"There's six, seven, eight, nine of them that are starting to say, ‘Listen, we're starting to look like we're out of touch with what's going on in Madison, and it's time to get back.'"

"I think some of them feel like they're boxed in and they can't come back to the Capitol right now."

Said Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald about the "Wisconsin 14."

Did the absconding senators themselves adopt the label "Wisconsin 14"? To my ear, it suggests yippies or lawless revolutionaries. Is that the image they want?

New Media Meade... in the assembly chamber, awaiting Governor Walker's address...

... right now.

What one Wisconsin legislator said to another after the budget vote: "You are f*cking dead."

Gordon Hintz (D) said it to Michelle Litjens (R).

(Via Alex, who notes the lack of press coverage.)

Althouse and Meade return to the Veterans Memorial and encounter apologetic protesters, the police, and a rudeness expert.

I took this video yesterday — Saturday, February 26th — at the Wisconsin Capitol building. Meade wanted to go back to see if the protesters had followed through on their promise to remove their things from the Veterans Memorial. The signs that had been taped to the back of the monument were gone, but there was still a lot of junk piled up against it.



The police we encounter didn't want to consult with us on camera, though I do get a clear "no" when I ask if it is against the law to photograph the police. Off camera, they are extremely articulate and professional explaining why the police are allowing the protest and occupation of the Capitol to go on the way it has.

A woman who does not have a Wisconsin accent noses in to tell me I'm "rude" to take pictures.

I say: "Let me ask you a question about 'rudeness.' This is a Veterans Memorial, for people who died in the war. These are all things..."

The rudeness expert interrupts me: "They do things for democracy, which is what we're trying to save right now."

I say: "What would you say to people that are..." And she's turned her back on me and walked away. The rudeness expert.

She had her point and she made it: The memorialized veterans "do things for democracy." That's a poor use of the present tense. They did "things." They died. They fought and they died. But what's important "right now" — according to her — is that the protesters are "trying to save" democracy.

I didn't get to ask follow-up questions, but I think her point was to equate the protesters to the veterans and to make that a justification for piling sleeping bags and all sorts of junk up against the monument. I didn't get to ask how trying to undo the results of the last election is an effort to "save democracy," and, obviously, she wasn't interested in having a conversation with me.

This is what civility looks like...

How did the Wisconsin protests happen? Who did what when? How did we get here? A timeline.

"On Feb. 7, with Wisconsin united in the afterglow of a Green Bay Packers victory in the Super Bowl" — so begins the Wisconsin State Journal begins today's article about the protests with a reminder about how great everyone felt in Wisconsin so recently. We were deprived of our enjoyment of the afterglow!

On February 11th, when Gov. Walker "dropped the bomb" — his words — union chiefs and organizers had "a freakout of a long weekend" — as one of them put it.

As unions organized protests to be launched in the coming days - the largest in Wisconsin's capital city since the Vietnam War - about 250 people in two separate groups picketed Sunday at the Capitol and in front of the Maple Bluff mansion Walker now calls home.

Here's my post commenting on the thin, mellow crowd that day:

It was a beautiful, unseasonably warm Sunday, and our new governor has just dropped a shocking union-busting proposal that our newly Republican legislature is likely to step up and pass. This is the push-back from the unions?

Ha ha. And the Isthmus didn't seem at all enthused:

Protests are exactly what Walker wants, because they can only lead to two outcomes: Either they are peaceful and accomplish nothing; or they turn violent and create a massive backlash against the unions and their members. Either way, Walker wins.

Look back over the last 2 weeks. We now know the protests were huge and peaceful, so did they accomplish anything? Did Walker win? He chose not to confront people, and, interestingly enough, the people of Wisconsin who opposed the protests didn't make trouble either. There was one pleasant Tea Party event on the first Saturday, with a good turnout, but everyone was nice. I mean, the anti-Scott Walker folks had their Hitler signs and so forth. But that's all. Over-the-top analogies.

