Guantanamo protesters arrested in D.C.

Here’s to the people out there making a difference.  Here’s to giving them some exposure.  The exposure they deserve.

I was glad to hear the protesters demonstrating in the background off camera last night as the pundits reviewed Bush’s speech to the nation.  The fact that we, the viewers, could hear them was unusual.  Those protesters are often there making as much noise as they can.  It’s the media, tweeking the microphone pick-up, that often don’t allow the viewers to hear it.   Just another example of media selecting what news they want you to see and spinning it they way they want you to see it.

MANUEL BALCE CENETA: AP

Jan. 11, 2007, 12:24PM
Guantanamo protesters arrested in D.C.

© 2007 The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — About 100 protesters were arrested inside a Washington federal courthouse Thursday after a brief demonstration calling for the shutdown of the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The group _ which had a permit for a demonstration outside the courthouse _ began singing and chanting as they were led away in small groups, their hands bound by plastic cuffs.

Demonstrators made their way into the courthouse through a side entrance where they were passed through metal detector and were cleared by security screeners. The protesters gathered in an atrium where they began reading poetry and singing songs.

Chief U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan ordered U.S. marshals to allow the group to demonstrate peacefully. An aide said it was the first time a demonstration had been allowed inside the courthouse.

The arrests were triggered when the demonstrators violated rules laid down by U.S. Marshal George Walsh and began waving signs and displayed bright orange T-shirts bearing slogans like “Stop Torture” and “Shut Down Guantanamo.”

Walsh said the demonstrators would be cited, then released. Charges would be decided by federal prosecutors.

“They were going to be given a chance to be private citizens discussing something in the courthouse, but once you put the signs up it becomes something else,” Walsh said.

Earlier, outside the Supreme Court building, several hundred demonstrators and dozens of rights activists wearing orange prison jump suits and black hoods called for the shutdown of Guantanamo.

Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights, told the crowd the Bush administration has engaged in an “unprecedented overreaching of executive authority.”