Jane, Bill, Dan, Scarecrow and everyone arrested: Our total support and thanks for standing up against corporate greed and government connivance. I forgot who it was that once said the only people free are the people in jail. While obviously meant to be paradoxical, it expresses the truth behind the impulse for civil disobedience — that when a government is wrong, if those who oppose it are put in jail, then they are the champions of freedom, and government the tyrant.

Bravo, Jane and everyone.

Thanks very much Elliott.

Looking very much forward to when Jane, Bill, Lt. Choi and the great Scarecrow are released.

Cheering here for Jane, Bill, Dan, Scarecrow and everyone who has stood up and sat in for the earth.

Let’s make sure we spread the word far and wide!

I am so proud to be a Firebagger!!

x2!

If only the protesters had shown up with $15,000 checks in hand,
they would have been considered grassroots supporters and been left alone.

This can only rev up the protest if you ask me.

x3! I wish I could be there.

x4

so is it the Tar Sanders 65?

Me too.

it was almost like being there this morning with Jane’s livestream

Well played.

If I were in DC, I’d love to make a pastoral visit to Jane & Co.

Jailing them until Monday is absolute bullshit and an abominable waste of tax payer dollars.

Can we get FDLers in the DC area to try and visit? Visiting those in prison is one of the traditional corporal works of mercy.

Would be nice to get an ecumenical group in there.

I have zero pull with my old denomination, Roman Catholic Church.

There’s a training tonight for tomorrow’s action … getting arrested in tomorrow’s sit-in would be the best possible way to visit!

http://www.tarsandsaction.org/schedule/

My apologies. I’m regrettably unable to make it.

New York Times just picked up the AP reporting

x5

Proud to be a Firebagger.

While the President’s on vacation in the millionaire’s playground, Martha’s Vineyard, our friends and allies are in jail all weekend for trying to get him to keep his campaign promises. I know we’ll hear lots more promises from Obama as his 2012 campaign ramps up, but let’s at least hold him to his unkept promises from 2008.

Courage, Jane, Dan, Scarecrow, and Bill — looking forward to your Letters From Jail after this weekend.

In Solidarity, Teddy

(((((Jane)))))

Good Luck Jane. love to see u more on TV and help get this country and progressives back on track. Obama really has to go. He will loose and we’ll be even in more trouble.

Dear President Obama,

Fuck you.

Very truly yours…

The jailed Firebaggers are going to have interesting stories to tell. I’m proud to be a Firebagger.

((((Jane))))

Dammit. I was going to write:

Dear President Obama,

Fuck you.

Very truly yours…

And now I’m going to make a modest contribution to FDL.

Thank you, Jane, Scarecrow, Lt. Choi and all of you.

FWIW, Tar sands poll

Damn! That Jane takes a good picture.

Wish I were with her and the rest..

The authoritarians never learn.

(((Jane, Dan, Scarecrow et al)))

They’ll want a decent meal when they get out.

Thanks to Jane’s friends for taking care of Katie and Lucy.

Thanks to Jane, Bill, Dan, Scarecrow, and the 61 other activists arrested today. For anyone thinking about joining the sit-ins, I’d highly recommend reading Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail for inspiration and guidance.

As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community.

Maybe we should make Obama put all of his 2008 supporters in jail the day before the 2012 election.

Obama fail.

I for one am looking forward to Scarecrow’s Letter From Lockup, written on toilet paper with blood from his left little finger.

(in response to masaccio @ 32)

“Letter from a District of Columbia Jail” has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?

Direct Action

The past will be the future, I think. Do we have any other choice now but direct action? Has anything worked for progressives up to now?

FWIW – voted.

Gee, it doesn’t seem to be very popular. Seems to be a trend with our “representative” government.

So very odd. /s

Left alone? They would have been escorted to a palatial estate; given an exquisite dinner; and entertained by Jennifer Hudson, Herbie Hancock, and OK Go. But they would have had to listen to Obama speak and joke about cutting Medicare, so maybe jail is, overall, less onerous.

Hey, Petro!!

At this point, I wouldn’t vote for Obama in 2012 even if he were running against a swaggering Satan speaking with a Texas twang.

You abandoned the American people, Obama. You’ve fucked over your base. Get out. No one will miss you.

May I join you? I know we pray for these brave citizens and also for our country and our President.

Hopefully it doesn’t become “Letter from Gitmo.”

Thanks to all the protesters for this
brave action and thanks, too, to Jane’s
dogs for doing without mother so she
could save the planet!
Proud firebagger over here.
And shame on Obama, the narcissist-in-chief
proclaimed the earth would ‘heal’ when he was
elected President. Whatta creep.

Reporting for duty, sir.

(Edit: Sorry, that was for SD @ 38)

Sixgill in solidarity with Hamsher et al. She’s making jail look too good.

The tar sands issue, and carbon in general, is not a new one for Obama. He’s had plenty of time to prepare. From the news archives:

Feb 9, 2009
George Bush and Dick Cheney saw the resource as a pillar of economic activity and energy security for the United States. But the tar sands have delivered neither security nor sustainability. How President Obama deals with the rapid development of the tar sands will pretty much indicate how serious he is about a switch to alternative and renewable energies.

Feb 13, 2009
When US President Barack Obama visits Canada next week for his first foreign trip, the issues of oil from Alberta’s tar sands and, more widely, climate change will be high on the agenda.

Feb 17, 2009
Canada’s oil sands industry, battered by collapsing oil prices, also faces the prospect of ballooning costs as the United States and Canada prepare to discuss energy security and efforts to fight global warming.

Feb 19, 2009
Harper-Obama news conference transcript
Q: With regard to the environment, going beyond green technology, how far are your two countries prepared to harmonize your strategy to reduce greenhouse gases? And how will you reconcile your approaches? They seem different when it comes to the tar sands, for instance.

Obama: Here in Canada you have the issue of the oil sands. In — in the United States, we have issues around coal, for example, which is extraordinarily plentiful and runs a lot of our power plants. And if we can figure out how to capture the carbon, that would make an enormous difference in how we operate. Right now the technologies are at least not cost-effective.

Is that Petrocelli???

To react to the substance of this post – people who get themselves arrested for things that they believe in warm my heart and stiffen my spine more than anything else.

You are in the finest company.

Petrocelli is a fine fellow, but alas, I am not he.

OK, sorry. Haven’t seen THAT Petro around for some time. IIRC he used to frequent the late night threads. Since I’m in the Eastern time zone, I’m rarely up that late.

Nice tweet from @JimWhiteGNV

Remember when Tony Hayward spent the weekend in jail because he destroyed the Gulf? Wait…. #StopTheKeystoneXLPipeline

Well, to everyone in jail, when you get out, I hope you read this: Proud firebagger here, and I totally support you guys all!!

Sad, how fucking bogus this country is, and it is only going to get worse unless people start to take a stand, just as you all have done.

I hope those of you who have pets were able to make arrangements.

Hugs, Rachel

Direct action seems to be the only way of pressuring the elites. That’s true in Chile, China, India, Tunisia, Egypt, Israel, and here in the United States.

Lovely. It’ll be interesting to see who squeals the loudest when gas prices go up, electric rates “skyrocket”, and people can’t afford heat.
Tsk.

Well said, Jeff.

I agree.

‘S OK. It’s a common problem around these parts. That’s what I get for mostly lurking.

Me.

Are you the same voice as Happy?

There are all sorts of letters that can come from jail. I heard of one, a hand written note, that went from Norman Mailer to a fellow novelist, who at the time was a college professor. It was written on the weekend of the March on the Pentagon in the fall of 1967. It went something like: Please excuse the absence of …. from your class. He was here with me in jail, …. .

….
Uncle Norman Mailer

Think of the synergy within the jail! Our heroes

Where’ve you been?

Do you consider gas prices to be low?

A lot of people already can’t afford utilities.

This is about centralizing an energy source so the elites can profit from it. If we had invested 1/10 of what the Middle East occupations had cost, we’d have DECENTRALIZED and DIVERSIFIED renewable energy generation. We’d be building an HVDC backbone and have better storage capacity leading to energy INDEPENDENCE.

For DC locals, is the Sunday morning get together at the White House also scheduled for 11 a.m.?

I hope I’m not wasting my time here, but…

It’s not just environmental, worthy cause as it is. When you look at the energy inputs to extract from tar sands, vs. energy outputs, well, this just reassures shareholders in the short term. They’ll wake up, too, and there will be some “squealing” there.

A message to c-span, you must get Jane on as a guest, so the story can be told. As usual target the innocent and let the law breaks roam in DC!
If you believe in the freedom of speech!

Jeez, I take the day off from the computer to get some stuff done…it doesn’t bear to be away from the toobz these days.

What charge were they arrested on? Trespass? Disorderly conduct? Can anyone say where they were? Surely not in Lafayette Park.

