Oakland Police at Beating Up People... Again

I'm pissed at the small group of idiots who broke off from the Occupy Oakland demonstration and trashed an area of downtown Oakland, but that doesn't justify the police going beserk, yet again, and severely injuring another military vet.

From Reuters:

A former U.S. Army Ranger and Occupy Oakland protester was in intensive care on Friday after a veterans group said he was beaten by police during clashes with demonstrators this week.

The veteran, identified as Kayvan Sabeghi, was the second former American serviceman during the past two weeks to be badly hurt in confrontations between anti-Wall Street protesters and police in Oakland.

The group Iraq Veterans Against the War said Sabeghi was detained during disturbances that erupted late on Wednesday in downtown Oakland and was charged with resisting arrest and remaining present at the place of a riot.

Highland General Hospital confirmed that Sabeghi was a patient in the intensive care unit there.

Brian Kelly, who co-owns a brew pub with Sabeghi, said his business partner served as an Army Ranger in Iraq and Afghanistan. He said Sabeghi told him he was arrested and beaten by a group of policemen as he was leaving the protest to go home.

"He told me he was in the hospital with a lacerated spleen and that the cops had jumped him," Kelly said. "They put him in jail, and he told them he was injured, and they denied him medical treatment for about 18 hours."

The Oakland Police Department did not immediately return calls seeking comment. Sabeghi's name was listed by the Alameda County Sheriff's Office as one of more than 100 people arrested that night.

The veterans group said in a statement that police struck Sabeghi with nightsticks on his hands, shoulders, ribs and back, and that in addition to a lacerated spleen he suffered from internal bleeding.

Clashes between police and demonstrators broke out in the early morning hours of Thursday in downtown Oakland following a day of mostly peaceful rallies and marches citywide against economic inequality and police brutality.

The Port of Oakland was forced to shut down during those demonstrations, sparked in part by the severe injury of another former serviceman, ex-Marine Scott Olsen, during a confrontation with police last week.

Olsen's injury became a rallying cry for the anti-Wall Street protest movement nationwide.

When crazies start to trash things, all honest protesters should immediately leave the scene and desist from protesting to give police free rein to go after the violent idiots who are intent on trashing things and not on legitimate protest. But police have got to stop illegally attacking honest protesters and beating them to within an inch of death. Those police officers need to be identified and charged with attempted murder.

Social change is ugly. The only truly successful technique requires determination and patience. You have to push for change and not be tempted by violence of idiotic "press coverage". The media will distort the message and tempt you into short-cutting the process of education and legitimate social change. The media wants to see the "protest" as a product. They have no interest in real change. So honest and dedicated demonstrators have to ignore the lure of the press and "instant fame". Real change is anonymous and done one-by-one. The glory hounds and the self-appointed "leaders" are mostly sociopaths interested in manipulating things for their benefit. You have to avoid them. You have to find like-minded friends who will join in for the long haul.