Protesting on the 'Mean Streets' of St. Paul

ST. PAUL, Minn.--Talk about a time warp. On the streets of St. Paul, a pair of anti-war activists approached a phalanx of riot police bedecked in traditional billy-club-and-gas-mask regalia--and offered them some freshly-picked flowers. The protesters received a face full of pepper spray in return.

Apparently, SWAT teams don't like daisies--even after all these years. As approximately 10,000 protesters--and what seemed like nearly as mainly cops--took to the streets this afternoon to replay the timeless battle between provocative faux-naivete and ostentatious authoritarian machismo, it was possible to imagine that a certain section of downtown St. Paul had magically interrupted the space-time continuum and transported itself back to 1968. Whether it was the weather (sunny, warm), the timing (Labor Day) or the simple fact that the cancellation of this evening's convention festivities had left everyone looking for something to do, the peaceful "Coalition to March on the RNC and Stop the War" Rally that began around 11:00 a.m. this morning at the state capitol quickly descended into the rather rote melodrama of The People vs. The Man--with each side playing their preassigned roles to the hilt.

The curtain went up, I gather, when the masses started marching toward the Xcel Energy Center around 2:00 p.m. Most made it uneventfully to convention headquarters, but it didn't take long for breakaway groups to create clusters of chaos throughout the downtown area. Some smashed windows on the first floor of Macy's; others surrounded a bus in the middle of an intersection; still others threw bottles at the authorities. Predictably, their activities drew the attention of the local riot squads--which seemed to be part of the point. (After all, everyone came equipped with bandannas to block the hoped-for tear gas.) When I arrived at the corner of Wabasha and Kellogg around 3:00, lines of cops, some on foot, some on horseback, were enthusiastically herding the remaining protesters northeast up Kellogg with a combination of pepper spray, tear gas, rubber bullets and deafening "flashbang" hand grenades. Walking behind the police, I spotted a middle-aged man in an "Anarchy" t-shirt shouting "the world is watching you!"; dreadlocked, pimply teens wearing oversized shorts and shooting silly string into the air; members of a group called "Funk the War" dancing to Public Enemy in the middle of Fourth St.; and representatives of the National Lawyers Guild, a left-wing Bar Association, scurrying around in florescent green caps. "Is this appropriate?" said an NGL worker named Anne (she was repeating my question). "Of course it's not appropriate! They're acting like we live in a police state!" That said, most of the people involved--the protestors, the national guard, the local cops, the journalists--seemed be thoroughly proud of themselves. It was almost as if something was happening.

Not everyone got off unscathed. According to officials, today's protests resulted in 13 arrests, seven misdemeanors, two gross misdemeanors and four felonies. (UPDATE: The final tally was more than 200 arrests.) I saw the cops tackle and pin a young protester to the ground in the middle of Kellogg Blvd. after he seemed to knock over a newspaper dispenser and a garbage can; when I returned to check on him 20 minutes later, scrapes and scratches covered his shirtless body. Asked his name, the boy indicated that he was having trouble breathing; an ambulance was apparently on its way. But more of the casualties were like the young woman who was pepper-sprayed earlier for offering the cops a flower. Fifteen minutes after the incident, I spotted her leaning against a wall three blocks away as her friends--eager for conflict, they'd brought along first-aid kits--flushed out her eyes with water. Crying uncontrollably, she told everyone to step back as she theatrically slammed her fists into the side of the building. Then she shouted "I'm ready" and sprinted off towards the shrinking riot. Her eyes were still closed.

Nearby, local children's television producer Cathy Shugrue, 54, told me she was shocked by the scene. "St. Paul usually looks like a ghost town," she said. "I'm just trying to get to my car."