Posted on 09/26/2009 3:47:48 PM PDT by Anti-Bubba182
PITTSBURGH (AP) - Police used all the nonlethal tools at their disposal to thwart protesters at the Group of 20 summit this week, firing bean bags, hurling canisters of smoke and pepper spray, using flash-bang grenades and batons and deploying a high-tech sound-blasting device meant to push back crowds.
It was all a bit much for civil liberties groups and protesters.
They decried what they called a heavy-handed and unwarranted police response, saying riot officers focused on largely peaceful, if unsanctioned, demonstrations when they should have been paying more attention to small groups of vandals that smashed windows of city businesses.
"It's not just intimidation, it's disruption and in some cases outright prevention of peaceful protesters being able to get their message out," said Witold "Vic" Walczak, legal director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania. "In a week when we need freedom of speech more than ever, free speech died in Pittsburgh this week."....[snip]
.....[snip]Around the same time, a few blocks away, windows were smashed at some 10 businesses. Police made 42 arrests near the university, but it wasn't clear if they caught any of the vandals.
Experts say that anarchists successfully deployed a tactic in Pittsburgh that they have often used at other protests, leading a large group of people toward police, then slipping out of the crowd to commit mayhem elsewhere......
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.myway.com ...
“May I suggest using your nightstick, Officer?”
Protesters were breaking windows, throwing rocks and bricks, etc etc. They were lucky the police have things like tear gas, sonic blasters, and bean bags now instead of having to use lethal ammo, and clubs.
does aclu ever get it right?
They had a plan.
1. cause violence
2. Blame the cops
Were the police acting stupidly?
‘Just talked to my sister in the “burg”. Lots of damage done by the punks. And of course, the conference itself shut down the city and some outlying areas.
I believe that all of these people should be rounded up, transported to Lake Vostok and delivered to the surface of the lake in order to report to the world the effects of global warming. Pack extra socks.
This has to be a direct result of the failed policies of the Bush administration.
Obama will fix it.
/s
There were many conservative patriots there...do you realize that?
So the civil liberty groups who were apparently on vacation during the tea parties are back?
And they’re defending violent thugs?
Hey Nancy: where are your condemnations of this violence and incivility? Your silence couldn’t be because *gasp* your voters were in the crowd would it?
I think our men and ladies in blue did an outstanding job. Downtown did not suffer nearly the amount of damage as places like Seattle
The police under responded. They needed to take them all out by force. lrad and OC gas is too easy for these scumbags.
I met lots of conservative patriots in Washington, D.C. earlier this month. I don’t think that these folks were in Pittsburgh. If they were, off to Lake Vostok with them.
It’s a little surprising to me that they are behaving as if Bush, not Obama, were leading the G-20 summit. Evidently the Anarchists aren’t impressed by the Obamamessiah.
Most of these smelly hippies don't have a coherent idea about why they're protesting, they're there for the party.
They give daddy, who is a capitalist BTW, a call on their cellphone to ask for more money to "support the revolution" and buy more dope.
Those “military” weren’t. They were wearing piecemeal uniforms, and each of their uniforms were different. And I’m not sure that anyone other than Navy Seabees still wears BDUs. No hats or caps or insignia, either.
Heck the police in Sweden a few years back shot and killed one of these anti-trade protesters. If that was the Swedish reaction, why would they be surprised the police here would use that array of nonleathal force?
BTW I live about 40 miles away and work downtown so I'm pretty familiar with the situation. Have also lived in Oakland, Bloomfield, Shadyside, Polish Hill and Lawrencville. These neighborhoods have a high ratio of middle class and lower middle class elderly and they were very scared. They had their property destroyed.
Local tv station had a classic interchange: A homeowner in her 60s or 70s asked a rabid commie chick why they were in her neighborhood and what they were protesting. commie chick points at her and says "You are the problem".
Remember the Kulaks.
You see the problems? Wrong uniforms. Unbloused boots. The man on the left is wearing brown boots, the man on the right, mostly behind the officer, BDUs and black boots. Whoever these clowns are, they are not military.
The G-20 Joint Information Center, which can be reached at 412-402-7630, issued this statement:
“The individuals involved in the 9/24/2009 arrest which has appeared online are law enforcement officers from a multi-agency tactical response team assigned to the security operations for the G20.
It is not unusual for tactical team members to wear camouflaged fatigues. The type of fatigues the officers wear designates their unit affiliation. Prior to the arrest, the officers observed this subject vandalizing a local business. Due to the hostile nature of the crowd, officer safety and the safety of the person under arrest, the subject was immediately removed from the area.”
I like this plan. Cryoprotestors.
There are pictures of those military men with that prisoner taken later with the police...prisoner is belly to the ground...the men are all adrenalin’d up....it’s all real and it is precedent for how they will handle the tea-parties...the Lrad was at the San Diego t party...you people are cheering your own demise...it is incremental squeezing...WE ARE FREE AMERICANS!!! All of us.
“Hate to mention this, but there was US military involved..first time since Kent State that the military has attacked American civilians.”
Dude, you need to get your facts straight. They were police not military:
http://hotair.com/archives/2009/09/25/video-the-purported-military-arrest-at-the-g-20-protest/
what are the laws in your state about defending your property?
The ACLU:
G-20 protesters: “Victims” fighting for peace and love against the “Gestapo-like” tactics of the police.
Tea Party protesters: Dangerous extremists who we would like to see muzzled and dragged off to gulags.
Would depend if the crime was state or fed and who the suits are.
I'd feel comfortable with my chances if you thought it was life or death.
If they were police then why were they in fatigues? What purpose does this serve? Do you think these special men just forgot their Darth Vader uniforms? Why and to what effect?
Bulls-eye. Correct statement.
Using the military against civilians is a direct violation of the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
