Photo by John Hoff (September 1) Despite my previous post worrying aloud that Republicans might "outflank" anti-RNC protesters, simply by having all their delegations doing "community service" during the scaled-back Day One activities, the "outflanking" completely failed to materialize. In fact...
The South Carolina delegation which had floated the idea of doing some work in my North Minneapolis neighborhood failed to materialize, failed to even follow up by placing another phone call after getting us excited about some new hands to help, at least for a day. And at today's anti-war march, I saw hundreds of counter-demonstrators doing the same kind of protesting--albeit less energetically--so it's not like Republican delegates were all flying to the Gulf Coast overnight to pass out water bottles to the anticipated victims of Hurricane Gustav while our side indulged in street protests.
Outflank the anti-war protesters? Seize the moral high ground through an unorthodox, brilliant tactical maneuver at the last possible minute?
Well, it just didn't happen. And, I might add, their counter protests were rather lackluster. I saw one counter-protester standing next to a pile of unused signs as high as his butt. Outflank us? Hardly! We had an amazing, colorful, and compelling street spectacle to support the troops in Iraq (by bringing them home) while the Republicans had unused "Support The Troops" signs up to their elephantine hips.
As was said after the far-more-exciting Battle of Seattle in 1999:
WE WON.
I think all the republicans that had any gumption were too busy out in the city destroying afternoons of fun loving people of the "real" people. I have had to deal with these non nice people all week at work and to have my friends and coworkers comment today at how insanely rude people were in the last 48 hours. I think it must be them... We usually don't have that many non nice people here....grrrrrr
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