The first is from the Village Voice:
"There's one group that always shows up at demonstrations, committing acts of violence," shouted Dustin Langley, a member of ANSWER--Act Now to Stop War and End Racism--at one of dozens of press conferences held on the steps of City Hall last week. "There's one right now," he said, pointing a finger at a cop strolling the plaza. "The NYPD. Let's identify the real thugs, the real terrorists!" he shouted, to the applause of supporters on the stairs.
Apparently the first step in acting to stop war and end racism is to randomly accuse police officers of being "thugs" and "terrorists."
The second is from the New York Post:
The officer, who was hospitalized with head wounds, was one of a group of scooter cops who went to the rescue of a female colleague who'd been surrounded by hooligans on West 30th Street...
Video of the incident showed that someone in a neon-green painter's cap was standing next to the assailant -- who has not yet been caught -- and had a "clear view of the incident," according to cops. Maybe you've noticed folks wearing caps like that: They're self-proclaimed "legal observers" from the far-left National Lawyers Guild, and they say their job is to protect anti-Republican protesters from alleged police brutality. When it comes to protecting the cops from the protesters' brutality, though, it seems they couldn't care less.
Indeed, the "legal observer" has yet to come forward.
Good thing those legal observers are there to protect the protesters. From what I here the ACLU was out and about doing a fine job of protecting free speech in the city as well. No word on who's job it is to protect the police from the protesters.
A lot of bloggers and journalists are stressing that the protests have been "largely peaceful," but I think that's a bit misleading. Certainly the protesters have been peaceful in that no riots have broken out, but the amount of thuggery displayed by these people over the last few days is outrageous. They have spit on people, brutalized them and made all-around asses of themselves.
Not all of them, mind you, but enough of them to show that these spots of violence are not isolated incidences.
(via Allah)