“So many protesters gathered at Stanford – more than 1,000 – that a reception for Bush at the Hoover Institution was moved at the last minute to the campus home of former Republican Secretary of State George Shultz after students blocked the road leading to Hoover, an on-campus, conservative think tank where Schultz had organized a reception”
Showing the way, once again, to a confused and beleaguered nation, with the Raging Grannies leading us, we properly welcome America’s Degenerate to dinner at Stanford…The “bubble boy” was obliged to retreat to George Schulz’s private residence when (possibly for the first time in recorded history) he was forced to look the people in the eye because the usual “free speech area” turned into real free speech.
For Debate:Too Rude, or just about right for the Servant of Satan?
Please ignore the december- and Reeder-like polemic in which the OP is couched and concentrate on responding to the actual question posed at the end of the OP.
(You are free to express your feelings about the OP in the Pit if you find it inappropriately phrased.)
Alaric, if you truly want to debate an issue, it would help considerably if you did not phrase the set-up as a rant. It has been a couple of weeks since we have had to discuss this with you, so perhaps you have forgotten, but you may consider this an official notice that I am going to simply shut down without ceremony any similar OPs that you post.
Not “too rude”, but outside the bounds of civil society. Protest, yes. Physically prevent someone from meeting another person in order to talk to that person? Hell no.
Free speech does not consist of prevent someone else from exercising his right to free speech. The public roads are just that-- public. Bush would have been completely within his rights to arrest every one of those blocking public roads. He simply chose not to. Which makes him, in this case, the better man.
This was not an act of civil disobedience, as the proesters were not engaged in breaking some heinous law that one could argue needed to be overturned. They simply wanted to be the group that shouted the loudest.
An act of patriotism, in my book. Bush needs to see first hand just how deep the outrage is toward his administration. If he has to start moving around to avoid masses of extremely angry people, perhaps he might start to think that just maybe he could be wrong about something.
I can see it both ways- on the one hand, the protestors certainly don’t win any points for having violated Bush’s rights (to assembly and free speech, if nothing else) in order to prove their point.
On the other hand, you could see it as being a legitimate means of conveying anger, especially given the way that dissent is often muzzled and ignored by the Bush administration. While the protestors were not deliberately violating a specific immoral law, they were ignoring the rule of law in exactly the same way that Bush and his cronies (I redrafted that phrase twice to make it less offensive, and still ended up with that) have done on innumerable occasions.
On the gripping hand, lets not pretend this is going to have any great impact on policy-forming. If anything, it is likely to reinforce Bush’s prejudice about whinging liberals, and alienate voters in (say) the upcoming November elections (given that anyone who approves of this action was unlikely to vote Bush anyway).
So, in conclusion, satisfying, maybe even ethically reasonable, but counterproductive.
That was clearly out of bounds to block the public roads, they should have arrested every single one of them. It’s just like Tianmen Square; those students had no right to inconvenience everyone by occupying a major public plaza.
DanBlather, that’s hardly a fair comparison- mainly because in America you have a viable way to effect change from within the system, therefore making such an extrajudicial act not justifiable in the way that popular protests in authoritarian China were justifiable. Plus, of course, Bush didn’t send the tanks in.
These people should not have blocked the road. Other than that, I have no problem with what they did. However, this is not Communist China, and it was not Tiananen Square. People do have a right to “occupy” a public area, do long as they do not impinge on the rights of anyone else who is there or just passing through. You can chant your slogans and wave your signs to your heart’s content. You can not interfere with other people.
For the record, Tianamen Square was an abomination. When the tanks rolled in and over people, it was an object lesson in unchecked government power, coupled with a total lack of respect for life. It was disgusting.
Once again, the hypocricy of the rabid left is revealed. They seem to think that their genuine passion to make particular statements, and their right to express themselves, gives them permission to infringe on the rights of others. Nothing new from the extreme end of any stripe. They should have all been arrested, or at the very least, the crowd should have been controlled so that the road was not blocked.
tomndebb, how did you not simply move this to the Pit? By not doing so you give the blind hate of OP the undeserved respectability of an actual debate, while giving him a free shot at vitriol. And then you ask others to temper their response, and to open their own Pit thread if they feel they must respond in kind? Please explain.
Who would? Blocking the road is the whole issue here. Of course they have the right to protest.
If a pro-life group blocks access to an abortion clinic, is that also an act of Patriotism? If not, why not?
If Hillary Clinton comes to speak at Stanford and the local Republican Youth group blocks the access road so that she is unable to enter, is that an act of Patriotism and if not, why not?
You and I both know there are people who have a problem with it (protest of any kind). I bet we could both come up with anecdotes about people we personally know (in real life away from the Dope) who would giggle like idiots if all protesters and dissenters were locked away forever. However, I hope we are all more reasonable here. But let’s not sidetrack. You and I both agree that protesting is OK but blocking streets or businesses or abortion clinics, or any place else is not. Over at the Daily Kos - which is transparently partisan - one of the protesters is denying that they blocked all access. Take it with a grain of salt. Regardless, NO avenue of “escape” should have been blocked.
Besides, on a practical note, you don’t win converts by pissing them off.
Oh whatever. Bush in engaged in a henious war that needs to be stopped. I, for one, have been involved in “prevent guy A from meeting guy B” that were actually very effective and managed to keep the bad stuff that was about to happen from happenng. Indeed, the only kind of protest I will participate in is one with an actual real-world effect. In my opinion, one of the problems with the modern left is that we’ve forgotten that it takes more than signs to make change.
In this case, GWB has historically restricted areas where protests are allowed, and so holding a protest in an inappropriate space is a very civilly disobedient thing to do.
The moderator mentions december, who was banned for (among other things) allegedly trolling in GD. And compares the OP to the same. The implication seems clear.
And yet the thread remains unlocked, and in GD. Just with a warning that nobody better respond in the spirit in which it was couched.
Then you’re OK with pro-life groups blocking access to abortion clinics in order to “keep the bad stuff” from happening, right?
I’d agree with you if it was just protesting outside the designated area, but this crossed the line into thuggery. Once you allow thuggery to advance your own political agenda, you have no basis to disallow thuggery when it is used to advnace any political agenda, even one which you find abhorrent. As someone mentioned above, this is not a dictatorial police state where there is no legitimate means to affect the political process.
In any case John Mace, no-one supporting the road-blocking denies that they are doing so from partisan interest, nor they deny that such an action is illegal and would be unjustifiable if performed by, say, anti-abortion protesters. However, they are saying that it is a morally justifiable action, because the actions of Bush mean that any (peaceful, let us not forget) action to oppose him are justifiable. Of course they would oppose such actions if performed in support of a cause that they did not regard as morally justifiable.
I suppose the real issue at debate here is, do citizens have a right* to defy the law in support of a “greater moral good”?