![ba_bartswat_493fl](http://cotocrew.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/ba_bartswat_493fl.jpg?w=300)
What's creepier than San Fran transit acting like the gestapo are the comments that follow the article on yahoo.
http://news.yahoo.com/sf-transit-blocks-cellphones-disrupt-protest-180916272.html
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A decision by San Francisco Bay Area transit officials to cut off cell phone service at some of its stations to thwart a planned protest drew angry response Saturday from one transit board member who said she was shocked that officials acted as "this type of censor."
Bay Area Rapid Transit officials have said they shut down power Thursday evening to cellular towers for stations stretching from downtown to the San Francisco's airport after learning protesters planned to use mobile devices to coordinate its demonstration.
"I'm just shocked that they didn't think about the implications of this. We really don't have the right to be this type of censor," said Lynette Sweet, who serves on BART board. "In my opinion, we've let the actions of a few people affect everybody. And that's not fair."
BART Deputy Police Chief Benson Fairow on Friday told KTVU-TV that the agency decided to turn off underground cell service because it received reports that a rowdy group that had protested in July had similar plans.
"It all boils down to the safety of the public," Fairow said. "It wasn't a decision made lightly. This wasn't about free speech. It was about safety."
To some, BART's tactic drew comparisons to those of former president of Egypt to squelch protests demanding an end to his authoritarian rule. Authorities there cut Internet and cellphone services in the country for days earlier this year.
"BART officials are showing themselves to be of a mind with the former president of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak," the Electronic Frontier Foundation said on its website.
Michael Risher, the American Civil Liberty Union's Northern California staff attorney wrote in blog: "The government shouldn't be in the business of cutting off the free flow of information. Shutting down access to mobile phones is the wrong response to political protests, whether it's halfway around the world or right here in San Francisco."
The ACLU already has a scheduled meeting with BART Police Chief Kenton Rainey on Monday over other issues and Thursday's incident will added to the agenda, spokeswoman Rebecca Farmer said Saturday.
Yet others said while the phone shut-down was worth examining, it may not have impinged on First Amendment rights. Gene Policinski, executive director of the First Amendment Center, a nonprofit educational organization, said freedom of expression can be limited in very narrow circumstances if there is an immediate threat to public safety.
"An agency like BART has to be held to a very high standard," he said. "First of all, it has to be an immediate threat, not just the mere supposition that there might be one. And I think the response has to be what a court would consider reasonable, so it has to be the minimum amount of restraint on free expression."
He said if BART's actions are challenged, a court may look more favorably on what it did if expression was limited on a narrow basis for a specific area and time frame, instead of "just indiscriminately closing down cell phone service throughout the system or for a broad area."
BART officials were confident the cellphone disruptions were legal. It said in a statement that it's illegal to demonstrate on the platform or aboard the trains, and that it has set aside special areas for demonstrations.
"We had a commute that was safe and without disruption," BART spokesman Jim Allison said Friday.
The demonstrators were going to hold a second protest over the fatal shooting of Charles Blair Hill by BART police on July 3 at the Civic Center/UN Plaza station in San Francisco. Hill was shot in the torso by officers responding to reports of a "wobbly drunk" The officers claim Hill came at them with a knife.
Several protesters were taken into custody after a demonstration on July 11 disrupted service during the rush-hour commute and prompted the closing of BART's Civic Center station.
BART has been battling image problems after a white officer fatally shot an unarmed black passenger on New Year's Day 2009 at an Oakland train station that led to violent protests.
___
Associated Press reporter Tom Murphy in Indianapolis contributed
Just read the comments section, now I feel sick to my stomach...
ReplyDeleteI do hope that most of the comments are created by the shills / cyber department.
Yes, we now see the second stage of draconian crackdown as the mask of the tyrannical state drops further, revealing the demon underneath.
ReplyDeleteWe also know of the huge postitioning of miliatry forces going on around the nation.
Signs that must be heeded clearly and without any delusional gullibility.
Something is cranking up big time.
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I guess the revolution won't be tweeted either. I wonder if there are phones that work independent of cell phone towers. Like off satellites or something. It'd be nice to have a phone they can't fuck with when bugout time arrives.
ReplyDeleteFinally got passports for all family members--wife and kid. Need to find a hide-a-away up in Canada before one of those republicans wack-jobs becomes prez.
