Hardly anyone noticed last month when the Bush administration quietly settled a lawsuit two American citizens had filed after being denied freedom of speech and that’s a shame because it represented a small but satisfying triumph over the Bush bullies.
In happier times, when more than the present 5 percent of Americans told pollsters they trusted Bush with “successfully resolving the war in Iraq,†the president would occasionally make appearances before audiences not completely stacked with true believers.
But even back then, during the first Bush term, his handlers made certain dissenters were not too visible, that the television audiences would see only seas of supportive, shining faces. To guarantee adoring audiences, the administration published a “Presidential Advance Manual†with detailed instructions on “creating a well-balanced crowd and deterring potential protesters from attending events.†The manual instructed event planners to see to it that only those “extremely supportive of the administration†were allowed near the president. All others, said the official how-to manual, were to be confined in “a protest area where demonstrators can be placed, preferably not in view of the event site or the motorcade route.â€
Should dissenters trespass into the sacred sightline of the president, the manual called for “rally squads†of supporters to get in front of them, raise large signs and chant, “USA, USA, USA.†And get this, “The rally squads can include, but are not limited to, college/young Republican organizations, fraternities/sororities.†This, I remind you, is from a government document.
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Appropriately enough, the manual was put to a test on the Fourth of July in 2004, when two protesters were arrested at an event in Charleston, W.Va., where the campaigning president was scheduled to speak. This wasn’t a Bush rally, but a city-sponsored program in observation of American independence, a nicety that didn’t deter the Bush goon squads.
A young couple, Jeff and Nicole Rank, showed up at the rally wearing T-shirts with anti-Bush slogans and were told they had to cover their shirts or leave the event. The couple tried to argue they shared the right to express themselves with those in the crowd wearing pro-Bush and Cheney shirts, but they were handcuffed and arrested as “‘America the Beautiful’ is playing over the loudspeaker,†Jeff Rank recalled. Nicole Rank, an employee of FEMA, of all things, was suspended on the grounds she had compromised the emergency management agency’s mission in West Virginia.
FEMA reinstated Nicole Rank and Charleston city officials dropped charges and apologized to the couple as the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit on their behalf on First Amendment grounds. The ACLU suit forced the defendant, a Bush advance man, to produce the administration’s Presidential Advance Manual, which proved sufficiently embarrassing to force the government to settle the suit.
The Ranks were awarded a modest $80,000 in taxpayers’ money and it was worth every cent because the proceedings cast additional light on the Bush administration’s totalitarian tendencies.
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This West Virginia action is one of several lawsuits filed by the ACLU and others after similar incidents, including the case of a Denver resident ejected from a Bush appearance because he was driving a car with a bumper sticker expressing the sentiment, “No More Blood for Oil.†The administration settled the West Virginia case without admitting guilt on the bogus grounds it wanted to spare the plaintiffs the expense of further litigation.
And, if you appreciated the ironic playing of “America the Beautiful†while the dissenters were being led out of the Charleston rally, I offer what the president had to say that day to the Fourth of July celebrants:
“On this Fourth of July, we confirm our love of freedom, the freedom of people to speak their minds...free thought, free expression, that’s what we believe.â€
Simsbury resident Dick Ahles is a retired journalist. E-mail him at dahles@hotmail.com.
