Civil Protest, Policing, Moving Forward

[TAHAWK]

Matt, I am sorry I was not clear .  The local news site in Portland that I specifically cited  is quoting a Black man, Mr. Baskin.   It's his point.  "A few blocks away, Carl Baskin sat next to his drive-up car wash station and worried that the message of racial justice was being taken away from the Black community by 'young white children.'”  I have no personal knowledge about Portland.  I only know what I read and see, and what I neither read nor see in the media.

This has happened before, although at a lower level of violence, and it likely will happen again.  

I observed the following, and it was documented in the subsequent Kent State civil litigation,  Scheuer v. Rhodes, in which I participated  in a minor way:

In the 1970 rioting at Ohio State University, the initial demonstrations were started by the Black Student Union, with racial issues, and the LGBT Coalition, with sexual identity issues.  "Anti-War" folks quickly joined  - Nixon had just "incursed" into Cambodia, seeming to escalate our long Vietnam experience.   A few thousand people, mostly students but a few young people from off-campus, were involved for a couple of weeks, and it was speeches, posters, chanting and drums beating, as columns of protesters snaked around Campus.    A few buildings were "occupied," but the University President took it in stride - no arrests - to your  point about the "old scout." Classes went on.  It was an unusually warm and sunny Spring.

Then two State Highway Patrol agents provocateur in long hair and flannel shirts (secretly being filmed by the FBI, as it turned out) got hold of a microphone and  urged the crowd on the University "Oval" to block the one public street that ran thorough campus,  Neil Avenue. The acting head of the University, in the absence of University  President Fawcett,  panicked and called in the police and Auxiliary Deputy Sheriffs, who had no jurisdiction unless invited on Campus.  They rioted, gassing everyone in sight, even as we were ordered by the University to continue to conduct classes.  They even gassed "Fraternity Row."  The gas drifted over are area of miles around Campus.  The behavior of the Columbus police and Auxiliary Deputy Sheriffs provoked tens of  thousands of students to join the demonstrations., but it was still nonviolent, if tense.  A little pushing and shoving might punctuate disagreements, but I saw no blows struck. Peacemakers seemed always at hand.

The trucks of young National Guardsmen arrived to cheers. They were not cops.  They were young - younger than many students.  They were generally understood to be in the Guard to avoid the Draft.

In the midst of the relatively peaceful disorder, radicals from SDS and The "Mobilization" movement started setting fires on campus and pelting any law enforcement they saw, plus the National Guard, with rocks and the bricks used to pave the campus walkways.  Fire hoses were cut and firefighters pelted with rocks and bricks.  Many State Highway Patrolmen were injured - especially by hails of bricks.  Shots were fired by Columbus police, who called on their radios for ammunition resupply.  No one was killed.  A five-state supply of teargas was used up just in time for Kent State (Later, The City and County sought reimbursement from the State for the cost of tens of thousands of rounds of teargas used by local law enforcement alone.).  Cars (and furniture pulled into the streets) on and around campus were set on fire.  Many businesses, especially up and down High Street bordering Campus to the east, were vandalized and  looted - regardless of ownership.  Some shop-owners resisted violently and successfully.

The "vanguard" went on to "occupy" University class buildings buildings and physically prevented students and faculty from leaving by chaining the doors shut - not too cool fire hazard-wise when combined with the arsons.   By then, the National Guard rank-and-file absolutely believed  (incorrectly) that many Guardsmen had been killed at Kent State.  They told me that the students were the "enemy."  When Denny Hall was occupied,  I and the other Faculty "Monitors" were told by radio that a couple thousand very angry Guardsmen were coming double-quick, locked and loaded.  I recall counseling one short, plump, red-haired radical (exhorting his group not to "retreat" with a bullhorn) that they should not all stay to "resist" the approaching Guardsmen, as they vowed to do,  since live witnesses would be required to testify to what would happen.  So they should decide who stayed to "resist" and who would withdraw some distance to be witnesses to the carnage.  They all left before the Guard came thundering up, many with fixed bayonets, frustrated that the "occupiers" had left.  Police arrived with giant bolt-cutters to open the doors for the trapped students, faculty, and staff.  I and the Head of Mathematics were pleased with our work, not realizing that worse was to come.

The Black Student Union had largely "left the building" by then.  Harder to say about the LGBT folks as they did not stand out in the largely White crowds, but their issues were no longer discussed. "Pigs off Campus!" and "Kill the Pigs!" became the overwhelming theme, sprinkled with anti-war slogans.

The radicals whom I observed and with whom I dealt were all White middle and upper class from their speech and dress, and told me the forces of the government would not dare shoot them.  "My dad's a dentist," one young  person in a black SDS T-shirt told me.  They were unbelieving when told about Kent State and Jackson State.  "You're just trying to scare us."  These were the sort who would buy new denim trousers and go to the University craft shop to grind holes in them with wire wheels to prove their "proletarian" bona fides.  They were overwhelmingly male.  They did not seem to contemplate that those pelted with bricks and holding loaded firearms might shoot, even given evidence that they had done so. They had no planning for retreat or casualties. 

When vowing to "liberate" the University President's then on-campus brick house, they threw stones, clods of dirt, and bricks at terrified young Guardsmen with loaded semi-automatic M-1 Rifles and a Browning 1919 .30-06 machine gun, (600 high-power rounds a minute)  who were only the thickness of a hedge plus a couple of yards of lawn away, with orders to "hold their position." Specifically, they had been ordered by radio to fire if any of the rioters breached the hedge.  The mob of near 1000 was jammed into the street and packed against a brick wall behind them to the south.  The intimidating sound of thousands of GI boots hitting the pavement in unison sent the crowd running before the massacre could happen.  The column of over 1000 Guardsmen, two lanes wide and with M-1 Rifles at high port and all with fixed bayonets, rounded the corner 100 yards away to the west as the last rioter left the area.  The young 2nd Lieutenant in charge of the dozen Guardsman at the site had wet himself.  A couple more minutes, and no would remember 1970 as the year of Kent State.  The deaths from trampling alone, had that machine gun, opened fire, would have made Kent State and Jackson State combined look like a picnic.

The University shutdown and reopened with a closed, secured campus.  

THIS is what the politicians are playing with.  THIS is what the media, with their political narrative, seem to actually want.  Real harm can occur.

And meanwhile the greater slaughter in our cities, primarily of and by "people of color," goes on as background noise, swallowed up by the contest for power and wealth.

No peace, no justice, no retail services, no government revenue, no welfare services, and no safety.

 

Edited July 31, 2020 by TAHAWK

[Troop75Eagle]

14 hours ago, TAHAWK said:

Matt, I am sorry I was not clear .  The local news site in Portland that I specifically cited  is quoting a Black man, Mr. Baskin.   It's his point.  "A few blocks away, Carl Baskin sat next to his drive-up car wash station and worried that the message of racial justice was being taken away from the Black community by 'young white children.'”  I have no personal knowledge about Portland.  I only know what I read and see, and what I neither read nor see in the media.

This has happened before, although at a lower level of violence, and it likely will happen again.  

I observed the following, and it was documented in the subsequent Kent State civil litigation,  Scheuer v. Rhodes, in which I participated  in a minor way:

In the 1970 rioting at Ohio State University, the initial demonstrations were started by the Black Student Union, with racial issues, and the LGBT Coalition, with sexual identity issues.  "Anti-War" folks quickly joined  - Nixon had just "incursed" into Cambodia, seeming to escalate our long Vietnam experience.   A few thousand people, mostly students but a few young people from off-campus, were involved for a couple of weeks, and it was speeches, posters, chanting and drums beating, as columns of protesters snaked around Campus.    A few buildings were "occupied," but the University President took it in stride - no arrests - to your  point about the "old scout." Classes went on.  It was an unusually warm and sunny Spring.

Then two State Highway Patrol agents provocateur in long hair and flannel shirts (secretly being filmed by the FBI, as it turned out) got hold of a microphone and  urged the crowd on the University "Oval" to block the one public street that ran thorough campus,  Neil Avenue. The acting head of the University, in the absence of University  President Fawcett,  panicked and called in the police and Auxiliary Deputy Sheriffs, who had no jurisdiction unless invited on Campus.  They rioted, gassing everyone in sight, even as we were ordered by the University to continue to conduct classes.  They even gassed "Fraternity Row."  The gas drifted over are area of miles around Campus.  The behavior of the Columbus police and Auxiliary Deputy Sheriffs provoked tens of  thousands of students to join the demonstrations., but it was still nonviolent, if tense.  A little pushing and shoving might punctuate disagreements, but I saw no blows struck. Peacemakers seemed always at hand.

The trucks of young National Guardsmen arrived to cheers. They were not cops.  They were young - younger than many students.  They were generally understood to be in the Guard to avoid the Draft.

In the midst of the relatively peaceful disorder, radicals from SDS and The "Mobilization" movement started setting fires on campus and pelting any law enforcement they saw, plus the National Guard, with rocks and the bricks used to pave the campus walkways.  Fire hoses were cut and firefighters pelted with rocks and bricks.  Many State Highway Patrolmen were injured - especially by hails of bricks.  Shots were fired by Columbus police, who called on their radios for ammunition resupply.  No one was killed.  A five-state supply of teargas was used up just in time for Kent State (Later, The City and County sought reimbursement from the State for the cost of tens of thousands of rounds of teargas used by local law enforcement alone.).  Cars (and furniture pulled into the streets) on and around campus were set on fire.  Many businesses, especially up and down High Street bordering Campus to the east, were vandalized and  looted - regardless of ownership.  Some shop-owners resisted violently and successfully.

The "vanguard" went on to "occupy" University class buildings buildings and physically prevented students and faculty from leaving by chaining the doors shut - not too cool fire hazard-wise when combined with the arsons.   By then, the National Guard rank-and-file absolutely believed  (incorrectly) that many Guardsmen had been killed at Kent State.  They told me that the students were the "enemy."  When Denny Hall was occupied,  I and the other Faculty "Monitors" were told by radio that a couple thousand very angry Guardsmen were coming double-quick, locked and loaded.  I recall counseling one short, plump, red-haired radical (exhorting his group not to "retreat" with a bullhorn) that they should not all stay to "resist" the approaching Guardsmen, as they vowed to do,  since live witnesses would be required to testify to what would happen.  So they should decide who stayed to "resist" and who would withdraw some distance to be witnesses to the carnage.  They all left before the Guard came thundering up, many with fixed bayonets, frustrated that the "occupiers" had left.  Police arrived with giant bolt-cutters to open the doors for the trapped students, faculty, and staff.  I and the Head of Mathematics were pleased with our work, not realizing that worse was to come.

The Black Student Union had largely "left the building" by then.  Harder to say about the LGBT folks as they did not stand out in the largely White crowds, but their issues were no longer discussed. "Pigs off Campus!" and "Kill the Pigs!" became the overwhelming theme, sprinkled with anti-war slogans.

The radicals whom I observed and with whom I dealt were all White middle and upper class from their speech and dress, and told me the forces of the government would not dare shoot them.  "My dad's a dentist," one young  person in a black SDS T-shirt told me.  They were unbelieving when told about Kent State and Jackson State.  "You're just trying to scare us."  These were the sort who would buy new denim trousers and go to the University craft shop to grind holes in them with wire wheels to prove their "proletarian" bona fides.  They were overwhelmingly male.  They did not seem to contemplate that those pelted with bricks and holding loaded firearms might shoot, even given evidence that they had done so. They had no planning for retreat or casualties. 

When vowing to "liberate" the University President's then on-campus brick house, they threw stones, clods of dirt, and bricks at terrified young Guardsmen with loaded semi-automatic M-1 Rifles and a Browning 1919 .30-06 machine gun, (600 high-power rounds a minute)  who were only the thickness of a hedge plus a couple of yards of lawn away, with orders to "hold their position." Specifically, they had been ordered by radio to fire if any of the rioters breached the hedge.  The mob of near 1000 was jammed into the street and packed against a brick wall behind them to the south.  The intimidating sound of thousands of GI boots hitting the pavement in unison sent the crowd running before the massacre could happen.  The column of over 1000 Guardsmen, two lanes wide and with M-1 Rifles at high port and all with fixed bayonets, rounded the corner 100 yards away to the west as the last rioter left the area.  The young 2nd Lieutenant in charge of the dozen Guardsman at the site had wet himself.  A couple more minutes, and no would remember 1970 as the year of Kent State.  The deaths from trampling alone, had that machine gun, opened fire, would have made Kent State and Jackson State combined look like a picnic.

The University shutdown and reopened with a closed, secured campus.  

THIS is what the politicians are playing with.  THIS is what the media, with their political narrative, seem to actually want.  Real harm can occur.

And meanwhile the greater slaughter in our cities, primarily of and by "people of color," goes on as background noise, swallowed up by the contest for power and wealth.

No peace, no justice, no retail services, no government revenue, no welfare services, and no safety.

 

It’s made infinitely worse by deploying units with no insignia and continued Unapologetic overtures to authoritarianism.  I did riot police training in the guard when I was with an MP unit.  Just training in a realistic fashion ;minus bricks, bags of urine, and Molotov cocktails) was bad enough.  People got hurt and reason flew out the window.  And this was all just with fellow soldiers. Things definitely get out of hand very quickly.  How much more so with true anger and violence.  The units rely on each other because there is NO ONE else between them and people would are so riled up that they’d like nothing better than to get their hands on an authority figure. In such situations, the police and guard are pushed to repay that currency in kind.  Who benefits?  Old men and fanatics playing chess with younger people. 

[TAHAWK]

"UNITS WITH NO INSIGNIA:

Want dozens of additional pictures?  No trouble.  Happy to.

Continued unapologetic overtures to mob violence and looting  make things finitely worse, as do the pandering to that violence and looting by political "leaders" and "journalists."

"Old men and fanatics playing chess with younger people. "  Sounds about left, and an apt description of the typical "university" in this declining age.

 

 

[walk in the woods]

51 minutes ago, Troop75Eagle said:

It’s made infinitely worse by deploying units with no insignia

Even snopes says that is undetermined (https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/feds-unmarked-vans-portland/).  If you look at the picture at the top of that article, though blurry, the officers seem to have identification right on their vests.

[TAHAWK]

"Even Snopes"??   Not nearly undetermined.  Very much determined.  Google and see.  Dozens of pictures of federal law enforcement - not "troops" - in uniform with multiple insignia per officer.  

[Troop75Eagle]

1 hour ago, TAHAWK said:

"UNITS WITH NO INSIGNIA:

Want dozens of additional pictures?  No trouble.  Happy to.

Continued unapologetic overtures to mob violence and looting  make things finitely worse, as do the pandering to that violence and looting by political "leaders" and "journalists."

"Old men and fanatics playing chess with younger people. "  Sounds about left, and an apt description of the typical "university" in this declining age.

 

 

I guess I was thinking of the breakup by the church in DC and thought I’d read that had been the case again.  If they are wearing Unit insignia, then that’s a good thing.

[Troop75Eagle]

1 hour ago, TAHAWK said:

"UNITS WITH NO INSIGNIA:

Want dozens of additional pictures?  No trouble.  Happy to.

Continued unapologetic overtures to mob violence and looting  make things finitely worse, as do the pandering to that violence and looting by political "leaders" and "journalists."

"Old men and fanatics playing chess with younger people. "  Sounds about left, and an apt description of the typical "university" in this declining age.

 

 

Left?  I was thinking back to WW1 when politicians and generals were moving people about.  Lol, though I am a libertarian.  Not only that, the word liberal is one I would gladly embrace but from the very specific meaning of classical liberalism as a product of the enlightenment.  That is the basis our founders used and believed.  It wasn’t til recently that ‘liberal and conservative became almost slurs.  Those modern definitions are useless.  But insofar as modern ideals go, fighting fanaticism, bigotry, ignorance are fundamentals along with strong separation of powers and separation of church and state.  There are many other specific qualities of course but classical enlightenment and liberalism is a great position to frame a stable approach.  At least I believe so. 

Edited July 31, 2020 by Troop75Eagle

[Troop75Eagle]

8 minutes ago, Troop75Eagle said:

I guess I was thinking of the breakup by the church in DC and thought I’d read that had been the case again.  If they are wearing Unit insignia, then that’s a good thing.

This is the reason this forum is good.  Yo clear up disinformation

[TAHAWK]

28 minutes ago, Troop75Eagle said:

Left?  I was thinking back to WW1 when politicians and generals were moving people about.  Lol, though I am a libertarian.  Not only that, the word liberal is one I would gladly embrace but from the very specific meaning of classical liberalism as a product of the enlightenment.  That is the basis our founders used and believed.  It wasn’t til recently that ‘liberal and conservative became almost slurs.  Those modern definitions are useless.  But insofar as modern ideals go, fighting fanaticism, bigotry, ignorance are fundamentals along with strong separation of powers and separation of church and state.  There are many other specific qualities of course but classical enlightenment and liberalism is a great position to frame a stable approach.  At least I believe so. 

Good point about "liberal."  The classic liberal held that: "I disagree with what you say but defend to the death your right to say it."  Compare and contrast to today's right wingnuts and leftists: "Fire that professor, he holds an idea I reject."  Of course, only the latter claim the label "liberal." for their illiberality -  while attempting to justify uber violent physical attacks.  

Not sure about "generals," but in WW I, the U.S.  federal government, under Wilson, imprisoned political opponents and actively encouraged mob violence against political opponents - such as smashing printing presses of opposition newspapers.  Victor Berger, the first socialist elected to Congress, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for  "hindering [i.e. questioning the morality of] the war effort."  (While Berger was free on appeal, his constituency returned him to Congress.) The Socialist Party leader Eugene V. Debs was sentenced to 10 years in prison for making an anti-war [pro-peace] speech.

WWII brought the concentration camps decreed by the U.S. federal government, under FDR [Executive Order 9066],  with the eager support of California democrat pols, including Earl Warren. Those with as little as 1/16 Japanese-born blood were imprisoned.  (1/16 was the fraction of "tainted blood" established to determine who was "Negro," and thus a non-person, under the Southern chattel slavery system.)  Blood Guilt.   National Socialists in Germany agreed with the approach, but, of course, had a different ethnic target - Jewish capitalism and Jewish communism and their constituencies, including Slavs.  The "logic" of such insanity led to the death camps and deliberate fatal starvation of millions

And that is where hate leads:  “I’m telling you. Guillotine the rich.” Martin Weissgerber

[MattR]

18 hours ago, TAHAWK said:

Matt, I am sorry I was not clear .  The local news site in Portland that I specifically cited  is quoting a Black man, Mr. Baskin.   It's his point.  "A few blocks away, Carl Baskin sat next to his drive-up car wash station and worried that the message of racial justice was being taken away from the Black community by 'young white children.'”  I have no personal knowledge about Portland.  I only know what I read and see, and what I neither read nor see in the media.

Thank you for your explanation, @TAHAWK. I did not know about what happened at Ohio State. I was too young to know what was going on back then but I do remember the assassinations in 68. There were a lot of long faces in my neighborhood. As for what you're not seeing in the media now, I am a bit surprised. I poke around in a lot of different news sources and while it does take some time to answer questions I usually figure it out. BTW, here's another headline for you: "Calm night of protests in Portland after Oregon State Police step in for federal officers." This was from a local tv station in Portland.

John Lewis wrote an opinion piece a few weeks ago that was published in the NY Times yesterday. It was very eloquent.

 

[TAHAWK]

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”–George Santayana, The Life of Reason (1905)

"Only the dead have seen the end of war."  George Santayana,  Soliloquies in England and Later Soliloquies (No. 25)(1922)(Often  incorrectly attributed to Plato -  although not found anywhere in his writings - apparently because Douglas MacArthur once so attributed the statement, and he was never wrong [Ask him.].)

[TAHAWK]

Police brace for more rioting in Portland after another night of clashes Saturday will mark the 71st night of protests since George Floyd's death

Rioters in Portland used pool noodles filled with nails as weapons and hurled frozen eggs and rocks at officers during a demonstration outside a law enforcement building Friday night.

Officers attempted to disperse crowds of hundreds of people almost immediately after they arrived outside the Penumbra Kelly Building-- which houses both the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office and Portland Police Bureau -- at around 9:45 p.m.

Police declared an unlawful assembly outside the building, told everyone to leave the area and made "targeted" arrests for trespassing as rioters  refused to leave, according to the Police Bureau.

Rioters , some wearing helmets and gas masks, and carrying shields, began breaking up large chunks of concrete on the sidewalk and throwing them at police. Others attempted to block traffic on East Burnside Street.

Some  rioters aimed lasers at officers, which can damage eyesight, and threw commercial-grade fireworks at police gathered in a parking lot.

One person who was arrested was wearing ballistic body armor, police said. Around midnight, a vehicle was stopped and an occupant was arrested for shining a laser at a police aircraft.

"As the officers dispersed the rioters, rocks, bottles, and explosives were continually launched at officers. Because of the danger posed by these projectiles, officers used crowd-control munitions as they moved the criminals."

Earlier in the day, a group of people gathered at a park in east Portland and marched to the local police precinct, where authorities say they spray-painted the building, popped the tires of police cars, splashed paint on the walls, vandalized security cameras and set a fire in a barrel outside the building.

One officer was severely injured by a rock, police said, but no additional details were provided.

The violent rioters overshadowed another peaceful demonstration decrying police brutality against Blacks and minorities that occurred earlier in the night. Police said they did not interact with that crowd.

 The chaos that started Thursday night and lasted into Friday morning in a residential neighborhood about 6 miles from downtown were noticeably smaller than the crowds of thousands who turned out nightly for about two weeks in July to protest the presence of federal agents sent by the Trump administration to protect a federal courthouse that had become a target of nightly violence.

 

 

[David CO]

On 7/31/2020 at 11:18 AM, Troop75Eagle said:

It’s made infinitely worse by deploying units with no insignia

The rioters seem to have no problem in identifying the officers (targeting them with dangerous projectiles and lasers).

[yknot]

This is so disheartening. There was a Washington Post piece the other day about the Portland protesters that was illustrated like a fashion photo shoot with all these protesters vamping for the camera in their cool grunge SJW outfits. It made them look like some new kind of super heroes. Awful. How I wish they would do the same kind of feature of scouts in their uniforms -- class A or class B -- out doing community service work. Instead we glorify these misguided youth who think it's OK to barricade a building and set fire to it with people inside.  

[TAHAWK]

Trapping people in a building and setting it on fires sounds like Bosnian war crimes.  But the Muslims being targeted were allowed to shoot back.