Date: Fri, 03 Dec 1999 10:27:44 -0500 From: Chuck0 <chuck-AT-tao.ca> Subject: Fwd: COLLATERAL DAMAGE IN SEATTLE -------- Original Message -------- Subject: COLLATERAL DAMAGE IN SEATTLE Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 01:44:51 -0500 (EST) From: Flint Jones <flint-AT-mobtown.org> Reply-To: dc-AT-lists.tao.ca To: dc-AT-tao.ca [From iww-news] >COLLATERAL DAMAGE IN SEATTLE >by Portland student/reporter Jim Desyllas > >Called-in from a pay phone outside Seattle. Wed., 7:30 pm Pacific time. > >(Posted at www.emperors-clothes.com 12-2-99. Feel free to distribute in >full including this note.) > >I just spent 4 days in Seattle. The "information" people are getting from the >mass media is false. This was not, as Pres. Clinton claims, a peaceful >protest marred by the actions of violent protesters. This was a massive, >strong but peaceful demonstration which was attacked repeatedly by the police >with the express purpose of provoking a violent response to provide photo >opportunities for the Western media. I know because I watched it happening. >I'll tell you how they did it. > >As Michel Chossudovsky says in his "Disarming the New World Order" (See Note ># 1 at end for link to that article) - the government put a lot of effort >into making sure the protesters in Seattle were a "loyal opposition" who >wanted to reform the WTO, not get rid of it. But the people in Seattle - >American steel workers, Canadian postal workers, college kids from all over, >environmentalists from Australia - you name it - were not for reforming the >WTO. They were for getting rid of it. > >And this wasn't just true of the protesters. I interviewed delegates. None of >them had anything favorable to say about the WTO. Two delegates from the >Caribbean were angry about job loss. One delegate from Peru took a bullhorn >and got up on a car and spoke to the protestors against the World Trade >Organization. He said it hurts the workers and farmers. I interviewed a >Norwegian guy from Greenpeace. Totally against it. Even a delegate from >Holland said it had hurt the farmers there. He said though it is supposedly >democratic, that's actually a lie: the US, England and Canada and a few >others get together and decide what they want to do. Then they ask the rest >of the countries to vote and if they vote wrong they threaten,"You won't get >loans," or whatever. They get them to do what they want by blackmailing them. >The Italians we interviewed were upset too. I couldn't find any delegates who >were in favor. > >So the government instigated a "riot" to discredit the movement against the >WTO because they couldn't dilute it. I am not guessing about this. I was >there. I saw it happening. And I will tell you I am frankly shocked to see, >close up, just how little our leaders care what happens to ordinary people. >Clinton can pose and speak a lot of flowery stuff but the truth is - we are >nothing to them. I saw this with my own eyes. > >Sunday and Monday, there was no violence. None. The people were aggressively >non-violent; they were self-policing. Up until Tuesday at 4pm there was one >window broken in the whole city - a McDonalds window. This compares favorably >to the typical rock concert, let alone a demonstration of people who were >non-violently barring entry to the World Trade Center! > >At this point, a new group of police - tactical police - moved in and started >gassing people and shooting rubber bullets. Is it any surprise that people >got mad? Of course, the young kids hit back by breaking some windows in >retaliation for being gassed, sprayed with very painful pepper gas, and shot >with dangerous "rubber" bullets. The police instigated these kids, plain and >simple. > >Sunday and Monday they had young cops, using them to block the streets. These >were trainees. But Tuesday they had the real cops; none of them were young. >They were trained to attack people. A small group, maybe 100 people total, >struck back. Then these cops herded that group around the city, making sure >there were plenty of photo ops of "violent protesters." > >A number of times they had these 100 or so protesters caught between >buildings and walls of police. They could easily have arrested and detained >this small number of people and gotten it over with. Instead they would gas >them and let them go. Then trap them again, gas them again, and again let >them go. The cops made no arrests that I know of until late Tuesday night >though the skirmishing was going on from three till 9:30. The cops would >blockade three or five blocks of an area, give the angry kids room to >operate, keep gassing them - when you gas a person, let me tell you, it gets >them fighting mad. > >Tuesday night the police gassed all of downtown. This was going on from 3 PM, >till 6 PM.. Gas everywhere. The kids broke a few windows - McD's, Starbucks - >small stuff - burned a few garbage cans. The police were using these people >as extras. It was staged. I believe also the police had their own people in >there, encouraging people to break stuff - if people think I may be >exaggerating, I saw supposed protesters - they were screaming and so on - and >then later, when everything was over, the same people tackled other >protestors and put handcuffs on them. > >At 6pm they issued a State of Emergency. At that point they had pushed the >100 people outside the city limits, so the police went outside the limits >too, and they started gassing that area too, gassing the neighborhoods where >the regular people live. I am not exaggerating. The police were relentless. > >This was in an area from the city limits for about 10 blocks to the Seattle >Central Community College. If you were alive, the police gassed you. People >coming back from work, kids, women, everyone. People would go out of their >houses to see what was happening because these tear gas guns sound like a >cannon - and they would get gassed. A block away there was a Texaco gas >station - they threw tear gas at gas pumps, believe it or not - they were >like vandals. They gassed a bus. I saw it with my own eyes. A bus. The >driver, the riders, the people just abandoned it . > >I was sitting in a little coffee shop called Rauhaus, [Jim did not spell this >- the spelling may be wrong.] They were shooting "rubber" bullets at the >glass. I picked up a dozen of the things in a few square feet. They were also >shooting this paint that you can only see with a florescent light. They would >paint anyone and everyone and then go hunting them. > >Anyway, because they were gassing everybody, the local people got mad too and >they joined the 100 who had been herded out of the city. So soon there were >500 including the neighborhood people