{"id":23473,"date":"2011-10-13T12:00:13","date_gmt":"2011-10-13T17:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=23473"},"modified":"2014-12-12T14:50:08","modified_gmt":"2014-12-12T20:50:08","slug":"the-utterly-usual-suspects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=23473","title":{"rendered":"The Utterly Usual Suspects"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Not sure why this bit &#8211; from\u00a0&#8220;Monty Python&#8217;s Life of Brian&#8221; &#8211; popped to mind:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/gb_qHP7VaZE\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"420\" height=\"243\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>It just\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/opinions\/dcs-occupy-protest-attracting-only-the-usual-suspects\/2011\/10\/11\/gIQAVgYPdL_story.html\">sprang to mind<\/a>. Just like&#8230;pow:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>By the time they got to Woodstock, they were half a million strong. But by the time they assembled on Freedom Plaza on Tuesday morning to plan the day\u2019s civil disobedience, they numbered only 53.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Attempting to emulate the Occupy Wall Street protests, Washington activists and some out-of-town guests set themselves the lofty goal of occupying the Hart Senate Office Building. \u201cWe are there to shut the place down!\u201d organizer David Swanson told his small band of followers.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Or, for that matter, this one &#8211; from &#8220;Monty Python and the Holy Grail&#8221;:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/dOOTKA0aGI0\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Honest. \u00a0No idea whatsoever why it jumped to mind: \u00a0<span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-style: italic; font-weight: normal;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>But how to do this with only a few dozen demonstrators? Well, Swanson said, they could push all the buttons on the elevators \u2014 the way naughty children sometimes do in apartment buildings. \u201cThere are people who are wanting to go into the elevators and fill them and not get out and push all the buttons,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you like that, do it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This set off a lengthy debate in Freedom Plaza, at the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue and 14th Street NW, as activists came to the microphone to argue the pros and cons of elevator disruption.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cLet\u2019s face it, our numbers are not enough to shut this building down,\u201d said the representative from Veterans for Peace. \u201cI think pushing elevator buttons is stupid.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>You go and read the whole thing while I figure out why those who movie clips came to mind.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Not sure why this bit &#8211; from\u00a0&#8220;Monty Python&#8217;s Life of Brian&#8221; &#8211; popped to mind: It just\u00a0sprang to mind. Just like&#8230;pow: By the time they got to Woodstock, they were half a million strong. But by the time they assembled on Freedom Plaza on Tuesday morning to plan the day\u2019s civil disobedience, they numbered only [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[327,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-big-activism","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23473"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23473\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49786,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23473\/revisions\/49786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}