HEY, YOU CAN'T DISRUPT MY DISRUPTION:

The Right's Stuff: A Texas-based band of conservative warriors tackles the left on its own turf--the street (ROBERT WILONSKY, 9/09/04, Dallas Observer)

On a Friday afternoon in late August they've come to this street corner to raise their signs and voices to protest the venal forces that would bring down the United States. They brandish placards and peace signs, and passing motorists wave back in agreement, offer their own gestures consisting of a single middle finger or ignore them. The demonstrators are mostly white men, ranging in age from 16 to mid-40s, and among their signs is one that reads, in part, "War never solved anything!"

For months this protest has been taking place in front of the Dallas offices of a company many Americans believe to be evil. With their signs and slogans the protesters stand on the front lawn of the corporation once run by Vice President Dick Cheney, Houston-based Halliburton Co., damned by Democrats for receiving billions in no-bid contracts for reconstructing Iraq.

But look closely at the signs. The one that says, "War never solved anything"? It says something just above that: "Except for ending slavery, fascism, Nazism & Communism..." And wait, what about those other signs they're holding? There's one with Osama bin Laden dressed as Uncle Sam. It reads, "Uncle Osama wants you to vote for John Kerry." There's another one with bin Laden on it: "Vote Kerry 2004 so I can kill your family." One says, "9/11 was just freedom of speech!" And another placard pleads, "Help! I'm surrounded by America-hating idiots!" And... waitaminute. That guy over there's wearing a T-shirt that reads--can this be right?--"I Halliburton."

What the hell?

Welcome to another Friday afternoon in the ongoing Operation Halliburton Defense Force being carried out by members of the Dallas chapter of a group of right-wingers called Protest Warrior. Their mission is to protest the protesters from the Dallas Peace Center who have been here since April to demonstrate against Halliburton. The Warriors' ideology is a bit more labyrinthine, a smorgasbord of conservative and libertarian ideas sprinkled with activism more commonly associated with lefties. Their motto is crystal-clear: "Fighting the left...doing it right." [...]

"Right to left, left to right, when you intrude upon someone else's event you are asking for a confrontation, not a debate," says Columbia journalism professor Todd Gitlin, who, as former president of Students for a Democratic Society, organized the first Vietnam War protest in March 1965. "When you enter into an emotionally charged arena in a pugnacious spirit you get a fight, not a debate. They will be martyrs and heroes. That sounds like pure political combat. The slogan 'Protest Warrior' is an interesting one. Is it that they are warriors or protesters?...It's another gimmick for belligerent right-wingers."

Fascists! When the Left protests someone else's event they become the event and are therefore inviolable!

Posted by Orrin Judd at September 9, 2004 11:32 AM