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Fizzling protests may be due to Obama

Ryan Sabalow

Published August 25, 2008 at 6:25 p.m.
Updated August 25, 2008 at 6:25 p.m.

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Linda Muller, a volunteer from Safford, VA., photographs a mounted Police patrol in front of the Convention Center in Denver, Colo. Monday Aug. 25 2008.

Photo by Barry Gutierrez © The Rocky

Linda Muller, a volunteer from Safford, VA., photographs a mounted Police patrol in front of the Convention Center in Denver, Colo. Monday Aug. 25 2008.

Sunsara Taylor's speech today at Civic Center in downtown Denver was fiery and filled with passion.

An organizer with the Revolutionary Communist Party, she railed on capitalism and urged her brethren to stand up for the impoverished and oppressed, while calling for an immediate end to the war in Iraq.

Too bad there were only a smattering of people listening to the impassioned New York native.

Protesters, like Taylor, so far at the Democratic National Convention seem outnumbered by the police sent to keep them in check and the reporters out covering any would-be ruckus.

And many of the protesters point to Barack Obama for the sparse turnout.

Taylor said too many of her peers have erroneously bought into the misconception that Obama would stop the war in Iraq and offer a progressive change in Washington.

"A lot of people are confused right now," she said, adding that the massive police presence in town might have also kept many away.

Denver estimates its force of 1,500 police has doubled for the convention.

Lounging with his head's on his friend's leg under shade trees nearby in the park, Dave Engelkenjohn, 21, of St. Louis, echoed Taylor.

"I think people have latched on to Barack Obama as this great hope," he said. "I think people have been swayed that just being black that means he's on our side."

Planned protests have so far seemed to fizzle, aside from a handful of marches Sunday that drew a few hundred people and only briefly snarling traffic on a few downtown streets.

Today, a Re-create 68 protest of the U.S. Mint building was a dud.

Although some 70 protesters half-heartedly arrived claiming they were trying to levitate the building, the much-touted event drew more reporters and police on horseback than activists.

The only real excitement came when Michelle Malkin, a conservative syndicated columnist and Fox News commentator, arrived, and her body guard got in a shoving match with a few demonstrators.

Chris Lugo, a 38-year-old small-business owner from Nashville, Tenn., wasn't one of them.

He stood toward the end of the line, mostly watching the smattering of protesters chant and hold their arms high.

He said that with so many progressive Democrats like U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich and Jim Hightower uniting for Obama, it's taken much of the pizazz out of many would-be activists' protests plans.

"I think it's going to be a lot bigger at the RNC (Republican National Convention), honestly," he said.

Comments

  • August 25, 2008

    7:26 p.m.

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    WHATRIGHTS writes:

    Couldn't have anything to do with the fact that if anyone says anything or look cross eyed, Denver's finest won't slap them around, call it resisting arrest and off to that nice little tank they built just for us.....please, fear is the hush factor.

  • August 25, 2008

    7:36 p.m.

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    solar_satellite writes:

    It is evidence of the decadence of America that at a time when our unadressed problems threaten to overwhelm us there is far more concern for rigidly maintaining order than interest in protesting the failed policies of both major political parties. The oppressive and overwhelming police presence is a disheartening backdrop for the few idealists who have come. What a message Democratic Denver sends the world: people who want no more than to be heard are considered so dangerous that they must be surrounded by countless police at all times.

  • August 25, 2008

    7:59 p.m.

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    commoncents writes:

    I don't see how committed protesters are deterred by the police. They are just watching people do their thing. Peaceful protests can bring change. MLK led many and was attacked for it, but I guess he really believed in his causes.

  • August 26, 2008

    4:05 a.m.

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    solar_satellite writes:

    commoncents: Go to Civic Center Park tomorrow and see for yourself. There are as many police as people of all other sorts in the park. They stand in groups of twenty or so throughout it. It is just a threatening atmosphere in which to conduct free speech. There are many times the number of police necessary to maintain order all around you. I'm not saying the police should ignore violations of the law, but consider: any number of irregularities have been sanctioned for the D.N.C. Does it really represent such a threat to public safety that a march should travel up 15th Street, instead of Colfax? There are enough police downtown to line both sides of any route a march might follow, and any ongoing or dangerous obstruction can easily be ended. Was it really necessary to mace the marchers, immediately they tried to go up 15th Street? I'll tell you one thing that was necessary, that legal observers on the scene tell me did not happen: if a march is deemed an illegal assembly, the police must declare it such and order the participants to disperse. Legal observers documented the fact that the D.P.D. simply started hosing down the protesters with mace. The City will be confronted in court for the outrageous conduct of those in charge of the police. I saw no misconduct on the part of individual officers; it is those in command who are responsible. Walking down the 16th Street Mall, I had to move aside for a platoon of riot police; these are all over the place. One said: "excuse me", but his tone was more like: "if you don't get out of our way, we'll arrest you so fast". I represent Democrats and Allies Against the Prohibition of Marijuana. We plan to march (with a permit, along the approved route) from Lincoln Park to Invesco at 2PM on Thursday (see schedule at www.comeuptodenver.org). We are not deterred from marching, but I would rather not be marching through an audience of police, yo a cage. The militarization of Denver for the DNC is out of all proportion to any conceivable threat posed by demonstrators; that is what is being etched in my memory.

  • August 26, 2008

    4:57 a.m.

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    solar_satellite writes:

    Had the DPD simply allowed the marchers to walk up 15th Street there would have been far less obstruction of it than was caused by their decision to arrest 100 people there, which was supposedly motivated by the DPD's determination to prevent the marchers from even temporarily obstructing 15th Street. 15th Street was closed for hours. Chief Whitman not only defies Denver's laws (see Sec. 38-176 of the Municipal Code), he is incompetent. The City would like there to be some significant number of arrests to justify all the money received for security ($50,000,000; at present we've spent about $500,000 per arrest), so more such idiotic and overbearing enforcement may be expected. Call Chief Whitman at 720-913-2000 and demand that he resign.