Collage for soul card, Artist, by Tammy Vitale of Tam’s Originals
Do you like doing one thing that solves two things? Yesterday I was working on ArtOMatic’s press list doing updates (I need to finish typing it this week). I’m doing it because it helps them and I like the freewheeling anarchy of their shows and also it increases my own log of press to whom I send releases. Two things for one. Win all around – time well spent.
While checking contact information for The Common Denominator: Washington’s [DC] Independent Hometown Newspaper, I came across an August 9, 2004 Commentary by Kathryn Sinzinger, a columnist. Titled, Americans are losing the fight for freedom. It sent chills down my spine because I have lately been ignoring all this madness created by the man who seems to have last been elected president (and I’m not above conspiracy theories about control of computerized voting machines). I have been ignoring it in the name of my own peace of mind and my own smallness in the face of the machine he and his cadre have created that is dismantling environmental protections in the name of business, and social welfare in the name of business welfare – oops – of course I mean in the name of self-sufficiency.
Anyways. The article is long but worth reading because what she’s writing about hasn’t stopped. And please tell me as you read these deletions of personal freedom, if you feel safer now, if you feel that what we’ve been doing lately has made the world a more stable place to live. Here is a part of it to whet your appetitie:
"The flowers were beautiful, as usual, at the Library of Congress, but heat radiating off the concrete was beginning to feel intense. Unlike earlier times, I could no longer take refuge under a shade tree on the Capitol grounds on the other side of First Street. The view was now a wall. Several steps away, near Independence Avenue, a woman lay on the sidewalk, conscious but obviously in some sort of distress, surrounded by concerned-looking persons. By the time I crossed First Street, heading toward the Rayburn House Office Building, a D.C. firetruck and ambulance were simultaneously pulling up to assist her.
"I suddenly noticed the street signs – "Independence First," they seemed to say. I found a camera angle. How ironic, I thought, that streets called "Independence" and "Constitution" are now the site of police checkpoints that impede the free movement of vehicles. I found another camera angle at Independence and First SW, this time with "Do Not Enter" and "Stop" signs as part of the scenery adjacent to Rayburn. I remembered driving unimpeded along that short street when I first moved to Washington, just as I – like so many other long-ago Hill residents – can still recall the shortcut that New Jersey Avenue on the east front of the Capitol used to provide for a quick trip to the post office. I still remember my older brother’s horrified tone when he described his reaction to seeing, on a visit to Washington nearly a generation ago, a guard booth erected to block free vehicular access to the Capitol grounds. He said it looked like "something out of Nazi Germany."
"Nearby, two marked U.S. Capitol Police cars had hopped the curb and were parked across the grass by the U.S. Botanic Garden. I snapped a few pictures. On Independence, eastbound traffic was backed up, with police officers directing motorists into checkpoint lanes. Metrobuses and tour buses were being boarded. The luggage compartment of one tour bus was opened and inspected. Most other motorists appeared to move on after officers took only a cursory glance inside their vehicles. I shot a few photos, crossed Independence, shot a few more.
"Time to start heading back, I thought. As I walked along the West Front of the Capitol, I realized how few tourists I could see – not like the old days, when a beautiful summer day would mean the streets and grounds around the Capitol were clogged with people. As I approached Constitution Avenue – noticing, again, the street signs that here seemed to say "Constitution First" adjacent to a throng of police vehicles and uniformed officers stopping cars – I suddenly, sadly, wondered if American citizens, like me, would still be able a few months from now to take a leisurely walk around the Capitol. So much had changed in the 16 years since I had relocated to put down roots in a D.C. neighborhood about five miles north of the Hill.
"The sun’s angle was bad for taking photographs along Constitution Avenue, but I tried anyway. Finding an appropriate shooting location meant attempting several vantage points. In retrospect, after my detention by police, my movements might have seemed strange – but were not dissimilar to what I would imagine any tourist who is an amateur photo buff would have done to try to ensure good photos. I headed for the park at the foot of North Capitol Street to continue my journey back to my car. While waiting for a walk light, I overheard a checkpoint police officer asking drivers of two vans – one of them a church van – where they were going. I wondered why the answer to that question mattered.
"When I reached First Street NE, which had been closed to through traffic days earlier over the objection of local officials, I pulled out my camera again. First, I photographed the barrier at First and Constitution, then began walking toward Union Station to take wider-angle photographs to show the street’s closure. Near First and C Street, I looked over my shoulder to see that a police checkpoint and barricade impeded traffic behind me. I stepped into the partially blocked street to snap a few photos. The two U.S. Capitol Police officers standing at the barricade seemed to be alarmed. "You can’t take pictures," one of them said as he approached me. I took a couple of steps toward him, introduced myself and assertively told the officer that "I think I have a constitutional right to take pictures of public streets that are blocked." "But you can’t take pictures from the middle of the street," the officer rebutted. I asked him, in an even-mannered tone, if he wanted to cite me for having done so. In response, he expressed his concern that "a grandmother" might drive through the barricade and strike me. I thanked the officer for looking out for my safety, noted that – being almost 49 years old and able to watch my own back in traffic – I had checked for oncoming traffic before snapping photos, but again thanked him for his concern for my safety. I moved on.
