Convention fun!

A group of Colorado activist types, including Ward Churchill pal Glenn Spagnuolo, has latched onto more than half a dozen domain names that the Democratic National Committee would have wanted, if it had thought about it, for its presidential nominating convention in Denver next year.

The domain names, among them "DenverDNC.org," rather than take visitors to a DNC site, will route them to a site called Recreate68. org. Colorado Confidential says that site will have:

numerous protest-related resources, including a Q&A sheet for engaging in civil disobedience, and a recipe and directions for wheatpasting political fliers to poles. The site will also be used to help streamline protest events and list hotel and shared housing possibilities closer to the convention date, said Spagnuolo.

Wheatpasting. Political flyers. To poles. So how did the DNC manage to screw up so bad? Another rhetorical question: could the group's name be more predictably lame than Recreate68? Anyway:

Asked whether the Recreate ’68 [oh, excuse me, "the" Recreate 68] will bring a repeat of the rioting and violence that gripped Chicago during the ’68 convention, Spagnuolo said: "That will be up to the Denver Police Department. Any violence would be at the hands of the Denver Police Department.". . .

Uh-huh.

Both national political conventions in 2004, in Boston and New York City, included a massive police presence, with concrete barriers, barbed wire fencing and what one Boston judge described as "a brutish and potentially unsafe place for citizens who wish to exercise their First Amendment rights." Spagnuolo was among an estimated 600,000 protesters at the Republican National Convention that year.

Brutish and potentially unsafe. Like the protesters said at the time, it was Guantanamo on the Hudson. Spags assesses the risks in 2008:

"I don’t think the message will come down to crack skulls," he said of Denver’s ’08 convention. "We’ll try our hardest to negotiate, but we won’t be having protest zones — you can’t cage democracy."

Oh, we won't be having protest zones, won't we? Well tra-la and pip-pip, old bean.

Spagnuolo places early estimates at the number of protesters who could be at the ’08 convention at 100,000.

Triple-threat Glenn "places early estimates," perorates:

"How many more Vietnams, Nicaraguas, El Salvadores [sic], Haitis, Somalias, Afghanistans, Iraqs, Guatemalas and Chiles do we need before we realize that imperialism keeps marching on?" he asked. "You always say vote for the lesser of two evils; we don’t want to vote for the evil anymore."

Glenn. Who Glenn sees in his bathroom mirror. And what do you want to bet he pronounces it "NEE-ka-rah-wah"?

My only problem with all this is becoming independently wealthy so I can hang out at the Convention Center and blog about the whole mess. Oh, and getting accredited. If that happens, maybe the chant will yet rise up from the bloody streets of Denver:

The Drunkablog is watching!

The Drunkablog is watching!

(via PB, whom I am getting sick and tired of getting stories via)