Will post this here too...these people just don't give it up.... And again to the rest of the thread....look up the IAC.... nice???? group
Protests Planned for Bush Inauguration
By Sue Pleming Dec 14 5:41pm ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Protest groups said on Thursday they plan demonstrations at the inauguration of President-elect George W. Bush in Washington on Jan. 20.
A motley coalition of mainly left-wing groups intends to protest this week's intervention by the U.S. Supreme Court ending weeks of post-election legal wrangling, which handed Bush victory over Democratic challenger Al Gore.
They will also be airing charges that many black voters, who overwhelmingly backed Gore, were stopped from voting. Many also oppose the Texas governor's commitment to the death penalty. Texas leads the country in the number of executions.
Organizers said many of the anti-globalization activists who came to the capital last April to try to disrupt meetings of the World Bank and IMF were expected to take part.
``We will have many, many thousands of people coming in by bus and cars,'' said Brian Becker, co-director of the New York-based International Action Center (IAC), which is organizing the anti-inaugural demonstrations.
Police said they were gearing up for a major operation to prevent disruption of the ceremony, which includes the swearing in of the incoming president on the steps of the Capitol and a parade through the streets to the White House.
``They are trying to cause some disruptions but have apparently said they will not try to shut things down,'' said Metropolitan police chief Charles Ramsey. ``What that means, I don't know.''
He told Reuters the city's entire police force would be deployed on Inauguration Day as well as additional police from surrounding areas. Federal police agencies will also be ready to cope with ``any situation,'' he said.
HAVOC IN THE CAPITAL
Demonstrators created havoc in the capital last April, closing down many government offices and clashing on several occasions with baton-wielding police who used pepper spray to stop them from blocking meetings of financial leaders from the world's richest nations.
The main aim this time is to protest the Supreme Court's decision on Tuesday not to allow a recount of Florida's votes, which effectively gave Bush his victory over Gore in the most rancorous, divisive U.S. election in recent memory.
``Bush's election is a result of the lynching of the black vote in Florida,'' Becker's group said in a statement to announce the protests.
``Governor Death does not have a mandate to push his pro-rich, anti-poor, racist policies,'' said the statement.
Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson has also threatened mass protests across America against Bush and said on Wednesday these would coincide with Martin Luther King Day on Jan. 15 or on Inauguration Day.
Jackson and other civil rights leaders are protesting what they say was the disenfranchisement of many black voters, particularly in Florida. They say many were turned away from polling stations because of registration problems.
Becker said 300 other groups were doing grass-roots organizing to make the Jan. 20 protest effective, but that it was not clear if Jackson's Rainbow-Push coalition would join their protest.
The protest would be nonviolent, he promised, like the huge anti-Vietnam War demonstrations during Richard Nixon's 1973 inauguration. ``Our plan is not to shut down the inaugural nor to conduct civil disobedience. All we want to show is that there is a very important part of American society that is ... opposed to the new president,'' he said.
Washington police arrested hundreds of demonstrators at the April anti-globalization protests and Ramsey said the same could happen again if there was ``probable cause.''
``Charles Ramsey and the police are doing their usual demonizing of the demonstrators, saying that we will cause mayhem. The truth is that the police is the lawless group,'' said Becker.
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