Downtown Minneapolis protest against Obama's Afghanistan Surge, December 2nd 2009

Raw footage, 33-minute version.

I covered the protest for Indymedia. About 200 people marched through downtown Minneapolis to protest Obama's Afghanistan surge. Eleven people sat down in an intersection and were arrested. No other arrests were reported.

Regarding the organizer's claims that "Marchers effectively shut down the streets of downtown Minneapolis for several hours", this meant walking down a single lane in two lane traffic escorted by the cops, and "blocking an intersection" meant sitting down over part of one of the quietest, lowest impact intersections of about 40 the marchers walked through all night.

It would have been interesting to see how the cops would have reacted if the marchers had blocked Hennepin or Nicollet, or Nicollet on another night during the Holidazzle parade.

In any case, the point was well made, and made without anything terrible happening.

According to local anti-war activist Ross Rowley, the MPD have a history of "live and let live" for unpermitted marches that aren't out of hand in downtown Minneapolis.

During the march, the police had a line of horses between the marchers' lane and oncoming traffic to keep things safe and called ahead to have traffic stopped at intersections for the unpermitted march. 10 minute, 5 minute, and "time's up" warnings were given to disperse before arrests. Bar some clumsy police handling/dragging of the intersection-blocking arrestees, the cops behaved as one would hope they would.

But it was a good protest. The exact date of the march was announced by Twitter on the day to be responsive to the date of Obama's announcement.

***

ORGANIZERS' BLURB:

On Tuesday, December 1st, President Obama announced a massive military surge of 30,000 troops to accelerate the occupation of Afghanistan.

On Wednesday, December 2nd, Twin Cities responded by taking the streets of downtown on an unpermitted march to stop business as usual against the escalation of war.

Marchers effectively shut down the streets of downtown Minneapolis for several hours in order to force attention on public opposition to the surge.

11 people were arrested for taking an intersection and refusing to leave in an act of civil disobedience on the corner of 3rd avenue and 10th street. The arrestees were charged with a single misdemeanor count of Unlawful Assembly.

Keep a look out for further action and legal updates from Direct Action to Stop War & Occupation.

Follow the DASWO twitter: text follow DASWO to 40404

***

EDITOR'S NOTE:

The end of the video includes the text from a leaflet distributed by the Anti-War Committee in the Twin Cities. The helpful background text explains the troop commitments and offers facts about the war in Afghanistan. See http://antiwarcommittee.org/ for more information.

For more information and other coverage of this protest, see this article on Twin Cities Indymedia:
http://tc.indymedia.org/2009/dec/anti-troop-surge-protest-clears-streets-down...

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Tags:

• Afghanistan
• surge
• war
• obama
• minneapolis
• protest
• direct
• action
• downtown
• loring
• park
• arrests
• police
• coleen
• rowley

[nigelparry]

It didn't get chanted that long. Yeah, the F-word was shut down pretty quickly by consensus. :-) Someone said "There are kids around".

[maxpowersstp]

You all voted for him and you will all vote for him again so shut up. You act like Obama even cares about you. he got your votes thats all he needed. That is why your protest is so small. Democrats will vote for war all day as long as they are in power. Now let's all sit back and enjoy our shitty Obamacare that you dumb fuckers let pass by protesting a war instead of his shitty health care plan.

[vangion]

@MrShoveitupyourass Fucj you loser

You speak for Canada now?

[MrShoveitupyourass]

Canada loves you

Keep up the fight for Peace...and a better tomorrow.

We are not angry at you, we know you can't help the Monster government that has come in like a bad virus and has destroyed your once great nation.

Do what must be done , to take back your house from the ememy

[1343kane]

as a active duty marine and afghan vet these people are dumb

[sakonhagakure]

the tea partiers need to take lessons from these guys. The tea partiers just protest in 1 central location, state their message and leave peacefully. you guys really got this protesting thing down. You block off traffic, march the entire city, and in some cases cause acts of vandalism.

[KennyIISan]

Bring them home? Then we get attacked again? No thank you.

[GodBlesstheGrass]

Oh my gosh. I was in the back of the parade and I didn't hear them saying the "F" word in the front! I'm prejudiced against that word due to how many times I had to transribe it for Mafia prosecutions in NYC in the 1980s. My quote wasn't very articulate but it was a take-off of Ghandi's, given the professional policing: "First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they escort you, then you win."