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Today's
Stories
November
1, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
How Bush Was Offered Bin Laden and
Blew It
Dave
Lindorff
Bulgegate Confirmed; Press Yawns
Greg
Bates
Nader Voter Survey Results
Roger
Morris
Novel Politics: Only Fiction Can Do
This Election Justice
Diane
Christian
Death Tolls
Lenni
Brenner
Secularists Be Warned: Christlike Kerry Roams Spiritual Universe
Christopher
C. Conway
Can the Left Sink Any Lower?
Francis
Boyle
Legal Elites and the Iraq War: the Nazis Had Their Law Professors,
Too
Jason
Leopold
Rummy's Failed War Plan
Website
of the Day
Dylan Resurrects "Masters of War"
October
30 / 31, 2004
JoAnn
Wypijewski
The Long March and the Million Worker
March
Winslow
T. Wheeler
Spartacus Tells All
Bruce
Anderson
Notes from the Big Empty: When the Hippies Invaded NoCal
Vicente
Navarro
They Worked for Franco: How Sec. of State Cordell Hull and Nobel
Laureate Camilo Jose Cela Collaborated with the Fascist Regime
Robin
Blackburn
How Monica Lewinsky Saved Social Security
Greg
Bates
A Question of Character: What Makes Nader Tick?
Nancy
Welch
The American Health Care Crisis: an Interview with Dr. David
Himmelstein
William
Lind
Election Day: Which Menendez Brother Will You Vote For?
Brian
Cloughley
Uzbekistan and Bush Hypocrisies
Suzan
Mazur
Oops They Did It Again: the NYTs the Paper of Record and Rip-Offs
Greg
Moses
Standing at the Graves of Iraq
John
Chuckman
Osama's Endorsement
Richard
Oxman
Why Not Accept Osama's Offer?
Ken
Avidor
Landscape of Fear: When Ugly is Suspicious
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Bush, Ba'ath and Beyond
Hope
Bastian
Strangling Cuba's Economy
P.
Sainath
Tower of Gabble: Toward a Sustainable Rhetoric
Dave
Zirin
Bush League: Why MLB Owners Support the Prez
Jon
Swift
The Dry Drunk Thang: Put a Cork in It
Ron
Jacobs
The Joke's on Me: a Review of Bob Dylan's Chronicles Vol. 1
Alexander
Billet
Taking Theatre Back: Are the States Ready for "Stuff Happens"?
Poets'
Basement
Jones, Laymon, Norris, Ford and Albert
Website
of the Weekend
The Origins of Halloween
October
29, 2004
Harry
Browne
No Justice for Peace Activist in County
Clare
October
28, 2004
Forrest Hylton
"The Gas is Ours:" Bolivia's
Ghosts of October
Col. Dan Smith
Rebellion
in the Ranks
Alan Maass
Jon Stewart v. the Pundits
Ron Jacobs
Ecstasy
in Red Sox Nation
Alexander
Cockburn
Kerrycrats and the War
October
27, 2004
Jules
Rabin
Crammed with Distressful Politics
Dave
Lindorff
Bulgegate: the Lies Continue
Katherine
Van Tassel
On the Home Front: Both Parties
Ignore Working Parents
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Bi-Partisan Politics of Oil
October 26,
2004
Brian Cloughley
Three
Weddings and Lots of Funerals: Atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan
William Blum
Fear
Factors
Lenni Brenner
The
1964 Berkeley Free Speech Movement: Lessons for 2004
Ben Tripp
The
Chicken Salad Election
Fidel Castro
After the Fall
Greg Bates
The Nation's Flawed Calculus
Walter Brasch
Gag the Public: the War on Dissent
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
An Open Letter to Pat Buchanan
Mickey Z.
