On Friday night I was covering the protest of the Americans for Prosperity conference at the Washington DC Convention Center. It started off with a march from McPherson Square, the location of the Occupation, down K Street to the convention center. The crowd of around 500 people chanted and marched around the perimeter of the complex.

Then they blocked four corners of the street with the aid of police vehicles. One of the attendees came out to ask why the cops were allowing the protesters to do this. The answer she got from police was that it wasn't illegal.

So the protesters, then thinning in numbers to maybe 200 - blocked the doors of the massive convention center (a three block-sized building). The attendees trickled out. One was reported to give the protesters the middle finger...only down near his ribcage nearly out of sight. Very brave.

Anyway, the Occupiers chanted and "occupied" most exits while some of the attendees were at pre-scheduled free screening of Atlas Shugged. (No joke, inside they have a booth set up where you can literally put on a Reagan mask and have your picture taken. If this isn't a metaphor for how the Right's odd relationship with a President who tripled the national debt and yet still raised taxes almost every year he was in office - I don't know what is.)

The worst thing to happen to the Koch-funded event attendees last night was that they had to get chanted at while walking a block to catch a cab or use the Metro inside the convention center. "If we made some rich guys use the Metro tonight - we won!" I overheard an Occupier say.

The opposite corner from where I was standing - a full block away - a silver Lexus sedan hit three protesters in the street. The reports were that he actually sped up "like he was playing chicken" according to eye witnesses. The video above is when the police let the driver go. Then the crowd became angry at the police. You can hear an Officer Walsh on the tape saying, "They shouldn't have been in the street." The Metro Police have said they released the driver because he had a green light. This contradicts the report or tweet from DC Councilman Tommy Wells who claimed the driver was apprehended blocks away and was in custody.

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Over at AmericaBlog Matt Browner Hamlin lays out in simple terms why liberals need to join #OcccupyWallStreet. Hamlin specifically zeroes in on a key passage of a must read Glenn Greenwald post pushing back against criticisms coming against these movement from certain mainstream progressive corners:

But for those who believe that protests are only worthwhile if they translate into quantifiable impact: the lack of organizational sophistication or messaging efficacy on the part of the Wall Street protest is a reason to support it and get involved in it, not turn one's nose up at it and join in the media demonization. That's what one actually sympathetic to its messaging (rather than pretending to be in order more effectively to discredit it) would do. Anyone who looks at mostly young citizens marching in the street protesting the corruption of Wall Street and the harm it spawns, and decides that what is warranted is mockery and scorn rather than support, is either not seeing things clearly or is motivated by objectives other than the ones being presented.

Seth D. Michaels from Working America’s “Main Street” blog also made similar arguments yesterday:

What’s important about this protest, to my mind, is not the particular goals, tactics or supporters. While the protest itself has drawn criticism or indifference from many corners, it illuminates two important points. First, the financial sector in this country has been taking up a larger and larger share of the economy as the rest of us have fallen further and further behind. Second, the big banks and investment firms who helped cause the crisis and the recession haven’t been fully reined in or held accountable.

That matters, and people around the country get it. We talk to thousands of Americans in their neighborhoods every week, and they understand the real-life effects of Wall Street’s outsized power: the failure of the economy to create good jobs at good wages, the powerful influence of corporations in our politics, the difficulty of keeping a roof over your family’s head.

If you want to get an understanding of the broad scope of this movement, I would recommend reading up Sarah Jaffe’s piece yesterday describing how these protesters are fighting banksters greed and the surveillance state.

Obviously I don’t expect the wankers in the DC media to get this. They are too busy slobbering all over former Wall Street lobbyist Chris Christie as “the people’s choice,” shamelessly begging him to run for the White House. Those guys are hopeless.

However, I think it is also worth noting that this movement provides a great opportunity for progressive organizations, talkers … well to organize around. The amazing narrative being threaded by these protesters against Wall Street greed and corruption seems to be right in the wheelhouse of traditional progressive groups who have always spoken up against too much money in politics.

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Last month, Governor Jan Brewer sparked national controversy by signing Arizona's new "papers please" immigration bill into law. Her justification has been that Arizona's border has supposedly been "overrun" with violent crime. Turns out crime in Arizona is down and border security is way up, so the "secure the border" mantra being parroted by Brewer and her friends at FOX has much more to do with empty election-year rhetoric than reality. Even Arizona cops can tell you that.

Well, yesterday Governor Brewer was in Washington, DC to meet with President Obama, and hundreds of picketers took to the streets in front of the White House to say "no" to what is happening in Arizona and "yes" to real, federal immigration reform that actually gets to the heart of solving our immigration crisis -- not exploiting it.

