I'LL STAND UP. YOU'LL STAND UP. IT'LL BE ANARCHY: Anyone who has followed the recent anti-war protests (and the anti-globalization protests before that) knows that while a majority of the protestors are peaceful, well-intentioned, and generally harmless, there's also an ever-present element of radicals who are there to stir shit up and break shit down. These people are known, almost universally, as wearing bandanas over the lower half of their face- a sort of universal uniform that says "anarchist."
Last week's Village Voice, predictably, covered "police abuses" at the New York protest on February 15, and writer Alisa Solomon (known for her usual valentines to Hamas and other suicide-bomb "activists") documents the various bad acts by the cops and takes just about every protestor at their word. So far so good, but most eggregious is this, the testimony of a guy who was arrested by "counterterrorist intelligence":
Josh Roberts, 23, a carpenter from Fitchburg, Massachusetts, attending his first rally, pulled a bandana out of his pocket when the wind off the East River got to be too much, and wrapped it over the lower half of his face. His friend did the same with a tan handkerchief...