Rumble in the Jungle at 30: Ali, Foreman and the Congo
Amir Taheri
The Boom in Conspiracy Theories
Alexander Billet
Say It Ain't So, Bruce!: the Boss Endorses Kerry
Doug Giebel
The Religion of G.W. Bush
Kathleen Christison
Why
I Liked Thomas Friedman's Latest Column Before I Didn't
October 25,
2004
Ralph Nader
Letter
from a Minnesota Highway
Werther
West
Texas Wahabbism
Dave Zirin
Boston's Killer Cops: Death of a Fan
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: Oregon Revokes Dr. Leveque's License
Omar Barghouti
Executing Another Child in Rafah
William J. Nottingham
Lori Berenson's Story
John Chuckman
A Foolish Consistency
Uri Avnery
On
the Road to Civil War
October 22
/ 24, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
You
Can't Blame Nader for This
Rev. William Alberts
On Bended Knee: Faith-Based Deceptions
Willliam A.
Cook
Killing for Christ
Saul Landau
George W. Bush: a Man of His Words?
Bill Quigley
I Held the Bullet in My Palm: Masked Haitian Police Shoot Children
While Arresting Priest
Christopher Brauchli
Seal It With a Frown: What Compassionate Conservativism Really
Means
William S.
Lind
Fallujah and the Moral Level of War
Sharon Smith
Guilt Trippers for Kerry
Greg Bates
Kerrynomics: "Hurt the Ones Who Vote for Us"
Justin E.H. Smith
Is Lesser Evilism a Compromise with Evil?
Rebecca Evans
Tarnished Legacy: Pinochet and the Chilean Military
Mike Whitney
Al Hurra TV: the Second Invasion
M. Junaid Alam
Purchasing Individuality in America
David Krieger
Nuclear Non-Proliferation: Examining the Policies of Bush and
Kerry
David J. Ledermann
The Emperor's New Crumbs
Lawrence Reichard
Same Old FBI Story
Website of
the Weekend
Lie Girls: the Real Coalition of the Willling
October 21,
2004
Ben Tripp
The
Undecided Voter Examined
Joshua Frank
Kerry
and the Environment:
It's Not Easy Pretending to be Green
Stan Cox
What
the Left Doesn't Get About Small Businesses
Bill Martinez
State
Depart and Cuban Visas: Only Anti-Castro Agitators Need Apply
Mark Engler
The War and Globalization
Lina Britto
and Lucia Suarez
Bolivia:
a Year After the October Insurrection
Website of the Day
Two Pampered Children of Wealth
October 20,
2004
Yitzhak Laor
"Did
You Two Squabble?": a Bullet Fired for Every Palestinian
Child
Jason Leopold
Sinclair
Broadcasting's Air War: a Long History of Journalistic Deception
Jesse Sharkey
A
Teacher's Account of How Military Recruiters Prey on High School
Students
Col. Dan Smith
Choking
Free Speech About the Draft
Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
Using My Religion
David Vest
If
Bush Wins, Blame Me
Jack Random
The Jackson 17: Reflections on a Mutiny
Ron Jacobs
Time
to Kick It Up a Notch
James Brittain
Plan Patriota and the FARC: a Change in the Countryside?
Christopher
Dols
Bombing Madison: Michael Moore's Fright Fest
Dave Lindorff
First They Came for the Nurses...
Website of
the Day
Banana Republican Catalogue
October 19,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Party
Favors: the Political Business of Terry McAuliffe
Jeff Taylor
Confessions
of a Swing State Voter
Matt Vidal
American
Myopia: "More Money in Your Pocket"
Victor Kattan
"It's Not Who You're Against; It's Who You're For":
Palestine Takes Center Stage At Euro Social Forum
William Loren
Katz
What Goes Around Comes Around
Sean Carter
O'Reilly Should Shut Up About Extortion Claiims
CounterPunch Wire
Who's Really in Bed with Republican Funders: Kerry or Nader?
