Two years awaiting trial; so much for the presumption of innocence

One way to quell dissent is to lock up the dissenters so that no one can listen to them.You can do this by overcharging on a criminal complaint, by asking for an unreasonable level of bail or both.

Cecily McMillan has been held behind bars by New York prosecutors for almost two years. Her trial on charges she assaulted a New York City police officer was to begin yesterday. After clearing procedural hurdles, and scheduling around court holidays, jury selection is scheduled to begin on Thursday and the government should present its case on Friday.

Ms. McMillan was charged with felony assault after she elbowed an officer beneath his eye at a Zuccotti Park protest back in March of 2012. Prosecutors claim Ms. McMillan deliberately elbowed the officer in the face as members of Occupy Wall Street fought with the police. Ms. McMillan claims that someone behind her grabbed her breast and she swung her elbow to protect herself. After her elbow made contact Ms. McMillan was viciously beaten by the police and arrested.

There was no need for Ms. McMillan to suffer the beating she did. She was one person. The officer wasn't seriously injured. Yet the beating commenced. And once it began there was no stopping it until the adrenaline ran out. What happened to Ms. McMillan on the street was far worse than what happened to the officer.

Now aside from the legal issues of what constitutes intentional or knowing action in this case, there is a bigger issue. The crime for which Ms. McMillan was charged is a Class D felony for which she faces a maximum sentence of seven years.

But let's keep in mind that Ms. McMillan is innocent unless proven otherwise beyond all reasonable doubt by the government. And for that reason alone she should not have spent the last 23 months confined to a cell. Her confinement was a means to coerce her into entering a plea that would resolve the case and leave her with a criminal record for the rest of her life.

Her confinement also shows the divide between the attitudes of prosecutors and the rest of society. For a prosecutor, a sentence is but a number that can be thrown around as if it were handed down by a god. There are no consequences for a prosecutor - he or she is going home every evening after work regardless of what happens.

For the rest of us, those numbers represent a tragedy. Someone's mother or father or daughter or son or sister or brother is going to be taken away. Arrangements must be made so that whoever is left on the outside can take care of everyone else. The situation is only magnified when judges and prosecutors play games with bail and lock up innocent folks for months or years while they await resolution of their cases.

Now there can be little doubt that the police in New York City (and elsewhere across the country) overreacted in their response to the Occupy! movement. There was no reason to clear parks by force when folks all over this country were organizing and exercising their constitutional right to assemble and petition the government for their grievances.

If things got out of hand that night at Zuccotti Park then we should be looking at the leadership of the New York City Police Department who instead of carrying out their supposed duty to protect and defend the residents of New York City, turned their weapons on the citizenry to clear a park at the behest of Wall Street interests.

Even if you believe the government's account of what happened that night, there is no excuse to lock up a young woman without a criminal record for two years. If bail were set at a level higher than that which she could afford to post, then it should have been lowered. After all, bail is not a punitive measure, it is merely a means of guaranteeing a defendant's appearance in court. Holding someone behind bars for two years serves only to make it more difficult to defend a case. It certainly doesn't advance the cause of justice.

Chicago mayor seeks to quell dissenting voices

Up in the Windy City, Mayor Rahm Emanuel is preparing to host both a NATO summit and the G8 summit. And, since we're living in a dangerous world, new security measures are a must.

Mr. Emanuel wants to spend money on the summits without first getting approval from the City Council. He wants local police to be empowered to deputize out-of-state law enforcement officers and he wants to be able to restrict the times and locations of protests.

He claimed the requested measures would be temporary - to shut down protesters while the world's eyes were on Chicago. But, like most "temporary" government measures, the changes would have been permanent. The police want more power to deal with any possible scenario - no matter how far-fetched it might be.

Here's an idea, Mr. Emanuel, why not allow Chicago to be a shining beacon of just what the First Amendment means. You chose to have these summits come to your city; in other words, you invited the problems you foresee. Let the world see just how much the right to assemble and voice your grievances means to Americans.

The greatest threat to democracy, Mr. Mayor, is intolerance of differing opinions. Sure, free speech can be ugly. It can be rude. It can be inconvenient. But the people's dissent serves as a check on government. Instead of being afraid of what protesters might say and do while the world is watching, embrace this celebration of the Bill of Rights.

