Open Letter to Tom Potter

Allow me too add my agreement, and state that I was one of the protesters on the side walk that would not move. The Park was packed, and we were well within out legal rights to be there. And may I also extend the invitation to our city officials to join us next time perhaps? Remember that 72% of the registered voters in Portland voted for Kerry. We also elected YOU to represent US. So see you next time then?

Thank you, Alan, for all you do to keep freedom in place. I myself refuse to allow police anywhere, including Portland, to discourage me from expressing my demand for Justice & Peace. Police behavior this last round remained unacceptable, but i will be back. Freedom is worth the cost of standing up those who would take that freedom away. Police are NOT in charge. Citizens are!

We need some of the Orange Revolution right here, right now!

Den Mark, Vancouver

Protesters need to be safe in their dissent. Police need NOT be bullies in their demonstration for control. I am still leery of the Portland cops. Protesters do not believe in violence. That's why we're in the streets! I left right after the march for other good things to do, but I must say I had an underlying thought of not trusting the police to protect us. Otherwise, it was a good day to voice our dissent with the "elected" administration. We will not be silenced. Bring our troops home NOW!

This is an important letter from someone who's literally on the front lines of the battle between police tactics and justice. I wasn't at the Jan. 20 protest, but I hear good things about it. In fact, while it may not be planned, moving from place to place as a group, rather than dispersing, is an excellent way to draw out the resources of the city, essentially its like cashing a check, similar to what Alan is talking about.

I've been to a few of the protest/marches since late 2002, (I wasn't at the A2202 protest, but saw some coverage of it, including a video put together by indymedia) and honestly I've been able to avoid direct confrontation with the authorities, in part because I'm careful to avoid it. Being young and strong, and male, I feel that perhaps an extra effort could possibly be made to reign in any perceived illegality on my part, to both make an example, a point, and to build a consensus as to who is in charge, physically. It's important of course (from law enforcement perspective) to make this point with the young and strong, men and women, of any race. But if you're a young angry man, you're often more likely to want to physically vent that anger against other young men--look at Iraq for instance. Aside from oil protection, in a real sense the conflict is a way for stagnant armed forces to blow off some steam.

In my own "backyard" I've had this experience, dealing with cops who're fresh from college or the academy, and their great fear is that they'll be outsmarted or outmaneuvered somehow, even at a TRAFFIC STOP! It's essential for them to just dominate everything, which prohibits discussion or reason, and leaves a deficit in the community--a deficit of trust and compassion, where fear prevails.

Alan writes that perhaps if he had been hit or shoved, he would be cashing another check at the city's expense. But it's not quite that easy--we all know that it depends on witnesses, extensive legal proceedings, etc...and that the city is always assured that many people will just drop it, lacking time and resources to get involved in a lawsuit. And remember, when they push and hit you, that means that you got in their way, and you should pay a fine for that--how else can they continue to afford these things?

Although we generally think of the cops as more or less inherently "rightwing," because they identify completely with the establishment and act as its armed enforcers, the fact is, we as a community do have power over them, if we are sufficiently unified and insistent about exercising it. The fact that, as past history shows, we HAVE been able to effect dramatic changes in police behavior shows that this is a reality. This is a key test of our strength: can we rein in police abuses and force the cops to respect the community? Alan, you are at the forefront of these efforts, and everyone who cares about civil rights and even basic humanity in our city should salute you.

Unsurprisingly, during periods of rightwing reaction at the national level such as we are living now, those cops who are already so predisposed sense a license to indulge their own macho power fantasies over others. As someone else mentioned, this applies especially to younger, insecure males, who in our culture are expected to be aggressive in order to prove their manhood. The whole war industry relies completely on the manipulation of these cultural notions. It's all of a piece: the very policies and politics of aggression and macho posturing that we are protesting nationally are motivated by the same emotional insecurities that drive violent cops who mar the public protests they are sent to "police." We have to come together as a community to send the message to the bully boys that this behavior is unacceptable, whether at the local OR the national level.

While I don't necessarily agree that the police have any business hanging around a protest at all unless they're participants, I really enjoyed your letter to the cops. In fact, it was almost as much fun as reading the angry pig post to it. HAR! Obviously, one of em is really pissed off that he can't ejaculate through his pepper cannister anymore. And so original: "Get a hair cut!""Get a job!" Yeh, right. Like none of us has ever heard THAT before. Like, wow, oooo, ouch, like boy that was some biting criticism there...not.

It's really telling how a police officer can post a comment like that, accusing anyone who dissents against the system, or more to his point, against his perceived authority, of not being a "normal" person. I was out there on the 20th, and the people in the streets were my friends and neighbors, the people who deliver my mail, the people who work in the grocery stores, the people who plant gardens and care for each other, I even saw at least one pastor out there. The only people who looked seriously abnormal were those thudding around in giant black rubber suits feeling important and manly. Those guys looked ridiculous. And like, now that you mention it, impotent. All dressed up in their little body condoms but unable to do the deed. HA! I'm laughing just thinking about it.

It's kinda sad, too, though. The way the cop says they think they're gonna be "protercting [sic] normal people from you dousch [sic] bags!" Man, they just don't get it. "Normal people" just aren't on their side anymore. "Normal people" have been liberated from the ignorance dished out by the corporate media, because they were lied to one too many times. And because they've been out here in the streets with us for the past couple of years, seeing what the pigs really are.