October 18,
2004
Saul Landau
Facts
and Lies; Slogans and Truth
Dave Lindorff
Bulletin
on the Bush Bulge
Diane Christian
Sheep
and Goats: On the Language of Goodness
Greg Bates / Dave Lindorff
Betting on War: a Wager on the Fallout of a Kerry Presidency
Uri Avnery
Ariel
Sharon's Philosophy
Peter LaVenia
Leaving the Greens So Soon? a Response to Josh Frank
Mike Whitney
O'Reilly at the Whipping Post
Elaine Cassel
The Other War: Civil Liberties Three Years After 9/11
October 16
/ 17, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
The
Free Speech Movement and Howard Stern
Leslie Brill
Unmerciful Judge, Merry Executioners: the Death Penalty as the
True Measure of Bush's Character
Jules Rabin
Reckoning Deaths in an Agitated World
Dave Lindorff
About the Bush Bulge: Was There a Pucker in That Jacket or Was
the President Just Glad to be There?
Peter Linebaugh
Judging Judges: a Few Pages from The Mirror of Justices
Gary Leupp
Iran and Syria: How to Effect Regime Change and Expand the Empire
M. Shahid Alam
America, Imagine This!
Ron Jacobs
Trying to Cross Lake Champlain
Fred Gardner
The Flu Vaccine Question: How Bush Blew It
Jenna Orkin
The Toxic Legacy of 9/11
Dave Zirin
Name the DC Baseball Team: Contest Results
David Hamilton
Alone and Exposed: Bush as a Strong Leader?
Ralph Nader
Criticizing Israel is Not Anti-Semitism
Doug Giebel
Thinking the Unthinkable
Mark Engler
Crimes in Freedom's Name: Dick Cheney's El Salvador
Derek Tyner
Blacks Didn't Get the Vote by Voting: an Interview With Clarence
Thomas on the Million Worker March
Evan Jones
Gimme That Ole Time Religion: Cash and "The Mind of the
South"
Poets' Basement
LaMorticella, Klipschutz and Albert
Website of
the Weekend
No More Bush Girls
October 15,
2004
Paul Craig
Roberts
Where
Did These "Conservatives" Come From?: The Brownshirting
of America
Laura Carlsen
Wal-Mart
vs. the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon
Greg Bates
Empire of Insanity: Kerry's Iraq Troop Numbers
Michael Donnelly
News from a Swing State: Does Anyone Here Have a Spine?
Katherine Lahey
The Venezuelan "Threat": Why Do Kerry and Bush Fear
Hugo Chavez?
Robert Jensen
/ Pat Youngblood
Election Day Fears
Leah Caldwell
From
Supermax to Abu Ghraib: the Masterminds of Torture and Abuse
Website of
the Day
An Anti-Billionaire Policy? Why That Would Be Economic Racism
October 14,
2004
Darcy Richardson
The
Other Progressive Candidate: the Lonely Crusade of Walt Brown
Willliam A.
Cook
Turning
Myths into Truth
Laura Santina
Water, Women and War
Evelyn Pringle
Free Speech Banned by Big Pharma: What You Can't Say About Drug
Importation
Alan Farago
Lessons
from Nature
Rep. Maxine Waters
A Letter to Colin Powell on Haiti
Nicole Colson
Maimed
for Oil and Empire
October 13,
2004
Bishop Thomas
Gumbleton and Bill Quigley
Aftermath
of a Coup: The Other Disaster in Haiti
Sharon Smith
Barak
O-Bomb-a?: Democrats Target Iran
Christopher Brauchli
God and the Bush Administration
Mike Whitney
The Real Meaning of the Hamdi Case
Paul de Rooij
Amnesty
International: a False Beacon?
