Last week when I wrote about Occupy Oakland’s creepy turn, I was surprised at the number of people who assured me that the violence was the work of a tiny minority, and that most of the day had passed entirely peacefully as thousands of protesters descended on the Oakland port to blockade it. Physically blocking people from entering or leaving their normal place of business is not what I normally think of as “peaceful”. I encountered a similar disconnect this weekend. As you may have heard by now, this weekend, at the Americans for Prosperity dinner (a group with which the … sigh … Kochs are affiliated), Occupy DC decided that it would be a good idea to blockade the attendees into the DC convention center.
What’s more disturbing, however, is that my reading, and private conversations, have uncovered a number of people who think this is all right—and who consider the real outrage to be the rumor (now squashed, I believe) that an old lady was knocked down by Occupy DC protesters*.

I am shocked that anyone would make this argument. This is outrageous. I don’t know any people on the left who would think that this behavior were “non-violent” if it were, say, aimed at abortion clinics. It’s bad enough that many of the occupiers seem to put as little thought as possible into the space they share with many fellow citizens. A sizeable number of them now seem to have decided that physical intimidation is a legitimate tactic with which to express their rage and frustration.

I have no doubt that support for these tactics is a minority sentiment on the left. But where are the condemnations that our left-wing commentariat were so eagerly demanding from the right a year ago every time Michelle Bachmann or another tea party figure said something stupid?

Occupy Protests Get Further Out of Hand - Megan McArdle - Business - The Atlantic

Source: The Atlantic

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