This is getting ridiculous…right of assembly, right of free speech, right of petition to the government…all being ignored in the name of security.
I admire everyone who was willin to be arrested today. I wouldn’t do it; having too much trouble getting employment as it is, and am no longer young and fiery. Or something. Still, so glad some people still willing to do this.

Oh, that is one gorgeous story with one gorgeous delivery. And perfectly timely.

Does anyone know if Glenn Greenwald is amongst the jailed?

X0X0X0 Jane’s doggies

There’s a link above in the post to the Tar Sands Action website. According to the website, they want you to attend a training the night before you join the protest.

Seconded. They’ll need extra scritches this weekend.

Kitt, I don’t think so. I think he was just reporting it in that tweet–see the placement of the colon. Also they have a report at DKos with pictures. Where, by the way, they are giving props to Jane in the comments. Solidarity!

I’ve been to that website. For now, I just want to get underfoot and add to the general commotion–to act shamed by our Democratic president….

Jane, you have changed, and we have and will change
with you.

Dear Jane, Bill, Lt. Choi and Scarecrow,

Thank you for standing up for the Earth. You make us proud to be Firebaggers! And, once again you’ve shown personal and collective integrity, something the archons do not understand.

Here’s Jane’s video from this morning:

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/16772180

Thanks.

Jane and all, thanks for your activism. Electrons don’t mean shit. Bodies count.

Became a paying member-firebagger a few days ago. FDL got Obama’s campaign contribution instead.

something coming in the mail Tues or WEd.(((Jane)))) (((Crow)))

Thanks for joining Melvoid!

Oooh. Thanks.

I can see them now, pacing around the house, their little toenails click-clacking on the kitchen floor . . . “whereisshe?whereisshe?noms?noms?walkies?walkies?i’m confused!whereisshe???”

HuffPo has a piece on the protest, linked from the front page: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/20/tar-sands-action-protests_n_932191.html#s334393&title=Tar_Sands_Sit

That was my first thought: How does one now get arrested for peaceful assembly?!

No, but he did tweet the arrest to his followers. Unfortunately, a lot of the veal pen did not do the same.

Zing! +10.

Just signed the petition and sent a donation to help provide support. Thank you Jane for your courage and leadership. I wish our president and elected representatives had half the guts you have in your left pinky.

(((Jane,Dan,Scarecrow and all the others who are standing strong)))

And whoever the hell above asked who will be whining about higher gas prices. Won’t be me. Go to blazes.

Thank you Jane, Scarecrow, Dan, Bill and everyone sitting in. Thank you for sitting in for protecting us from the pollution that nasty pipeline would bring.

I think this photo from behind is Jane handcuffed

Amen to that!

Thank you SO MUCH for posting that. They were already arrested and the livestream gone when I woke up and logged onto fdl this morning.

Scarecrow, for some reason I assumed you were younger than me, (30-ish…I’m 32).

((Jane)))

(((Scarecrow)))

My people, my thoughts and heart are with you. I missed you both at the excellent book salon today.

Still watching the recorded livestream, btw….

Thanks for the link, Siun. At the very least, we can all donate.

Thank you, melvoid, and welcome.

Some time in the recent past Scarecrow said to me the door to change was the streets. I shivered from the daring of it. Did he truly say that; it was so out of character of the Scarecrow I’ve known, but then, why not; he is and has been a moral man through the years. Of the many issues he could go to the streets on, I’m not surprised that it was finally an environmental protest and I notified various church friends who are into non-violent protest actions about the possibility that Scarecrow would also be arrested and they might enjoy the comments of those who have been NVP actors in the past, are prepared to be that in the future and those, like me, who honor the praxis but are still reluctant to go to the streets (at least like in Wisconsin, for a definable duration and be prepared to be arrested). Afterall, I don’t have any money to bail me out of jail.

But I trust that Jane, Dan, Bill and Scarecrow do. And I trust that they’ll all have many things to say about their experience. Glad that Peterr and RevDeb are wishing they were in a position for a pastoral care visit. Wish I had a relationship with the pastor of the Church of the Saviour in DC, whoever that may be in these times, for he/she/they would surely care about the issue and our heroes’ courageous witness and testimony. Do you suppose they were allowed to keep their lap tops while in jail?

Looking forward to their posts in the coming days.

I say thanks be to God and blessings to all,

wish I was there! ;) It’s a great day to go to jail!

Many props to all there and all those that take the time to make a stand and make some truly valuable positive PR to counter this Earthen rape for $$.