Website of
the Day
Operation
Truth
October 12,
2004
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
"Indian
Country"
Greg Bates
The Year of Voting Dangerously: a Survey Request of Nader Voters
in Swing States
Steven Conn
Progressives as Pawns: Kerry's War on Nader
Jason Leopold
Under Cheney, Halliburton Helped Saddam Siphon Billions from
UN Oil-for-Food Program
Security Scholars
for a Sensible Foreign Policy
Time for a Change of Course
Timothy J. Freeman
Dying for a Mistake
Pierre Tristam
Deconstructing Bush
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The 2nd Debate: the Blurring of Act and Audience
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
Israel as Sideshow
Website of the Day
John Kerry's Personal Off-Shore Tax Shelters
October 11,
2004
Robert Fisk
Iraq:
Unforgivable Betrayals and Broken Promises
Kevin Pina
The
Untold Story of Aristide's Departure from Haiti
Patrick Gavin
Rethinking
Columbus Day
Chris Floyd
Tribes with Flags in the New Afghanistan
Daniel Wolff
Radioactive Money: Entergy, Political Cash and America's Most
Dangerous Nuclear Plant
Walter Brasch
The Only Ones Who Believe Saddam Had WMDs are Bush, Cheney...and
40% of All Americans
Mike Whitney
The Phony Afghan Elections: Ballot of the Disappearing Ink
Ari Shavit
"He Talks to Condi Rice Every Day": an Interview with
Sharon's Lawyer
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Debates and the Big Lie
Website of the Day
Dylan's Greatest Recording?
October 9 /
10, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
"There
Are No Innocents"
Paul de Rooij
Northern Ireland is Still the Issue: a Conversation with Gerry
Adams
M. Shahid Alam
Making Sense of Our Times
Laura Carlsen
Protest and Populism in Latin America
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: ASA Goes to Court
Col. Dan Smith
Bush's Credibility Gap
Paul Craig
Roberts
Faith-Based Economics
Greg Bates
What If Nader Critics Get What They Demand?
Joshua Frank
Cobb, the Greens and the Collapse of the Left
Felice Pace
Wilderness, Politics and the Oligarchy: How the Pew Charitable
Trust is Smothering the Grassroots Environmental Movement
Walter A. Davis
Of Pynchon, Thanatos and Depleted Uranium
William A.
Cook
The Agony of Colin Powell
Phyllis Pollack
Twas No Crank Call Love Affair: London Calling, 25 Years Later
Poets' Basement
Klipschutz, Albert, Ford
Website of the Weekend
Abu Ghraib: the Taguba Annexes
October 8,
2004
Jennifer Loewenstein
The
Israeli Invasion of Gaza
Moshe Adler
Edwards' Gambit: He Hoped No One Would Notice the Similarities
David Swanson
Media Blackout: Press Continues to Ignore Labor's Opposition
to Iraq War
Dave Zirin
CounterPunch Contest: Let's Name the New DC Baseball Team!
Rep. Ron Paul
The Draft is a Form of Slavery
William S. Lind
Keeping Our SA Up
Samar Assad
Kerry v. Bush: No Difference When It Comes to Israel / Palestine
Jim Ingalls
and Sonali Kolhatkar
The Elections in Afghanistan
October 7,
2004
Dave Lindorff
All
Out of Volunteers: A Draft is in the Air
Masha Hamilton
Fear in Kandahar
Christopher
Brauchli
Master of Corruption: the Ripening Scandals of Tom Delay
Jason Leopold
Is There Still Time to Impeach Bush?
Bruce K. Gagnon
Bombing the Panhandle: Fighting the Pentagon in Rural Florida
Meredith Kolodner
Where
is the Urgency?: The Anti-War Movement's Election Year Challenge
October 6,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
"Please,
Dude, Can I Take Them Out?": Targeting Civilians in Fallujah
Ron Jacobs
Going
Nuclear: the Ghost of Edward Teller Lives
Michael Colby
The National Flip-Flop: Suddenly Bush is Unfit to Lead?
Tarif Abboushi
More of the Same: Israel Wins the Debates
Matthew Behrens
Canadian Firms Profit from Iraqi Blood
Mike Whitney
Rethinking WMDs
John Pilger
Stealing Diego Garcia
Ben Tripp
Kerry's "Triumph"
Kevin McKiernan
Cheney's Poison Lab: Wrong Time, Wrong Target
Patrick Cockburn
Elections
Will Not End the Fighting in Iraq
Website of the Day
Is There an Islamic Problem?