Back to the State Journal:

Before Walker unveiled his budget-repair bill on Feb. 11, the Teaching Assistants' Association at UW-Madison, along with campus student groups Student Labor Action Coalition and Multicultural Student Coalition, had planned a noon march from the Memorial Union to the Capitol to deliver "I Heart UW" valentines to Walker and urge him not to cut education funding....

They delivered the valentines.

That night, TAA leaders went back to campus and sent their 2,800 UW-Madison members an e-mail urging them to return to the Capitol on Tuesday and testify at the Legislature's powerful Joint Finance Committee, which had scheduled a hearing on the bill at 10 a.m.

Unions across the state were doing the same, as a dozen leaders convened Monday.

State law prevents Capitol Police from locking the building while there are ongoing hearings. So some TAA members made plans to stay as long as necessary, not realizing they wouldn't sleep at home again for weeks and that their union would set up a nerve center in a Capitol office, with members coordinating volunteers and helping manage what became the Capitol's 24-hour ecosystem.

So the occupation of the Capitol began as a UW TAA operation.

[Tuesday, February 15th], AFSCME, a 68,000-member union that represents state and municipal workers... started running buses from at least seven cities throughout Wisconsin.

About 10,000 people gathered at the Capitol for noon and 5 p.m. rallies, holding protest signs and chanting "Kill the Bill!" and "This is What Democracy Looks Like!"

Inside, 3,000 more turned the ground-floor rotunda into a raucous drum circle and plastered the walls with anti-Walker, pro-union posters. It was the start of a protest village that would occupy the Capitol at least through Sunday, Feb. 27, when Capitol Police say they'll no longer allow protesters to stay overnight.

So the TAs gained the support of AFSCME (and its buses). Why did the Capitol Police let them stay? They're clearing everyone out today, supposedly, but why did they let them stay so long? I talked to the Capitol Police yesterday, and I asked them the questions I raised in this post about free speech and viewpoint discrimination. I got a sense of what the answer is and will write about that later today.

Back to the State Journal. (These are excerpts from the article. For a more complete timeline, go to the link at the beginning of this post.)

At the [Madison Teachers Inc.] meeting, executive director John Matthews  discussed the far-reaching consequences of the bill and the group decided Madison teachers should spend the next three days at the Capitol - and not in the classroom.

"We were in lockstep," said Matthews. "There was no dissention."...

About the same time, finance committee co-chairs Rep. Robin Vos, R-Rochester, and Sen. Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, directed staff to stop registering people wanting to testify, angering opponents....

The committee adjourned about 3 a.m. Wednesday. At that point, Democrats continued hearing testimony in another room, giving justification to protesters to stay overnight in the Capitol.

So the reason the protesters could stay in the building overnight was that the Democrats kept hearings going, which kept the building open. With the Madison schools closed, the crowd in the Capitol swelled on Wednesday, and many slept in the building overnight.

Thursday morning, the Senate's Democrats absconded, which kept the bill from passing and the protest going. And here's a State Journal scoop: Republican Mike Ellis, the state senate president, helped the last of the 14 Democrats get out of state, at least according to that Democrat, Tim Cullen. Cullen was assisting the family of Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Bill Bablitch, who had just died. Cullen says he called Ellis "to ask if he could enter the Capitol without being detained," and Ellis "said fine, come in. There's no problem." Keep in mind that the Republicans only needed one vote to meet their quorum. They had Cullen, and they let him get away! According to Cullen. Ellis even called Cullen as Cullen was driving to Illinois to "double check" if he got out okay. According to Cullen. Doesn't that mean the Republicans accepted or even encouraged the prolongation of the protests?

The flight of the 14 Democrats enthused the protesters, and Madison public schools were closed for a second day and then a third, February 17th and 18th. Saturday, the 19th, was the day the pro-Scott Walker people showed up too. They came, had a rally outside the building, and then left.

