In totalitarian countries, when they want to have a march and make good TV pictures, or pack a street for an address by the Dear Leader or the Chairman or whomever, they just tell all the cadre and the bureaucrats that they will be required to march.
We don’t do that here, because we have a professional and non-political civil service.
Oops. Well we didn’t used to to do that sort of thing. But now we do.
And what’s a “freedom march” without tight control, coerced participation, and roughing up dissidents while the police look on,
One protester, Rik Silverman, 27, of Arlington said he was holding a sign that said, “Shame on You” when a marcher leaned over the railing and punched him in the stomach. A U.S. Park Police officer wrote a report but no arrests were made.
UPDATE: Carpetbagger Report has more on the unFreedom at the ‘Freedom’ March: protestors had signs confiscated, and this disappearance jem from the NYT:
One man who registered for the walk was detained by a Pentagon police officer after he slipped a black hood over his head and produced a sign that read, “Freedom?”
The man was removed from the Pentagon registration area, handcuffed and taken away in a police car. It was not clear whether he was charged or simply detained and the police did not respond to messages requesting more information.
Thank you for noticing the story. I have not disappeared, that is, I reappeared after a brief detention.