October 5,
2004
Anthony Loewenstein
Rupert
Murdoch and the Marginals: "Personally Creating Outcomes"
Mark Clinton
and Tony Udell
The
Suicide of an Iraq War Veteran
Greg Bates
Trading
Idiots: an Open Letter to Eric Alterman
Dave Lindorff
What's
the Frequency, Karl?
Norm Dixon
Why Washington Won't Save Darfur Villagers
Larry Kearney
God Talk and Burning Children
Bill Linville
Dirty Politics in the Land of "Clean" Government
Gary Leupp
What
Edwards Should Ask Cheney
Website of
the Day
A Guide to Halliburton for Tonight's Debate
October 4,
2004
Diane Christian
The
Gates of Hell
Joshua Frank
An Interview with David Cobb
Doug Giebel
Incurious George: What If Bush Didn't Lie?
John Chuckman
Strange Victory: Sen. Obvious and the Pathetic Lump
Ramzy Baroud
Reverse the Picture: Anatomy of a Palestinian Outrage
Julia Stein
Remembering Mario Savio and the FSM
Sean Donahue
Outsourcing
Terror: Kerry and Special Forces
Website of
the Day
Mapping
Mt. St. Helens as She Rocks
October 2 /
3. 2004
Paul Wright
John
Kerry on Criminal Justice
Kathleen and Bill Christison
An Exchange with Israeli Historian Bennie Morris
Kathie Helmkamp
My Son Trent: a Marine Who Doesn't Want to Kill
Phillip Cryan
Indigenous Mobilization in Colombia
Lenni Brenner
The First Ex-Catholic Saint: Memories of Mario Savio
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: In Case You Missed "Montel"
Ron Jacobs
It Did Happen Here: When Neo-Nazis Terrorized Olympia
Ben Tripp
Sticker Shock
William S.
Lind
The Grand Illusion: Iraqi Security Forces
Dave Zirin
The Swindle of the Century: Baseball Comes to DC
Dave Lindorff
Lies from the Great Debate
Luscon Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Elections: a High-Tech Sham is Underway
Zoe Moskovitz
& Sasha Kramer
Separating Lies from Truth About Haiti
Nelson P. Valdes
Habana Night vs. Latin American Scholars in Vegas: 61 Banned
Cuban Academics
Alan Farago
The "Ownership Society" and the End of the Everglades
Nancy Haley
What is the Historical Jesus Trying to Tell Us?
Alex Billet
Long Live The Clash: London Still Calling After 25 Years
Steve Fesenmaier
Save and Burn: The War on Libraries
Poets' Basement
Smith, Holt, Albert
October 1,
2004
Steve Breyman
Kerry's
Missed Opportunities
Rose Gentle
My
Son Died for a Lie
Lee Sustar
Iran
in the Crosshairs
Ralph Nader
What
We Didn't Hear at the Debate: Where's the Exit Strategy?
Walter Andrews
We Are Less Secure Now Than Ever
Mike Whitney
Pandora's
Government
Mickey Z.
Debate
This
Saul Landau
The
Iraq Invasion: Lessons from the Pinochet Cases
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
November 2, 2004
To Control
the Event
Attention
Bicyclists!
By
JAMES DAVIS
Apparently, once you displace whatever
is in the road you are traffic. With this in mind 1000 cyclists
gathered at Union Square in New York for the annual Halloween
Critical Mass bicycle ride. Participants were rakish as ever
but found themselves besieged by an enormous police charm offensive
at Union Sq. Officers in fall-casual baby blue rain jackets handed
out fliers affirming that riders should follow a designated route
and that "bicyclists who do not follow the routeare subject
to arrest." The Flier also declared that bikes left locked
on the sidewalk or street might be removed. A sound truck and
white shirted officers with bullhorns repeated the same statement
and caddishly wished participants a good time.
The current escalation on New
York streets emerged out of events during the Republican National
Convention in the city two months ago. The August 27th Critical
Mass set off with 5000 participants and rode for two hours before
ending up outside St Marks church on Second Ave. The ride was
the biggest ever east of the Mississippi and was swollen by new
people stepping up to unwelcome the republicans. At St Marks
police attacked the crowd and arrested scores of bikers and passers-by.