Oh, and by the way, pig. Nobody said there would be 10,000 people. Geez. Talk about optimism. Hardly any promotion for this event, very little organization. I was thinking there might be a couple hundred. So when 2,000 showed up, man I was thrilled. Especially when I realized how many others were in the streets of every other city, and how many were still sitting at home wondering what to do, but will be figuring it out and joining us soon enough.

Well, Alan, I was really wanting to see you hold out for a policy change rather than going for the money. But now that I see how pissed the dumb cop is, I'm happy for your windfall.

that give the PoPo's all the BAD PRESS and why they are trusted less and less by us seemingly very "normal people" who are getting feed-up reading about such overgrown little baby BAD BOYS
that bully others. Quite frankly, while we realize we can't do much about you damned ignorant
bullies on an individual basis, we do realize we can scream long and loud to your bosses til to
shut us up, they'll be forced to deal with YOU! Quite frankly, "copper who bobs 'em" we also
are sick 'n' tired of paying high taxes to be used to pay assholes like you salaries you don't
deserve. If you don't like the "climate" here, then pack your fucking bags and go back to the
hick town you came from, as it appears living in a large multi-cultured multi-racial complex
cosmopolitan setting is just too much for your simple mind to fathom and handle with grace and
dignity! Go and be damned done with YOU and your fucking kind...go N-O-W before the heat gets
too hot for you to handle is my suggestion, for we "normal people" aren't about to let thugs
like you take over here. We got rid of Mark Kroeker and by God, we can get rid of your ass too!

2,000? My foot! Within the march, I saw Chris from Jobs with Justice on the sidewalk. I asked him how many were ahead of me. He said there were 2 blocks ahead, and 10 blocks behind. Folks, they say 1,000 people per block.

come on, jk, there were not 12,000 people as you posit.

I was there. I saw how many people were there. I think somewhere between 2,000 and 5,000 is more like it.

I was disappointed there weren't more people there.

"no rubber bullets, sage weapons or other such arsenal"

What the hell are "sage weapons"?!?! Am I missing a bit of nonlethal jargon??

Alan, I loved your measured letter. However, I must disagree with you that the cops seemed at all "restrained." I know you made a point to say that they simply seemed "more" restrained, and not actually restrained, but I want to just add something.

I personally witnessed an officer who appeared to be completely out of control, lift his assault weapon and point it, point-blank, at the head of an unarmed protester. Clearly, this is not the way to handle crowd control, and there is much more work to be done. Can I ask, Alan, that the next time the street videographers hand you hours and hours of tapes to use to sue the city, please please please make it a priority to use that tape to force the police to stop using chemical and impact weapons for crowd control entirely. I believe that's what happened in Oakland, isn't it? I don't begrudge you the money you earned -- on the contrary, I'm happy that you've taken if from the city and made them think twice. However, I believe a change in policy is even more important.

There has been some misinformation put out about what we could have accomplished with our lawsuit. I want to correct the record to help, in part, the writer above understand better what we can do about police brutality.

First, in our initial complaints we asked for injunctive relief (policy changes) which included the installation of a civilian based review board. The court threw it out holding that it did not want to meddle in the affairs of a municipality. Rachel Sussman, the National Lawyers Guild attorney, who put together the Oakland settlement, told me that the policy changes they got in place, were on a paper and worthless without a monetary payout. Oakland NLG lawyers are still fighting the city of Oakland for a monetary win that they believe will force real changes. The Oakland NLG along with NLG attorneys who do this on a regular basis, have told us that our win here was big and we could expect to see some changes from it. We just have to keep coming back at them, again and again--which we plan to do.

We spent five months negotiating with the city for an agreement that would have forced the city to make policy changes, e.g, limiting the use of pepper spray, and other limits to methods of force. In the end, the city woudn't give us anything that we felt would make a difference in how the cops treated protestors. The final offer the city made to us was so watered down with exceptions, that it was completely meaningless. We decided that a large monetary payment would go a lot further in changing what went on the street than agreeing to a worthless piece of paper.

If we had not agreed to a settlement, we still had to make it past summary judgment and a trial--either of which would not have given us any policy changes and had a potential for a loss.

We we did get was this: 1) a huge psychological victory (and one of the first of its kind) as you can see by Officer Doucebag's reactive post; 2) a big enough payout that the city decision makers will look long and hard at police tactics in terms of what will cost them again in light of rapidly diminishing public funds; and 3) funding for the Center--both the Plaintiffs and attorneys have donated a large amount of the settlement to the Center so that it can continue to be an active thorn in the side of the belligerent police force. We will change policy, we will make them jump and chew gum and get maybe even get them to be nice. Its not either or.

I also have a great connection and a lot of respect for Portland Indymedia and the folks who work tirelessly putting it together, which inlcudes going out in the street and getting videos of these protests. We will continue to have a working relationship with street videographers and we plan to continue to use these videos to make a difference.

The Center has had success in changing the law. We got the first sit-lie ordinance declared unconstitutional and plan to challenge other laws and policies as well. Each battle is different. Each fight necesitates different tactics. Ultimately, I am convinced that if you hit them in the pocket, they will respond because in a society driven in huge part by capital and greed, the greedy are like reactive molecules. They jump when stung and are predictable in how they react.

Selfish motives revealed are like the water Dorothy threw on the wicked witch. We now got some water in our barrel. Anyone game?

Alan Graf

According to an article labeled "Hey, Hey, Yawn Yawn!" subtitle Where's the radical fringe gone? It completly is bitching that the protest was non violent, and we were not "riled up" enough. You really can't win with this media. It also states that Tom Potter was at the protest? Another Article claims he will be riding with Crital Mass? What? Whoa Alan effective letter!