and all very angry. Naturally. Because >they had been gassed and hit with pepper spray, that stuff does a number on >you. And shot with these damn bullets. Then people set up barricades at >Seattle Central Community College. The cops organized themselves for about an >hour and then moved in and gassed that area. > >Today they started mass arrests. That was because Clinton - the Greeks call >him the Planitarchis, Ruler of the World - was coming. Weeping crocodile >tears about how he just LOVES peaceful protest, which of course you'd have to >be two years old to believe he had nothing to do with the police action. This >whole thing, this police attack, this was US foreign policy, not some action >decided by some bureaucrat in Seattle. This was the State Department. They >wanted to discredit the people. > >When things started on Sunday, there was a protest rally of solidarity >involving people from different walks of life. Monday it got even bigger. >Tuesday there was a big sort of carnival where people were doing different >things, a band was playing music and people were blocking the World Trade >Center. And about 3 PM the cops started throwing tear gas. > >The thing that drove Clinton crazy was that on Tuesday the protesters had >succeeded in making nonviolent human chains and had therefore stopped >everyone from going into the World Trade Center. Only maybe 27 delegates got >through, mostly US and British. There were what seemed like tens of thousands >of protesters involved. So the police did their gassing number against these >nonviolent people to break up the human chains and make the protesters look >violent. > >Today (Wednesday) I followed the union protest put together by the >Longshoremen's Union. They went down to the docks and had a rally then >marched to Third Avenue. As soon as they got there the cops started gassing >them. There was an old lady there. She had gone downtown by bus to buy >something. This lady was in her 70's and I saw her trying to run, but she >couldn't breathe. She was in shock. I carried her to a building entryway. She >was gasping, terrified. She had been in Germany, and it was like she was >having flashbacks. The tear gas sounds like gunfire and there were >helicopters overhead, sirens, cops on horses, everything. > >They had clearly made a decision to destroy this movement. > >So anyway there I was with her in this building and she wanted to go to the >hospital but there was tear gas everywhere and I was afraid if I tried to >move her she'd be gassed again. I went to this line of cops and begged - I >mean begged - these riot police to help her. They ignored me. A girl told me >later that a one year old had been gassed. And I myself saw a girl no more >than 18 - a cop had busted her lip wide open - she was bleeding - and then >they gassed everyone including her. After that she was kneeling on the ground >crying like a baby and praying for 15 minutes, Hail Mary, Hail Mary. Over and >over. She was in a state of shock. They just gassed these people who were >sitting down non-violently and doing nothing. Nothing. > >At one point the Seattle Mayor said his boys were not using rubber bullets. >Miraculously, by then I had ten in my pocket. I could open a little market, >sell the things. They are everywhere. I and other people started giving them >to delegates and stuff. "See what they're doing? They're shooting "rubber" >bullets and lying about it." We showed them to the media. I guess enough >people and the media got the information because the Mayor made a new >statement then that they were using them. As if he hadn't known. > >They shot rubber bullets from four feet away into the face of a guy next to >me, broke all his front teeth. When that happened I lost it. I forgot I was >supposed to be getting the news for all of you and I started yelling at the >cops, "What the hell is wrong with you? Are you sick, man?" So this cop aimed >his gun right at me. That was his answer. So I first put my hands in front of >my face because I didn't want to lose my teeth. And then I thought, to hell >with it. I was wearing my target shirt that said "Collateral Damage", you >know? With a bullseye target, like they wore during the bombing in >Yugoslavia. And I told this guy, "Go ahead, shoot! Here! Here's the target!" >He didn't shoot me. > >I want to emphasize, these protesters were NOT violent people. They were the >most non-violent people I have ever seen. Even when I was screaming at the >cop, this girl came up to me and said, "Do not scream. This is non-violent." >These people were too much to believe. They must meditate all the time, I >don't know. > >Clinton said he supports nonviolent protest. That is baloney. Today (Wed.) >the protesters were causing absolutely no "trouble". In downtown the cops had >people running who weren't even protesters - like that old lady or just >people going to work or shopping - everyone was getting gassed. The busses >weren't running because of the gas. I was lucky to catch one with a driver >who could still see. I begged him to drive the old lady home - the driver >changed his route especially for her. If you want to find human decency, stay >away from the Planitarchis. Go to the to regular people. They have some. The >Planitarchis lost all his years ago. Now he wouldn't know human decency if it >came up and bit him. > >So now I have made personal acquaintance with the people who run this >country, and they are quite simply scum. There were people at work, people >with babies, they were all getting gassed because the government would not >allow an assembly of people speaking their minds. It is the same as what >happened in Athens. Clinton's requirements on the Greek government created >the riot and he did the same thing here. And then he says he supports >nonviolent protest? How? By shooting rubber bullets? And today they outlawed >gas masks. They want to make sure everyone gets his money's worth. > >Today, just like yesterday night, the police were in the residential >neighborhoods. People in cafés were getting gassed and shot at, you could >hear it on the windows, bang, bang, bang. A guy trying to cross the street to >go to his house got gassed. First a drunk guy outside a bar yelled at the >cops "Get out of here!" so they gassed him. And then this other guys was just >crossing the street to go home so the cops figured, might as well gas him >too. People got gassed for coming out of restaruants and bars and coffeee >shops. I'm amazed that nobody died who had asthma or something. > >Or maybe somebody did die and they didn't talk about it. I mean after all, >it's just collateral damage.. > >*** >
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