Bay Area TV Station Notes 'Professional Protester' Influence in Riot; Other Media Silent

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By Tom Blumer (Bio | Archive)
January 8, 2009 - 23:37 ET
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OaklandRiotTVreportPic0109Here's something you don't see every day.

A video report about last night's riot in Oakland related to the shooting death of an unarmed man at the hands of a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) police officer actually calls it .... a riot. What's more, the reporter notes, as is really often the case in situations such as these, how people he characterized as "professional protesters" egged others on and created the atmosphere that led to so much violence and vandalism.

CBS5 reporter Joe Vazquez filed "Inside the Oakland Riot: A First-Hand Account." It's a little too "gee whiz" to me, but it least it gets some usually unreported facts out.

Here is the full text of the video:

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Anchor: Last night, Joe Vazquez followed those demonstrators every step of the way. Well Joe, police noticed the influence of so-called "professional protesters."

Vazquez: I have to tell you, one other intricacy in, in, and you hear about "mob mentality," this was a classic example of it. It looked like most people were there to just have their voices heard. But there was so much anger.

And there were also folks in the crowd inciting it, no doubt about it. There were some folks in fact that when police had dispersed you saw a lot of people run. But then there were some folks in the middle, the ones with their faces covered. Perhaps they had been in protests before; they certainly looked like it.

They were yelling, "Come back, come back. Confront these officers. Stand your ground. Come back here and get in these officers' faces." And when they did that, that provoked the police officers' actions.

So there's no doubt about it, there were some interesting levels of protest. These, you might call them "professional protesters," they were definitely inciting the riot. They were yelling, "Come back here! Support us! Stand your ground!" And that's when the confrontations happened.

Vazquez's blog entry at the same link on what transpired uses the term "instigators" instead of "professional protesters, and supplied these additional observations:

Demonstrators would occasionally disperse, but then instigators in the crowd who appeared to be anarchists called them back.

They wouldn't identify themselves, but those instigators wore bandanas on their faces and seemed more intent on provoking confrontations and throwing stuff at police than truly having their voices heard.

"Come stand with us," they implored. "Stand up for Oscar Grant!"

The crowd would then return. And they were getting bolder. Some protesters screamed just inches from the faces of officers. The cops stood still.

Others waved photos of Grant and called the officers "pigs" and "murderers."

..... Glass started raining down. Bottles, trash – anything protesters could get their hands on – were flying at officers. They kept marching. Officers mechanically stomped over a woman's bike as they chased her off. Other protesters who stood their ground were hit with billy clubs.

Occasionally, officers would burst into the crowd to go after the folks throwing garbage at police. In a tactical maneuver reminiscent of my rugby days, the officers would send four officers sprinting into the crowd, tackle the suspected offender, then retreat with the arrestee back behind the formation.

..... It was shocking to see, but the officers seemed to follow their training and were quite restrained, from my perspective.

To sum up the night, it was pandemonium that seemed uncontrolled, unplanned and unnecessary. Most of the protesters were not thrilled about having their peaceful demonstration thwarted by ugly behavior of a few. 

You will search in vain in the rest of the media for any reference to the professionally organized nature of the riot. Actually, you won't even see any "riot" reference except in "riot gear" worn by police at these links: the Associated Press ("Fatal police shooting sparks violent protests"), the New York Times ("Oakland Simmers after Night of Violence"), and the San Francisco Chronicle ("Protests over BART shooting turn violent").

But the Chronicle did leave its slip showing by having a sidebar link asking readers to share and view their "riot photos." Oops.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.

—Tom Blumer is president of a training and development company in Mason, Ohio, and is a contributing editor to NewsBusters


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my word

January 8, 2009 - 23:47 ET by candance

Someone in the media actually supporting our police and acknowledging that some people manipulate public anger in order to perpetuate chaos?

Next they'll be telling us levies broke in New Orleans because of poor design and maintenance, not because of Bush hating black people. 

I know I know, the second one is a stretch, but after reading a report like this we can dream/

 

I'm a typical white person.

cd... Right on the

January 8, 2009 - 23:55 ET by bigtimer

cd...

Right on the money...you summed it up well.

This is infuriating with the other so-called headlines...so typical.

One can dream indeed.

"America isn't the problem...America is the solution." ~ Rush Limbaugh

good evening BT

January 8, 2009 - 23:57 ET by candance

I really need to get some sleep before I go off on another rant and get my blood boiling all over again!

Hope you have a nice night.

 

 

I'm a typical white person.

We had professional

January 9, 2009 - 01:15 ET by maggieqpublic

We had professional protesters living in some oak trees for over a year… in order to prevent the renovation of the university football stadium.  We have all kinds of locals who have nothing better to do than go to the next grievance site.

Though they don't always report the truth, the MSM is well aware that protesters/rioters in this area often have the same familiar faces.

Only 11 more days.....

January 9, 2009 - 03:11 ET by old cro

until this type of behavior will not happen anymore.

Wha???

January 10, 2009 - 03:07 ET by Chattychito

You think it will change in 11 more days you are nuts. it will get worse just you wait and see.

especially if he doesn't do what hose commies want him too, they will kill him just like JFK and riots will fill the american cities from coast to coast

What are "hose commies".......