Associated Press reporter Tom Murphy...
ReplyDeleteI wonder if that could be our very own 'Major Tom' from OEN daze?'
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Yes Mr 0, the Military has SATCOMLINK, NDGPS and MILSTAR to find your azz in Canada after Rick Perry declares you an enemy combatant.
ReplyDeleteYou'd think like Palin seeing Russia those Barts and Simpsons in comments section would not broadcast the fact that they are idiots. Cell phone service not a right. I see why EWO got sick.
I'm over fifty EOW. I got used to the dims twenty years ago when Clinton, Janet "sasquatch" Reno and the ATF were killing women with babies in their arms in Ruby Ridge and Waco.
Now it's her lil protoge Holder doing the dirty work with Janet "sasquatch' Napolitano. It is my opinion that the neo-psycho-liberals kill Americans easier than the neo-convicts or at least they do a better job of acting like they are sad about it.
Thanks Deb for this post because it just shows how easy idiots living in virtual reality and playstation can accept the real police state and like 'who cares dude, about a dead queer or homeboy, I killed a bunch last night playing grand theft auto. Awesome dude.
Ground control to major tom
ReplyDeleteTake your protein pills and put your helmet on
Wouldn't that be a gas if it was one and the same crusty bastard?!?!
So, as off topic as we can be here(not) seems like the whole E-Cat deal in Greece has been scuttled. Huge suprise I know.
Weird how this odd corner of the blogosphere can seem more warm and familial than some "real" places...........Much love peeps
I agree rogue. There is definitely something in the air. Like the calm before the storm.
ReplyDeleteThe entire system is cracked and more people than I've ever witnessed are recognizing their loss of rights. It would even appear that there's been a media blackout on a national level regarding civil unrest.
As far as the comments, some were disturbing. ANY impedence of communication, whether cel or landline is why we fight.
As far as cel use goes, blame the inconsiderate ass hole alone in a restaurant, closing "the" deal at full blast or the jerkoff in a movie theater narrating the movie to their friend at home for not knowing the time or the place.
I refuse to aknowledge any "law" which threatens my freedom for whatever reason. Some "laws" are meant to be broken.
Why'd you go and mention him?
ReplyDeleteNow he'll 'show up'.
He is sort of comical tho, like a clown at a circus.
I never did like circus,,,especially the clowns
At least Tom Murphy was an intelligent shill with a sense of humor, unlike most that we see that simply annoy by talking in circles (think albury).
ReplyDelete"Hilder" Just a letter away from.......well u know.
PD, No doubt about it. Those ultra violent video games are the best juvenile brainwashing weapon of mind manipulation ever invented.
Personally, I have a love hate relationship with cell phones. I use mine rarely and I love it when i need it because it's great in an emergency. I just hate when people have them glued to their ears while driving or when they talk loudly in public places and never turn them the hell off.
In this instance they were to be used as audio weapons in the battle to maintain our first amendment rights and civil liberties. Foiled again by the thought police bastards.
"We don't need no thought control...its just another brick in the wall".
ReplyDelete"Cell phone service not a right."
ReplyDeleteActually, it is. In principle anyway. Should be covered by the first amendment--if not the fourth.
Not that USA Inc gives a damn about the constitution anymore, but the right to assemble is a basic right.
And yeah. The basic problem is that most Americans probably don't know what a constitution is, let alone what's in it.
I find comfort in the Verizon Strike and it is obvious the FBI's involvement is meant to deal with strikers and not some false flag sabotage.
ReplyDeleteThis thing COTO and what we see is becoming so apparent and easy that it makes me very anxious. I cannot believe that this is incompetence and random stupidity on their part.
It is like Roque said and I have warned. We are on the brink and we rest in some intermediate plane from new world to old world.
For spiritual people who are not King James sycophants or Mayan galactic surfers, they should be able to acknowledge not only the agenda and operations globally by committee and authorities but see other things. Soil, water, the color of the sky, animal and insect phenomenon, disease, ilnessses, the taste of their food, thier mood changes, etc
It's an energy, a physical force, a chaotic viral villian moving through the NET, the atmosphere and the cells of our own bodies.
I don't expect the New World Orphans to sense it but expect that we can see the physio-psycho changes in our respective boroughs.
a lot of Pot kettle and black here...