That was a week ago. The occupation of the Capitol continued, and you've seen the pictures and descriptions on this blog. Yesterday, we had "about 70,000 people" at the Capitol, but they were mainly outside. I went inside. I walked right up to the nearest door, and a "volunteer" in an orange vest told me to go wait in a line to go in some other door. This door was for... I didn't quite catch who the special people were who got to go right in the door I'd walked up to, but I said, "This is a public building. You're saying there are 2 kinds of people — ones that get right in and ones that go wait in line? Who are you?" He was obviously not a uniformed city official. I was all "Who are you?" and "How dare you!" and, after a few seconds, I (and Meade) got right through that door.

Once in, I said "How dare they!" about 10 times. Sorry, Meade didn't video that. You've never seen video as emotional as I was right then. I got outraged for myself and for all the people that were out there waiting in that line. I was outraged about them for 2 reasons: 1. Because they were treated as second-class citizens who had to enter through the subordinate door, and 2. Because they meekly accepted their subordination.* On the other hand, whether the restricted entry plan came from the Capitol Police or not, it assisted them in what appeared to me to be a well-coordinated procedure of closing down portions of the building and moving a smaller and smaller group into the central area. I assume this slowly tightening cordon will effectively accomplish the end of the occupation at 4 p.m. this afternoon.
_______________________

* My stature as a "line pioneer" was verified by David Foster Wallace. I have that in writing from the now-dead genius writer, who had a problem with lines too.

Is it viewpoint discrimination under the First Amendment for Wisconsin to permit the protesters to use the Capitol building as it has over the past 10+ days?

Here is part of a presentation made at the University of Wisconsin Law School on February 22, 2011 by Donald Downs, a UW political science professor:



Downs is very briefly raising the issue of whether it should be considered viewpoint discrimination for the protesters at the state capitol to be permitted to post signs and sleep overnight when other groups are not going to be given the same treatment.

The case he mentions is Clark v. Community for Creative Nonviolence, in which the Supreme Court upheld a neutral rule that prohibited everyone from sleeping in the park. In that case, protesters argued that they had a right to special treatment, because they were sleeping as a form of expression, to say something about the plight of the homeless.

In the current Wisconsin situation, the protesters are being allowed to do many, many things that ordinarily no one does. It's hard to imagine how the state could operate in the future if other groups were given equal treatment and permitted to stay overnight for days on end, to post thousands of signs all over the historic marble walls and pillars, to prop and post signs on the monuments, to bang drums and use a bullhorn in the rotunda to give speeches and lead chants all day long for days on end. Tell me then, what will happen when the next protester comes along and the next and the next? Hasn't the state opened the Capitol as a free speech forum in which viewpoint discrimination will be forbidden under the First Amendment?

But, you might say, the Republicans hold the political majority and the special treatment is going to their opponents. To that I say: So what? If you discriminate in favor of your political opponents, it's still viewpoint discrimination. It's interesting to speculate about why the Republicans are permitting such a giant extra helping of free speech to their opponents. Perhaps it is so they can say, when their friends show up on some later occasion — some Tea Party group? — that they must give them the same access.

But I don't believe they want that. The Capitol has for years and years been a solemn place. For 25 years, I have brought visitors there and walked slowly through the beautiful spaces looking at the different colored and patterned marble on the walls and gazing with awe up into the dome. This is the Capitol Wisconsinites know and treasure. It can't become an all-purpose free-speech forum.

At Christmastime, there is a big tree in the rotunda. The Freedom from Religion Foundation doesn't like that. This week's anti-Scott Walker people are banging on drywall buckets and chanting "This is what democracy looks like." How about a hundred atheists in the rotunda for a week in December banging on buckets and chanting "This is what stupidity looks like"? (Okay, there's a conlaw exam for you. Submit your answers and I'll grade.)

I think the Republicans are simply refraining from confrontation and waiting for the protesters to get tired and leave or — on their own — to upset the ordinary people around the state. Any attempt to sweep them out or pull down their signs might make them look sympathetic or generate an air of martyrdom, and so, I assume, it has seemed to be the wiser path to leave them alone.

