Colorado guy arrested for insulting Cheney -- He's on W/Hartmann NOW

[Bozita]

He's suing the Secret Service.

Good on him!

[IChing]

1. Interesting story

Smart guy and the poor 9 year old kid, lucky he ran away and found his mom or they would have taken him to Social Services.
The guy was shoe shopping with his kid when it happen.

[flordehinojos]

2. tell us more--how did he insult cheney?

whoever thinks we are not living in a dictatorship these days is just simply delusional.

[Bozita]

4. NYT article ...

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/04/washington/04cheney.html

October 4, 2006

Man Sues Secret Service Agent Over Arrest After Approaching Cheney and Denouncing War
By KIRK JOHNSON

DENVER, Oct. 3 — A Colorado man who was arrested in June on harassment charges after he approached Vice President Dick Cheney to denounce the war in Iraq filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday accusing a Secret Service agent of civil rights violations.

In his suit, filed in Federal District Court in Denver, the man, Steven Howards, an environmental consultant who lives in Golden, Colo., says he stepped up to the vice president to speak his mind in a public place and found himself in handcuffs — in violation, the suit says, of the Constitution’s language about free speech and illegal search and seizure.

The suit seeks no specific damages, and names only one agent, Virgil D. Reichle Jr., who is assigned to the Denver office of the Secret Service. But Mr. Howards’s lawyer, David A. Lane, said Mr. Cheney might be called as a witness, along with the district attorney in Eagle County who threw out the criminal case against Mr. Howards. If a chain of command within the Secret Service is found that suggests Mr. Reichle was acting on orders, Mr. Lane said, more defendants could be named.

A call to Agent Reichle was not returned. A spokeswoman for Mr. Cheney referred questions on the matter to the Secret Service. The agent in charge of the Denver office, Lon Garner, declined to comment.

more...

[flordehinojos]

6. thanks

thanks for this link ... my oxygen has just been taken away...how do these bush people think they are?

[Gabi Hayes]

5. here's the transcript of his interview with Amy Goodman...great story

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/05/1429248

[flordehinojos]

7. hi Gabi Hayes ... thanks for the link to the Amy Goodman interview.

(i will read it when i come back a little later--i have to step out now. Amy Goodman does a good job at getting to a lot of what the corporate media covers up).

p.s. i wonder if after jeb had to hide in a closet yesterday due to protesters getting to him, if repressive measures against people protesting any of the bushes and those linked to them are going to get graver and more severe?

adiós free speech.
:( the bushes have done you in. hopefully it won't be good-bye but only, 'till we meet again'!

[Gabi Hayes]

12. yr wlcm....big difference in the NYT version and the Goodman interview

nothing in the former about how they tried to intimidate him after the fact

I did like the thing in there, though, about how the SS LIED to the DA

wonder if anything will come of that

ha

[IChing]

3. Steve Howard is his name

Here is a story that should cheer Steve Howards, the Denver-area man who's filing a federal lawsuit after his arrest last summer for criticizing Vice President Dick Cheney over the administration's handling of Iraq.

It should cheer the rest of us, too. Then, again . . .

As you may have read, Steve Howards was walking his 9-year-old boy to a piano camp at Beaver Creek on June 16 when he saw a crowd. Turned out, the vice president was shaking hands and posing for pictures.

Steve Howards walked past, not three feet away from Dick Cheney. Unable to hold his tongue, he said, "I think your policies in Iraq are reprehensible." He and his boy then walked on, he said.

Ten minutes later, a Secret Service agent stopped Steve Howards and arrested him for "assaulting" Dick Cheney. He was hauled off to Eagle County Jail.

He was released later that day, however, and charges were eventually dropped.

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/14557

[flordehinojos]

8. assaulting cheney for telling him the truth?

the sadist goons don't wanna hear one iota of the truth!

[Tesla]

9. This HAS to be stopped!!

That man thinks he is sooo above the law!
Thats why he has Chimpy in the head seat to take all the cheap shots.
Arrested for disagreeing, scary!!!

[cybildisobedience]

10. curious to read the man's story

Mike Allen, world-famous apologist for the Bush administration who calls himself a journalist, was on C-Span last week, chastising the man for "rushing" Cheney and screaming and yelling -- in other words, giving cover to the Secret Service for the extraordinarily extreme response.

Sounds like the man was hardly inappropriate, just outspoken -- which, in these times, is apparently enough.

[Gabi Hayes]

11. did you hear that, too? I've posted almost exactly the same thing, even

calling him an apologist, IIRC!

he was one of the secret reporters who snuck into Baghdad for that Thanksgiving fiasco

Dana Milbank was on a radio show, discussing the whole scenario, and I called in and said NOBODY out here CARES about the details. what we CARE about is that people like you and Allen are the ones who are so taken with such creepy affairs of state/journalism, and that you should NOT be participating at that level

that said, I wonder what the Denver DA meant by this, from the NYT:

"'It was our understanding that the vice president did not want to prosecute,' Mr. Hurlbert said in a telephone interview. 'The original indication was that he had pushed the vice president. Later it looked to be that he had just spoken to him.' "

the original indication could be a FALSE STATEMENT, yes? can't they be prosecuted for that? nobody there will say he made any sort of threatening gesture, or EVER TOUCHED the president (yes, the president).

you have to read the Amy Goodman interview to get a much fuller version of what happened, a version that shows how the SS THREATENED Howards, and tried to bully him.

surprised?

and here's the bugmenot code for the NYT
http://www.bugmenot.com/view/www.nytimes.com

Username tiredout
Password tiredout

[SoCalDem]

13. I am glad that people are protesting these freaks, BUT

you CANNOT "rush-approach-swarm-etc" people who are protected by the secret service. You may know that you will nto do them physical harm, but THEY DON'T KNOW IT..

Times have changed and assassination attempts are always the first thing they think of when someone approaches in a unfriendly stance...

[Gabi Hayes]

14. they did NOTHING at the time he spoke to the president!

they got him only because he happened to be returning the same way he came, during which he came nowhere near Cheney

big, hugh, difference there

if they'd thought he'd presented ANY sort of danger to the Pres, they'd have nailed him on the spot. he was walking around, shaking hands with other people, and Howards approached him, talked to him, and LEFT! if he was doing ANYthing untoward, why did they let him leave?

he was acting exactly as the "wellwishers" were