ReplyDeleteusa was among the folks saying that cutting comms in Syria,china,and all the other places where civillians are protesting wasn;t on.
and then they go do it?
and the poms have the same holier than thou supporters also.
the govt couldnd access bberry calls, now they have a reason.
.or they made it happen so as to have a reason..
and dont worry- for company our crudball PM will probably follow like the Fabian control freak she is.
Right on Boom.......leave those kids alone!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4SKL7f9n58
Yea Oz, it's a global thing. They've got all their political ducks in a row, their police states in place and are ready for the big smackdown of we the people of the world.
ReplyDeleteI expected this to happen in some big city soon; a trial run to see how much outrage (or not) there was. Small brighter note, Ron Paul did well in Ames this weekend.
ReplyDeleteIt was another one of my whacky eighties conspiracies when i said there was a reason for payphones disappearing. Anonymity!
ReplyDeleteBoy did I lose friends back then. I couldn't get a date in a womens prison with a handful of pardons. I just never learned to shut my mouth when it was suggested.
I had the use of a mobile car phone in 1980. Then you had to go through a mobile operator radio AMPS transmission technology. It was obvious then and now that the land line and analog digital transfer was a huge success for the panoptic police state and maybe it's time to call those chicks that blew me off, but I assume they are still in the matrix and facebooking their information directly to CIAgoogle-plex.
I have old Motorola cell phone and have replaced parts. Verizon has been on me for years to upgrade to NDGPS and 4G kill models. I refuse.
Just for the record Mr. 0, cell service is going to be a mandate soon enough and when they connect human chipping and cellular service it will be the bomb and the fuse. A most perfect union. Like Free porn it's the gift that will keep on giving.
Nothing is FREE and anything labeled such should be avoided at all cost (imo)
They commit that hypocrisy time and time again. It's a great tool for predicting moves when they dun the resisters for doing what they do on a regular basis.
ReplyDeleteIt's the source of satire and comedy for me to listen to Anderson Pooper-scooper say we are just trying to get to the truth. What a rube!
Unfortunately like EyesWiderOpen after I read the comments it's not as funny.
I'm sure everyone here at coto feels it PD. That feeling of impending doom. There are definitely physical symptoms too. Everyone I know complains of being tired and forgetful... EVERYONE, regardless of age. Even the most vapid sheeple I know have the sense that something wicked this way comes. They just don't know what it is or think it's the "terrorists" about to attack again. Some will just never get it.
ReplyDeleteI already posted about the weird sonic sounds and the distant humming sound I have heard late at night when the world is quiet around here.
Oddly enough, except for today when the sky is gray and full of black storm clouds, the sky has been mostly blue with fluffy clouds the past week. I guess the chemtrail sprayers have rotatated to another area for now. No doubt, they'll be back soon. It's almost as if they are torturing us. Reminding us of what we're missing...
Nature is not doing so well. The trees are looking sick and this has been for the past few years. Odd thing around here regarding insects is there seem to be baby crickets everywhere. It may be normal but it seems everyone is just noticing them for the first time. I don't have a clue what that means, if anything.
Personally, I'm just waiting for that other big shoe to drop. I know it's going to happen very soon now. I can feel it comin' in the air..............
It appears to emulate the script of "Money Never Sleeps"
ReplyDeleteHi Brad,
ReplyDeleteRon Paul has also said out loud that this economic thing is going to lead straight to a draconian clampdown. And he seems to think the message urgent...
Whew...SIGNS a poppin'
The Anniversary of 9/11 might just be more than a media circus...
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Plain points in here. Yeah, we got "Change" alright. Left turns all the way...
ReplyDelete“MUST READ.. ANOTHER CHANCE FOR THE SHEEPLE TO WAKE UP.....DON'T FALL FOR THE PLANNED DESTRUCTION OF AMERICA”
http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?read=212909
Nice pic Jersey, You look like an anti-matter Sarah Palin.
ReplyDeletehaha..thanks korny. Unfortunately, my new glasses aren't as magical as SP's. I can only see as far as Camden, NJ from my house and the sight ain't pretty........
ReplyDeleteNo such luck, eyes. They're the real McCoy
ReplyDeleteThose aren't crickets, jersey. That's your ears ringin.
ReplyDeleteMine have been ringin for two years now.
So have mine Pete. No reason for it. Just the screaming of lambs in a slaughter.
ReplyDelete