UPDATE: At the Capitol today (2/26/11) I talked to the police enough to get some insight into what the legal theory is. I've got a lot of video and photographs to process this evening, so I will put off writing more about this until tomorrow.

UPDATE 2: Prof. Downs emails:

Ann raises points that merit serious First Amendment attention. In my talk last Wednesday, I raised the concern about viewpoint discrimination, but said it was outweighed at that point by public necessity. But the necessity position loses force as time passes, and police are able to adjust to the situation. Regardless of where one stands on this particular issue, it is never a valid or good thing if government grants special First Amendment rights to one group or set of protesters that it would not extend to all other groups. This is bedrock First Amendment principle based on a long history of experience. And police need to maintain a position of absolute neutrality in such matters. And it doesn't matter how peaceful or respectful a group might be behaving, for such otherwise laudatory behavior does not entitle anyone to special treatement under the law. The First Amendment either applies equally to everyone, or it is subject to political barter.

Weary Wisconsin Democrats surprised by late-night vote, rush at the Republicans "pumping their fists and shouting 'Shame!' and 'Cowards!'"

AP reports:

With the Senate immobilized, Assembly Republicans decided to act and convened the chamber Tuesday morning.

Democrats launched a filibuster, throwing out dozens of amendments and delivering rambling speeches. Each time Republicans tried to speed up the proceedings, Democrats rose from their seats and wailed that the GOP was stifling them.

Debate had gone on for 60 hours and 15 Democrats were still waiting to speak when the vote started around 1 a.m. Friday. Speaker Pro Tem Bill Kramer, R-Waukesha, opened the roll and closed it within seconds.

Democrats looked around, bewildered. Only 13 of the 38 Democratic members managed to vote in time.
Republicans immediately marched out of the chamber in single file. The Democrats rushed at them, pumping their fists and shouting "Shame!" and "Cowards!"

The Republicans walked past them without responding.

The Democrats were playing games and the Republicans decided to play one of their own. It's not pretty. I'd like to see video of that rushing, shouting, and fist-pumping action. That seems to cross over into something approaching a physical threat.

IN THE COMMENTS: 2 commenters — Liz and Jana — come up with the video right away:

"In the private sector, the capitalist knows that when he negotiates with the union, if he gives away the store, he loses his shirt."

"In the public sector, the politicians who approve any deal have none of their own money at stake. On the contrary, the more favorably they dispose of union demands, the more likely they are to be the beneficiary of union largess in the next election. It's the perfect cozy setup... Recognizing this threat to union power, the Democratic Party is pouring money and fury into the fight. Fewer than 7 percent of private-sector workers are unionized. The Democrats' strength lies in government workers, who now constitute a majority of union members and provide massive support to the party. For them, Wisconsin represents a dangerous contagion."

Charles Krauthammer.

Governor Walker's Fireside Chat.

This was on the radio just now. I thought Walker did an excellent job of articulating his side of the controversy.

What can/should the Wisconsin GOP legislators do while the Democrats are off hiding in Chicago?

The NYT reports:

Starting Tuesday, those [Democratic] senators, who are in Illinois, will have to watch from afar as Republicans continue the work of governing without them, taking up matters from the mundane to the controversial.
“By not being here, they’re basically deciding to let things go through the body unchecked,” said Scott Fitzgerald, the Senate majority leader. “They’re not here to represent their constituents. We’re here to work.”...

In Wisconsin, the issues scheduled for consideration in the Senate on Tuesday were routine: an appointment by the governor, tax breaks for dairy farmers and a resolution commending the Green Bay Packers for their Super Bowl victory. But Mr. Fitzgerald said more significant legislation could also be in play, including a bill requiring voter identification that Democrats strongly oppose.

Gov. Scott Walker, in comments delivered against the din of the raucous protesters gathered outside his office, praised the Senate Republicans for the move, which he said he hoped would entice the Democrats home. “It’s time for them to come back and participate in democracy,” Mr. Walker said.

