"The whole thing is set up as a way to distort the general public [to believe] that even the most quiet and peace-abiding protest can turn into something violent".
Using anti-terrorism laws to target domestic protest organizations is redolent of the actions of the Justice Department against law-abiding protesters during World War I and the Vietnam War -- actions that are rightly remembered as disgraceful.
The exception is The Grapes of Wrath (1939), a monument in American literature, a novel of political engagement which none the less avoids the abiding problems of protest fiction, speaking from inside the individual characters' heads, and fulfilling the first obligation of the novelist: to tell a good story.
In the public mind he remained not only one of the most celebrated poets of the great war but also an abiding emblem of courage and protest against the carnage.
In a statement, he offered an "unreserved apology" to the woman, who does not want her identity to be revealed, and said he was also sorry for deceiving "law-abiding members of London Greenpeace," a peaceful protest group.
Michael Ancram, chairman of the Conservative Party, scorned Mr. Blair's characterization of the picketers as "an insult to the many decent, law-abiding people conducting lawful protests".
"I have enormous sympathy with the law-abiding people who are protesting in Piccadilly Gardens like they're doing up and down the country and across the world about events in the Middle East.
Every spring it holds a national Empty Holster Protest "symbolizing that disarming all law-abiding citizens creates defense-free zones, which are attractive targets for criminals".
"The Manhattan district attorney's office fully supports the tradition of civil disobedience and that all individuals have the right to protest, if they do so in a law-abiding way," Michele Bayer, an assistant district attorney, said in court.
However ironic his tone, there have often come times when normally law-abiding citizens feel that injustice has been enshrined in law, and so protest – often unlawfully – against it.
That is potentially good news for Londoners, at least the law-abiding ones, and for members of the Met who last year took part in the largest street protest by police officers against budget cuts.
