Skating the Democratic National Convention

Epiblog

2004-07-30T04:23:00.000-07:00

Maps and photographs are on the official Skating the DNC web site: MY SITE
Featured Hot Spots of The Day:
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City Hall: Bl(a)ck Tea Time
Each hot spot is linked to a photo Album.
The photos are in chronological order.
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On the final evening of the convention the street media finally got some of what the Democrats have been calling 'red meat'. Three arrests and a flag burning in a petty incident that pretty much focused on the infamous Free Speech Zone.
Bl(a)ck Tea Bagged
I arrived at the Canal Street/Free Speech area shortly after the incident and saw no evidence of a problem and no change in the usual ambiance, no lingering bad vibes.
I paid my least respects to the Free Speech Zone. Now that there will be nobody wanting to say something, there is no need for all that fencing and barbed wire. I skated with about a hundred Bl(a)ck Tea people as they Marched from Canal Street to the Commons in an innocuous demonstration. They were visibly tired from a long day of protests and when they arrived at the Commons the survivors settled down in the shade. There were more speakers: one a man who, in the 60's, had spent a year in jail for draft resistance: a timely subject for the exhausted young men and women who may well have some difficult choices to make.
Everybody was through with it all. The cops were bored, the marchers exhausted, the spectators (like me) jaded. I took the long way home on a skate along the river on a beautiful summer evening, savoring the quiet and peacefulness that the DNC had brought. Boston had been evacuated, but where had the people all gone? Interesting story in the Herald:
Return from Limbo
As city officials continue to spin the unrealized revenue windfall as 'prospects of gain', the rest of us are left with the bill and a few 'guests' who just won't seem to leave.
The MBTA claims the right to retain the Random Search policy.
The high-resolution security cameras will turn away from the fleet center and cast their stare into 'high-crime areas'.
The bill to the taxpayers won't go away anytime soon: the new police and fireman contracts, inked in haste to preclude a messy labor dispute during the convention, the vast amounts of overtime for the same .. and on and on. The Globe gives a good final accounting:
The check, please ...
What did it all come to? What was gained and lost? What will abide now that the road show has moved on? I have an answer: the road itself.
All that new pavement will remain right where they put it: a vast improvement in the skating environment in Boston that will bring joy to skaters and boarders and bicycle riders for years to come. From that perspective, the DNC was a fabulous success. To the City, the Public Works Department and to all the men who laid the asphalt I say thank you, thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
To all who have read this blog, my best wishes. May we never loose sight of the real objective: the restoration and protection of our liberty and the honor of our country.
Parker T. Pettus

Prisoners and Politics

2004-07-29T05:01:00.000-07:00

Maps and photographs are on the official Skating the DNC web site: MY SITE
Featured Hot Spots of The Day:
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Copley: Protesting Prisoner Abuse
Each hot spot is linked to a photo Album. The photos are in chronological order
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Wednesday was a damp and cloudy day but the small turnouts at the protest events can't be blamed on the weather. The sickening photos from Abu Gharib and the baleful images from Guantanamo were big news not long ago: a shattering, national disgrace.
So, why did less than two hundred people show up to protest the treatment of prisoners in Copley Square yesterday? The existence of those photos did - and still do - much to undermine an effort that good men and women are dying for, so even pro-war types could have found a real justification to attend. They didn't.
Of the celebrity pols, only Dennis Kucinich made an appearance. He said good things about basic human rights and decency for about ten minutes and then left without mingling with the crowd. Very little media, no TV, no AL Gore to rail against those who would drag the good name of our country through torture chambers and rape rooms built by Saddam and which are now under American management. We hung around for a bit and then went to lunch.

The big story in Boston all week has been the lack of a big story and today's papers continue to focus on the big hit small businesses in Boston are taking from the DNC.
Article.
I keep asking myself if this is all there is. The country has suffered the two most spectacular and devastating 'intelligence failures' in its history, gone to war with a country for a bunch of red-herring issues, Bush has cynically leveraged 9/11 to serve a special interest agenda and everyone seems to have gone to the beach. The Globe wonders if the anger is being save for the Republican convention.
Where'd they go?
baloney. The Left had plenty of work to do in Boston and they could not even write the job description. The Democrats are tip-towing all around Iraq and the intelligence nightmares as if they were poison ivy. They have embraced Bush's 'stay the course' nonsense. The Dems love to talk jobs and health care but that platform is a pipe dream as long as this country continues to hemorrhage money on security, weapons and warfare. If the best hope for the Left is the Democrats, why did the left not vigorously demand that the Democratic Machine configure itself to provide a clear alternative to the worst administration in American History? Where's the outrage? Where's the plan? Kerry embraced pre-emptive strikes the other day. Great plan. Maybe the protest did not materialize because everyone knew that listening to the grass roots had stopped the minute Kerry clinched the nomination and now the Democratic Party has locked itself in a televised fortress to play party politics and win the election. Kucinich caved completely to the Party. Sharpton, in one of the best speeches I have ever heard, ultimately mounted that Donkey. In uniting for victory, this party has built a political potemkin village on the same rotten foundation that the Republicans will stand on in New York.

It's easier to win a race than it is to plan a route that really takes you somewhere you want to go. Whoever breaks the tape in November will find himself right back at the starting line.

Billionaires March the DNC but where's the money?