You know, it really was rather smart of the Republicans to let the protest/exile peter out over time. The teachers couldn't keep canceling school, and the group at the Capitol will, more and more, be UW students/TAs and old Madison lefties with more radical slogans. The legislators-in-hiding look more and more ineffectual and more and more Chicago. I don't think these developments are increasing political support around the state.

Meanwhile, Walker and his GOP cohort are waiting patiently — it only takes a few days — to get going working on the state's problems.

“They can vote on anything that is nonfiscal,” said Senator Jon Erpenbach, a Democrat, from his hotel across state lines. 

(There's a Senate rule that requires a larger quorum for fiscal matters. The Republicans need one Democratic senator to return to give them that quorum.)

“They can take up their agenda; they can do whatever they choose to do.”

Mr. Erpenbach said that his caucus was determined not to return until the restrictions to collective bargaining were off the table. But he worried aloud about what legislation could emerge in the meantime.

What legislation should the Republicans put on the agenda? They have the votes to pass things with or without the Democrats, so the question might be: What do they want to do that will be especially convenient to do without Democrats around to pester them? Or: What are the things that, if done without the Democrats' participation, will most hurt the Democrats politically? Or: What issue will prompt at least one Democrat to return, thus enabling them to get to the fiscal matters?

UPDATE: Concealed carry, voter ID, race-blind admissions in the University of Wisconsin system...

Madison schools will open again on Tuesday — and Jesse Jackson will be there at East High School.

Ridiculous.

Just before classes start at East High School, Jackson plans to march from the corner of First Street and East Mifflin Street to the East parking lot for a rally....

"We could have done a big rally in the gym, but we've got to get kids in the classroom," [principal Mary Kelley said]....

But district policy says teachers can't use their positions to "promote candidates or parties or activities," including protests. [Madison Superintendent Dan Nerad] said principals will determine to what degree teachers will be allowed to discuss the matter in the classroom.

How about following the policy? Seriously. I don't get it. You have a policy. Do the rules apply or don't they? You'd better set the example you expect the kids to follow. You don't accept their explanations for why the rules don't apply to them.

Peggy Coyne, a Black Hawk Middle School reading specialist and president-elect of Madison Teachers Inc., said she plans to ask students to write journal entries Tuesday about what they did while classes were canceled the last four days.

Coyne said teachers might also incorporate recent events into lessons about Wisconsin labor history. Some elementary school teachers have been told not to discuss the political events with younger children, she added.

Ridiculous! Outrageous... and kind of intimidating. What grade does a kid get if he says he demonstrated in favor of Scott Walker? Or if he says he stayed home and played video games? If this isn't deliberate spying on the students and their families it will still feel like it to many students.

"If (teachers are) going to be speaking about the rally and the protest, it really needs to be a planned lesson and it really needs to look at both sides," [Don Johnson, superintendent of the Middleton-Cross Plains School District, said].

Look, the teachers should leave the children out of their political struggle. They've already deprived them of nearly a week of the teaching they signed on to deliver. The students should receive, immediately, substantive educational lessons of the completely normal kind. Leave the politics, indoctrination, ideology, and political discipline out of the classroom. Children are required to attend school. The teachers who hold these young bodies and minds captive owe them pure, rich education. It's a disgusting violation of trust to do anything else.

I can't believe people who are fighting to preserve their job benefits would even think to appropriate the children this way. It's mind boggling.

ADDED: Link fixed.

"48% Back GOP Governor in Wisconsin Spat, 38% Side With Unions."

Ah! A poll! At last!

MORE: Rasmussen surveyed likely voters across the country — I'd like to see an all-Wisconsin poll — and found "strong partisan disagreement on both questions and a wide gap between the Political Class and Mainstream voters."

Highlights of the last 8 days of following the Wisconsin protests here on the Althouse blog.

The light, low-key demonstration on February 13th: "It was a beautiful, unseasonably warm Sunday, and our new governor has just dropped a shocking union-busting proposal that our newly Republican legislature is likely to step up and pass. This is the push-back from the unions?"

