Think again, comrade. And you thought it was bad when they stuck political dissenters in “free speech” zones- ie cages. Now, at least in St. Paul, they’re not even bothering to give lip-service to such out-moded concepts as free speech- just bust down the doors and arrest the dissenters. I mean, it’s worked for other states, why not here? Don’t you know there’s a war on, comrade?

From Glen Greenwald’s article:

Jane Hamsher and I were at two of those homes this morning — one which had just been raided and one which was in the process of being raided. Each of the raided houses is known by neighbors as a “hippie house,” where 5-10 college-aged individuals live in a communal setting, and everyone we spoke with said that there had never been any problems of any kind in those houses, that they were filled with “peaceful kids” who are politically active but entirely unthreatening and friendly.

In the house that had just been raided, those inside described how a team of roughly 25 officers had barged into their homes with masks and black swat gear, holding large semi-automatic rifles, and ordered them to lie on the floor, where they were handcuffed and ordered not to move. The officers refused to state why they were there and, until the very end, refused to show whether they had a search warrant. They were forced to remain on the floor for 45 minutes while the officers took away the laptops, computers, individual journals, and political materials kept in the house.