The tally of arrests for the night ran to 260. At the same time
officers were using bolt cutters to take bicycles locked in the
area. This tactic was repeated during the week of the convention
but that night more than 40 bikes were seized. Many of the bikes
belonged to neighbourhood residents who assumed their bikes had
been stolen. 5 of the victims sued in federal court on the grounds
that their fifth amendment right to due process had been violated
when their property was seized without any charges being brought
against them.
The city denied the claims
of the bike owners and countersued seeking an injunction to prevent
the Halloween Critical Mass ride from happening last Friday.
On Thursday Lawyers for the city and the 5 aggrieved riders faced
off in front of Judge William H. Pauley III. Civil rights attorney
Norman Siegel, and co-counsel Steven Hyman argued for the bike
owners that the NYPD could not confiscate property without bringing
charges against anyone.
Skinhead police commissioner
Raymond Kelly wrote in The Daily News on the morning of the hearing
that Critical Mass had been taken over by extremists precipitating
a police crackdown. Judge Pauley had earlier denied United for
Peace and Justice Coalition's application for a permit to rally
in Central Park after the big RNC demonstration on August 29th,
that may have encouraged Kelly in feeling anointed.
However, Pauley was sympathetic
to the plaintiffs arguments in court. He granted a preliminary
injunction preventing the police from seizing bikes without informing
owners, giving a reason and indicating the course of appeal.
Cops can take bikes that are obstructing sidewalks or streets
but not punitively as a means of discouraging participation in
rides. On the question of the countersuit by the City seeking
an injunction preventing Critical Mass from happening on Friday,
Assistant Chief Bruce Smolka outlined the Police Department's
rationale. He wrote that while the rides had been going on for
several years they had grown in the last year from "fewer
than a hundred' to rides 4 or 5000 strong and "because the
rides were so disruptive to normal traffic flows it was extremely
difficult for the department to move around the mass to control
the event." For this reason the rides need to be permitted.
Norman Siegel argued that it
was unfair to force the 5 plaintiffs whose bikes had been appropriated
by the police to carry the burden of the permit issue. He also
noted that the permit issue does not belong in Federal court
and, in any case, Critical Mass is not illegal and so it doesn't
need a permit.
Judge Pauley had done some
research and knew that unpermitted rides of 1000 or more bikes
were relatively common over the last few years both in NY and
elsewhere in the country. He wondered why the police were seeking
an injunction now when they hadn't had a problem with Critical
Mass in the past. To ride in Critical Mass is, he pointed out,
to engage in "expressive association" to wit "[T]he
right to associate with others in pursuit of a wide variety of
political, social, economic, educational, religious and cultural
ends" which enjoys First Amendment protection. Therefore
it would appear that Critical Mass is traffic and speech, in
as much as the Boy Scouts is speech.
The Judge turned down the city's
application tp outlaw the Critical Mass because the rides had
gone on in the past without objection. He added, "This court
declines the City's invitation to wander into a Serbonian bog
before a state court has had the opportunity to illuminate the
path". A Serbonian bog relates to the lake of Serbonis in
Egypt, which by reason of the sand blowing into it had a deceptive
appearance of being solid land, but was a bog.
A gulf profound as that Serbonian
bog . . .
Where armies whole have sunk.
- Milton.
So by Thursday afternoon it
was 2 for non-polluting transport promotion and zero for the
City. Cops couldn't steal bikes and Critical Mass didn't need
a police permit to ride. Pauley did commit both parties to agree
upon a route before the ride began though. Thus the police fliers
at Union Sq on Friday. The 'official' route was not agreed by
both parties, it was a unilateral order from Bloomberg's enforcer,
Commissioner Kelly. Nevertheless, riders in Halloween garb set
off up Park Avenue accompanied by scooter mounted police outriders,
police SUVs and three-wheeled traffic police electrocaddies.