People have died in the streets of Cairo, Damascus and other cities throughout the Arab world over the last year because the authoritarian regimes would not tolerate dissent. In this country we have witnessed the orderly handing over of power for more than two centuries because dissenting opinions are not only tolerated, but encouraged.

Petty tyrants must be in control of everything. Differing opinions must not be tolerated. A true democrat embraces the cacophony of voices and celebrates the people's right to be heard.

You gotta blame someone

Last March protesters took to the streets of Bahrain demanding a voice in the governance of the oil-rich kingdom. Imagine that - in this day and age of democracy busting out all over, we have the vestiges of an era in which someone grabbed a bigger stick and declared himself to be king. How could that cause any problems?

As is wont to happen when an authoritarian regime is challenged, the security forces (providing security for whom?) were whipped into a frenzy and went into a murderous rampage against their own citizens. Now let's just think about that for a moment. Armed personnel (thugs?) in the employ of the government are ordered to beat, maim, intimidate and kill anyone who dare speak out against the regime. The same regime that puts on its smiley face and tells the people to be patient - that reform is in the works.

Nope. Wrong answer. What we have is a government that has lost all legitimacy. Once a regime turns its armed forces on its own citizenry, it has lost whatever moral authority it may have had in the first place. And any member of the security forces (or police or army or whatever the hell you want to call the thugs) that follows an order to turn his weapon on a fellow citizen is guilty of a crime.

But there's more. You see the Bahraini government decided that it wasn't enough to beat, maim and kills its own citizens. After all, the victims who were still breathing had to get medical treatment somewhere. With all apologies to Shakespeare, the king decided the first thing he needed to do was kill the doctors.

Punish the doctors, that's right. Forget about the dead and the wounded. Forget about the army pointing its weapons at the people it's supposed to protect (well, that's what we're told the military and police do - in reality their job is to protect the chosen few.)

Twenty doctors, nurses and medics were convicted of inciting the people to overthrow the government and were sentenced to between five and 15 years in prison. Forget about the soldiers that shot, maimed and killed their fellow citizens - they went back to their barracks and got some commendation or ribbon to pin to their uniforms. But the medics who did what doctors do got the whip.

Maybe some of the medics wanted to see the government overthrown. Maybe some were part of the protests. Who cares? They were tried and convicted for tending to the wounded and trying to save their lives. They were punished for treating the citizens who were injured at the hands of their own government.

Bowing to international pressure (and to an international panel's report that found "abuses" in the government's crackdown on protesters -- I guess you could call killing protesters to be abusive. I prefer to call it murder), the medics were retried on Monday.

Maybe the regime tries to make nice and hope everything blows over. But you can't unring the bell. And, no matter how hard you scrub, you can't wash away the blood on your hands.

So much for the First Amendment

Cheap Trick sang about them two decades ago -- the Dream Police have invaded the Twin Cities. This past weekend, while everyone else was focused on Gustav and his assault on Nawlins, the Minneapolis police cracked down on anyone who had the gall to challenge the Bush/McCain illusion of America. Is this a glimpse into the crystal ball of how McCain intends to prevent 9/11 from happening again?

Media with Conscience reports that the FBI-led Minneapolis Joint Task Force on Terrorism recruited informants to report on the activities of leftist groups in the area. The Minneapolis police and the FBI-led task force conducted pre-emptive assaults on groups exercising their right of free speech.

The Michigan Messenger reports that Ramsey county sheriff's officers conducted an armed raid at a St. Paul convergence space and handcuffed hundreds as they watched movies and ate a pot-luck dinner. Officers defended their actions by claiming they had search warrants -- though no one was allowed to see the warrants.

Despite the authoritarian tactics employed by the local police and the FBI, protesters turned out en masse on the opening day of the RNC.

The strength of this nation comes, not from our similarities, but from our wildly divergent origins, paths, views and philosophies. The United State's isn't a melting pot where disparate elements are melded together -- we are a pot of jambalaya, a rich stew made all the better by the mulitude of tastes.