February 16, when the Madison schools first closed for the protest: "Okay, now, everybody go to the demonstration! The kids won't have school, but you can learn a lot of things outside of school. Some of these things are even taught by the teachers who are not there. For example, it's okay to call in sick when you're not actually sick, but you just have something that you think is really important."

A lady lets Meade know — via face — that he's an idiot not to understand the comparison between Scott Walker and Hitler.

Another lady holds up a Scott-Walker-is-Hitler sign and tells me fascism is coming to America.

On February 18th, I wonder what's really happening: "Why wouldn't the Republicans embrace a strategy hostile to the public employees? Why wouldn't they drive a wedge between the public employees and all the other citizens in the state?"

I talk to a man who likens Walker to Stalin and a young woman who likens Walker to the Wicked Witch of the West.

I don't like Jesse Jackson grandstanding here.

I'm wary of the Tea Party rally if it insufficiently Wisconsin.

I encounter the doctors who are handing out sick-day excuses to protesters.

Video: faces in the Tea Party crowd (with audio of Breitbart speaking).

I confront a woman with a "Please don't teabag our children" sign.

The Judas/Brett Favre/Scott Walker thing.

The nefarious honking salt trucks.

I'm irked at the lack of journalistic vigor from the New York Times.

Can I get my news about Wisconsin from the New York Times?

The newspaper I'd like to rely on is leading 2 main stories about Wisconsin on its website this morning: 1. "Wisconsin Puts Obama Between Competing Desire," and 2. "Protesters in Wisconsin Say They Are Staying Put."

As for #1... yes, as usual, it's all about Obama. What does it mean for Obama? And his "competing desires"? Good, lord, it sounds like jacket copy for a romance novel.

The battle in Wisconsin over public employee unions has left President Obama facing a tricky balance between showing solidarity with longtime political supporters and projecting a message in favor of deep spending cuts to reduce the debt.

What's the best way for Obama to look best? The eternal question. Is there no real Obama? Possibly not!

“This is a Wisconsin story, not a Washington one,” said Dan Pfeiffer, the White House communications director. “False claims of White House involvement are attempts to distract from the organic grass-roots opposition that is happening in Wisconsin.”

If it's a Wisconsin story, why did Obama horn in on it? He horned in and then backed out. It's this back and forth, trying to get into the right pose to look good later on. It's so difficult for him! (As for "organic grass-roots." Organic! You just know, the Tea Party was commercially grown.) I'd like to know what's really going on! Can't the NYT ferret out some real information about the behind-the-scenes national-level politics reaching into Wisconsin instead of passing along propaganda from Dan Pfeiffer?

Now, if we can tear ourselves away from always-scintillating trials and tribulations of Barack Obama, let's look at the second article...

Union leaders urged Wisconsin teachers to return to work at schools that are open on Monday...

But the Madison schools are closed, and there was a big union vote yesterday about that, as I blogged last night. "Nearly 3,000 Madison teachers, staff and family gathered at Monona Terrace," and the press was kicked out. The NYT doesn't mention that — let alone try to find out what went on.

As the protests went on through falling sleet and snow...

But hardly anyone was out in the bad weather, as my video, taken yesterday afternoon shows. The continuing protest was indoors, in our posh Capitol building.

As for that indoor crowd, are they Wisconsin school teachers, or are they UW students and teaching assistants? Is it still about the Scott Walker budget, or has it skewed into more generic left-wing causes? Here's the video I took inside yesterday afternoon, and those are the questions that occurred to me.

Why doesn't the NYT dig out some information? Who's involved in the organizing? How are they using Facebook and Twitter to maintain the presence in the Capitol? Who's sleeping there overnight? I photographed a sign on a pillar in the Capitol rotunda that says "talk to the TAA about how we can work together." Does the NYT know or care what the TAA even is let alone its role in organizing the protest?

Democrats in the State Senate, meanwhile, who are in the minority but are needed for a quorum, said Sunday that they intended to remain out of state — and far from the voting chamber — until Republican leaders agree to remove broad collective bargaining restrictions from the proposal to increase workers’ health care and pension costs.

