NYC Police Arrest Nearly 1,000 Protesters (& "Pink Slip" Protest Today)

[Khephra]

NEW YORK -- Thousands of protesters waving pink fliers that read "The Next Pink Slip Might Be Yours!" formed a symbolic unemployment line stretching three miles from Wall Street to the site of the Republican convention on Wednesday.

"I've been unemployed before," said Gary Goff, 57, a data processor. "I'm concerned that unemployment is going up so drastically under the Bush administration. I think Bush is a disaster for working people."

The peaceful demonstration came a day after police struggled to contain swarms of protesters with metal barriers and orange netting, eventually arresting nearly 1,000 demonstrators with their sights set on fortress-like Madison Square Garden.

The "unemployment line," organized by the nonprofit Washington-based People for the American Way, was part of the Imagine Festival of Arts, Issues and Ideas that called for a creative response to party politics.

more.........

http://www.newsday.com/news/politics/wire/sns-ap-cvn-protests,0,3877436.story?coll=sns-ap-politics-headlines

[thecrow]

1. What's with this orange netting crap?

[Khephra]

2. I'm not there, but it's probably this thick plastic net

that I've seen used a big concerts before. It's a cheap and quick way to put up temp fences.

[KurtNYC]

3. they have sections of a thin mesh plastic net

that they wrap around the ends of groups they want to mass arrest. They used it Sunday on the bike protest. It is a new technique which the ACLU says is illegal.

[David__77]

4. Hope someone always cuts through it.

People have to learn how to combat their techniques. This is a lesson into police-state tactics.

[The Sushi Bandit]

5. Anyone have a picture of it?

[clownskull]

6. not a great image

that's the best I can find. If you ever have gone downill skiing, you will notices that they use this all the time.

[sleipnir]

7. No, it's much finer and lighter weight than that stuff.

Though I have seen some cops using the Snow Fence. They also have a different material that's much more malleable and weighs less. It's close to the riot netting they put on their vans and trucks.

[TahitiNut]

8. Such mesh is made in a wide variety of designs.

It's used for barriers of various kinds, often around constricution or excavation sites, or around agricultural sites where pesticides or chemicals are used, or on poles to deter birds.

It usually comes in rolls 50-75 yards long and about 4' wide.

Some of the designs include ...

[lostnfound]

10. Use it here in Houston often; bet some * buddy is getting a cut..

probably standard practice for the new * homeland.

[calimary]

9. Damn! I hate to see headlines like this.

The note in the story is a little bit about the peaceful protest today and a LOT about all the arrests for something else yesterday. SHIT. It makes us all look bad. I wish some of these folks could keep just a wee bit of a cooler head. Yes, many of them are angry. And that anger is justified in many (probably most) cases. But don't they know how they screw things up for the rest of us?

[G_j]

11. pink slips

Protesters line up on lower Broadway from Wall Street to City Hall to voice their opposition against what they say are the failed economic policies of the Bush administration September 1, 2004 in New York. The peaceful protest came on the third day of the Republican National Convention. (Henny Ray Abrams/Reuters)