Protestors Greet Ashcroft in Portland

OPB News

Protestors Greet Ashcroft in Portland


By Ley Garnett

PORTLAND, OR 2003-07-18 (OPB Radio) - Attorney General John Ashcroft is in Portland today, meeting with members of the Joint Terrorism Taskforce. When he arrived for the meeting Ashcroft was greeted by hundreds of protestors gathered outside the Hatfield Federal Courthouse. OPB's Ley Garnett describes the scene.

It's a raucous scene here. Sidewalks are blocked around the courthouse. A line of police motorcycles and bicycles are in front of the demonstrators across the street.

Protestors are holding signs reading "Stop Ashcroft," "Free Liberty Now" and other signs that say things we can't repeat on the radio.
(snip/...)

http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/opb/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=523462

Ring the bell. America is waking up.

Look for really nasty distractions to begin momentarily.

My country
Your country
Our country

Reclaimed and restored

Bear down DUrs!!!

Time is of the essence!!!

:bounce:

KOBE KOBE KOBE
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=61872&mesg_id=61872&page=

Waiting anxiously for pics, but this report seems biased.

this guy's policies are unreal.

Especially when he covered up the naked statue at the Justice Dept

that was unclothed for 70 years.

"It's a Washington cover-up of a different sort. The Justice Department spent $8,000 on blue drapes to hide two giant, partially nude statues in the Great Hall of the agency's headquarters, said spokesman Shane Hix. The Great Hall is an ornate, two-story room that the department uses for ceremonies and special speeches. The drapes were occasionally hung in front of the aluminum Art Deco statues before formal events, "for aesthetics," Hix said. The department used to rent the drapes, but has now purchased them and left them hanging."

Yikes what a mentally ill reptile

he became available for AG. They're a circle of evil who are the sons of Lucifer. Let's ask Robertson to say a real pray/; God save America from the GOP/Bush/Christian Coalition Crime Satan Families who are destroying the world.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/oct2002/well-o29.shtml

They really help.

From your last link:

(snip) In November 2001, Ashcroft announced that the Drug Enforcement Administration would discipline Oregon physicians who prescribed lethal doses of barbiturates to terminally ill patients. The directive was challenged and is currently under appeal in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. Ashcroft clashed with Oregon officials again in December 2001. Portland police officials refused Ashcroft's request to interview Middle Eastern immigrants for their knowledge about terrorism, saying to do so would violate a state law. The FBI said it would interview the immigrants without local police help. (snip/)

State's Rights for Oregon!

and anti-patriot act reasons (well, I support all the groups they lsited).

Code Pink was there....and set the tone of the protest.

The BEST participant was a young gal, about 24 years old dressed up as the statue of liberty! With the head gear and all! Except. she had ropes tied around her, restraining her...and a gag over her mouth. And you could here her try to say: Help me! Help me! Free me!

It was a show stopper for sure!

There were quite a number of people in ibm/repub type dress: blue suits, white shirts......standing with the police in front of us in the 'free speech zone' -- talking on their cell phones, of course, wearing jet black sunglasses, and TAKING PICTURES and video of us protesters. I tried to get everyone to say CHEESE! Damned spooks!

And you could see all in the tinted windows of the 18 or so floor courthouse a bunch of justice workers lined up against the windows watching everything.

Code pink had a great marching band and kept the spirit up as they circled the courthouse and the park...bang bang banging away.

I appreciate that OPB called it a RUCKUS time.....but it's really sedate. They got the numbers estimated correctly (that's a first!). In fact, I think they exaggerated it a bit! Which is fine......since they estimated our 30K numbers in March to be about 20K too few!

NO SIGN OF ASHCROFT......I think he came and left by helicopter, quite frankly. You should have heard the code pink's little chant about Ashcroft being CHICKEN!

I've attended many a protest in Portland, but couldn't make this one. Glad you could represent.

:hi: Great story about the Statue of Lib lady. The street theater really helps, doesn't it?

He gave Portland 24 hour notice that he was coming. Real brave there john, real brave.

he thinks they represent Satan.

you'd think he'd know better!

Oh the rally? You want to know?!? IMHO the rally rocked! A good
turn-out, esp. considering the short notice. Drum corps was there. Black Cross too. Death with Dignity. And a good pink turn-out - let's see ... Pam, Joe, Rabia, Sasha (with her artist-roommate Zoe, 1st time), Olivia, Marilou, Crystal, Beverly, Theresa, me ... oh, maybe more....

Anyway, it was a good-sized crowd. The police blocked off only the
courthouse block itself - we were allowed to rally right across the
street. Sometimes we all marched around the block (on the other side of the street of course!). Code Pink led with our banner when we marched - with the drum corps right behind us. At one point we were marching alongside the block where the jail is and the inmates' cheering was almost deafening. They always love it when we protest. (I know this on good authority - a young man I know sometimes tends to have trouble with anger management and winds up in jail ... This spring during the peace protests he told me how much they all love it when we're out there protesting.)

Radical Cheerleader Paula came. She had a good cheer which we used:

A - L - I-B-I - you ain't got no alibi.
You're ugly - John Ashcroft - You're ugly! Huh!
Racial profiling - ugly!
Patriot Act - ugly!
Revocation assisted suicice - ugly! ugly! ugly!

A - L - I-B-I - you ain't got no alibi.
You're weird - John Ashcroft - You're weird! Huh!
Racial profiling - weird!
Patriot Act - weird!
Revocation assisted suicice - weird! weird! weird!

then we started making up more verses...

A - L - I-B-I - you ain't got no alibi.
You're scared - John Ashcroft - You're scared! Huh!
Calico cats - meowwwwww!
Naked ladies - wooOOOoo!
People speaking for our rights - you're scared! scared! scared!

A - L - I-B-I - you ain't got no alibi.
You're fired - John Ashcroft - You're fired! Huh!
Nationalism - you're fired!
Moral arrogance - you're fired!
Anti-women - you're ass is fired!

That was fun and pretty popular - everybody laughed. But the rhythm was a bit too random for the drum corps to join in on. Then sometimes we just chanted over and over:

Kiss my Ashchroft

Rabia made up a song to the tune of Mickey Mouse ...

D E M - O C R - A C Y for me!
Bill of rights, bill of rights,
Forever will I hold your banner high!
etc.

Paula and I each wore one of my hot pink long satin gloves - the "pink power" fist was prominent and enjoyed by all.

Oh and at the end when we marched over to Pioneer Square we marched around the square in "military formation" in two columns behind our banner, chanting in that military sing-song chant:

De - pleted uranium -
We just want our troops back home!

Code Pink outreach was pretty successful - I had flyers and songbook
handouts sticking out of my pink backpack and lots of people asked for and took some. I'd expect an upcoming increase in our list membership.

Police behavior which I personally witnessed was pretty restrained - though of course it remains to be seen if reports turn up on indymedia about bad cop stuff that was not so obvious.

Anyway, all in all it was a pretty good protest and maybe a harbinger of more to come. I'd say Asscroft was not disappointed - we kept up our reputation as "Little Beirut" - and a good time was had by all!

Plus Lady Liberty