August 7, 2008 7:15 PM
In case you haven't had enough Spagnuolo
From the Q&A:
"We're saying we're not going inside that freedom cage, and we expect to be able to go to the Pepsi Center. We're going to push that limit. Yeah, absolutely."
"I heard some other liberal groups talking about the fact that they wanted to go in there and hang out and camp. My suggestion is just shut the door behind them and lock it because they're part of the problem also. We're not going in that cage. If anything, if we went in that cage, it would be to tear it down."
"I always go back to Franklin - Benjamin Franklin - who said that if we're willing to give up our civil liberties for security, we don't deserve either one. We need to find that balance and right now the scales aren't balanced."
"I was sad because I watched the constitution be used as a doormat on the front steps of the federal courthouse. It saddened me to see what was happening in my country ... But it gave me more energy to fight this because it's the right thing to do."
Question: How many people do you expect?
Answer: "It's hard. People don't RSVP for a revolution."
Question: Doesn't wearing a black T-shirt with the silhouette of an AK-47 feed into the fear that you blame the city for?
"I'm not going to lie. There's a section of Re-create 68 that are more militant minded than other sections. But we've agreed that we are going to tamper down our militancy and act in a nonviolent way because right now nonviolence is the best weapon afforded to us."
"They're the fear mongers. When (Denver City Councilman) Doug Linkhart is talking about protesters smearing themselves with feces so the police don't touch them, that may be some sick S&M fantasy he has in his mind, but it's definitely never entered our minds."
From the press conference:"The city and the mayor ... laid down for the democratic party."
"The federal court and the laws in this country have moved so far now to the right and the democratic party has assisted them in this move that every American citizen should be concerned about the embarrassment that happened in the courtroom the other day."
"The city in their closing arguments made a point (to say) that we were not willing to negotiate with them on certain issues, and they're right. We believe the constitution is a nonnegotiable document, but unfortunately they believe that document does not apply to the protest that's happening in the streets. So we're not going to file our appeals in the federal court system. We're going to file our appeals in the city of Denver.
"We've said this time and time again, do not blame us for the confrontational situation that is being created by this government and this local administration. We have tried everything we can to make our protests as legal and as nonviolent as possible, but the city has taken every step they can to make this a confrontational situation."
"We're going to vote with our feet and we're going vote in the streets. We're going to take our marches right to the gates of the Pepsi Center, and we're going to push the limits of that security zone because sooner or later, at some time or another, Americans need to start resisting and say no, enough is enough. We're going to stand up for our rights. We're going to stand up for what this country was originally founded on. We're going to fight for our civil liberties, and if that needs to take place in the streets of Denver, like I said a year and a half ago, this will become ground zero for the fight over our civil liberties."
"We don't want this confrontation. We want to be able to exercise our rights as peacefully as possible. But when they're creating a situation where they're training every day for violence, when they have the national guard put on call to come out and surround the Pepsi Center ... you ask me about confrontation? You should be asking the city about it."
"We're going to do everything we can to remain nonviolent, but like we said from the beginning, we're not going to roll over and just let you take our civil liberties away from us neither. We're going to come out and we're going to protest. I mean, people told Martin Luther King ... that he wasn't allowed to march over that bridge into Selma, Alabama, but it didn't stop Martin Luther King from marching for his rights."
August 8, 2008
11:29 AM
C. Philips writes:
Spagnuolo quotes Franklin about giving up civil liberties for security.
In fact, he demands that everyone else to give up their civil liberties and security so he can appropriate all the rights of the Constitution for his exclusive use.
The rights of the Constitution have to be shared and balanced.
These are violent people who would like to tear up the city and provoke the police.
August 8, 2008
1:57 PM
Tina Braxton writes:
Not true. The rights embodied in the Constitution apply fully to everyone. They are not to be "balanced" against anything. And ultimately, that is your only real security. The Framers, and Franklin in particular, knew well the cost of allowing the State to "protect" the citizens by abrogating citizen rights.
Rights are stated and explained on paper. They are only guaranteed by constant vigilance and activism by the citizenry. A good example of this is the rights guaranteed to all Americans, regardless of race or descent, by the 14th Amendment, which became law in 1868, but had no meaning whatsoever in some parts of the country, almost a century later.
I can also say that I have personally witnessed Mr. Spagnuolo and others who work with him face up against police violence and react in a non-violent way.
August 8, 2008
7:08 PM
thetruthhurts writes:
Sure they react in a non violent way. Cops rarely hurt one of their own.
August 9, 2008
12:11 PM
urasnitchjacket writes:
thetruthhurts commented:
>> Sure they react in a non violent way. Cops rarely hurt one of their own.
What, you're trying to discredit a protest leader by claiming he is a cop?
When the FBI's CoIntelPro agents used such techniques, they took the trouble to forge phony letters and deposit them where they were likely to be accidentally discovered by associates of their target, and therefore thought credible. How sloppy and lazy the reactionary element is today. I can just imagine all the DNC protest people going home because thetruthhurts anonymously flung an accusation in a web page comment. Not...