January 10, 2009 - 04:15 ET by old cro

will they sprinkle him to death?

HEE HEE

January 11, 2009 - 00:21 ET by Chattychito

Well it was supposed to be Those but hose works. a hose commie would be one wholie sto get hosed.  sprinkle or tinkle!!! Hee hee a little humor in this world of such drudgery.

And who do you think were

January 9, 2009 - 05:44 ET by RR GOP

And who do you think were behind the big protests/riots during the Vietnam War?  The MSM and therefore the conventional wisdom that follows has us believe that these came about spontaneously and were 'grass roots' protests all the way.  Not true.  They were organized by domestic Communists.  Most protesting were not Communists.  I saw an interview years ago with a man who was involved with such protests but didn't figure out until decades later that those actually organizing them were indeed Communists.  He didn't like that because he was against the U.S. being in Vietnam but was not supportive of Hanoi.

Anyway, it's interesting that certain people are 'innocent until proven guilty' but this guy is already guilty.  

Of course when Eve Carson was abducted and murdered by black guys-that wasn't racism.  When that young couple (Christian and Newsom) were raped and murdered in east Tennessee by four African-Americans-that wasn't racism.  Hell, that wasn't even worthy of the national MSM's attention!

One of the 24% who thinks George W. Bush was a great President. One of the 89% who wants to bring back the stock and pillory.

I find it interesting

January 9, 2009 - 07:10 ET by BobAnthony

That this TV station, CBS5 would go deeper into the latest idiosyncracies of fans of Philly cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal, who I was FORCED TO LEARN ABOUT IN COLLEGE!

 

Anyhow, here's the scoop on CBS5

Call letters: KPIX-TV San Francisco Oakland San Jose

Owner: CBS (that's right CBS.  For years Westinghouse owned the station.  The 1995 sale to CBS made it an Eye Net-owned station, but has been CBS since 1949.  They went on the air Christmas Eve 1948, the first San Francisco TV station)

Studio: 855 Battery Street

XMTR: Mount Sutro

Co-owned stations: KBCW 44 (the former UHF Indie legend KBHK )

 

 

 

The Constitution is NOT a conspiracy theory and the founding fathers are NOT conspiracy theorists!

Those professional

January 9, 2009 - 08:05 ET by eaglewingz08

Those professional protestors wouldn't be associated with ACORN, would they? Wouldn't be surprised.

Hey!

January 9, 2009 - 10:18 ET by NorthCoaster

Now we can see what a "Community Organizer" does!

the real tragedy of this story and the failure of the media

January 9, 2009 - 12:12 ET by UndercoverConservative

is twofold. First, they don't bother to tell you that the "officer" was a transit authority security guard, and *NOT* a police officer.

Second, the biggest unasked question: why is it legal for a train station rent-a-cop allowed to carry a gun while amost all citizens in California are not? Is this not the ultimate ramification of "police state"? Why a bus station is considered more important to protect than someone's home? 

 this is completely aside from the obvious questions like "was the shooting justified", and "why there just happened to be a camera available to record this that just happens to drop out as the shot is fired" or "if terrorists are willing to blow themselves up to make a point, why is it impossible to consider they'd engineeer an 'unjustified' shooting so they could create dissent, riots, and distrust of civil authority?"

 

"to call an illegal immigrant an "undocumented alien" is the same as calling a streetcorner drug dealer an "unlicensed pharmacist".

"You spend your money anyway you want and respect other's rights to do the same"

Here is how you get rid of

January 9, 2009 - 15:02 ET by Utherpend

Here is how you get rid of the agitators in demonstrations like this.  Announce to the crowd that anyone wearing a MASK or a disquise will be arrested and detained to insure they are a true protestor and not part of a criminal element sent to cause riots.  And then DO it.

 

"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you."

UnLawful Assemblies

January 10, 2009 - 03:15 ET by Chattychito

when ever there are masked people in a group gathered to simply protest it becomes an unlawful assembly.  protestors have nothing to hide but riotors do.  There is a difference between them and they are not the same.  riotor get involved to cause mayhem and chaos.

any group of protestors that has legally applied for a permit but allows masked people to enter into their assembly would automatically forfit their permit and the assembly becomes unlawful and needs to be stopped by the authroities.  this to protect life and property.

The Bookstore that was named is nothing more than a front for promotion of communistic ideas.  when a majority in this case about 1/4th of the assembly were from the book store.  this would put the book store in the position to have a permit to assemble lawfully of which it did not. for any group that gathers with more than 15 fromthe same organization they need a permit.

A street preacher needs a permit just to stand on the corner to preach his views from a bible with no one assembling.  how much more not just the protesting group that applied but the bookstore needed permits to assemble when their group was a majority of those assembled.  at least they should of been named as participants in the permit application.

The memeber and employees of the bookstore should be charged with willful public destruction of property and instigation of rioteuos activities.  Communist often use rage as a means to cause uprisings against the govt. see what happened in Greece last December.  It was communist behind those riots under the exact same situation a shooting death of an unarmed man.

never the less the organizers should be held resposible, and those who were captured on camera  should be proseuted to the fullest of the law so that this does not happen again.