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media. BUT...what's the odds of the TRUTH being told anyway! Anyhow, here's how it came down...
www.wsws.org/articles/2006/feb2006/shee-f02.shtml
Sheehan describes what happened once she was shown to her seat: “I was warm from climbing three flights of stairs back up from the bathroom so I unzipped my jacket. I turned to the right to take my left arm out, when the same officer saw my shirt and yelled, ‘Protester.’ He then ran over to me, hauled me out of my seat and roughly (with my hands behind my back) shoved me up the stairs. I said something like, ‘I’m going, do you have to be so rough?’
“The officer ran with me to the elevators yelling at everyone to move out of the way. When we got to the elevators, he cuffed me and took me outside to await a squad car. On the way out, someone behind me said, ‘That’s Cindy Sheehan.’ At which point the officer who arrested me said, ‘Take these steps slowly.’ I said, ‘You didn’t care about being careful when you were dragging me up the other steps.’ He said, ‘That’s because you were protesting.’ Wow, I get hauled out of the People’s House because I was, ‘Protesting.’ ”
Contrary to police statements and press reports, which claimed that Sheehan refused to cover up the shirt, she explained, “I was never told that I couldn’t wear that shirt into the Congress. I was never asked to take it off or zip my jacket back up. If I had been asked to do any of those things...I would have, and written about the suppression of my freedom of speech later. I was immediately, and roughly (I have the bruises and muscle spasms to prove it) hauled off and arrested for ‘unlawful conduct.’ ”
Sheehan’s arrest was a flagrant attack on democratic rights, in a city where free speech and the right to protest are under siege. Sheehan violated no laws. According to Capitol Police regulations, “demonstration activity” means “parading, picketing, leafleting, holding vigils, sit-ins, or other expressive conduct or speechmaking that conveys a message supporting or opposing a point of view” or anything that might attract a crowd. It does not include the wearing of “Tee shirts, buttons, or other similar articles of apparel that convey a message.”
Capitol Police have protocols for avoiding ‘incidents’ during the State of the Union, but Sheehan had done nothing to disrupt the event. The very fact that she revealed the shirt before the speech began, providing the police the opportunity to haul her out, is evidence enough.
Beverly Young, the wife of right-wing Florida Republican congressman C.W. Bill Young was treated quite differently. Mrs. Young showed up to the event wearing a T-shirt that read, “Support the Troops—Defending Our Freedom.” When asked to leave the gallery, she argued loudly and called one of the police “an idiot.” She was not roughed up, however, nor was she dragged off to jail for four hours or charged with a crime.
Moreover, Mrs. Young’s departure came after Sheehan’s arrest. Clearly, the Capitol Police felt that their actions would have been exposed as a blatant attack on opponents of Bush unless they asked the congressman’s wife to leave as well. Rep. Young spoke on the House floor Wednesday, complaining that his wife had been asked to leave the gallery.
On Wednesday, following publicity over the incidents involving Cindy Sheehan and Beverly Young—and the obvious double standard in the handling of the two women by the Capitol Police—the charges were dropped against Sheehan. Sheehan plans to file a First Amendment suit over her arrest.
more...
I do hope this girl is watching her back. She has caused these numbnutted fools enough grief that I fear someone may try to harm her. I put NOTHING past them...ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!
:patriot:
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