Watch video of one protester -- a woman holding a banner that reads, "We Are All Arizona:"

She argues, "SB 1070 is unacceptable. It puts racial profiling into law."

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Oh, those horrible, awful, violent liberals. Neil Cavuto dug up brought health care protester William Rice out once again to show viewers how mean and violent liberals are. Evidently, Bill is a little upset about the lack of attention he's received since his original 15 minutes of fame back in September and was happy to re-enact his heavily edited version of events in Thousand Oaks.

You may not recognize his name, but I do. I was present at the September MoveOn vigil for health care reform in Thousand Oaks and saw the incident unfold in real time through my camera lens. That's why it was a bit of a surprise to me to hear Mr. Rice describe his involvement this way:

... I was in the process of leaving when I was accosted by a man, came across the street, screaming at me that I was an effing idiot. And he was waving his arms in a violent way, and he came at me as if to attack me. So a scuffle ensued and my fist ended up in his mouth, and he bit my finger off.

Not so much. Mr. Rice seems to have forgotten a few things, like the fact that he threw the first punch, nailing the guy hard between the eyes, knocking him into the street and oncoming traffic. He also seems to have forgotten the second punch he threw where Rice's "fist ended up in his mouth" [Rice's description]. The coincidental presence of Rice's fist in the other guy's mouth got a reaction: the tip of his finger was bitten off.

Cavuto trotted Mr. Faux Victim Bill Rice out there to try to paint liberals as violent, firebreathing evildoers, but he chose a very bad example. There were no heroes in Thousand Oaks that night. There was Bill Rice, who decided he had the right to punch a man in the face who he disagreed with, and the man who bit his finger off, presumably after the fist found its way into his mouth.

It was an ugly incident all around, but not at all what Cavuto and Rice described. Of course, that won't stop the teabaggers from trotting Rice out whenever they want, now that he's one of them, or so he claims.

There are more photos of the incident here. They tell the story better than Rice did. Rice is the guy in khaki.

It's pretty pathetic to see Faux News pimp a guy who initiated a violent attack on someone else as a victim, but then...it is FOX after all.

Sean Hannity was evidently distraught about Logan's post last Thursday about the teabagging Glenn Beck fan Katy Abram, who showed up at Arlen Specter's health-care town hall to spout Glenn Beckian nonsense. Logan remarked:

Granted, Abram isn't a professional pundit, but when questioned it became clear that she is the poster child for the entire undereducated, under-informed mob that make up the right wing town hall protesters.

Hannity gulps at this:

Hannity: Lovely. I guess the tone in Washington has really changed.

Of course, it hasn't. It hasn't because Sean Hannity and his Fox compatriots -- particularly Beck, who has even characterized President Obama as an anti-white racist -- as well as the Limbaugh-Coulter sector have seen to that.

But of course, on Planet Wingnuttia, it's been the liberals who are mean and nasty:

Hannity: Now what do you make of -- now we've watched all these politicians attacked. We've seen how Gov. Palin was treated, we saw how George W. Bush was treated. This is the first time, though, American citizens are being attacked by a party. Are you part of a mob? Are you a political terrorist? Do you like Tim McVeigh? Uh, any sympathies toward the Nazi Party?

Abram: No! [giggles]

Hannity: No racist views in your life?

Abram: No.

Hannity: No. What do you think when prominent Democrats have been making these charges?

Abram: I think it's ridiculous. I have heard Nancy Pelosi say, you know, we're a mob, swastikas, and all that stuff. I'm sorry. I'm a stay-at-home mom. I take care of my kids. I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. And you've got these people that are in charge of the country calling the people of this country ... awful names. Awful names! I mean, my original question to Arlen Specter was going to be, "I want you to denounce what Nancy Pelosi has said about the people of this country. It's ridiculous! It's ridiculous!

Yep, that's what we mean when we say "undereducated and under-informed." Pelosi didn't "call the people of this country" Nazis; she called out the morons who bring signs with swastikas -- comparing Obama to Hitler, as has been done frequently by prominent figures on the right in recent weeks, from Beck to Limbaugh. You know, awful names!

Of course, you can go back and look at what she said on Donnell's show for more evidence of this kind of blithering idiocy:

...You know, yeah, I mean, there are programs in place that the founders did not want to have here. I know there are people out there that can't afford health insurance, that can't afford a lot of different things, and, you know, with the founders, they thought and hoped that the goodness of the people would allow the people to take care of those who are doing without. And I know that may seem naive in today's, you know, world...

Ouch. My head hurts. Another wingnut who has read Glenn Beck but hasn't read Thomas Paine.

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We have been documenting the increasingly violent and threatening protests at Democratic town hall events around the country, and now it seems things are reaching the boiling point. The Secret Service has finally gotten involved:

There were signs comparing President Barack Obama to a Nazi and showing him with an Adolf Hitler-style mustache, but federal officials believe another sign referencing the president and his family went too far.

A man who was holding a sign reading "Death to Obama" Wednesday outside a town hall meeting on health care reform in Hagerstown, Md., has been turned over to the Secret Service.

Washington County Sheriff's Capt. Peter Lazich said the sign also read, "Death to Michelle and her two stupid kids." Read on...

As many have said on blogs and the tee vee, these protests have nothing to do with health care reform, and they never did. They are temper tantrums being thrown by small minded, uneducated, racist white people who are angry about having a black Democrat in the White House. I'm encouraged to finally see the Secret Service getting involved in a public way.

(h/t Heather at VideoCafe)

Lawrence O'Donnell filled in for Chris Matthews on Hardball Wednesday, and somehow managed to avoid savaging clueless town hall protester, Katy Abram. Abram went on a moronic tirade at Senator Arlen Specter's town hall meeting on Tuesday, telling him she was afraid that America was turning into Russia and that he had awakened a sleeping giant.

This wasn't like shooting fish in a barrel, it was like shooting the broad side of a barn with a bazooka -- at point blank range. O'Donnell toys with Abram, and you can tell he just wants to cut loose. Granted, Abram isn't a professional pundit, but when questioned it became clear that she is the poster child for the entire undereducated, under-informed mob that make up the right wing town hall protesters.

When asked about taxes, Katy admits that she has no idea how much money she and her husband make. When asked about Socialist programs like medicare and social security, she had this to say:

...You know, yeah, I mean, there are programs in place that the founders did not want to have here. I know there are people out there that can't afford health insurance, that can't afford a lot of different things, and, you know, with the founders, they thought and hoped that the goodness of the people would allow the people to take care of those who are doing without. And I know that may seem naive in today's, you know, world...

Okay...umm...so she's against a public option that would allow the goodness of the people help those who are doing without? There are many more displays of stunning ignorance in this segment, feel free to document them in the comments.

Here's a recap in video of Judge Sonia Sotomayor Confirmation hearing from Monday just in case you missed it. Don't forget to check C&L's Video Cafe on a daily basis because the team is posting a ton of videos there that we don't front page.

Judge Sonia Sotomayor Introduces Her Family Members

Senator Hatch Opening Statements Judge Sonia Sotomayor Hearing

Senator Feinstein Interrupted By Protester Judge Sotomayor Confirmation Hearing

Senator Sessions Opening Statements Judge Sonia Sotomayor Hearing

Judge Sotomayor No Republican Would Have Picked You! Senator Lindsey Graham

Senator Russ Feingold Defines "Judicial Activist" Judge Sonia Sotomayor Hearing

Jeff Sessions oblivious to the irony of calling Sotomayor 'prejudiced'

Judge Sotomayor's Opening Statement

You know, it really is interesting, how thoroughly they've scoured almost every public hearing on health-care reform from anyone testifying in favor of single-payer - the only solution that makes economic sense under our dire economic circumstances. I wonder why?

They must really be scared.

Health care activists disrupted a Senate Finance Committee hearing Tuesday, standing up one after the other as Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) tried to restore order.

As soon as police escorted one protester out of the room, another would stand up, criticizing the committee for convening a panel of 15 experts and excluding witnesses who support creating a Medicare system for all Americans. About eight were led out of the hearing.

“We need more police,” Baucus said.

The mini-protest was organized by Healthcare Now, Physicians for a National Health Program and Single Payer Action, all of whom support a single-payer, government-run health care system.

“Single-payer needs to be on the table,” one of the protesters yelled. “This is political theater.”

Baucus eventually restored order to the hearing, asking those who remained in the audience not to cause further disruptions.

“I want you to know I care deeply about your views,” Baucus said.

Uh huh.

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A St. Paul police officer who was dragging an alleged protester down the street was jumped from behind by what I'm assuming is another protester. The officer quickly sprays the surrounding onlookers who are not involved in the incident and is forced to retreat and loses both men in the process. The angle of the video doesn't show what the alleged protester had done to prompt the officer to drag him down the street.

Note: In posting this video I am not advocating attacks on police, or violence of any kind. But as I heard someone say yesterday, the Denver police prepared for protests, the St. Paul police prepared for the Apocalypse. Glenn Greenwald and Jane Hamsher have been documenting the searches and seizures on peace groups. And the Minnesota Independent documents a 17 year old peace protester and community organizer who was beaten and pepper sprayed by the St. Paul police.