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Twin Town High (vol. 8) |
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Tests of Our Freedom
Wednesday 07 March @ 15:48:59 |
 by SID PRANKE
We may shudder or get upset when we hear about threats to our freedom in this country, especially when the culprit is our own government. Nature lovers and Native Americans who regularly gather at Coldwater Spring near Minnehaha Falls were ticketed by Homeland Security for visiting the area without a permit, and now are fighting a treaty rights case through the federal courts. Seven young performance artists called the "Zombie Dance Party" were arrested and harassed after they staged a creative protest against shopping on the Nicollet Mall.
 There's an ominous yet ambiguous effort to portray ordinary citizens not just as dissenters, which is our right, but as potential terrorists. And this growing practice is happening all over the country.
Last summer, a Denver television station reported that federal air marshals are given monthly quotas to add "suspicious" citizens to watch lists. After the report aired, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) asked Homeland Security officials to investigate the allegations. In its July 27, 2006, letter to Hugo Teufel III of Homeland Security's privacy office, ACLU reps stated: "Perhaps most disturbing, the [television] report also alleges that marshals falsely reported individuals as suspicious in order to meet these alleged quota."
George Bush has set the legal stage to declare martial law, basically, whenever he feels like it. A Feb. 19 New York Times article denounced a disturbing provision of a law called "posse comitatus" that actually passed in October 2006 without any congressional or public debate, partly because it was "quietly tucked into the enormous defense budget bill at the Bush administration's behest." Posse Comitatus makes it easier for a president to override local control of law enforcement and declare martial law. [See this week's Jim Hightower column on page 9 for more on this.]
Locally, activists who care about our community face the growing affront to civil liberties in this nervous climate--from law enforcement personnel who are free, in many cases, to "interpret" their own versions of what constitutes a potential terrorist threat.
And a potential disaster for civil liberties is in the making, as St. Paul and the rest of the Twin Cities braces for the 2008 Republican National Convention.
The Republican National Convention and issues of security
At Monday's first of three public hearings that St. Paul held in the interests of having a transparent process while planning for the 2008 convention, it did my heart good to see and hear the very earnest Assistant Chief Matt Bostrom (in charge of the local law enforcement operation for the convention) try to set a reassuring, optimistic tone for the standing-room-only crowd at the meeting: "Why can't we [the City of St. Paul] set a new standard?" on security for the convention, balancing public safety AND the protection of individual rights. "I'd love to be Boston on this," Bostrom said.
Bostrom was referring to the 2004 Democratic National Convention, where only six or seven arrests were made. Contrast that with 1,800 cumulative arrests over the course of the 2004 Republican National Convention. Bostrom said that securing the area around St. Paul's Xcel Center, where most of the convention activities will take place, is less of a challenge than Boston was for local law enforcement personnel--I-94 and the Mississippi River in St. Paul are easier to manage when "securing the perimeter" than I-93 and the harbor were in Boston, he said.
Security will be a metro-wide effort, Bostrom said, with the sheriff's offices and other police from Minneapolis and Bloomington helping out. To help prevent any jurisdictional disputes, "Ramsey County and the City will train collaboratively [and also] maybe the state patrol," Bostrom said. "So people don't have to worry that there are mercenaries in our city." Mercenaries?
Maybe he was referring to the mood set by scene in Boston outside the 2004 convention: snipers mounted on rooftops, riot police in full body armor, police dogs and a chain-link mesh and razor wire "free speech zone"--as described by an antiwar protester's lawyer in Massachusetts. Vijay Shah, of Cambridge, Mass., has filed a federal lawsuit against the U.S. Secret Service and the Boston Police Department, charging he was "treated like a terrorist because of his skin color," according to March 5 news reports coming out of the Boston Herald and other East Coast news media.
U.S. Secret Service agent John Kirkwood was on hand as well at the St. Paul City Hall public hearing. Kirkwood said National Special Security Event (NSEC) status is being sought for the convention with the Department of Homeland Security, which, if granted, would solidify the feds' jurisdiction for law enforcement at the convention. Since 9/11, there have been 21 occurrences of NSEC status being granted, including the Olympics and the Super Bowl.
Losing local control of law enforcement is something that concerns many local activists. One citizen at the meeting asked Bostrom how police will decide who to arrest. "If they look scruffy?" he asked. Bostrom said it would be determined "by their behavior."
If, as City of St. Paul Marketing Director Erin Dady stated, "security is the most important element" of the convention planning process, how will local officials assure citizens that the feds won't pose more of a threat than do any protesters if local law enforcement isn't in charge? The feds know little about our community, and probably could not care less about us.
There are at least two more public hearings planned within the next few weeks:
•Monday, March 12 from 7 to 8 p.m. at the Battle Creek Recreation Center, 75 S. Winthrop St., St. Paul
•Monday, March 26 from 7 to 8 p.m. at the West 7th Community Center, St. Paul
•For those who can't make it to the hearings, residents can send comments to the City by e-mailing: convention@stpaul.gov. ||
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