Behind the Bright Lights of the Convention
Brian Wagner
My friend Mary Brusch, who I marched with in the protest last weekend outside Madison Square Garden, was released from jail last night after spending 36 hours in detention. She now faces charges of 2nd degree assault, 1st degree inciting a riot, and disorderly conduct. Two misdemeanors and a felony. Did she attack Bill O'Reilly? Pull Ann Coulter's hair? Rip open Dick Cheney's chest to reveal his robot inner workings? No, she protested in Madison Square Garden.
Mary, along with a dozen other protestors, dressed up in jackets and pearls and infiltrated the Young Republicans gathering at MSG on Wednesday. Allowed in without resorting to any illegal tactics, they revealed themselves in the middle of the event by throwing off their jackets to reveal their unpatriotic anti-AIDS t-shirts and signs. Now, I can understand that the Republicans at the event were suitably angered and disgusted by the interruption, but their reaction was unsupportable. ABC caught one Republican page on video actually kicking a protestor after she had been pulled down to the ground by the crowd, which sought to dislodge protestors from their chairs. One man, who is HIV-positive, was kicked until he bled openly.
The disgusting treatment did not stop there, but continued in holding cells, where one Jewish woman was denied kosher food, and another woman was refused medical treatment for ovary pains for 2 hours. Eventually, 36 hours later, Mary was released, charged with a felony and two misdemeanors for protesting. Beyond the basic question of how one could be accused of inciting a riot in the enemy camp, the mere existence of such serious charges for protestors who were themselves assaulted is utterly ridiculous.
The Republican Convention ran smoothly because the city of New York, oh my liberal bastion, decided to restrict the meaning of free speech. Thus, grass gained a greater protection of the law than a protestor, and the police were pressured to play rough to ensure that no disturbances occurred. The Republican Convention was a success for the party, but for the city of New York, it was an indication that Mayor Bloomberg was willing to play hardball with peoples' well-being and rights in exchange for some political capital.
I've always viewed protests, despite their potential failures, as a simple yet pure exhibition of human political interest. We may not be political animals, as Aristotle stated, but there are large groups of us willing to be seen speaking out against a policy or a person when we feel strongly enough. The Convention in NYC illustrated that in the modern era of negative ads, targeted advertising, and hourly polls, the grassroots aspect is only respected and honored when it benefits the party pulling the strings. One woman, after being arrested for the 2nd time in as many days, was then arrested for a third time soon after leaving the courthouse due to her role in protesting the plight of those who had still not been released. Were it not for the intervention of legal observers, she may have faced a second stay in jail for no offense whatsoever. That is not the face of democracy. Hell, I don't know if I could describe the face of democracy accurately, but I can tell you that the actions of the police in NYC went far beyond what was necessary to ensure the safety of those at the convention. As one soon-to-be retired and disgruntled corrections officer told Mary Brush while she was in jail, (paraphrasing) "we move you around to make you think that you are making progress, then we give you a carrot to make you think you will soon be released, then we put you back, then we start over again." There was a game played with protestors that bypasses all intentions of fair play to ensure the success of the convention. And that is something I cannot accept; if we are going to claim to be a democratic society, we must seek to ensure that protestors are inhibited or punished only when they seek or truly do cause harm of a tangible sort beyond a disruption.
NYC survived the convention. The convention survived NYC. But it came at a cost, and it was a cost that I feel we did not have to pay.
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Sep 5, '04
Brian...I,m not sure I understand the point of your post. Are you outraged at the treatment she received? Should the charges be reduced or dismissed? Your comments suggest a dreadfully naive understanding of protest and response. We all know that the R's were loaded for bear. Their many commentators and syncophants openly hoped for a running street battle with tear gas and broken windows. The protest folks wouldn't give them the opportunity so it was taken in other ways. Your friend got into a private gathering, likely with credentials not issued to her, with the intention of disrupting the proceedings. Playing by their rules, they threw her out and had her arrested. So what???? It goes with the territory. In terms of diffusing conflict the NYPD did exactly what they planned to do....delay, obfuscate, deny, foot-drag, etc. A few of the more obnoxious and hostile protesters will get jail time and fines. Most will see their charges dropped due to the failure of the arresting officer to show up in court, poor paperwork nad bureacratic inertia.