2004-07-28T04:28:00.000-07:00

Maps and photographs are on the official Skating the DNC web site: MY SITE
Featured Hot Spots of The Day:
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Faneuil Hall: The Million Billionaire March
Each hot spot is linked to a photo Album. The photos are in chronological order
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'Billionaires for Bush' brought their hilarious yet sharply pointed political message to the streets of Boston yesterday evening. In a exuberant display of conspicuous assumptions and in the finest spirit of Noblise N'oblige, an ostentatious parade of billionaires reawakened the hearts and minds of ordinary Bostonians to the kind of respect and deference to the wealthy that has been the foundation of proper societies throughout the history of Western civilization.
Haughty, arrogant and dismissive of the 'little people' who looked on from the sidewalk, the Plutocrats on promenade openly referred to the police bicycle escort as 'The Hired Help'. The cops? Bemused, smiling and enjoying the scene.
That the aristocratic elite would deign to assemble and walk the streets in support of a President and Administration is a magnificent testimony to the fervent patriotism and undying gratitude that tax breaks to the wealthy can inspire.
I skated the event as a participant, wearing a rollerfrisbee team uniform I had put together years ago: a tuxedo t-shirt with 'Beacon Hill Brahmins' printed on the back. In some places the cobblestones were a hazard but in most places the going was very smooth and I was able to move freely: getting photos of the parade from all angles, at times photographing while skating backwards in order to hold the distance between myself and the marchers constant. I don't recommend doing this with your best camera.
'Billionaires for Bush' will be preaching to the choir in New York at the Republican Convention.
Become a Billionaire
Oh, yes: let us not forget the reason for the presence of all this DNC stuff, the foundation to the decision to host this event: the money. It seems that the money did not come to town along with the bomb-sniffing dogs, the Anti-War veterans, the Delegates, the f-16s and the Falun Dafa. The city proffered visions of delegates wandering the city under some strange compulsion to spend as much money as possible. No doubt they were relying on CIA on FBI estimates, because the local merchants bought into this fantasy as eagerly as the Bush Administration bought into the WMD 'intelligence' and the promise of a war that would pay for itself with oil.
The Money Pumps have come up dry.
And now, just like Sadam's weapons stockpiles, the piles of cash cannot be found. The city, hermetically sealed for our protection, has scared off the hundreds of thousands of people who work in and visit the city every day in exchange for a relatively small number of Delegates and Media, who are themselves largely confined to the security of the TV studio called the Fleet Center, private parties and their hotels.
Another Intelligence Failure
It was another incredible evening skating. It's raining today so I'll be flat-footing it this afternoon. We're expecting dry weather for tomorrow and I'll have a chance for the Big Skate Finale.

Skating in Guantanamo

2004-07-27T04:51:00.000-07:00

Maps and photographs are on the official Skating the DNC web site: MY SITE
Featured Hot Spots of The Day:
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Fleet: Skating in Guantanamo
Other Sights: Kennedys at the Greenway Dedication, Jesse Jackson and Dennis Kucinich
Each hot spot is linked to a photo Album. The photos are in chronological order
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Yesterday was the opening day of major road closings and the first day to realize the supreme street skating scenario I have long anticipated: Skating the Democratic National Convention. There was never any question that the first order of business would be to play rollerfrisbee in the 'Free Speech Zone'. The skate to Guantanamo North took us through Copley, The Commons, Park Street and City Hall Plaza. The only 'political' groups in evidence was the Falun Dafa people at Copley Plaza, quietly meditating. The city was quiet and uncrowded: only the constant beating of the helicopters and the occasional low rumble of the F-16s on combat air patrol disturbed a peaceful summer afternoon. Boston is not deserted, but delightfully subdued. Quiet on the set: a TV show is in progress.
The Free Speech Zone was nearly deserted: populated only by a small knot of people in one corner of the pen, where a small stage and microphone were provided to any who wished to say something. The sound system is a bullhorn-grade loudspeaker that turned ordinary human speech into a grating, metallic monotone, making everyone sound like Hillary Clinton. The group du jour was some nameless 'anti-fag' coalition of the ill-willing who were singing an adaptation of an old patriotic favorite: 'God Hates America'.
The Free Speech Zone is not a good rollerfrisbee venue. The asphalt surface is uneven and littered with small stones and dirt, like the construction site it is. It is skateable, however, and it was possible for us to get in a few rounds, if only for the sake of defying the oppressive nature of the place.
We also played a little bit on Canal Street, where the access to the Zone is. There's more room, new pavement and very few people. The voice-mangling PA system in the Zone was clearly audible in the street, sufficiently annoying to drive away anyone who has ears enough to listen.
Skating throughout the city was superb. Tonight the rain should hold off enough to grant another evening on wheels and time to skate the 'Billionaires for Bush' event.
THE MILLION BILLIONAIRE MARCH
My photographer friend from Maine has set up camp in my living room and is also covering the goings-on. As a non-skater he has been attending events in other venues and taking some very impressive photos in the process. Take a look the 'Other Sights' hot spot on the web site home page.

A Peace March, A Parade, A Backbone for Kerry

2004-07-26T04:25:00.000-07:00

Maps and photographs are on the official Skating the DNC web site: MY SITE
Featured Hot Spots of The Day:
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Common: For the Start of the Anti-War March
Fleet: Continuation of March coverage
Copley: The Falun Dafa parade and the 'Peaceful Tomorrows' stone.
Other Sights: Kucinich speaks and Kerry is offered a backbone
Each hot spot is linked to a photo album. The photos are in chronological order.
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Boston was happening yesterday: everywhere, all day and evening. A lovely summer day, one day before the official opening of the DNC, was filled with peaceful protest, peaceful demonstrations and peaceful policemen. Everywhere I went there was heavy security without heavy-handedness. I had pleasant encounters with a few policemen in ordinary uniform and while it was not always easy to get the other cops in full riot gear to return a smile, they were in no way threatening. The contrast could not be more striking: the streets full of people in t-shirts and shorts or costumes of may kinds and on the sidewalks and side streets were formations of police in black helmets, black body armor, black uniforms and black weapons. The police were decidedly overdressed for such a casual event. It was not black tie, however, because those plastic wrist restraints they keep at the ready are white. All in all, it was as if the cops had prepared for a pitched street battle and found themselves at a beach party.

