"people tend to misbehave"

Bush speaks! On Thanksgiving! With a message of America's universal compassion and general awseomness. NYT:

this year, the White House hoped to show a more contemplative side of Mr. Bush, who, his aides say, has been struck by the goodness of the many ordinary Americans he meets during his travels

Of course, only to a closed group of prescreened supporters.

Menwhile, USA Today writes about an initiative designed to keep all such events off of college campuses. The Soapbox Alliance wants to preserve the traditions of the founders and encourage presidential connection with the all the people. Some responses:

"[L]etting in radicals that just want to make a mess of their event — what good would that do?" [David Horowitz... guess you know how radicals behave, right you old hack?]

"Do you want to cut off that revenue stream?" [Democratic operative]

...and the classic statement of Bushian fascism:
"It's a nice concept, but people tend to misbehave," says Trent Duffy, former deputy press secretary for President Bush.

Talk to the stormtroopers, buddy.

Carpetbagger Report here.

march on, brownshirts!

Second post of the day straight out of 1933... Father of a dead soldier is carrying a mock coffin with the son's picture on it during the most recent antiwar protest. Gathering of Eagles brownshirts snatch the photo and kick the crap out of him.

DailyKos diary here; photo from Crooks & Liars here.

Comment 87 sounds right out of the SA playbook:

Like most of you , I don’t agree with their tactics or their politics, but the GoE members, I believe, were only trying to restrain Carlos after what appeared to them an assault on their friend. If it were really that serious of a beatdown as this article implies, there would have been arrests, and charges filed.

Fortunately the other commentators aren't falling for it. Still sad though.

Update: turns out that the father involved was the one who set himself on fire when military representatives came to his house to deliver news of the son's death.

"Rally squads"

Republican stormtroopers are GO!!!

Portions of the Presidential Advance Memo have been released (pdf from ACLU):

Inside the event space, the manual advises, White House advance personnel should preposition “rally squads” that can swarm any protesters at the event and “use their signs and banners as shields between the demonstrators and the main press platform.” The rally squads can be formed using “college/young republican organizations, local athletic teams, and fraternities/sororities,” the manual notes.

Young aggressive jocks blocking political opponents from displaying their allegiance. Just how the SA got its start.

(In fairness, ABC article notes that the Kerry campaign blocked opposing t-shirts with its own cheerleaders too. But that's different than rooting through the crowd for silent opponents and having them arrested by the police. I the use of the word "swarm" here...)

(A second point in fairness is that the manual does mention that you can ignore protesters who are not disrupting the event. And that you should avoid physical confrontation, because that is what they want. But this was the case in SA policy as well. And also in both cases, your stormtroopers are never likely to be deliberative in their swarming given the pressures on them to protect The Leader from anything embarrassing - including the knowledge that not everyone agrees with him.)

(ABC reports available here)
(hat tip Pandagon)