our Government creates these wars (for the most part) only to have these men and women come home to nothing. We sit in the middle of uncertain times, but it seems to me that there is a push to bring us to the edge of revolution.
Thank you for your comment and your service.
I removed your address for your safety.
Mike
This article and the Dr. Roberts interview expose THEIR agenda very plainly and accurately. THEY have stripped us of our “founding fathers legacy” in broad daylight. THEIR agenda is prominently displayed in history, and certainly from WWII forward.
Demonize the group for intended removal and expand the “definition” with each additional “threat” to THEIR definition of “danger to the rest of the Patriotic population”. THE PATRIOT ACT: Has to be a good thing because I AM A PATRIOT!
This is going to end badly. Might as well go down swinging!
http://openchannel.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/11/19/8884405-lobbying-firms-memo-spells-out-plan-to-undermine-occupy-wall-street
Looks like even the lobbyists are worried.
The good news is they apparently recognize the potential of the Occupy movement. The BAD news is also as stated. And as stated by the “talking head”, this is only one document from one group. Imagine what other “efforts” are developing behind the curtain.
Perhaps we can resurrect the term “Iron Curtain”?
How about, “The thin blue iron curtain?”
I am not disputing the author’s allegation of a conspiracy among the nation’s mayors.
Rather, I am saying that such a conspiracy is unnecessary. Grants from the Department of Fatherland — oops — Homeland Security have militarized police departments. Afloat in cash, police chiefs attend arms fares, where they purchase from the Pentagon “obsolete” weaponry at fire sale prices.
“Yes, Chief, you too can afford to purchase your very own armored personnel carrier!” Such a deal!
Police departments all around the country also receive the same indoctrination and training from the feds. Demonstrations are “low-level terrorism.”
The DHS has done an end-run around Posse Comitatus. If you can’t use the military for law enforcement, then morph the police departments into a branch of the military.
America is not a police state; it is a militarized state.
Absolutely true. There are some small town sheriff’s departments that are equipped as well as some military bases.
I watch msm just for laughs,but it isn’t funny!Bloomberg on CNN saying there are only a thousand or so ,No big deal!I was watching ustream and saw streets overflowing with people,all peaceful I may add in numbers more like 35,000 or more.I’m paying for disinformation,that’s about to end.It’s a hard fact to swallow that media is bought ,just like or Goverment.Even harder for older Americans ,who think they are reading and watching the gospel.Awaking to the reality of it all is an all to bitter pill to swallow.But drinking they magic kool-aid is worse.It’s hard to explain to older generations the mass of disinformation they are consuming.Even sadder is people believing all this BS with resouces to know better.Don’t they know Wall st.has alway’s been infested with Rat’s ?
@ Bluesgirl
“…It’s hard to explain to older generations the mass of disinformation they are consuming…”
I’m 67 years of age, intelligent, well-educated, well-informed and rational, and it is impossible to explain it to younger generations. The reason is that they are not consuming disinformation.
What makes it impossible is that they either have the earbuds of their mp3 players glued into their ear canals or they have their cell phones welded to their outer ears. They are totally isolated, self-absorbed and oblivious to the world around them.
Cheap electronic toys have subverted their humanity.
Have you ever seen somebody on a cell call bump into a light pole? It’s hilarious. It makes you want to shout, “Hang up and walk!”
If they don’t start listening to level headed people and move on to DC fast where they have a right to be in the People’s House they will loose all they have done. That young black fellow that started the bank removal of deposits, the AARP guy that advertise “there are 50 million of us and we vote” the tribunal of Goldman Sack calling for justice now, and many other result oriented people have it right. Get to DC before they go home and DEMAND action spell our unpunished crime or lack of regulation and enforcement of rule…..I just contacted my Rep. informing him of lack of action by local Sheriff to protect citizens, just open up old cases, I was robbed again, never bothered to interrogate the person or send me a report, in the process made me an easy target. AS they say here “Don’t bother calling the cops they will do nothing” They were right so I called my Congressman to check my 4 years old case, silver dollar collection, not chicken feed. And yes Mexican women both time. You all they accuse you of being racist. Wrote Obama to look below the 1% as well, the disease has spread. DEMAND ACTION NOW to start clean up society and stop the MEDIA pollution of decency.
Michael, if you and the others haven’t seen it yet, you will soon: Video shot by a University of California at Davis film student of the protests there shows a line of peaceful sitting student-protesters being shot in the face en masse with pepper spray by a cop holding a canister as big as a paint-spray bottle!
I watched it on Huffington Post early this morning, but now the AP, Wall Street Journal, CNN and everyone else have the story. You need to search for the full-length video showing how an almost kindergarten play-time group of young students is literally pounced upon by riot cops. While the UCD campus may be a pastoral setting of learning, the police apparently are Sacramento Valley thugs who would be equally at home in any Red State beating Blacks and Chicanos.
This one-size-fits-all approach to police action needs to be addressed by all concerned citizenry. These are young men and women who might be our sons and daughters. And I agree that for every one of them, there are at least a thousand people at home who are behind them.
@ Joe in San Francisco
“…And I agree that for every one of them, there are at least a thousand people at home who are behind them.”
I disagree. If they were behind them, then they wouldn’t be at home.
It’s the “walk the walk” thing — literally.
Why does Roberts keep using the term “anti-war protesters”. These aren’t anti-war protesters. They’re protesting the fact that our government has been taken over by corporations and banks. Of course the police were going to turn on the protesters. That’s what they do. Do you think King would have been killed if he stuck to civil rights? Once he started speaking out against the war and about economic injustice, he had to be silenced. Yes, the police are going to pull out all the laws about sanitation, people being in tents where they can’t see them, drug use. They care more about attacking OWS for that than they do about keeping drugs out of our neighborhoods.
This has always been the way this country does things. Only this time, it’s not just in minority neighborhoods. The whole middle and working class are on the chopping block. Those who don’t know it are the ones with the money that don’t have to care.
Why does Roberts keep using the term “anti-war protesters”.
When this recording was made, OWS had not yet begun. He was talking about war protests, but I think everything he said would equally apply to the OWS protesters.
Mike