The 'Bring Our Troops Home Now' rally was not large: maybe 2000 people. It was a politically eclectic crowd and issues ran the gamut from Iraq to Aristide. It never came close to disorder, much less violence: at the pre-march rally one speaker cautioned his listeners not to fall asleep because they'd all be marching soon. It was exactly what one might hope a peace march would be, except really big. Peaceful protest is unobtrusive in nature and it needs a lot of people to be effective. This march was cheerful and boisterous and certainly had its say, but the headline on the Globe today panned the effort due to lack of attendance.
Short Handed
This march was the only one that will be allowed to go past the Fleet Center during the convention. It also passed by the Free Speech Zone, which was virtually ignored. The streets were full of free expression of all kinds.

In a incredible contrast in style and culture, the Falun Dafa (Gong) people held a huge parade from Copley Square to Chinatown. There were easily 5,000 marchers (maybe twice as many) who marched, danced and paused to practice their form of meditation for short periods. They had come from all over the world to make their plea to the Democrats for protection from persecution. One marcher asked me personally to 'tell them to stop killing us'. I confess to knowing little about this group beyond the fact that they practice something that seems to be a completely harmless cross between Tai Chi and catatonia and that they claim to be persecuted in China. They made me welcome as I skated at the edge of their parade and they were always very pleased when I stopped to take a photo. they were quick to make eye contact, smile and wave.

Dennis Kucinich made an appearance in a Boston neighborhood called Jamaica Plain and at that rally were the members of The Backbone Campaign.
Skull and Bones might need a Spine
This is a group of artists and political activists from the Seattle area who think that Kerry should take some of that starch out of his shorts and show a little backbone. He needs to: his anti-Viet Nam war quote about who would ask the last man to die for a lie is much in evidence yesterday and the anti-war faction finds Kerry's position on Iraq to represent a loss of memory, a loss of principle or maybe just a loss of bone mass.

Today the convention begins in earnest and yesterday's superb skating conditions will to far exceeded. The weather today is good but the forecast is mixed. For tonight, at least, Boston will be a paradise of open pavement.

A Peaceful Summer Evening

2004-07-24T06:39:00.000-07:00

Photos and Maps for this blog: MY WEB SITE
Today's Featured Home Page Hotspot: Faneuil Hall.

Friday night was hot and steamy and Boston was a busy yet peaceful place to be. There were two events with thematic ties to the Convention: the Sox were hosting the Yankees (aka: The Evil Empire) and Shakespeare's 'Much Ado About Nothing' was playing to the public on Boston Common. A third event with a more direct connection to the spirit of the DNC was an evening of speakers at Faneuil Hall, sponsored by Veterans for Peace and We The People. Faneuil Hall was built in 1742 and has been an important political venue ever since Sam Adams (Brewer and Patriot) held forth (and froth)in the name of Liberty.
Veterans spoke for peaceful means for peaceful ends. One, a woman veteran and lawyer, spoke out against rape and abuse in the military, of which she was both a victim and prosecutor. The abuse, she reports, is rampant and justice difficult to find.
Daniel Ellsberg was the featured speaker. He reminded the audience that no matter who wins the election they will need prodding and pressure by the electorate if they hope to realize an honest and open government. He described Senator Kerry's explanation for his war powers vote for Bush (that it was a 'vote for a process, not a war') as bullshit. Realist as he is, Ellsberg went on to say that bullshit is the lingua franca of politics, so deal with it.
There were a lot of Vietnam-era vets there, quite a few with graying pony tails and there was a protest-folk singer with his acoustic guitar. The rhetoric was comfortable and familiar: brotherhood, peace, non-violence.
The words have really not changed so much since the anti-war days of the late 60's, but the landscape sure has: 'Pre-emptive' warfare, the desperate quest for absolute security, villains who live in caves, terrorism, The Patriot Act, and our growing status as a rogue nation. It seemed to me that these new threats could use a new vocabulary of discussion, new modes of political organization and new ways of informing ourselves. The old ways seem a little threadbare. During the winter before the war on Iraq was launched the largest peace demonstrations in history took place and the familiar words were spoken and the familiar arguments given and it just didn't matter. The people spoke and were politely ignored. I heard many important things last night but nothing new, nothing that does not have a long history of being ignored.
The phrase "The World Has Changed Since 9/11" is a new, powerful bit of rhetoric. It has been adopted by the government to justify illegal warfare, erosion of civil rights, unlawful arrests and extra-judicial murder. 9/11 is a trump card that is played on every size table: international, national, community. This need not be the case, but it will be until the Left offers an alternative to the bottomless pit of total security. So far, it has not. It will have to if it is to survive.
Walking home through Boston's shopping district I saw plenty of garbage barrels and large piles of unattended trash bags stitting on sidewalks. This in a crowded downtown area; quite in contrast to the denuded sidewalks in residential Back Bay. Strange.
Today the Globe reports that eight F-16 fighters will patrol the skies over Boston on a 24-hour basis during the DNC. So far the officials have done nothing to protect the city from meteors.
Buzzing Beantown

Legally Sad

2004-07-23T04:58:00.000-07:00

They washed down Newbury Street again this morning. This formerly residential street, lined with trees, expensive boutiques, sidewalk restaurants and cafes is Boston's hottest promenade; I came, I saw, I was seen.
All this attention to street cleaning and decoration by the city brings to mind the old apologies for Fascist regimes: Mussolini made the trains run on time, Hitler made the Autobahn. I hope that the current fastidiousness is not the harbinger of a new, totalitarian America.
Things seem to auger in favor of clean streets and repression. Despite calling the Free Speech Zone 'an affront to Free Expression' Judge Woodlock responded to the anger and complaints by those who would speak freely with no changes whatsoever in the barbed wire cage that many activists are now certain to boycott. Woodlock said that it is `irrefutably sad' but necessary because of protesters' antics in New York and Los Angeles.
This is called preemptive collective punishment. For the government to subject the public to this kind of repression because of the acts of a few people at other events at other times is quite a bit more than 'sad'. This town is swarming with police and security with every high-tech gadget and weapon available and they act as if the citizens they are supposed to protect are as mindlessly dangerous as so many flesh-eating zombies.
I plan to visit the Free-Speech Zone during the convention and report on conditions inside. I promise not to say a word while I'm in there.
Stuck under the tracks

Unspeakable

2004-07-22T05:12:00.000-07:00

I skated to the Free Speech Zone yesterday afternoon to have a look for myself. The photos are posted on this blog's web site (see header). Look for the 'Fleet Center and Free Speech Zone' hot spot.
This is not a zone, an area or even a proper space. It is an aggressively punitive holding cell beneath an abandoned ramp: enclosed with layers of metal fencing, covered by black netting, wreathed in barbed wire. It is built as if to constrain a menagerie of starving wild animals, gone crazy with hydrophobia. Looking into this ... prison, it is impossible to imagine that it was built with anything but absolute contempt for Free Speech and total disregard anybody who wants to do so.
It is an insult to free people .... or maybe a wake-up call to people who imagine themselves to be free. This is a place for troglodytes to line up for self-incarceration and to sulk and catcall from within a security web of steel, wire and mesh. Nobody in that dungeon could be called 'Free'.

The determination of the Boston Police to picket the convention, determined to protest the arbitration of their contract dispute, has caused the cancellation of at least two events for delegations who will not cross the picket line.
This Party's over

The Twilight Zone / Labor Pains / Something Fishy

2004-07-21T04:39:00.000-07:00

The Free Speech Zone is on the front page today. It's not exactly where I thought it would be and I doubt if any of the protest organizers, ACLU or the Lawyer's Guild expected it would turn out this way. They are all in court today protesting the location. It's under a section of unused elevated trolley tracks that run perpendicular to the front of the Fleet Center and faces the bus parking lot. The tracks go from elevated near the Fleet to (fittingly) depressed, so that clearance at the tunnel end is about six feet.
Virtually the entire Zone is under the footprint of the elevated. There is an entrance at one end and an exit at the other. Black netting is hung from the elevated structure to the ground, and concrete barriers and chain-link fence complete the fortifications. The Free Speech Zone is completely enclosed: above and on all sides. I'm going down there this afternoon to check it out and will have some pictures on the web site tomorrow. Here's the Globe Link with a photo:
A dimension out of sight, sound and of mind
LABOR issues are prominent today:
- The Boston Police have lost their legal appeal for 'fast-track' arbitration and are obligated to settle the contract dispute on Thursday. Despite the fact that they will have a contract, the police still plan to use the 29 picketing permits they hold for DNC venues. Mayor Menino argues that with a contract, the picket is really a protest. That logic should put the Police in the Free Speech Zone, along with the Bl(a)ck Tea Society.
Picket or Protest?
- The yet unborn and their mothers are the latest cohort to face DNC disruption.
Born Under a Road Sign
This convention is billing itself as 'environmentally correct' and recycling is an integral part of the plan, including one truly ingenious disposal solution:What to do with all that hot air?
And finally, the streets and some sidewalks in my neighborhood were washed early this morning. Everything is sparkling clean and neat: flowers hung from lamp posts, newly-planted trees along the sidewalk, unsightly trash barrels removed and wayward trash cleaned up. I guess I'd better get a haircut.
OFFICIAL WEB SITE LINK is in the header to this blog.

Trash Basket Imbroglio

2004-07-20T04:21:00.000-07:00

They have removed the sidewalk trash baskets (aka: barrels, cans) from my neighborhood and from Beacon Hill and other downtown locations. I hope that this policy does not extend beyond the convention but if so, people will adjust. In the city anything that looks remotely like a container can be drafted for use as a trash can. If an open box is on the sidewalk passers-by will fill it with trash. If a parking meter is removed and the metal pole left standing, the open top will immediately fill with trash. Trash attracts trash. A large cup, placed on the sidewalk will fill with other cups. I'm sure that if you painted a round, black spot on the sidewalk it would soon be piled high with trash. Evidence of the resourcefulness of trash-laden Bostonians was abundant this morning: empty cups perched lightly on parking meters, trash carefully balanced on mailboxes, garbage neatly arranged in the nooks and corners. People also put trash where the barrels used to be. Some trash barrels sit in a open metal frame. One of these frames, without the trash barrel, was filled with bags of trash.
Otherwise, the dumpsters are still in the alleys behind restaurants, and the trash cans in the Prudential Mall are in place.
Talkin' Trash

It seems that the 'Free Speech Zone' is pretty much where Sunday's skate indicated: Canal Street and a small open area adjoining. There is a spot where protesters can be near the delegates as they file into the Fleet Center, but there will be a 12-foot fence in between. It will be topped by transparent material, so that the delegates can see into The Zone. The city has denied a group that wants to march directly in front of the Fleet Center on Sunday, before opening day. Legal wrangling is the order of the day.
Two takes from our mainstream press on this:
Herald
Globe
Allied on this issue with the protesters is a strange bedfellow: the Boston Police, who involved in a hot labor dispute with the Mayor and would like to picket the Convention. The police are planning to picket some of the delegation parties that will be held at locations scattered about town and some delegations are very reluctant to cross picket lines. The State has ordered a fast-track arbitration, hoping to obviate the issue before the convention.
The State of the Union

Skate Report from Sunday, July 18, 2004.

2004-07-19T04:47:00.000-07:00

There are eight days until the convention.
Sunday's skating routes were chosen to test various avenues of approach to outdoor venues where protest and demonstrations are scheduled. The 'Free Speech Zone' is on the top of the list but since its location is not yet formally established I reskated the Fleet Center neighborhood, scouting out likely areas. There are not many good candidates. Canal Street, near the front of the Fleet Center, would satisfy the 'within sight and sound' requirement. This place is also very near an enormous, temporary parking lot which has appeared quite recently, apparently to handle the convention shuttle busses.
The new parking lot features acres of new pavement, laid on a gently undulating surface. It was unattended and virtually empty yesterday so I got in a good long session of rollerfrisbee under difficult wind conditions. The asphalt was smooth but still a bit raw.
Freshly laid asphalt need some aging to be in top skating condition. It takes some time for the oily-sticky surface to dry out and a patina of dust helps prevent the surface from getting too hot and gooey under the sun. This stuff was too young and both my frisbee and my wheels were black and sticky by the time I was finished.
City Hall Plaza is already being surrounded by crowd-control fencing. The Free Speech Zone, City Hall Plaza and the Commons, all protest venues, are an easy walk from one to another. A number of marches from one area to another are scheduled and it seems clear that the venues and routes between them will be carefully circumscribed. Will it be free people marching openly on public streets or will it be more like the Chicago stockyards? Stay tuned.
The entire northern segment of the Esplanade near Mass General Hospital has been fenced off as a restricted area. State police vehicles (including the command and communications trailer w/toilet) are there, as well as a number of tents. The large number of Porta-Jons suggest that eventually quite a few people will be billeted there: national guard perhaps. I labeled it 'Fort Security' on the web site map.
This fort will cut off some traditional Northern skating approaches to the Fleet Center but I expect that closed streets will provide many alternatives during the convention.
The city has already put on its makeup for the big party. Now come the helmet and gauntlets.
My favorite new security measures: SCUBA divers will be patrolling beneath harbor piers, especially Fan Pier, where the new Federal Court House is. Patrol boats have a new thermal imaging device that is said to be able to see a swimmer (with a knife in his teeth, no doubt) from a mile away. Terrorists are well known to be experts on the monkey bars but I haven't seen any file footage of them on TV training in the pool. Besides, I would think it nearly impossible to swim with a keffiah wrapped around your face.

See the Web site (in header) for maps and photos.

Here's looking at you, kid

2004-07-18T09:12:00.000-07:00

There is a good deal of difference between being seen and being spied on and when the a person is unaware being scrutinized, the difference is completely in the eye of the beholder. Today's media main course is surveillance in public places by hundreds of existing and brand-new high resolution cameras in Boston. Many of these cameras will be networked together and tied to command and control facilities for seamless coverage. Technologies such as face identification will be utilized. Participants at the protests, marches and demonstrators will be scrutinized, cataloged and subject to the photographic equivalent of fingerprinting. No one person can really know when or if it will happen, but all have to assume it will.

What if the government were to demand that anyone speaking in public can be photographed, fingerprinted and subject to computerized investigation? Something very much like that is happening now, without even the courtesy of a demand. In the land of the free, our lives have become transparent; we are as naked as the prisoners in Abu Ghraib.

A security camera in a department store has a specific purpose and does not bother me a lot. These video feeds will go directly into the belly of every security, political and counterintelligence beast that prowls the edges of the herd, looking for strays ... and for leaders.

These measures are like so many other security measures that are being introduced as necessities for the DNC: they are (and were) intended as permanent installations, to be kept in regular use long after the delegates are gone.

I'm going out skating soon to check on the preparations for the convention, including progress Boston is making in Paving The World For Democracy. In the Common, Copley square, near the Fleet Center, on some streets, I will be on camera and possibly under scrutiny, in open public spaces. No demonstrations, no convention, no special events.

If you live in another city, please consider that these measures taking root in Boston are likely top provide a peek at your own future. What's happening in Boston is really a roll-out for a model that is sure to catch on among city governments all around the country.

I spy!

Official Skating the DNC web coverage: see the link in this blog's header.

Media Mixology

2004-07-16T04:47:00.000-07:00

It seems that there is so much security planned for Beantown commuters that the MBTA needs to bring in some help to make it all happen. This will include the National Guard. Armed soldiers will be patrolling the subway stations. This was on page 3 of the second section of today's Globe.
Guarded Measures
Yesterday, the local papers (and MSNBC's Countodown) ran stories on the lack of pay toilets in Boston, raising the ugly vision of visitors to Boston urinating in public. This happens every Red Sox game and complaints of Fenway neighborhood residents about this have been ignored for years. Is political urine more offensive or just more newsworthy? It's neither, really: just the endlessly ravenous media, tuned and focused on the convention, on a slow news day.
The local news never tires of reporting about the new police boats, the new police control and communications van (which has a toilet, by the way), the surveillance cameras covering public streets and open spaces: all the toys for the security boys.
The story about Armed Soldiers in the subway was second-string to the story about John Kerry's Pops Concert, which has re-surfaced in diminished form and may be held the UMASS campus a few miles south of downtown on the shore of Qunicy Bay. Then there is the closings of community pools:
Dry Up!
Boston is inundated with convention coverage but the tide of information is straight from a blender set on puree. News comes by the truckload and the sheer tonnage of stories obscures the bedrock reality that this convention will introduce the citizens of Boston to life in a police state. Maybe then all those shiny, new police toys will begin to loose their appeal.

Note: The link to the official 'Skating the DNC' web site is in the header above.

Windfalls Wane in a Biochemical Breeze

2004-07-14T10:20:00.000-07:00

The residents of Beacon Hill who counted on raking in a few thousand bucks for a short week's rental of their homes are disappointed. The Conventioneers are staying in hotels and the residential rental market that so many anticipated simply did not materialize. Of all people, the Brahmins should have known that trickle-down economics means that money does not flow up hill.
The cash cows never came home

Same with Hotels in nearby suburbs. They were counting on a large amount of overflow business from delegations that would have failed to find rooms at the inns close to the Fleet Center.
Inn Town

There's a perfectly good explanation for this: FEAR.

Bioterror antidotes rushed to Boston
Tom Ridge is in town today checking on security arrangements at the Fleet Center and the Boston Globe is full of stories about more road closings and precautions against - preparations for - a biochemical attack.
The Antidote for Complacency

No wonder there's plenty of hotel space available, what with the Feds RUSHING BioChemical treatment materials to Boston hospitals. Do they know something we ought to know? Will Tom Ridge have enough confidence in Homeland Security to be in Boston during the convention? We should invite him. `There's plenty of room ....

Again: the link to the web site for this blog is in the header.

Transit Search now Official / Convention draws protest groups

2004-07-13T07:03:00.000-07:00

The Boston Herald reports that the MBTA has made the random search policy official. For security reasons the exact time and location of the first search locations were not announced. Riders who refuse the search will not be allowed to ride. I feel safer already.
Searching at Random

The Globe reports that some 67 protest groups have obtained permits. There will be plenty of activity at locations all around doentown Boston and lots of opportunity for photos and interviews.
Permits for Protest

Please look to the header of this Blog for a link to my web site, which is devoted to coverage of the convention.

Make Way For Prisoners

2004-07-12T04:47:00.000-07:00

In order to make room for the people the police expect to arrest during the week of the convention some existing prisoners are being moved to institutions outside of town. There are reserved accommodations for 140 'John Does' ... not
counting cancellations and no-shows. I wonder what the charges are expected to be and if they are broken down by offense. Our country is really big on prisons and We The People are big on making prisoners of one another. The land of the 'untidy' as Rumsfeld might say.

A summary of the security and logistical measures in place for the DNC.

This is a nice editorial.
No more conventions

I finally got my web site in order. The site is dedicated to wheel-time coverage of the convention. Please be invited:
Skating the Democratic National Convention

Detours on the Stairway to Heaven

2004-07-10T08:41:00.000-07:00

Can there be anybody else for the DNC to inconvenience?
When the disruption extends beyond last rights can anything or anybody be unaffected? Morticians and Funeral Directors cite concerns about the ability to hold funerals and to transport the deceased out of town during the convention.
Grave Implications

Public Comment to the MBTA and Thoughts about 'Random' Search

2004-07-09T05:03:00.000-07:00

The MBTA's opportunity for public comment yesterday was both illuminating and sobering. Interestingly, I was granted access to the building by showing ID and getting a visitor's pass but my shoulder bag (bulging with a camera) was not searched. The meeting room had a capacity of about 60 visitors and it was SRO. Members of a grass-roots organization called TRU ('T' Rider's Union) in attendance, along with a representatives from the ACLU, The American Friends Service committee, National Lawyer's Guild and individual citizens.
There were nine MBTA board members around the semicircular conference desk, seated in enormous chairs that could rock and swivel and spin: indispensable capabilities for bureaucrats.
The meeting allowed public comment but it was not a public hearing. An organization called the Rider Oversight Committee made formal requests to the MBTA to hold public hearings on any Search Policy that might be devised, but was turned down.
Nobody seemed quite sure exactly what the official Search Policy is (or is to be), except that it would include random searches on the subway and on the bus and that there would be four to eight search teams (with dogs), working at selected stations. All but two speakers (one of whom was a lawyer who worked for the MBTA) spoke against the policy. Objections were raised on the US Constitution 4th amendment and on the Massachusetts constitution Article 14, both of which offer protection from unreasonable search and seizure.
As I listened to the speakers and comments by the board members, I realized that the 'Random' part was really an attempt to make a dreadful security policy somehow politically correct. In doing so, they also made it useless as a security measure.
A policy that calls for searches of 'suspicious' persons is a very hot button for minorities with a very well-founded fears of racial and ethnic profiling by police. Using the word 'Suspicious' was impossible; 'Random' was the alternative.
'Random' means selection without cause of any kind, without judgment, without reason. The MBTA would offer exactly that kind of search strategy in order to implement a policy that is ineffective and in direct conflict with our most basic legal protections from unreasoning, arbitrary intrusions on individuals by governmant.
People searched at 'Random' are an anonymous constituency: politically hamstrung in today's 'interest-group' politics. Black, Muslim, Asian: these are groups that are identifiable to each other and to others. Every tenth person? Who is that? They have nothing in common, no group identity. They are just a bunch of somebodies else.
'Random' is the great red herring in this debate. The worth of even-handedness depends a great deal on what kind of glove that hand is wearing and injustice delivered at random is no less unjust than when focused on a specific group.
By the way: the search policy is not mandatory. You can refuse to be searched and simply walk to the next station without a search team
and step right on.
This leaves the MBTA with little more than a security fig leaf, but that is really all that was possible in the first place.

Newspaper Account

PS: Senator Kerry's permit for a concert and fireworks event on July 27th was turned down for security reasons. I guess JFK will have to listen to the VP acceptance speech after all.

Looking for Trouble

2004-07-08T05:09:00.000-07:00

They have begun random searches on private-carrier commuter busses from New Hampshire and the program for random searches on MBTA busses is due to begin. The subway searches cannot be far behind. Bus Contention
I'm uncomfortable with the fact that these search policies were first presented to the public in the context of security for the DNC but the convention is three weeks away and searches have begun. They will continue after the DNC is over. In addition to our newly paved streets, it seems that the DNC has been used to pave the way for the implementation of policy initiative(s) that are much wider in scope and are actually independent of DNC concerns.
It's kind of self-defeating. Even as officials plead with the citizens to take public transportation they promise to subject them to random searches. People in cars will not be searched even though you can pack a hell of a bigger bomb in a car than you can in a backpack.
Today I plan to attend an open MBTA meeting during which comments by the public will be allowed. The agenda includes the allocation of funds for ordinary maintenance and the refurbishing of a subway station or two.
The MBTA has made it clear that the search policy will not be included on the meeting agenda but I suspect that the search policy will be on the minds of many who will wish to speak. I'll post a report on the goings-on tomorrow.

Another Security Blanket

2004-07-06T05:56:00.000-07:00

I did not mean this blog to become a diary but the run-up to the convention is proving to be a stepwise descent into a bottomless pit of fear and suspicion that needs to be chronicled. Every day there is a new act of preparation, a potential threat identified, or a defensive measure taken. Boston seems uncomfortable in it's self-imposed status as a bull's eye, even as the politicians and business leaders stand around reassuring everyone that 'we'll get through this', smiling their frozen, political smiles. Pretending to embrace the convention like a winning lottery ticket, the VIPs look like a group in a photo at the formal ball, trying desperately to ignore the fact that somebody just passed gas.
Today: Insurance. There's more than one way to defuse a bomb. The easiest way is to off-load the expense and let the damn thing blow up. It might be cheaper (considering only property, of course) to insure against terrorism than to fight a war against it.
Covering the Corporate Backside

Justice delayed / The 4th provides a minor rehersal for the DNC

2004-07-05T06:33:00.000-07:00

It seems that every day there comes another announcement of something closing. This time it's the courts. No trials will take place in Boston or Cambridge during the week of the convention. Cops won't have time to testify and besides, everyone will be telecommuting or on vacaton or hiding. Some might even be breaking the law ...
Court is Adjourned
Not to worry though: the fast lane for arraignments have been cleared for the DNC, with the city ready to process offenders through a legal assembly line. Four courtrooms and more than a dozen veteran prosecutors have been set aside to arraign unruly or civilly disobedient demonstrators during the Democratic National Convention.
The Fast Lane

The Forth of July gave me an opportunity to observe this year's version of 'our new security traditions'. I love that quote, taken from a radio announcement on July 4th, 2002: the first 4th after 911.
There are so many kinds of security personnel, even if you are counting only ground-level uniformed types. There were:
Boston Police
State Police
SERT (a branch of the State Cops: Special Emergency Reaction Team)
National Parks Service
National Guard

The SERT guys were reay for action. Dressed in the height of Summer fashion: Deep black fatigue uniforms with a sleve tab that allows you to strap up a rolled sleve. They were very well armed: one big, burly cop had a pistol in a gunslinger-type quick draw holster (strapped to the thigh) and a combat knife in a leather sheath on his belt in the small of his back. Now, that's what to wear to a fireworks display.

I skated to the Fleet Center to get some 'before' pictures of the Fleet Center and Free Seech Zone, which is a principal destination during the Convention. Making inquiries around the area I happened to met an old friend who works as a trolley conductor for the MBTA. He said that the Free Speech Zone had not been formally selected. He went on to say that the CIA, FBI and the MBTA itself were very concerned about the 'Black Tea Society', who were "very well organized".
One Lump or Two?
I guess that my friend's report might fall under the category of 'official rumor', but at least it's a tiny peek into the mindset of the MBTA. So, no 'Free Speech Zone' ..yet. I grew up with the understanding that the whole of America was a Free Speech Zone.

The paving for the DNC is not yet completed but my experiences yesterday augured well for the event. This might just turn out be the best street skating venue ever known to Western Civilization. There is new pavement everywhere. The wheels on my skates are black from skating on freshly-laid asphalt.

Protests over Search Policy / Party to the Max

2004-07-02T05:53:00.000-07:00

Protests:
----------
At last somebody is making some noise about the search policy.
(link below)

You Can't have too Many Parties:
--------------------------------
I watched the Boston Channel last night as important
people from The Gillette company and Massachusetts General Hospital gave presentations before a TV camera (and, perhaps, some people). Both were ready to take on the security and logistic challenges of the DNC with a 'can do' attitude. Both likened the event to a 4-day snowstorm: a simile that is gaining popularity despite the fact that snowstorms are not self-inflicted events.
In the middle of the security restrictions and the logistical and transportation nightmare, John Kerry has decided to throw a major outdoor concert at the Hatch Shell, along with a fireworks display.
Among the reasons given is that John Kerry loves the Boston Pops and loves fireworks.

The permit has been pulled but permission is stil pending. Scheduled night: July 28, when the Vice Presidential candidate is scheduled to give his acceptance speech.

Which event will Kerry attend?

If he loves fireworks so much maybe he should make some with his campaign.

