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Rocks For Brains?Friday, Aug. 07, 2009 3:50 AMA town hall meeting in Tampa, Florida was disrupted by protesters who claim their actions were encouraged by a local activist group and conservative talking head Glenn Beck, with the St. Petersburg Times calling it a 'near riot.' Despite Beck's plea against violence earlier this week, his standard fare is exactly what protesters parroted: charges of tyrrany, arrogance, Obama-hates-white-people, anti-immigrant, anti-government blather. And the fact remains that these protesters are doing exactly what Beck and so-called 'grass-roots' groups are telling them to. Simple question - why is it that society insists the loud, disruptive folks get their free speech rights instead of those listening with respect and asking questions in turn? It seems we're getting the level of democracy we deserve. Boston Police officer Justin Barrett, who drew notice for sending out an e-mail calling Professor Henry Gates 'a banana-eating jungle monkey,' is suing his department, the police commissioner, and the mayor for violating his civil rights. I imagine that if officials were acting purely on hearsay, without seeing an actual copy of the e-mail, then there might be a case. Otherwise, if Officer Barrett used department computers to transmit said e-mail, he is liable for its contents and must accept the consequences of his actions. You may remember the Dhaliwal brothers, the two survivors of the San Francisco Zoo tiger mauling. A couple of weeks ago, Kulbir Dhaliwal got picked up on possession (several grams of cocaine); his brother Paul is already on parole for an earlier shoplifting charge. Last night, Kulbir Dhaliwal was arrested for DUI. Paul got himself booked as well for claiming to be a third Dhaliwal brother (who was not involved in the tiger mauling case). (I imagine Paul lied about his identity because he was in technical violation of his parole - either out late or outside a certain area.) But, riiiiiight. They wouldn't do something so dumb as to throw rocks at a tiger ...
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