Indymedia covers Info war+ FTAA protests.

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After watching this video it only reinforced what I thought was happening at these rallies. I didn't think about the embedded journalists, but it only makes sense.

I was somewhat astounded seeing the police officer refusing to give his badge number. Call me naive. Another part I found interesting was the lawyer who did absolutely nothing getting pelted with rubber bullets.




[edit on 7-10-2006 by DontTreadOnMe]

Anyone who doubts that the US is a police state should look at this video. It shows quite clearly that police are prepared to use tasers and nightsticks on peaceful protesters, including women. They're also prepared to trample on whatever rights are supposed to be possessed by Americans in order to keep protests away from the hotel where the FTAA meeting is taking place.

It's funny how you never see this kind of viewpoint in the mainstream media, isn't it?

Around 50 minutes in there's the footage of the woman being shot with rubber bullets. She's dressed in a business suit and is holding a board on which is written "fear totalitarianism". She's walking peacefully, on her own, in front of a line of policemen all clad in full riot gear - and they shoot her with rubber bullets, for no reason at all.

Someone asks her how she feels knowing that she'll never get coverage in the mainstream media, and she says, "Oh, I know I'll never get covered, I'm middle-aged, middle-class, and in a business suit." All the MSM want to concentrate on is the kids with weird hair and dress who can be demonised as an outgroup. The fact that many educated, peaceable people also think the FTAA sucks and are prepared to peacefully protest is better kept quiet.

And as for the "embedded reporters"... I was appalled by the coverage they produced. There's a great clip of some neofascist bimbo reporter, who rather gives the game away by saying, "we were closer to the police lines than the protesters'... because we didn't want to get hit with anything." There's an underlying logic that says, well, that's because the police were the ones on the offensive, but this would obviously be difficult to acknowledge. Instead, she says that their van was surrounded by protesters who slashed one of their tyres and wrote "propaganda" on it in magic marker. An accurate assessment, too, by the look of things.

And could it be a surprise, given that the police were being so intimidating, that they'd gone round to Overtown (a poverty-stricken and predominantly black district of Miami) and suggested to various shady types that if they robbed protesters and media people who weren't embedded, that there would be no action taken? There are several witness testimonies to this effect, and one from an independent film maker who was robbed of all his equipment and film at gunpoint while police looked on and did nothing?

Americans - you need to realise. The police state is already here.