The video beforehand is really great! Jane asks great questions! LT Dan is such a charmer, Scarecrow and Bill McKibben show such passion in their focus and determination. Heart warming, seriously!
thanks again for letting us in to see ;)

I can only applaud Jane, Dan, Bill, Scarecrow and the rest who stood up for their convictions in this way. I hope they will make their point and emerge free, safe, and sound. Yet I wish they’d done it for something else: the budget bill, the public option, Bush’s pardon of Scooter Libby, or even, God help us, Federal dollars for renewable energy.

First: oil is going to be progressively harder for America to get as we keep drawing down domestic reserves. There are two places in this hemisphere that have big oil reserves, Venezuela (which Bush and Cheney alienated from us big time for no real reason) and Canada. While I support alternative and solar (and have posted on that in this blog) we need oil until other sources get on stream. So why protest oil that actually comes to the US by pipeline instead of the Mideast??? The mind boggles.

Second: If there was one thing NAFTA got right, is was the Canadians’ agreement to sell us oil. They know how badly we need that oil and so does anyone else who has studied the oil market (I’ve written on it in places like the NYT and the Baltimore Sun). So imagine how this protest plays in Canada: “America doesn’t want our ‘dirty’ oil? Fine. We’ll renegotiate NAFTA and sell to China!”

Is that what we really want?

I understand why some hate the Tar Sands. Processing it IS dirty, sucks up huge amounts of precious freshwater. And the local Native tribes (Canadians call them, First Nations) have claims regarding the desecration of their lands. Noted. I just don’t see how picking this fight really helps America.

Why couldn’t the big demonstration be to get funding for domestically manufactured solar panels and wind turbines??? Now THAT would do something to fix the energy problem.

Before you flame me for this, just remember, I’ve written articles from way back denouncing the depredations of Big Oil and I have felt like one of you since the Valerie Plame days even if I don’t post much.

A legal opinion on why Jane and friends were sent to jail for peaceful protesting would be good I need a good laugh.

I could not yet find an archive of CSPAN’s live coverage. I went through all of Jane’s videos from the peaceful assembly and demonstration which provide awesome coverage and interviews. Bill McKibben short talk to the group was brilliantly succinct as to how combusting all the tar sands would destroy the climate. I was touched to find out that First Nation representatives from Canada were there who were sick and dying from the toxins involved in energy extraction on their lands.

“..65 environmentalists” demonstrating for a return to 10,000 BC. Well, at least that would get us out of these Democratic Party Ponzi schemes. Yes, I know, we humans have melted all the Ice Ages … so we must be punished, so says the Global Warming God. And, it is better to send billions of dollars to our enemies than to keep it here for creating new jobs and helping our poor … so says the Global Warming God.

Why am I totally unconvinced that your primary concern is about “helping our poor”?

Obama is now into jailing progressives. My, what a surprise. /s

(I’m sure the punditry he listens to will tell him that more hippie-punching is just what is needed to secure his victory in 2012)

stewartm

So what is this REALLY about? Sounds like political intimidation to me. Sounds to me like Obama learned plenty from the Daley machine. Seems to me the biggest political mistake of my life was staying in the party after 1968.

The whole world is watching the implosion of our once great nation.

Still, demonstrations aren’t going to work this time around I don’t believe. They didn’t work most of the time in the ’60s and that was before the 9/11 hysteria turned local police forces into impersonators of the former East Berlin police.

We have to deny them voters and we have to let the parties at the local level know that we will deny them voters.

Just stop voting for them. Adopt a small party.

Teach your favorite tea partier that small goverment begins with small parties.

Probably because you worship the Global Warming God…and, sorry, humble me can’t help you with that problem.

I worship nothing but truth and accuracy. And I just can’t think of any oil lovers whose actions reflect a genuine concern for the poor. There’s just too much of a values clash there, I guess.

The Brits acted up for a few weeks, and now Cameron is talking concessions. Seems to be a more effective strategy than relying on black box voting in campaigns flooded by unlimited corporate dollars (and remember, 2010 was just the first hint of what that will look like in future). Street action is the minimum of what is required, and I am thrilled and proud of Jane, et al, for showing the way. The learning curve here at FDL has been slower than one might have hoped, but it seems that it is finally kicking in. If the PTB choose to abuse legal protesters, then they will reap the same whirlwind Cameron did. That’s just the way things work in the real world. Abused people eventually get angry enough to act up. If they kill us for it, the pushback will probably just get more extreme.

Best to all concerned and thanks to those who got up and stood up for what’s right! Don’t give up the fight, folks. Demostrations may sometimes seem meaningless or less than useful, but I disagree. Exercising one’s civil liberties by peaceful protest is a good and effective means of communication. If such actions were so meaningless, why would the PTB bother to jail citizens for speaking out?

Get the word out. Hold the POTUS’s feet to the fire in terms of what he alleges he stands for. Let all the world see what a phoney Obama is and how bought off by the Oligarchy.

Power to the people!

I agree. And I disagree with those who say that protests and street actions have no effect. JMHO, of course, but just bc the corp-owned media chooses to try to *ignore* these events does not mean that they have no effect. Saying that and then using it as an excuse for not protesting is pretty much allowing yourself to be co-opted by the PTB. Again, just my opinion & not to diss anyone. Just saying…

The only time demonstrations have the potential for working is when they are in support of an issue with a very broad base. For example, had people organized a broad based middle class coaltion for a nationwide demonstration, march etc. for labor and jobs on Labor Day that might actually have had enough leverage to move the debate DC.

Even so, the demonstrations are pointless if they don’t motivate people to vote.

We had the National Guard at my campus every spring and I totally believed that by year 3 we had changed the voters in my state. We won our county and lost the other 98. We’d have done better working to GOTV in those other 98 counties.

I say demonstrate with your ballot in 2012 and talk your friends and neighbors into doing the same.

And to greenbell #104. Effectiveness of street action depends on the militancy, magnitude, and persistence of that street action. Those are the most important variables. Comparisons to past events lose their probative strength as one considers that the present situation is more extreme, by a variety of objective measures, than the past events referenced. It’s long past time to conclude that the voting system is hopelessly rigged and corrupted. If you don’t agree with that, you probably don’t know enough about all the ways that system gets manipulated. The test that is now underway is about street action vs. government force. How that dynamic plays out will determine our future.

How much more evidence do some people need to convince them that Obama is a hard-right-winger?

Obamabots are thoughtless true believers.

Our enemies? Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait (to name our biggest suppliers) are our enemies?

You can’t be taken seriously.

We need to use technology to use LESS oil. Conservation is what broke the back of OPEC in the 1980′s as our imports dropped by a large amount.

“Jane Kleeb on the Tar Sands Pipeline protest” (Aug. 21, 2011)

“Stop the Keystone XL Dirty Tar Sands Pipeline” (Apr. 11, 2011)

“Climate Justice Movement Keys off Civil Rights Crusade” (TheTypee.Ca, Aug. 19, 2011)

Well, you won’t find too many American cities more liberal than the Twin Cities and you should have seen how they turned St Paul into East Berlin during the Republican convention. I mean you can see it even in San Francisco with the recent BART over reaction. The cops have been armed like armies. The sleepy old National Guard of my day are now battle hardened warriors.

Street actions are virtually impossible. The only chance you have today is to organize a truly broad based coalition around a broad based issue so that the police are confronted with sending half of Peoria to jail. And yoiu’d best be focusing on economic issues now.

Daily Kos diary list for tag Stop Tar Sands

includes Bill McKibben’s Message from Jail

I’ve by no means read all that’s there but here’s 350.org’s photostream of the sit-in

and here’s Jane’s mug shot on tarsandsaction.org’s flickr set.

Lots of stuff out there.

Deeply, deeply proud of firebaggers and environmental people of conscience everywhere.

Thanks tvt

Helping the poor into further poverty and expanding potential for ill-health through greater atmospheric pollution and through actual damage to and further potential for catastrophic damage to existing fresh water supplies across our nation? With as little as one-half of a functioning brain cell, even a die-hard climate skeptic should be able to see what the matter is with tar sands oil extraction along with perpetuation of the myth of a sustainable oil economy.

I don’t disagree that the enforcers have become more militarized amnd aggressive. Doesn’t change the basic dynamic. Does increase the risk.

Petition doesn’t work for those of us running non-microsoft operating system–at least I can only assume that’s the problem. All I get on the petition page is a disclaimer that my email address will not be used for any other purpose–no petition to sign.

Well, finally got petition to respond, but when I signed and commented it assumed I was volunteering to go to DC. Says they will be in touch with me shortly. Sorry, but I am 64 years old, broke, and responsible for an elderly parent. I find it disheartening that they only want my signature if I’m able to come down and demonstrate. I have deep admiration for those demonstrators, but cannot participate at their level.

Loved this one:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tarsandsaction/6062567485/

Could almost have been me, lifetimes ago.