After hearing about the Wisconsin Senate's shady, perhaps illegal, approval of Scott Walker's union-busting bill, my wife was quite upset last night. I told her I felt I needed to get to the capitol that night, as many automated text messages from various progressive groups were imploring me. "Will you be mad if I get arrested?" I asked her.
"No," she answered. So, I filled my pockets with granola bars and grabbed my prescriptions and off I went.
I arrived about 7:00 p.m., after the official closing time of the capitol. There were protestors inside who had refused to leave, and crowds formed at every entrance imploring the police to "Let us in! Let Us In!"
Things were getting very intense, when a protestor inside ran to the doors where I was standing and opened them, allowing hundreds of us to rush in. That energized the crowd already inside, and the same scene played out a few more times before police finally gave up and opened the doors.
The Madison police and Dane County deputies are no longer providing security inside the building, and the mix of state troopers, small-town deputies and fish-and-game wardens is a disaster waiting to happen. They lack any sophistication in non-violent protest management and crowd control. Madison and Dane County officers are experts at allowing crowds to simply flow from one place to another. The ticket-writers turned palace-guards consistently do just the opposite. They gather in groups of 4 and 5 and walk through the building like protester magnets, leading the crowd to the exact spots where they don’t want them to be. They station themselves at the bottom of stairwells, standing in the way of people who just want to walk around, inviting confrontation.
Amateurs. They rely on brawn and very little brain, and they have much less developed social skills than the local cops.
The capitol soon filled to the rafters, then slowly started to thin. Chanting and drumming continued until 2:00 a.m.
I got a few hours sleep on a thin blanket spread on the softest marble I could find.
I spent the early part of this morning walking around talking to people, then wandered into the vestibule of the assembly chambers. You may have seen people being dragged out of that area. I holed up in the hallway that led to the office of Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald with thirty or so new friends. Most were college age, but the older generations were there, too.
You can see part of me in the photo attached to this story. I'm right in the front. That's my gray coat, blue jeans and black sneakers. Really.
Eventually the troopers doing the heavy lifting reached the hallway. They took us out one by one, some of us walking on our own and some, including me, going limp. The troopers stumbled as they carried me past the dozens of cameras and a few crying Democratic assembly reps. They dropped me as they stumbled, then picked me up again and carried me out to the crowd in the designated first amendment area, where I stood up and joined the chants of “Shame, shame!”
I was not hurt or arrested. Our small victory was exposure to the world and a delay of the assembly session by 90 minutes.
I was able to secure a seat in the gallery for that session, and did a lot of head nodding as the Democrats proceeded to rip the Republicans apart. Of course, the vote was just a formality and I left before it was taken.
We are not done. This is already energizing more people to join the recall movement, and the tractors are coming Saturday. Can we get 150,000? I think so.
If you're into boycotts like I am:
Businesses that supported Walker