Police fire on crowd of Bush protesters

[BurtWorm]

http://www.salon.com/news/wire/2004/10/15/protest/index.html

Oct. 15, 2004 | JACKSONVILLE, Ore. (AP) -- Police in riot gear fired pepperballs Thursday night to disperse a crowd of protesters assembled in this historic gold mining town where President Bush was spending the night after a campaign appearance.

Witnesses said Bush supporters were on one side of California Street chanting "Four more years," and supporters of Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry were on the other chanting "Three more weeks." Police began moving the crowd away from the Jacksonville Inn, where the president was to arrive for dinner and to spend the night following a speech.

"We were here to protest Bush and show our support for Kerry," said Cerridewen Bunten, 24, a college student and retail clerk. "Nobody was being violent. We were out of the streets so cars could go by. We were being loud, but I never knew that was against the law.''

Bunten said she was pushed by police as she held her 6-year-old daughter.

...

Protester Richard Swaney, 65, of Central Point, said he was walking with the crowd away from the inn when he was hit in the back with three separate bursts, one of which knocked him down.

[sui generis]

1. you know why this stuff happens doncha

All of these police departments are just dying to have a chance to use their "new" crowd control technologies, and any excuse will do.

Well, in three more weeks, we'll be pepper-balling the wailing teeth gnashing republicans when they riot in the streets, and it will be a SWEET day indeed.

[Tansy_Gold]

2. That's my greatest fear --

that no matter who "wins" this election, the other side is going to protest so mightily that it leads us into another civil war. Only this one won't be neatly divided north v. south or east v west; it'll be within families and neighborhoods and nasty beyond belief.

I'm not being pessimistic, I don't think. I'm hoping it doesn't happen. I'm hoping there's a quick and clean Kerry/Edwards win, that the "other side" accepts it graciously, and we all go on with our lives. But I fear. . . . . .

and talk about riot police itching to use their weapons doesn't make me feel any better. :-(

[BurtWorm]

3. Wingers have already promised that they will never let up

if Kerry is elected. One winger site that I used to visit is loaded with people who vow they'll make the Clinton years look like the golden age of bipartisanship if Kerry is elected.

[mikehiggins]

4. They are like vampires

They will never give up. Never. Never. Never.

If we do lose, I think lots of people should start thinking about emigrating to Australia.

[BurtWorm]

5. NEVER!

I don't like the climate. ;)

Seriously, why should WE emigrate? Why don't we work on making life here so intolerable for them that THEY want to emigrate?

[HootieMcBoob]

14. then we need to put a stake throught their hearts

:mad:

[Cyrano]

25. Ummm, not hearts. Chests. You can't drive a stake through what's not there

[SoCalDemocrat]

22. No way

This is my country, I'm not leaving.

Think about forcefully emigrating Bush and his friends to Australia.

[Arkana]

26. If they're gonna be vampires

Then we need to be the Van Helsings of the political world.

[HootieMcBoob]

13. That's why Kerry needs to win in a landslide n/t

[Snivi Yllom]

24. gaaaahhh

more people arrested for bicycling riding and other everyday activites.

[Voltaire]

6. If there be Civil War

Then let them bring it. And let us defeat them. The BIG elephant in the living room that is this country is that those people on the other side are anti-American, anti-progress, anti-whatever else you can think of. This country will make NO progress until the Republican Party and the Christian Fundamentalists are made to account for their illegal acts and serial mendacity. I am a peaceful man. But if we needed to physically fight to bring those people to heel and to make them pay for their crimes, then I am all for it. And I know I am in the minority when I say that, my wife HATES to hear me say it. But that's my belief and I'm sticking to it.

[Tansy_Gold]

8. I tend to agree with you, Voltaire.

eom

[Voltaire]

11. I would like for this election to go peacefully

I truly do. Normal would be SOOOOOO nice. But I guarangoddamtee you that if this thing is stolen by those vermin again my ass will be wherever it needs to be on November 3rd to help overturn that result. No retreat, no surrender and enough of the bullshit.

I'm going to stop now because we ARE going to win. I feel it in my bones. But the pragmatic side of me wants to be ready for anything.

[Roland99]

7. EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT from forum.johnkerry.com

http://forum.johnkerry.com/index.php?showtopic=95208


A report about Bush's visit to Jacksonville tonight. Tonight I was in Jacksonville, Oregon for a pro-Kerry ("Unwelcome Bush") Rally from about 5:30 pm to 8:45 pm (PDT) when I left (was finally able to reach my car) to come home. When I left an hour ago there were still in the streets of our tiny pioneer town dozens of state troopers because George Bush is staying in the "Honeymoon Cottage" of the Jacksonville Inn owned by businessman Jerry Evans. What started out as a fairly small rally (I would guess 100 of us men, women, teens, lots of children, babies, many whom I know from college and my past employment) even dogs on leashes, turned into a shocking confrontation with dozens of state troopers with assault weapons aimed at us, clubs in hand, with masks over their eyes, row upon row of them moving us from one location to another to another to accommodate Bush's return from Expo in Central Point (a neighboring town), the same place John Kerry gave his rally earlier this summer. So we, seniors, kids, townspeople, were backed up step by step for two blocks away from Bush's entourage path and in the process we were sprayed with pepper spray or mace (yes, little kids, too!) and at least one person was shot with rubber bullets. I saw one woman pushed by a state trooper, and I did not see her doing anything to deserve it. We were ordered to clear the town center or face arrest. We had helicopters flying low above our heads with lights shining on us. We were also videoed throughout the night by the police.

Jacksonville is a tiny town of less than 3,000 people in Southern Oregon a few miles off I-5 and about 30 miles north of the California border. A state highway runs through town that turns into California Avenue for about four blocks, then back into a state highway as it heads up into the Applegate River area. Access to the hundreds of homes and ranches on the Applegate is through Jacksonville. Jacksonville is hard to drive in at any time as it is a tourist town, a National Historic Site (one of only eight in the nation), and a residential community. Why a sitting president would be allowed to stay here with the logistics as they are is beyond my comprehension. He came into town about 3 pm, apparently went to Jacksonville until time to be at Expo at 6 pm (Most of our group didn't realize he was in Jacksonville when our rally started at 5:30), then the motorcycles and cars bearing Bush and his entourage tore down four blocks of our tiny town at 60 mph, scaring the hell out of us. It was long before his return trip from Expo to Jacksonville for the night that the trouble started.

The media was there early on and left, then some came back out (by "out" I mean to Jacksonville from Medford, about seven miles) but I am not sure how much the reporters picked up as things got heated very quickly. In my opinion, the influx of dozens upon dozens of state troopers, sheriff deputies, City of Medford and Jacksonville police was total overkill, even for President Bush. There were NO teenagers who came from surrounding areas to join in the scenario; they were all the same kids who had been there from our original 5:30 meeting point in Doc Griffith Park. BTW, I live 1-1/2 miles from Jacksonville out in the country although I have a Medrord, OR address, but J'Ville is my home town.

I saw John Edwards yesterday right here in the Rogue River Valley. A group of us waited for awhile to watch his entourage leave the Armory where his town hall program was given. He turned to us and waved, gave us the thumbs up, and left with a few police officers and other police cars. Many of us at tonight's rally had been out to see Edwards the day before.

[Tansy_Gold]

9. They have dozens of state troopers to quell a "riot" but

only one trooper, according to F 9/11, to patrol the entire Oregon coast for potential terrorists landing.

It's true that they're living in a fantasyland of black is white and unemployment creates jobs and poverty means wealth, but sadly, they've dragged us along for the trip.

[treading_water]

10. This stuff happens ALL THE TIME in Oregon.

I'm at the point where the lack of violent police involvement in a peaceful protest is more of a surprise.

[BurtWorm]

12. Why does this happen so often in Oregon?

I don't get it. :wtf:

[treading_water]

17. I don't know, but maybe because of the

Large, VERY vocal activist community on the I-5 corridor, but especially in Portland.

Portland had a police chief who was a very, very big mistake. Thank $deity he's gone.

A complicit media, who vilify all protesters as anarchists.

[BurtWorm]

18. So if that jerk in Portland is gone, who's behind this shit?

I remember the "riot" in Portland before the war, when the cops were firing rubber bullets at and showering pepperspray on families with children.

[treading_water]

21. * is behind this shit

But I think the police are complicit. I don't know if these were local sheriffs, Oregon State Police or Dept. of Homeland Security.

It would be interesting to find out. If they were DHS, the were probably pulled out of Portland, hence the over the top violence on peaceful protestors.

Measured response is not in their vocabulary.

[depakid]

23. Um, excuse me, BUT

But it DOES NOT happen all the time in the Rogue Valley. If you live here, you know that.

[Zuni]

15. Sounds like the Nixon days

[Catfight]

16. Kenton Ohio all over again, soon there will be blood on American

streets for people who don't agree that we want a dictator.

Bush must go DOWN!

[maxsolomon]

19. this is total crap

but i bet the umpqua folk, sturdy conservative christians that they are, think those hippies got what they deserved for speaking up.

i know that's what my reagan-democrat father back in cincinnati will say.

never mind that, given the size of jacksonville, they probably know all of them. they'll just chalk it up to 'anarchists' from medford.

[reprehensor]

20. Bring it on.

"They drew first blood! They drew first blood!"

[choicevoice]

27. Time to dust off the oldies but goodies......

Time to start singing Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth" and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's "Four Dead in Ohio". Can they shoot people with pepper balls for singing when the President is coming? We could add Green Day's "American Idiot" as well.

[Caoimhe]

28. Also happened last night in Central Point, Oregon

:wtf:

This article talks about it: http://news.statesmanjournal.com/article.cfm?i=88340

The last few paragraphs:

Three Medford school teachers were threatened with arrest and escorted from the event after they showed up wearing T-shirts with the slogan “Protect our civil liberties.” All three said they applied for and received valid tickets from Republican headquarters in Medford.

The women said they did not intend to protest.

“I wanted to see if I would be able to make a statement that I feel is important, but not offensive, in a rally for my president,” said Janet Voorhies, 48.

Here is a picture of the women in the "obscene" tshirts, you be the judge: :mad: