To see where this decision will end up, have a read of the coverage of the streets outside the Democratic Convention:
I saw a guy with no weapons run at a bunch of police, immediately get shot with rubber bullets, and then receive what looked very much like a pistol whipping.Think I'm over-reacting? Then WTF was the Riot Squad doing at the pissant Undie 500? If it's worth killing, it's worth over-killing.
...Over here on this side, the only thing saving everyone was a collection of videocameras and an army of press badges. But demands started to get more and more hostile that everyone move away, not watch, etc. This would repeat more and more aggressively with us outside the caged in crowd. Finally the cops started to threaten that our observance would be met with arrest if we set foot in designated areas, all the best viewing locations. Holding rifles and billyclubs, they moved us farther and farther away from the conflict, leaving us only to hear the crowd and not see it.
...Finally, after the arrival of two tanks, hundreds more police, some snypers on the top of the Sheraton hotel, more gas masks, horses, cargo trucks, five helicopters -- the crowd was released. And with them, the stories.
