Regrouped

I focused on going through the last section of "Place of Safety" and plotting out the rest of what needs to be done for the story as well as making notes about what is referred back to and needs to be added to the opening two sections. I'm having problems with it, in that by the time Brendan returns to Derry, the British and RUC have a solid network in place of spies and informants, so it'd be hard for him to wander about the city without being caught onto. Plus civil liberties had been so curtailed against the Catholic population by this point, they would need no reason to arrest him and hold him as a terrorist. No need for a real trial or even to bother telling his family where he is.

It's funny, what the Brits and Prods were doing in Northern Ireland 30 years ago the US is doing now to its own people. If someone someplace high enough in the government decides that person is a terrorist...or now even a terrorist sympathizer, thanks to the Supreme Court, all you have to do is offer humanitarian support to any group deemed to support terrorism, then you are supporting terrorism as well. And matters of degree don't matter. Give medicine to people who take it to Palestinians under Hamas, you can be charged with supporting Hamas by proxy. And then you don't necessarily have access to a trial; you might just be charged in a kangaroo court and put away till you're crazy, as happened to one American citizen charged with aiding and abetting the enemy.

And it's not just in this country. In Canada, relatively liberal country, a judge gave the police the right to arrest anyone they want to if that person gets too close to the G20 summit. So far nearly 600 people have been arrested. He also said the cops can use methods of crowd control -- like noise cannons -- on protesters if they feel the need. Noise cannons can damage hearing not just of the protesters but anyone who's nearby. Lesson being, don't hang around to watch what happens.

And in Minneapolis, homes of people just planning to protest were raided and trashed by the cops with impunity. On top of this, I just learned that of the hundreds of people arrested during the Miami conference of the G20, not one was convicted of a crime. So the whole point of these arrests are to intimidate -- to end discussion of what those in charge are doing -- to make all of use act like simple sheep and do as we're bid by our masters.

I guess we're seeing the end of Democracy in the world and a return to the feudal style of civilization. How disgusting.