From the open publishing newswire: During the height of the Anti-War Protests in PDX, I wrote a letter to Noam Chomsky asking for his opinion on the dilemmas we had been facing locally. The following article is comprised of these letters, beginning with my own so that his appears in context.

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: HOW DID IT COME TO THIS? How did we get stuck in the wrong reality-- stuck in a Philip K. Dick novel, it seems to me. I've spent a few days trying to piece it together for myself...

For the past year I've been participating in and documenting these protests... As I wrote on the site, my protest photography pretty much ends here. I ain't standing on the sidelines and taking pictures of other people getting arrested. I don't quite know what I'm going to do, except that I want to do it from love, not anger. And that won't be easy because I have a lot more anger than love right now. [ Full Story & Photos ]

PHOTOS: [ M15 Rally Photos by Chris Lec | M15 Rally and March Photos ]

'Oregonian' Disproves Own Estimate
From the open publishing newswire: Today's Oregonian attempts to downgrade the crowd estimates for Saturday's massive anti-war rally and march in downtown Portland. Organizers put the figure at around 45,000, while television news reports ranged from 20,000 to 30,000.

According to Oregonian reporter Joseph Rose, using aerial photographs taken by Bergman Photographic Service, the number was closer to 14,200 people. But there's a problem.

A Peacekeeper Responds to critics of "Peace Cops"
I was a peacekeeper Saturday, at the corner of 3rd & Madison, where the march route took a right turn in front of the Federal Building. I would like to respond to some previous postings about what peacekeepers were doing, perhaps referring to this intersection. [The previous postings: Peace cop gets violent & Peace cop hits small woman repeatedly with bicycle]

All but one of the five of us had taken a weekend training in nonviolence two weeks before. At the training, we were told that it is best to not touch anyone, at all, in any way or for any reason (except, of course, for such obvious reasons as helping people who are injured, or otherwise in need of human kindness and caring). Now, it becomes clear to me one of the reasons for that: in situations where emotions are running high, ANY touch may be perceived in vastly different ways. I will take responsibility for my actions: I'm sure I did touch some people, as a natural, reflexive response of human contact and caring, and as a way of getting attention. I'm equally sure that I did not push, pull, grab, or shove anyone, nor touch anyone in any way approaching the use of force. Nor did I witness anyone of my group of peacekeepers do so. If they did, then I will say that they made a mistake in doing so. My purpose here is not to dispute what has been reported otherwise, but to report what my experience was, and leave room for the experience of others. [ Read More... ]

From the open publishing newswire: Vancouver, Washington, draws hundreds at weekend peace vigils
Friday, Vancouver For Peace sponsored a Peace Vigil in the bandstand of downtown's Esther Short Park. About 130 attended. We had music & speeches & lights. Today, Sunday, as part of the "rolling" world-wide effort called by Anglican Archbishop Tutu & others, we held another Peace Vigil, in the same Park, with around 200 people, silently facing SE & the clock tower & the fountain & the moon, our lights toward the sky.

The only sounds were wind, water in the fountain, an occasional whisper, or an innocent child's laughter. The peace was intoxicating, beautiful, yet so sad. Several pictures of our sister Rachel were held by people. As i walked slowly around the crowd, i looked into people's faces & saw somberness which made me sad, but also angry. [ Read More... ]

500 in Corvallis participate in nationally-organized protest against the war
Sunday, March 15, 2003, 7:00pm - 8:00pm --- In Corvallis, Oregon, outside the Benton County Courthouse, 500 persons with 500 candles participated in a Vigil against the proposed War, That's 1% of the local population. Folk stopped what they would otherwise be doing in order to come together in protest. [ Newswire item ]

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: a friend of mine who is not taller
than 5 feet was dressed normally and was drawing, with colorful chalk, a cat
that said 'kitties so no to war'
a man walked up behind her and hit her in the back with his bicycle.
let me say that again.
a man walked up behind her and hit her in the back with his bicycle.

she turned around and he said 'dont draw on walls' to her
heated words were exchanged
she turned around and continued to draw.
so what did the man do?
the man hit her in the back with his bicycle.

i don't mean ran into her
i mean picked up his bike and hit her in the back with it.
[ Read More... ]

Previous, related story: [ Peace cop gets violent ]

Have you seen this cop?!
This police officer sprayed a crowd of non-violent traffic stoppers on the Morrison Bridge on saturday. No violent provocation was given and he was the ONLY cop to use weapons of any kind in the melee. If you have photos or video of this guy, send them to the news ASAP. They are looking for shots of baldy in action.
[ Photos ]

Related posts: [ About Officer Marty Rowley, Badge #8969, who often pepper-sprays people | About Officer Meyer, who assaulted a 12 year old girl ]

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: This is just an outline of what I saw at the march, since I haven't seen ANY articles on indymedia that actually give a report of the march. I wasn't able to observe everything since I spent a fair amount of time volunteering to help the march run smoothly. I hope that others will contribute anything they saw that I missed!!

I arrived with the student/labor/radical feeder march from Pioneer Square to a very packed Waterfront Park at around 2:00. John Lewis gave a short speech, followed by a fundraising pitch. I helped do fundraising, and I was mobbed by people almost immediately during the fundraising pitch. My bucket was full of cash in minutes, and when I brought it back to deposit the money, the experience of all the other fundraisers was similar. [ Read More... ]

PHOTOS: [ Link to Saturday march photos... | Portland for Peace | Dade's Photos from the March 15 Peace Rally in Portland | Photos of Portland Peace March - Link Inside ]

Power To The Future! ACA Community Childcare Report Back
Just a short note to say that Portland Anti Capitalist Action provided childcare as an option last saturday during the protest. Six kids attended and a great time was had. Games, Movies (The Lorax!) and a chance for kids to speak out against the war. The kids painted a banner of their own and paraded around the block chanting 'No Way! No War!'. [ Read More... ]

From the open publishing newswire: notes from march 15th
From the open publishing newswire: the numbers of people who were peppersprayed are being drastically underreported - although only a couple people were peppersprayed ON the onramp to I-5, I think dozens of people who had our backs and were keeping the police off the onramp were peppersprayed. thats a second hand report from a medic who was treating people but it seems like the numbers were closer to 30 people.

Rowley [picture featured on front page] was one of the officers who handled this part of the action, and one of my friends overheard him pratically begging the second-in-command of the portland police [you know, that nice looking woman cop who always plays good-cop] for permission to 'stop them here' while brandishing his pepperspray. [ Read More... ]

Details of Radical March
Alright. What a day yesterday, huh? I got home around 6p and got onto Indymedia to post a complete story of the radical march, spent an hour writing that and then it didnt post. That ticked me off, so I waited until morning to see if someone else was going to do the "news" part of it. Tidbits here and there, this will be as complete as my perspective allowed.

Arriving at the No Park Blocks around 1p a crowd in the low hundreds had amassed. The rallying time was 1p, but you know these radical marches never get off on time. More people showed up, I saw four police officers meander amongst the crowd, one undercover and 9 bike cops on the outskirts. At least two different cop cars did loops...one of them held Marty Rowley (I am nearly positive). I wondered what the police prescense was like on the waterfront, but didnt really care, I knew that this was their gold. [ Read More... ]

Next time: more direct actions
Okay so I marched with the morrison bridge crew until the mouth of I-5 and cheered folks on from there. (note: nobody told me about your action, so i figured you didn't want/need me to get in your way) Then I marched in the liberal march and it was sooo quiet and boring. I believe that we *need* all of those people on the streets and its okay for liberal marches to exist because the left is too small not to recruit!).

However, next time, let's issue a call *well in advance* for every willing revolutionary/radical/rowdy to form affinity groups and plan their own direct actions like the awesome Morrison Bridge one. there was a lot of outreach done by liberals,but I run in a pretty radical circle and only heard one or two mentions of direct action. What if we called every radical group we knew of in Portland and asked them to committ to direct action the day the bombs start falling? some will say no but most will say yes.Sometimes people need an invitation or reminder. [ Read More... ]

PHOTOS: [ more morrison bridge pix ]

Related: [ Morrison?? NO, Reclaim State Capitol. | How to overthrow riot cops ]

From the open publishing newswire:

Six March 15 pictures of queer activists. Includes Lesbian Community Project; Out Against the War; Pride At Work; and others. [ Photos ]

From the open publishing newswire:

From the open publishing newswire: As the permitted peace march started, the radical feeder march marched through downtown and onto the Morrison Bridge, as the police stood by and watched. The march then moved onto the I5 onramp, and at this point the police started pepper spraying people. About 60 riotcops came as reinforcements and managed to push the march back over the Morrison Bridge towards downtown. [ Read More... ] [ Some pix from Morrison Bridge standoff ]

Officer Marty Rowley, Badge #8969. Armed and Dangerous Officer Marty Rowley, Badge #8969, strikes again From the comment posted to the above newswire item: Once again, it was Officer Marty Rowley, Badge #8969, who whipped out the pepperspray and started attacking people. This guy's dangerous. He clearly enjoys hurting people. He's the same one who peppersprayed people on Feb. 15 and at the Bush protest. Keep your eye out for him! Here's a post that has more information about Rowley's deeds, and more photos of him: Portland Indymedia Reporter Pepper Sprayed At F15 Peace March. Here's more: Photo-essay: The sit-in and pepperspray on Feb. 15. And in this post, someone has had fun putting slogans on photos of Rowley: Where's Rowley.

Officer Myers: pepper sprayed a 12 year old girl Officer Meyers peppersprays 12-year old girl officer meyers [pictured] pepper sprayed a 12 year old, discerning her as the smallest of his possible opponents. the people were already complying on the onramp. they had already checked their forward progress and were being forcefully pushed backwards. near the back of this retreat was a line of protesters and officer meyer grabbed the smallest, turned her around and pepper sprayed her in the face. From a comment posted to the same story: I am a friend of the 2 12yo girls that got peppersprayed today. Most heard of the one girl but her friend got a decent sized whif of the shit too. Anyway, I am wondering if you have any other photos of our friend Mr Meyers who loves hurting little girls. I am attempting to find his badge number. I figure a good picture may have it in there. if you have others, please email me. From another comment: Officer Meyers is also a key orchestraters of a plan being pushed forward by the Portland Police, which will sweep homeless campers off of ODOT an PDOT land along the I-405 corridor. [see "portland Trespasses on the homeless".] He is a Senior Neighborhood Officer in Central Precinct and recently arrived here from Arizona. Apparently he thinks picking on homeless people is a good way to make a name for himself in his new home town. I guess I'm not to surprised to hear that he is pepper-spraying 12 year olds. [ Read More... ]

radicals are cool
pictures of SAA high school students taking the street before the radical feeder march even started, the morrison bridge being 0wned, and the onramp being given our damn hardest. well some of our damn hardest. a group of people slowly started working their way right around the police line blocking the onramp, and suddenly hundreds of people could make their way up the bridge where we rocked out and all of that.
[ Read More... ]

Debate: Lack of Solidarity at Morrison Bridge?
YES: While the masses (that may or may not be asses) were busy buying their constitutional rights at the "Peace Festival", some of us were busy getting attacked by our local police force. Shocking? No. Lack of support and soliderity, yes. I cannot support a movement that doesn't move any further than Waterfront Park. How many dollars does it take to ensure that the Portland Pubic doesn't get sprayed by the cops? You see, if you aren't part of the organizers or organizations that pay off the city to not attack us, you're part of the rest of us. Maybe next month we will be able to purchase tickets to the wonderful "protest" at TicketMasters. How could people at the MAIN march stand in silence (and contempt) while we were being assalted? [ Read More... ]
NOT EXACTLY: If we want real solidarity in Portland, the first step has to be opening up communication. I think it's important to remember that many in the crowd (me included) didn't even know what was happening on the Morrison Bridge. It's hard to see anything from below. More importantly, though, this action was not planned in coordination with the March 15th coalition, and so there was no way to organize some sort of solidarity on the part of the crowd. I think this shows that we need to talk to each other and go to each other's meetings so that we can begin to build real human ties. Neither side will be willing to put its ass on the line for the other until both recognize the hard work, honest dedication and courage of the other side. [ Read More... ]

Other posts: [ portlands finest hits protester, on video | What has happened to Indy Media and the public ]

Bloc arrested on I-5 onramp? Does anyone have any info on the black bloc that was brutally arrested on the I-5 onramp? After getting a whiff of the pepper spray I looked beyond the blinding sting and saw a comerade tackled. But there't no info on him. Anyone with info on his condition, please post it here.

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: John Lewis was the featured speaker today, March 15, 2003, in Portland Oregon, at the Peace gathering at Waterfront Park. This is an audio file of that address (~10 minutes, streaming). [ More about John Lewis | Thousands fill Waterfront Park - now crowding through downtown ]

PHOTOS
Photos from peace march 3-15-03
Photos from peace march 3-15-03, part 2
Portland Peace March
Portland Peace Protest
over 50 photos from today's rally in Portland

Indymedia readers respond to "Hypocrisy Formula Part 2..."
From the open publishing newswire: It is estimated that 35,000 people are supposed to show up in downtown Portland to protest our upcoming "oil war". That said, I started to wonder how much gasoline would be consumed by the participants traveling to and from such an event. I came up with a rough estimate of an overall average of a 10 mile round trip per person, although I suspect its probably higher. This means 25,000 people multiplied by 10 miles which equals 350,000 miles. With an average fuel economy of 12 miles per gallon that comes out to 29,166 gallons of gasoline. At an average price of $1.89 a gallon that comes out to $55,125.00 That seems like an awful lot of gasoline to burn just so you can make yourself feel good.

One response: NO, we would not be better off "organizing yourself into a cohesive political party and trying to get your candidates on the ballot for the next election". i don't know if you are aware of this, but by the next time an election rolls around it will likely be too late to stop imperialist military action and occupation in the middle east.

Another response: I am a homeless person. I live a sustainable lifestyle. The protest today was valuable because it works toward building a political will. We may well go to war with Iraq, yet this experience will build in people's hearts. In the future we will take another step. No nay sayer, reguardless the motive, will weaken this. This is not a sprint, but a marathon. Please respect that we are all human beings with human mistakes and a learning curve.
[ Join the pile-on ]

Peace cop gets violent
I was walking alongside the large permitted march today when the march took a turn to the right. At the intersection there were 3-4 cops. Not the usual portland police, but rather peace cops wearing green armbands. As I approached, I saw the fellow at the front say "You have to go this way" and pointing to the right. One person kept walking straight forward, and the peace cop grabbed the person by the arm and pushed them.

So here we have the so called peace cop assaulting someone for not doing what they are told. This person is acting just like Bush, only on a smaller scale. This is the very behavior that needs to be changed.

As I reached the front peace cop, he also ordered me to turn right and got in front of me. I told him in an angry voice, I don't have to do what he said and walked ahead. He was quite pushy. Behind him were two more peace cops and they tried to deter me from crossing the street also saying "You have to go this way" and pointing to the right, and saying "We have an agreement with the city".
[ Read More... ]

See also: [ Pro-War counter protest Main CNN website story ]

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: Several blocks worth of people gathered around the Eugene Federal Building this afternoon after a march from the University of Oregon campus. The march took over the streets for approximately four blocks and was filled with dancing, music, and anarchist clowns giving balloons to happy children. The entire demonstration remained relatively peaceful, institutions of imperialism were left standing and all automobiles remained upright. Hopefully the cultural foundations of modernity and the American empire were overturned and set ablaze. (Hopefully)

Once at the Federal Building, people took up several blocks, the tops of nearby buildings and the whole front plaza at 7th and Pearl. Speakers spoke, musicians musicked and people danced. Small clusters of counter-protesters held signs with charming messages like "stop the inspections, start the bombing." Counter protesters were seen blocking traffic with cops, but not hugging eachother, lest anyone think they were deviating from the heteronormative standards of the dominant culture.

After a second march attempted to leave the building, riot police gathered at the entrance to the highway. That march was limited to approximately 75 people and stopped one block away from the Federal Building. [ Read More... ]

PHOTOS:
Eugene Peace Rally - My Favorites
Photos - Eugene Peace Rally
Eugene - A Quiet Voice Among Thousands
Make Love - Peace - Life is Sacred
Bread - Education not Bombs - Soldiers
Child for World Peace

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: March 15th (2PM)is the date set for the next large anti war mobilization here in Portland. ACA Community Childcare is offering free childcare as an option for parents and children. We have secured the New Day School in Southeast Portland for the day. We will be providing food, activities, art, fun, and an opportunity for childrens voices about what is going on to be heard in a fun creative and collective environment. We are asking parents to register their children by the 13th of March. References of all caretakers are available upon request, and any and all inquiries are answered. Please contact us. set@dontmesswithtexas.com [subject Childcare] Alissa (503) 335-3193 (ask to call back and leave message if not home)
[ Read More... ]

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: Northwest Campuses for Peace and Justice is planning a student, faculty, and staff feeder march for March 15th. Gather at 1:00 in the South Park Blocks next to Portland State University (SW 8th/9th and Harrison). At 1:30, we'll march down to the waterfront to join the main rally. Bring drums, chants, and lots of spirit. Education, not war! Contact Northwest Campuses for Peace and Justice at nwcpc@yahoo.com or visit our website at http://brunslo.com/peace/
[ Read More... ]

[ more events listed at your guide to march 15 events ]

From the open publishing newswire: From the open publishing newswire: a lot of folks have been uploading plans and posters and ideas about the upcoming March 15 peace/anti-war events in portland. here's a collection of what's gone up so far. please add other flyers, details, etc. (and from places other than portland!) to this post as comments. there'll be a link to this page from the top of the front page until the day of the event.

POSTERS for Day War Starts events
Communities all over Southern Cascadia have announced plans for what they will do the day that bombing/invasion starts in Iraq. Here's some posters that have been made to promote the events in Portland. Please upload other posters and events here for people to see. [ Posters and Events ]

Online & Offline: Organize, Organize, Organize
More and more, internet activism and mass protest operate as companion parts of a single whole, (both containing elements of the other). While the peace movement does embody a great deal of organizational intelligence, and webmasters move mountains of code to get the word out, it seems useful to characterize the internet as the brains, and mass protest as the body of this, our political moment. It remains for conscientious activists to recognize the strategic nature of this relatively new dynamic, now -that we may help move the struggle for social transformation to the next level. [ Read More... ]