“This is not a stunt, it’s not a prank,” said Senator Jon Erpenbach, one of the Democrats who drove away from Madison early Thursday, hours before a planned vote, and would say only that he was in Chicago. “This is not an option I can ever see us doing again, but in this case, it’s absolutely the right thing to do. What they want to do is not the will of the people.”

Instead of passing along a cheerleader quote from Erpenbach, how about making him tell us who's paying to house the 14 Democratic Senators in Chicago? And I want some investigation into how the protest is playing with voters around the state. Are the protests stirring up support among Wisconsinites or pissing people off? Are people outraged by the teachers taking sickout days? Are working parents struggling to find alternate childcare or leaving kids alone? Do people accept the flexible ethics of doctors giving excuse notes to protesters who called in sick and legislators who don't show up for their jobs? Are people inclined to pursue remedies like impeachment or recall? What would it take to get  actual public opinion polls?

The weather here is a dreary winter mix, and the reporting drizzling in from New York only adds to slushy mush.

Madison schools will close again on Monday — the 4th school day in a row — to accommodate teachers protesting at the Capitol.

"Nearly 3,000 Madison teachers, staff and family gathered at Monona Terrace... At one point, the [union] membership was so evenly divided on a vote to return to work Monday, they were asked to exit the meeting room and re-enter through two separate doors so an exact count could be taken. The vote was 741-731 to return Monday, but a later, more overwhelming vote to return Tuesday won the day."

Madison city salt trucks circle Capitol Square blowing horns in apparent solidarity with protesters.

This is raw footage that I took from our car today, February 20, 2011. The protest against Scott Walker's budget plan continues inside the Capitol, but the crowd outside in the cold rain is thin. Two city salt trucks circle the block at least twice, with horns blaring. Only one is visibly spreading salt. The protesters wave and hold up fists, indicating that it is their interpretation that the city workers are sounding support for the protests. Obviously, we taxpayers pay for the salt trucks and the employees who drive them and we expect those trucks to be used to make the streets all over town safe, not to circle the Capitol Square for other purposes.

"Ask me for a flower, and I will show you a Light."

At yesterday's protest, some people did their own thing. Here's a friendly gentleman in a "PEACE" hat, with a framed picture of John Lennon, a scattering of sayings, a small "Recall Gov. Scott Walker" sticker, and a lot of postage stamps. The stamps, he told me, were his contribution to the government.

Also in the photograph:

Right side: The man-in-tights blogged here.

Top left: Corrugated cardboard signs, readable in the super-enlargement. Why do people do signs on sorry-ass broken-open cardboard boxes?

Top right: The lined-up police who were keeping the pro- and anti-Scott Walker people apart. I suspected that there was an official police policy to keep the Tea Party crowd from getting big. We were forced to enter the Tea Party group at corner of the block and blocked from walking across the lawn. I expressed my theory to a woman standing next to me, and she said: What do you expect? Whose side do you think the police are on? Meaning: They're all public service employees too.

I said that I wanted to get over to the Tea Party group and complained about the difficulty of getting through the crowd to the entrance point at the corner. Her attitude toward me suddenly changed. She snapped: "You're a Republican?" Pussy that I am, I said: "I just want to get into the Tea Party group." Actually, I'm not a Republican, but I backed away from the challenge so reflexively — a habit of 25 years in Madison — that my conscious rational processes never crystallized into the lucidity that would have produced a simple "no." 

The protest continues — in the Wisconsin Capitol rotunda this evening.

"The people, united, will never be defeated."



Look for the yellow "Sarah Palin shot my dog" sign.

(Video by Meade.)

"So you're really providing real doctor's notes for people that miss work?"

"I thought this was a little street theater..."



(That's the video I was promising to deliver, back in this post.)



The tall sign says: "I'm a doctor. Need a note?"

"'I need more rights'? You've been leeching for 45 years, from the looks of it!"

A quote that begins 3 minutes at the rally today. [Note: The young man in the frozen frame below has other things to say. It's another person who begins the clip.]