Update on the RNC Arrests

Max Specktor, a cultural studies student, will have a hearing, along with the other RNC 8 in November. Mr. Specktor, a self-described community activist, has said that he plans to plead not guilty to conspiracy to commit riot in furtherance of terrorism, among the first times that Minnesota's version of the Patriot Act has been used in criminal prosecution. 

What is particularly loathesome about the entire affair is that the group had been infiltrated by paid informants for the FBI for over a year. Regardless of the difficulties of obtaining inside information on an allegedly terrorist group, this practice of buying information from those who might serve as agent provacateurs should end as a matter of policy. When there is money involved in a transaction of information, the seller has less and less reason to be truthful in the information transmitted, if the perceived value will result in a higher price. One must ask, at what point does such an infiltration become a frame up of otherwise innocent Americans?

Life Lessons and Vice Presidential Candidates

As a child, I learned two lessons about the adult world almost as soon as I was able to tell right from wrong. That the authority granted to adults and supposed authority figures most often is not granted because they are moral or even responsible people and is usually a coincidence arising from their career, rather than given to them through any legitimate means. Second, I learned that most people are not deserving of respect (beyond that due every human) until they prove otherwise. Since I learned those lessons at Catholic school, it took me a while to separate my problem with authority from my perception of all Christians as hypocrites. If you have read some of my other posts on this blog you will notice that I still have that perception of Christians.

Christian hypocrisy is a good transition into discussing the issues surrounding the pregnancy of Sarah Palins unwed teenage daughter. Anti-abortion types will see this as not being hypocritical since Bristol, Palins daughter, will be keeping the child. This is itself a red herring and the hypocrisy I wish to discuss because it ignores the anti-contraception and anti-sexed positions that are associated with an anti-abortion and which Gov. Palin has herself expressed. A friend of mine observed today that you can't treat teen sex like the Easter bunny and decide not to believe in it because it does happen and has profound consequences. Many of those consequences will not be felt by Bristol and her child(eren) because of the financial status of her family. Sadly this is not the case for most unwed teenage mothers. Teen pregnancy is almost a guarantee that the mother and new child will live out their lives in poverty according to the CDC. It is easy to be anti-abortion when you have a safety net. Yet the Bush administration, right wing Christians, and other people with nothing personally at stake continue to push for abstinance only sex education, which has been shown to do nothing to reduce premarital sex or teen pregnancy. At the same time, Jamie Lynn Spears is on a publicity romp, glorifying teen pregnancy. To get back to the accusations of hypocrisy, Sarah Palin has advocated abstinence only sex ed while claiming to be anti-abortion, which is consistent until you notice her unwed teenage daughters pregnancy and have to question Palins parenting.

So while she is telling the rest of the nations women what is right for them she is either not practicing what she preaches or she is ironically suffering the consequences of the polices she supports, but not really suffering from them the same way every one else will. At the same time the Republicans are decrying all the public attention this is getting because its prying into a personal family matter and shouldn't be public, which is hypocritical because of the way in which the very same Republicans dug into the personal sexual lives of the Clintons during the Monica Lewinski scandal.

I applaud Sarah Palin for supporting her daughters choice to become pregnant and to keep her child. (Remember there is always adoption.) I just hope it can be a learning experience for her about the failings of abstinence only sex education even though it will not open her eyes to the deep personal consequences it has for far too many American girls and the resulting social costs to U.S. taxpayers.

Zer-0bama

During Gov. Lingles speech at the RNC tonight the crowd could be heard chanting "Zero," when Lingle attempted to answer accusations that Sara Palin is inexperienced by pointing out that neither Obama nor Joe Biden has any experience in an executive office. The red herring aside, I was immediately inspired. The number zero and the letter "O" are similarly shaped and to distinguish between the two, people and computers will frequently put a slash through the zero. I thought this could be a clever way for the Republicans to say "No," to Obama while also implying that he has no experience as a leader. It could be spelled as 0bama or as zer0bama and pronounced "Zer-obama." Hands off that, I am going to try to sell the idea to the RNC.

Flagrant Fascism Fronts RNC Convention

Instead of waiting for scenes of peaceful protesters being outnumbered and surrounded by riot control police, or being sprayed with a pepper spray cannon that looks like a fire extinguisher, or being callously shoved to the ground as was the case in Denver, the police in the greater Minneapolis/St. Paul area have been proactive in suppressing potential problems. Instead, they have staged a series of raids on houses and meeting places of potential protesters, and confiscated computers and written materials. Of those arrested so far, the only charge that has been brought forth is a constitutionally questionable charges of "conspiracy to incite a riot." The St. Paul police spokesman Tom Walsh said that the cause for the search warrants that police were executing is not public at this time. Also targeted in the raids were journalists from other parts of the country in the area to cover the protests.

The group targeted, the RNC Welcoming Committee, which describes itself as "anarchist/anti-authoritarian," was described by Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher as "a criminal enterprise made up of 35 self-described anarchists...intent on committing criminal acts before and during the Republican National Convention."

For a bit of editorializing, the police are engaged in an active campaign to block freedoms of speech and assembly, which form the cornerstone of representative democracy is unabashedly loathesome. The fact that only a handful of those detained have been arrested is a clear indication that the authorities in Ramsey County are limiting their actions to those which rest in the ambiguous grey margins of the law, as evidenced by use of the 'conspiracy to commit riot' charges.