My Protest Experience Today.

I heard Cindy was going to be in town to talk to Mel Watt (D - 12 district of NC) about impeachment. She was supposed to be there at 2 but we left at 3:30 and she had not yet made her way there. A nice group of us showed up and although it was hot I was still excited. We were all outside holding signs and such when an employee came out of the building. She could have gone around the protesters but I watched as she huffed and took both elbows, dug them into two males and then pushed them out of the way! She then went over to the cops, across the street, to complain about us! They were pretty nice and asked us to leave a walkway space for people to get through and we were happy to oblige. I just could not believe how rude the woman had been but there was more to come.....

About half an hour later the owner of the building came out and said we must get off the steps and not enter HIS building or risk being arrested! Not many of us were on the stairs and those that were had remained off to one side as not to block the entrance. He threatened people with arrest and then, after we had moved, he went over and talked to a cop (while also talking on his cell phone) for a good solid ten minutes or more.

The whole incident upset me to no end. I went over and complained to a newsman and said if they wanted a story while waiting for Cindy, they should get that guy's story since he seemed to think even though he housed a public representative that it was his private building and we would be arrested if we went in thus blocking our right to see the person who is supposed to be representing us in the government. The pretty boy correspondent shrugged and I proceeded to tell him off. I said how the world would be much better off if the news people would stop reporting on the umpteenth missing blonde bimbo and start concentrating on the important things happening in our country. I did say I applaud him for covering Cindy Sheehan and the impeachment issue but I said that our rights are being trampled across the board and all they seem to report is fluff. I guess I should have talked to the wall for all he cared but it sure felt good to vent!

Will we be seeing you on the news in a few minutes? :D

edit to add I forgot WGHP Fox affiliate. I never watch them anyway LOL
There may be something on that new channel 14 station..they had coverage of Cindy at Charlotte

No, they took footage mostly of poeple with signs and flags. I was not sure if I was going today or tomorrow so I did not have signs ready for today. But I did feel the most important thing was showing up and giving my support to the impeachment process.

Where will you be tomorrow? Cindy is supposed to be at Howard Coble's office at 10 AM. That, too, is in regards to impeachment.

I bet I know who the "prettyboy" is. I ran into someone similar at the last peace rally here. What a fuckhead!

Anyway, now you have me concerned. I was about to leave to see Cindy at Bennett tonight. I wonder if she made it here??

Thanks for the feedback!

:hug:

I get all of my news off the internet! I hardly ever watch TV news any more. He had blonde hair, in his 30's, maybe 35 or so? He wore loafers and as he talked on the phone he took one loafer off and massaged his bare foot! (yuck!)

She had not made it when we left. I am not sure if she is in Greensboro now or not. I think the boys and I will go to Coble's office tomorrow. You bringing the kids tonight? I bet they have grown!

the older boy is at camp. Actually they are older but not much bigger. They take after my hubby, a late growth spurter.

Crap! I wish I could find out if she is here. :crazy:

I would be interested in knowing how it went as compared with today. Have fun and be safe.

Peace!

I'm here at Atlantic Beach this week but wish I was there.

I love, love, love Atlantic Beach.

We all have to pitch in to make it work. Hope you have fun at Atlantic Beach.

...I would quibble with calling the missing blondes "bimbos."

I agree with you, I was so mad with the reporter just shrugging and not even caring. To me, it would make great footage to see this guy saying people were not allowed access to a public official.....although that is what they do at *'s rallies, isn't it? It was the first time I came face to face with someone in the media blindly ignoring items and I let loose. I do agree I should not have used that word. Thank you for being so nice and respectful in your correction.

thought the tee-vee was going to mention it

She was only in Charlotte. I hope she did not get in an accident or anything.

just mentioned Cindy in Greensboro (only mentioned) but now they're doing a story about staff at Moses Cone doing care packages for soldiers...

totally ignored the Cindy story

I think they would have had camera coverage if she had been there. They sat around long enough and waited for at least an hour and a half. They would get footage if she were there.

I caught the tail end of it....did mention that Cindy didn't show, but they did talk to a couple of protesters on camera...not a bad piece actually..the one at 5:30 was awful though...They may have video on the WXII website.

It remains a private building and is owned by someone. You have no right to block the entrance or gain entry. Doesn't Watt have an office at your publicly owned State House? There you have a right to enter and see your representative.

Perhaps a professional attitude would serve you better in your contact with the press. That might keep them covering Cindy, instead of discounting her and her followers as fringe kooks.

Just an idea.

I will say I have been in that building before when a friend of mine had to hire a lawyer from that building. There are many, many lawyer's offices in that building....go figure since it is across the street from the jail. It is a building many public people would go into. I already plan on calling Mr. Watt's office tomorrow to complain so we shall see if his office is meant to be a private one that his constituents may not go to at any time and if they back up the owner. If so, fine.

We did not block the entrance at any time. We were waiting to gain entry only because Mel's office had said he would see the protesters ten at a time. Ten people were already in there talking to him.

I started off being very professional. It would seem they have already discounted Cindy. Me telling the truth (albeit, I never should have said the word 'bimbo') is akin to Michale Moore telling the truth. I am sorry if they can not stand it but if they did their jobs this country would not be the disaster zone it has become. And just for the record, he did not get up and leave and decide not to cover Cindy because of me. He was still there when I left.

Just a fact.

Just a fact. Here's another, you can't block access to a private or public building, even on the sidewalk.

Just a hint, you need to google a picture of this building.

or "Why don't you guys cover..." I could buy something nice.

If, on the other hand, I had a dollar for every time someone suggested a good story, I could buy a pack of smokes. Maybe.

The general public has no conception of how news organizations work, but they assume they all work badly because they don't cover the stories they think are important. What they don't understand is reporters are assigned to cover A and they're expected to write about A, unless B breaks, where B is something like "Cindy Sheehan shot at Congressman's office."

Sometimes it's "Yes, we should do a story on that. Why don't you suggest it to my editor, who takes his orders from the managing editor, who takes his orders from the publisher, who takes his orders from the stockholders? Because if I suggest it, he's just gonna laugh at me and/or chew me out."

It isn't nearly as simple as most people think it is. Not anymore.

Edit to add: Sometimes when you do get a good tip, you say, "Yeah, that sounds interesting. Who would I contact about that?" and the response is either "I don't know. Can't you find that out?" or "Oh, you didn't hear this from me. I don't want to get involved." :eyes:

I actually felt if he had even approached the man then the man would have backed down. Republicans are pretty much full of hot air until someone confronts them. Soon as they see that small bit of bright light they scurry away like cockroaches.

I have a pretty good idea how news organizations work. They are owned by corporations and those corporations are Republican owned. They decided that they should not report anything that is against their best interest. Yeah, I know. I don't even know why any protesters, kept from going to *'s public speeches, were reported on. It is a darn wonder, you know? And free speech zones are nothing to report on.....move along, nothing to see in *'s Ameruka.

By the way, if it had been a real tip, like the latest missing blonde, he would have had everything he needed - the protesters that were threatened with arrest were right in front of him and I pointed to the 'owner' (who wasn't the owner and we would have found that out with one or two questions) across the street. Everything was right in front of him unlike the Watergate story where they were led in a general direction and they had to do legwork.

More than anything, it bugged me how superficial this guy came across. The cameraman got up and took footage. This guy went over to the shade. He played with his manicured fingernails, and took off his shoes as he massaged his feet. He sat there and even got attitude when his paper called him telling him he had to go to a movie theater after they left the protest. He got of the phone and started complaining to his cameraman about where they had to go afterward. It was like it was a bother that they even wanted him to work. There was more but I will not bore you with all of that.

I just got off the phone with Mel Watt's office and wanted to say they were upset that we were treated that way. What you may find interesting is that the man coming out saying he was the owner and he would have us arrested if we tried to go on the steps or inside the building was NOT the owner. The representative from Mel's office had me describe the guy and it was not the owner. On top of that, Mel's office had spoken to the owner to let him know what would be going on and they had the owner's approval. We talked it over and came to a decision that from here on out when protests are held, at this location, Mel's office will speak directly to the protesters outside and let them know that they have full approval of the owner. That way when someone comes out trying to break up the whole gathering, we will be armed with information to know we are in the right and we will not be intimidated.

This is nothing new, the more I protest the more I run into these types of tactics. I protested at another reps office last year. We were on a public sidewalk and a man from the building tried to scare us away. When that did not work he called the cops on us and said we were out in traffic stopping cars, handing out flyers to them, and any pedestrians that came by we would stand in a line and not let them pass! When the cop showed up he could see we were being peaceful. He saw we did not have brochures to pass out. He also noted that we had left a nice walkway so people could get by without us blocking them. The cop left shortly after that.

I am sick and tired of these tactics and perhaps if these people stopped getting away with it, we would all be a safer and nicer country.

We were there because their guest speaker was a republican senator who was sponsoring a bill cutting medicaid.

The young GOPers kept coming out of the restaurant hassling us and threatening to call the police. I was hoping they would, since I knew a public sidewalk is well, public. (I have done my fair share of protesting.)

Finally the senator arrived and was very nice. He talked to us and listened to our concerns and held the young GOPers off.

It was amazing though that they didn't even try to talk to us or find out why we were there. Their first reaction was wanting to call the cops!!

I keep learning more and more about my rights as I keep protesting. We did all stand out on the sidewalk yesterday and Mel Watt's office said we had behaved exceptionally well. It was great that the senator took the time to talk to you. How long ago was this? Just wondering with the current political atmosphere.

I am glad you had a good protest. Did you see Cindy?

And my little one woke up sick this morning so we could not see her then, either. I guess we will see her next time. We mether last time she was here. That was nice.

and the "owner" of that confronted you? There are a couple of asswipes in this building and I am curious to see if it is who I think it is.

I came out and yesterday for a little while. I didn't see anyone blocking the entrance.