The mood was quieter than usual, a little nervous over the police
intimidation. There were noticeably fewer older people along
perhaps because people had been discouraged by the arrests and
the bicycle thefts. But people meant to have a good time and
1000 bikes are hard to repress. By the time the ride reached
midtown participants had had enough police interference. Officers
blocked all the side streets expecting cyclists who wanted to
leave the route to dismount and walk their bikes. Police tactics
were reminiscent of demonstrations in the city where barriers
are used to coral marchers and break them up into individual
blocks. The scooter fleet purchased with RNC security loot worked
as mobile barricades, but only in isolated pockets.
Once the official route broke
down the ride split up into smaller groups and kept moving. Police
scooters flew around trying to block riders and began making
arrests, 30 in all before the ride wound down a couple of hours
later. By then there were up to 10 different splinter rides around
Manhattan between Midtown and Union Square, they split up to
regroup spontaneously at a different junction later on. The ride
was a big success and participants thrilled pedestrians and on-lookers.
As is customary an excess of police force was frustrated by the
agility and creativity of Critical Mass.
Critical Mass has been seizing
US streets for more than a decade. During the Summer of 1997
Willie Brown of San Francisco was traveling in his Mayoral limousine
when he became ensnared in the middle of a passing ride. It was
a slow news Summer for the Mayor so he decided "to declare
war over this". Chris Carlsson, one of several Critical
Mass originators in the city recalls the Mayor convening a meeting
to which participants were invited. Carlsson declined to attend
but those who did were harangued by City functionaries. Immediately
afterwards one of Browns PR men appeared before the press claiming
that there was agreement and that Critical Mass would apply for
permits from then on. When rides continued without approval Brown
instructed the police to stop them. SF police were unsure what
to do so they attacked riders and arrested more than 100. No
arrestees were convicted of crimes and one of them, Howard Besser,
sued the City for unlawful arrest and won. He beat the City again
when they appealed to a superior court.
Afterwards the Police backed
down and Brown moved on to other targets but 7 years later Critical
Mass is booming in San Francisco. Last weekends Halloween ride
had more than 2000 cyclists who visited the picket lines of locked
out hotel workers from Local 2. The details of this most recent
SF ride bear on whats happening in New York. Because the event
is established in these cities (as it is elsewhere) it is a simple
matter to coordinate it with issues happening locally, like the
hotel lockout in San Francisco or the Republican Convention in
New York. On his website Carlsson continues,
All this is to say that the
new composition of work and production, spread widely through
temporary and precarious employment (the hotel workers of Local
2 themselves are almost all immigrants from South America or
East Asia), is giving rise to a new set of tactics for resistance
and revolt. Rather than workplace occupation, the diffused nature
of economic organization-globalization in a word-has moved our
collective power from specific worksites to the arteries of economic
life, the roads.
Its clear that New York cops
became preoccupied with Critical Mass in the lead up to the RNC.
Commissioner Kelly is a Marine Corp Vietnam Vet and probably
remembers all that better than most of us. It wakes him late
at night to dream of a late Spring evening with 10 or 50 000
bikes against the war in Iraq seizing the city's thoroughfares
willy nilly. As with Iraq "to control the event" becomes
more and more improbable. The defeat in court simply compounds
the issue, Judge Pauley's mention of "expressive association"
opening a Pandora's box of inference and precedent that makes
any legal remedy inaccessible. If Britain in the 90's invented
Reclaim The Streets parties as a way out of ever retrenched opportunities
for political and social expression then Critical Mass has created
a similar outlet in the contemporary American scene.
On Friday night in New York
the police, having no other option, reverted to force and attacked
the after party in at the Times Up non-polluting-transport-promotion-space
on Houston St. Police later claimed that an undercover lieutenant
had been struck in the face when she confronted people with open
containers at the storefront. There was "no sign of injury"
and the assailant was "a person unknown" but the policewoman
and her colleagues called for backup when they found themselves
"surrounded". Reinforcements closed down Houston St.
and its sidewalks for several blocks. 7 people were arrested
on the street as events unfolded. A cop appeared brandishing
a shotgun pointed skyward and at one point undercovers tried
to bum rush the party but were kept out by revelers blocking
the door and others singing "we do not consent to a search".