"I crossed D Street and turned around, this time staying at the curb, to shoot a couple of quick photographs to show that the First Street barricades began at the southern end of this intersection. I turned to wait for the "Walk" light. I needed to get back to my newsroom. I was tired and thirsty and knew I had a long night of work ahead to get Monday’s paper ready for our printer. When the sign said "Walk," I began crossing the street but turned – halfway across the street – to see that the person hailing "Miss!" was a U.S. Capitol Police officer addressing me. I finished crossing the street, then turned to wait for the officer to reach me. I looked at my watch. It was 4:20 p.m. I offered a handshake, identified myself by name and as "editor and publisher of The Common Denominator" and asked "How can I help you, officer?" He told me that I couldn’t take pictures of the "security perimeter," asked if he could see my pictures – at first, assuming that I held a digital camera – and asked if I had identification. I readily produced my D.C. driver’s license and my press card and handed them to him. He told me to "wait here," then began speaking with someone on a radio. I asked him if I was under arrest or being detained and requested my ID cards back. I told him that it was my deadline day, I was parked in a residential parking zone, and I needed to get back to my office. He again told me to "wait here" and crossed D Street toward his original position near the barricade, retaining my ID cards.
"I became alarmed. At this point, I pulled out my cell phone and dialed the one telephone number I could recall that might offer some assistance to get me on my way quickly. I called the Metropolitan Police Department’s Public Information Office in my distress to speak with the officers there about my situation. They said they could offer no assistance. The officer who had told me to "wait here" returned to my side. I again asked that he return my ID cards. He said we had to wait for a "task force" person to arrive. I began to assertively protest that I should not be detained for taking photographs of something in public that has already been all over television and in the newspapers. The officer said he had never heard of The Common Denominator. I proceeded to tell him about the newspaper, which has been published since June 1998, and where he could obtain a copy. He noted that I lacked Capitol Hill press credentials. I told him that we don’t regularly cover federal activities on Capitol Hill – the only reason that reporters obtain Capitol Hill press credentials. I suggested that the officer could call his chief, Terrance Gainer, to verify my identity because the chief knows who I am. (After returning to my newsroom, I would learn that Gainer was out of town – in the midst of what he has claimed to be a crisis that requires the heightened security in which I was mired.)
"While we continued to wait for a task force person to arrive, I asked the officer if other residents and tourists who take pictures were being treated the same way that I was. He told me yes. I immediately asked: "Are you under orders to do so?" His reply: "Yes." At that point, I told him that I understood that he was only doing his job. However, I again protested my detention and suggested that he call his chief to check me out. As I continued to protest my detention, the officer told me that I was not being detained, that I was "free to go." "Does that mean I can have my driver’s license back?" I asked. "No," he replied. "Then I guess I’m being detained, because I can’t drive my car back to my office if you have my driver’s license," I told the officer. He did not respond.
"A U.S. Capitol Police car pulled up at the corner. An officer got out of the car, introduced himself, but I didn’t catch his name. He was the task force person we had been waiting for. He used the word "reasonable" to describe what was happening to me. I again stated my objections to this officer. He retrieved and returned my driver’s license and press card, told me that I "checked out" and that I was free to go. I asked for his business card and for a card from the officer who had detained me. The task force officer handed me a card (I later discovered it lacked his name), and I immediately flipped it over and wrote down the name of the other officer, who did not have a card to give me. I told them both that I knew that they were just doing their jobs, but that I objected to what they were doing. I walked away, heading back to my car, and looked at my watch. It was 4:35 p.m."
Thought for the Day: There’s an election coming up. What kind of world do you want to leave your kids? And I say world because the U.S. is now the gorilla in the middle of the room that can sit anywhere it d*** well pleases.
bully: (1) a person who is habitually cruel or overbearing, especially to smaller or weaker people; (2)a hired ruffian; a thug (3) a pimp.
This week even a packed Supreme Court wouldn’t give the ok to above-mentioned president’s handling of war prisoners, saying that his methods did not meet the standards of the Geneva convention.
I keep wondering when we the people will learn that you cannot make war to create peace. And when we will begin to see through a government that wants us to be afraid (easier to control).
There’s a thunderstrom trying to roll in – seems appropriate to end this post in a flurry of sound and fury.