Frankly, the best thing we could have done is to ignore the bastards.
7:52 p.m.
Sep 5, '04
Sounds to me like th eproblem isn't that she got arested but that she and other were mistreated. If convention-goers really were assaulting the protesters, where's the news coverage of that?
Sep 5, '04
Right here
11:59 p.m.
Sep 5, '04
Hrm, my Mac won't play that clip.
Sep 6, '04
Oh, well I can give you a synopsis if you like.
It's a local news report on the protestors, and they show the Act Up people starting to, well, act up during Andrew Card's speech. You can see a woman being taken to the ground by Secret Service agents, and a curly-haired young Republican begins kicking her. I couldn't tell from the video if he actually succeeded in making contact, but he was certainly trying to. A reporter then approaches him and tells him that they have him on camera and asks him if he kicked a protestor. He sits there looking uncomfortable for a bit, then says quietly, "I don't believe so. I don't know." She says again that they have him on camera, and he doesn't say anything.
The report also says that another male protestor was punched in the face (they didn't get that on camera), though another young Republican says the guy was accidentally elbowed in the face.
Sep 6, '04
Raging red- Mary Brusch, the girl I talked to, is also visible in that video until someone out of view yanks her down and her head disappears from the back of the picture.
After being arrested, they pointed out to the secret service that they had been assaulted, and that they hoped that if they were to be punished, so would the young Republican pages who had kicked and punched them. The Secret Service man replied, "lady, what do you expect me to do? I just got this suit dry-cleaned!"
Also, of no real importance, but just because it is morbidly funny, one of the police officers who handled them after they were taken from MSG was named Officer Nazi. Poor guy.
Sep 7, '04
Hey, this is standard fare for these thugs. During the 2000 campaing then Gov. Bush was up at the University of Portland. One big hippie looking enviro protester started shouting during Bush's speech and he got the crap kicked out of him by a bunch of campaign thugs and some secret service.
This really shouldn't surprise anyone. They train their young like pit bulls. The Republicans beat their children unless they bully and pick on those weaker. Their sick.
10:25 p.m.
Sep 7, '04
Rorovitz -
I don't think that all Republicans beat their children. LOL. My mom certainly didn't beat me. Though after a lifetime of being a registered R she died a Democrat... hmmm...
Anyway, I think it's horrible how protesters were treated and I think a most of the Republican platform is nothing but narrow-minded hypocrisy. But to say they all beat their children and train them like pit bulls... c'mon. That's really unfair. They may be hypocrites in more ways than I can count, but they're not all child-beaters.
I'm not usually a defender of Republicans and I certainly don't condone the abuse of anyone for any reason, really, but that's a little much, don't you think?
Sep 8, '04
Jesus' General has more info on the Young GOP kicker: http://patriotboy.blogspot.com/2004_09_01_patriotboy_archive.html#109451325217047800
His name is Deryk Schlessinger and he may be Dr. Laura's son.
9:44 p.m.
Sep 8, '04
Well, if his name really is Deryk Schlessinger, then he's very likely Dr. Laura's kid. See www.drlaura.com/about and scroll down.
How many Schlessinger's in the world can there be named "Deryk"?
Sep 11, '04
There have been reports of pro-Bush hecklers being assaulted by Kerry supporters too. It's wrong in either case, but people who purposely disrupt gatherings deserve to be escorted out by the scruff of their necks.
If you want to protest, great. Do it outside. If you're going to try to ruin others' attempts to lawfully gather and share their enthusiasm, don't piss and moan when they get upset and don't automatically intuit that you're as holy as Ghandi and deserve nothing but plaudits.
To be clear: I do not condone assault of hecklers, whether by "thugs" who support either Kerry or Bush. But if you're trying to screw up someone's legitimate event, you're probably a self-righteous jerk, to say the least.
There's certainly a case to be made about the liberties taken by law enforcement. Still, I think it's revealing that there's so much indignation at those liberties taken, and nothing but pride about the uncivil and disorderly behavior of the event infiltrators. I find it hard to feel sorry for them.