Articles:
Pushing the Pops
Protests Over Search policy

Street Closings present an Opening

2004-07-01T12:08:00.000-07:00

The DNC is expected to bring about 34,000 people to The Hub in the forms of Delegates, Candidates and Media. That's about the same number of people who attend the average Red Sox game. The city functions nicely around the game and the mild congestion it causes, even though the entire audience arrives and departs in the same evening.
The four-day DNC will essentially close down the city. All major traffic arteries that even traffic in the general direction of the Fleet Center will be closed down by 4PM, including that part of interstate 93 known as the Big Dig, and miles more. All roads in the vicinity of the Fleet Center will be closed to all vehicular traffic. Got a delivery? Get a handcart. The airspace for 30 kilometers around and Logan Airport itself will be closed during the sessions. The harbor will be restricted and heavily patrolled and so will the sections of the Charles River that are near the Fleet Center. The tour boats will operate but will have armed escorts. The MBTA transit has decided to suspend the carrying of bicycles on the trains during the days of the convention and commuter rail to the North of Boston will be closed. The mayors of towns to the North of Boston are talking of closing their streets to non-residents, fearful of a flood of detour traffic. Everyone is talking about of alternatives: bikes, telecommuting, going on vacation. Even Mayor Menino, the main attractor for the DNC compares the event to the infamous Blizzard of '78, which paralyzed the city for days and was not generally considered an economic windfall.

Strange to say, the city fathers have 'accelerated existing plans' for repavement and many, many streets in Boston are being repaved in anticipation of closing them. During the convention sessions, Boston will be under total lockdown and the smooth, black streets will lie deserted.

This is like a Thanksgiving Feast to a street skater. The summer evenings in the last week of July will feature the best street skating I have ever seen, weather permitting. Have camera, have skates, will blog.
Here's an official Presentation on transportation and closings:
Presentation
Here's Boston's Main Convention Information Site and its prosaic title:
INFO2004
Some Excellent Maps

Search Me!

2004-06-29T06:26:00.000-07:00

The Boston MBTA is the first mass transit system in the USA to have announced plans to conduct random searches on the subway and trolley system. They want to select 10% of riders (!) and demand Photo ID and to search knapsacks, shopping bags and briefcases. On the subset of the 'T' called the Orange Line packages will be forbidden altogether. In an excellent letter to The Boston Globe one lady pointed out that downtown merchants will be overjoyed to know that nobody on the Orange line can carry shopping bags.

There is no law here that requires a person to carry photo ID but I suspect that if you fail to have an ID, fail to cooperate in any way, you'll be escorted to the street or face a trespassing charge ... trespassing on public transit.
The policy is to take effect in July and there is no guarantee that it will be removed after the delegates leave town.
I sit in the subway every morning waiting for a trolley and listen as the squawk-box PA system drones on in a metallic monotone, issuing the same instructions over and over again: "use your eyes and your ears ... look for unusual objects or suspicious behavior .... report anything suspicious or unusual to MBTA authorities immediately ... be part of the MBTA security team."
Nobody seems pays the slightest attention to the loudspeaker. Not on the team, I guess. When the searches start we'll be forced to pay attention and then we'll become real team players. One in ten will be stopped searched, at random, to be sure that it is ineffective as it is unconstitutional.
The fourth amendment should be re-written for our age of Total Security.

THE NEW FOURTH AMENDMENT:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Only a terrorist would object to random searches at the discretion of transit workers. Get over it.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Remember to Live normally but be on guard against pointless, random terror. Go shopping but don't carry packages or you'll be terrorized by random searches. Stop making sense. You make sense, you make yourself predictable target. Live in a random manner and you will avoid the terror. Search in random manner and you'll catch the terrorists.

I rescheduled a doctor's appointment today. Usually there aren't many options to choose from: if you reschedule it will add weeks to your wait to see a physician. The DNC has changed all that. My Doc's calendar is wide open during the convention week. This might be a great time to call contractors. Old date: 4PM on the 28th: I'd miss some prime time skating. New time: 1 PM. I'll be free wheeling by 2:30.

Jeez, I hope the weather stays dry ....

Link to the site of my future DNC-intensive web site.
My Site
And more on MBTA security:Packing Light on the 'T'
The MBTA 'TRANSIT WATCH' pdf presentation:
WATCH OUT!

The Money Pump

2004-06-24T05:04:00.000-07:00

Our Mayor worked overtime to get the convention in
Boston, promising $150 Million in Mana from the Members of the Democratic Party. A money pump, connected right into the heart of Beantown, the Athens of America.

The city and state spent $800 million on a brand-new convention center, which officially opened two weeks ago. The DNC will not be held there but at the Fleet Center instead, because the Fleet Center
has stadium seating and thus is a far more 'telegenic' space. Costs for reconfiguring the Fleet Center for the four-day event is around $12 million: about what it costs to keep the new Convention Center operating for a year. Security costs are in the $40 million range, and the escalating price tag for expenses in direct support of the convention is near ing $100 million. This does not include opportunity losses, such as the Tall Ship event and the Olympic Gymnastic trials, both of which were lost to the DNC.

Right now the accounting from Beacon Hill shows a net loss of around $15 million. This does not count the losses that will stem from the fact that the city will be virtually closed for the week bracketing the convention. The Mayor's office is encouraging everyone to either telecommute, take vacation or otherwise get lost.
About half the cab drivers I talk to are going to stay away.
All this, to stimulate an economy.
Pumps work both ways, I guess.

This is my first blog attempt and my web site is not ready.
Right now it has my personal stuff on it but I'll be giving it a DNC makeover (something that is fashionable in Boston these days) so that maps and pictures will be available.
My Site
More on the Money:
The Big Pig
... and some brand new toys: