Co-conspirator, sister, and potentially violent protestor A. and I got up early to head over to the National Lawyer Guild's Legal Observer headquarters on E. 35th in Manhattan. We picked up our green hats and badges and were assigned to go monitor the NARAL Protest, with started at City Hall in Brooklyn, went across the Brooklyn Bridge, and ended with a rally at City Hall in Manhattan.

A. and I were assigned to Team Giraffe (cute, I know) with C. as our team leader. The three other members of the team were middle-aged (or elderly) and all pretty lawyerly. A. and I are relatively young and were much closer in age to C. than the others.

The rest of the team headed directly to Brooklyn. A. and I stopped at Duane Reade to buy granola bars and water (you can never be too prepared) and then at a cafe to get a lil' breakfast and some coffee.

And whaddaya know but about fifty cops walk in:



Many of them had bundles of very thick plastic cuffs dangling from their belts. Each also had an unfamiliar-looking squarish canvas bag attached to their belts; I assume that they contained gas masks.

[A. and I had the phone number to call if we got arrested scrawled on our calves in black magic marker; I think a cop spotted it and smirked.]

We arrived at the rally point in Brooklyn, and it seemed like a pretty big crowd.



You think these guys were actual protestors or plainclothes cops? [Love the jerseys...]



And here are some of the protestors:




More soon.

No legal observer stuff today. Today instead was spent recovering from a wild Thursday night with old friend and gadfly S. that began at her pirate radio show in the East Village. Then there were bars and a club, or something, but it's all a little hazy.

Monstrepo arrived and has temporarily taken human form -- he even has a car! Hours were spent driving around in Brooklyn, lost. Badly lost.

Saturday: Legal Observing!

Last night was the NLG training session, held at a good ol' lib church (Universalists?) on the Upper West Side. The attendees spanned a wide range of ages and ethnicities; some were dressed in suits, some in hipster garb.

CBS Sunday Morning showed up early on to tape the proceedings for a segment this Sunday.



The job of the Legal Observer (LO) is pretty interesting. Turns out our primary duties will be documenting police "incidents." We get the names of people arrested, try to photograph incidents as they take place, and relate that information to HQ so they can get legal help to people. LOs are encouraged not to be "active" participants in the protests; we watch the police and try to act as a deterrent to conflict. If that fails, we document as much as possible for future trials.

I feel totally comfortable in this support role. LOs facilitate protest and help to ensure that protestors' rights are protected. It suits me well.

LOs are identified in potentially tense protest situations by their green hats, pictured here:



I'll probably begin my own LO saga on Saturday. Too much to do until then. Sunday is the day that the biggest protests might take place. Check back often!

Here.

The New York Police Department and the largest armada of land, air and maritime forces ever assembled to provide security at a national political gathering are being deployed in New York for the Republican convention, according to federal, state and local officials. They said yesterday that they were planning an intentionally huge response to intelligence that Al Qaeda hoped to carry out an attack to disrupt this year's elections. . . .

The backbone of security is being provided by the 37,000-member New York Police Department, which has a budget larger than all but 19 of the world's standing armies. To prevent an attack, the department will flood the streets with officers and employ high and low technology, from seven surveillance helicopters to plainclothes detectives traveling the subways and eyeballing other riders.

Up to 10,000 officers, many reassigned from narcotics and other duties, will be part of an enormous show of force around Madison Square Garden. That display will include special heavily armed "Hercules" antiterror squads, snipers and phalanxes of officers set up around the arena to search buses and trucks before they enter the area. In addition to the helicopters, several of which can feed close-up video surveillance images to mobile command centers on the ground, 26 launches will patrol waterways, and officers will use 181 bomb-sniffing dogs, many of them borrowed from other law enforcement agencies.

I've been here two days, been nowhere need Madison Square Garden and I've still seen tons of cops. One popped her head into the A train at 59th St/Columbus Circle but I couldn't pop a photo of her in time.

Enough for tonight. Tomorrow, the NLG Training Session! With photos! CBS was there!

You've got to see this.

Bikes Against Bush is a one-of-a-kind, interactive protest/performance occurring simultaneously online and on the streets of NYC during the upcoming Republican National Convention. Using a Wireless Internet-enabled bicycle outfitted with a custom-designed printing device, the Bikes Against Bush bicycle can print text messages sent from web users directly onto the streets of Manhattan in water-soluble chalk.

[via monSTREPOoo]

Looks even prettier!

Check it out.

Although I know all of you are hungering for pictures of animals, these cuties are presented more to test out the camera:







Yeah, gotta figure out how to rotate. No time now, however. I'm off to be educated about police brutality!

[Rotation services provided by monSTREPOOOOOOOOOOO, Inc.]

So now the serious blogging starts in earnest.

I arrived here in the afternoon on a cramped puddlejumper flight from Chicago Midway. To my dismay, there was no sign of potentially violent subversives on the flight or at LGA. Where are all the bangers?

Old friend M. is providing lodgings in one of my old haunts: Park Slope, Brooklyn. I had a nostalgic walkaround and saw lots of old friends (the Donuts Luncheonette; the pizza place on the corner of 7th Avenue and 9th Street; Prospect Park; the Pavilion movie theater; etc., etc.).

No sign of potentially violent co-conspirator (and sister) A. yet. To evade pursuit, she may have had to take the indirect way to the city: through the subway and sewer tunnels. Our contacts with the lefty mole-people contingent may have paid off.

[Confidential to F. in Western Mass.: I have left the package at the dead drop, as we had arranged. Be awfully careful with the big box. I hope that "cough" you have clears up.]

I'm still getting the digital camera download situation sorted out. Pictures soon, I promise.

Tomorrow [Wednesday 8/25]: Training with the National Lawyer's Guild for the legal observer thing. This will, of course, be the perfect way to shroud my nefarious activities (of which you will hear much more about very soon) with a veil of legitimacy.

And don't forget: as soon as the delegates start arriving, only on SALTO:

GOP FASHION DISASTERS: THE PHOTOBLOG

NOTE TO THE FBI: If you really want to find me for your speech-suppressing intimidatory interview, I'm staying at this dude Robert Hanssen's house. He's in the book, I believe.

The story is here.

Double-check, people.