Outside police behaviour was becoming dangerous while inside
some people were fleeing over the back wall as others, oblivious
to events at the door, continued dancing in the basement.
The police laid siege to the
store for almost 2 hours. Negotiations allowed people to leave
but when Mandy Hu did a cop pushed her as she walked away, she
objected and was arrested. She spoke at a press conference at
the space on Sunday afternoon. Tahura Faune Alfword who was videotaping
outside and "obeying police orders" by walking backwards
as she taped, was lunged at by a female undercover as other uniforms
tried to take her camera by striking her hand. According to Norman
Siegel the police were "extremely agitated" displaying
"outright hostility" and that "there appears to
exist selective enforcement of law targeting Critical Mass Bike
riders."
Siegel was summoned from his
bed at 1.30am on Saturday morning by Times Up volunteers. He
came and negotiated with the police to allow the last of the
party goers leave unmolested locking the shutters behind them.
No doubt all this will come before Judge Pauley in federal court
before next months ride. And there may be a few more charges
on the docket. As soon as the Times Up space was empty cops began
clipping the locks off bikes parked on the sidewalk. These guys
never learn. The police don't have a whole lot more to throw
at Critical Mass in New York, short of large scale repression.
They are tactically baffled and incapacitated by tight turning
and by Deleuze. As Chris Carlsson has it,
"Young urban bicyclists,
many of whom survive as members of the burgeoning 'cognitariat'
and/or at the margins of steady employment, come together monthly
to affirm a new way of living, a new way of being together in
city life."
This doesn't mean that the
police are likely to back off in NYC any time soon, but Critical
Mass has displayed a rare intelligence and it remains several
moves ahead of any net that might be cast to capture it. Next
months ride will be significant in this regard. In the past during
similarly tense moments rides have sometimes 'ridden to rule',
obeying all traffic signals and directions scrupulously. Critical
Mass's ingenuity and energy mean that it has lots of options.
Lets Roll!
James Davis is a film maker living in NY. Contact
poucajim@yahoo.com
Weekend
Edition Features for October 30 / 31, 2004
Winslow
T. Wheeler
Spartacus Tells All
Bruce
Anderson
Notes from the Big Empty: When the Hippies Invaded NoCal
Vicente
Navarro
They Worked for Franco: How Sec. of State Cordell Hull and Nobel
Laureate Camilo Jose Cela Collaborated with the Fascist Regime
Robin
Blackburn
How Monica Lewinsky Saved Social Security
Greg
Bates
A Question of Character: What Makes Nader Tick?
Nancy
Welch
The American Health Care Crisis: an Interview with Dr. David
Himmelstein
William
Lind
Election Day: Which Menendez Brother Will You Vote For?
Brian
Cloughley
Uzbekistan and Bush Hypocrisies
Suzan
Mazur
Oops They Did It Again: the NYTs the Paper of Record and Rip-Offs
Greg
Moses
Standing at the Graves of Iraq
John
Chuckman
Osama's Endorsement
Richard
Oxman
Why Not Accept Osama's Offer?
Ken
Avidor
Landscape of Fear: When Ugly is Suspicious
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Bush, Ba'ath and Beyond
Hope
Bastian
Strangling Cuba's Economy
P.
Sainath
Tower of Gabble: Toward a Sustainable Rhetoric
Dave
Zirin
Bush League: Why MLB Owners Support the Prez
Jon
Swift
The Dry Drunk Thang: Put a Cork in It
Ron
Jacobs
The Joke's on Me: a Review of Bob Dylan's Chronicles Vol. 1
Alexander
Billet
Taking Theatre Back: Are the States Ready for "Stuff Happens"?
Poets'
Basement
Jones, Laymon, Norris, Ford and Albert
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