"I don't think any of the Republican leadership has accused law enforcement of siding with protesters or abetting them in anyway..."

"... which, by the way, would be a terrible political move for them, accusing people of being traitors."

Says UW polisci prof Barry Burden, quoted in a Christian Science Monitor article inquiring into whether law enforcement at the Capitol here in Madison, Wisconsin permitted or facilitated a descent into mob rule. This is a very serious question whether it's in the political interests of the Republicans to ask it or not! Obviously, the Democrats don't want to ask the question. Indeed, some Democrats are implicated in the chaos.

We, the people, should demand to know what happened, how it was that thousands of protesters were able to occupy the state Capitol building day and night for weeks and, especially, to storm and retake the building after police had cleared them out pursuant to a court order. It's not that the police did nothing, but they had some kind of policy, and it was quite accommodating to the protesters.

The Christian Science Monitor says:

The protests were peaceful, on the whole – with only 18 arrests during more than three weeks of steady protests in Madison – but critics question whether Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney, too, was taking sides.

Anyone can look at the pictures and video and see crimes being committed. The low number of arrests is evidence that the police chose not to enforce the law. Meade, outnumbered in the center of an angry mob, was physically assaulted by a very large man, and all the while a police officer looked on and did nothing. Should Meade have said "Arrest this man!" — under those circumstances? Think about it! The police seemed to be on the other side, and he was surrounded by people who'd decided he was a "Walker plant." How, exactly, was he supposed to extricate himself from the situation if the police didn't respond to his accusation? What do you do when you can't count on the police? You're on your own.

The CSM article is also about whether the federal government can come to the rescue under the Guarantee Clause of the Constitution. Article IV, § 4. You mean, when the state can no longer fend off domestic unrest, the feds have a duty to help us? Pardon me if I laugh. The Obama administration might send in forces to do what the local police here won't do?

Sorry. I'm a constitutional law professor, and I'm especially interested in all the federalism stuff, but I live in the real world, here in Madison, Wisconsin. I want real police, enforcing the law, equally and with a high sense of duty — not self-interested union enthusiasm.

Now, what we really want to know is: Who handcuffed the Capitol doorknobs from the inside on the night the mob retook the building?

Meade has been trying to get an authoritative interview from the police. He was over at the Capitol on March 11th and got as far as a police escort into the office of Wisconsin Capitol Police Chief Charles Tubbs. Tubbs was there, but talking on the phone. He shunted Meade to a secretary, to take Meade's name and number. A phone call was promised. We're still waiting for the phone call.

I want to know more about Tubbs. The Wisconsin State Journal — which caters to the political tastes of Madisonians — just adores the man:

Capitol Police Chief Charles Tubbs has earned himself a new nickname.

From here on out, we're just going to start calling him the "Protester Whisperer."...

Most people would agree the crowds around the Capitol the past four weeks have been some of the nicest angry protesters ever to assemble.

There has been the occasional Hitler sign (knuckleheads), and some Republicans have received death threats. But for the most part, the crowds at the Capitol acquitted themselves nicely.

Don't hold your breath waiting for investigation from the "mainstream" press here in Madison! (Don't you just love how the linked article has, instead of a picture of Tubbs, a picture of the young reporters posing cutely back to back?) Hey, children, there were Hitler signs all over. Hitler, Stalin, swastikas — the nastiest stuff you can imagine. And if there were a Tea Party rally with 1% of the nasty signs we saw and photographed here, those reporters and the liberals they represent would get all righteous about the terrible violence infecting the Tea Party.

And what's a little death threat to "some Republicans"? It was a death threat to all the Republican Senators and their families, and it said:

So, this is how it's going to happen: I as well as many others know where you and your family live, it's a matter of public records. We have all planned to assult you by arriving at your house and putting a nice little bullet in your head. However, we decided that we wouldn't leave it there.... So we have also built several bombs that we have placed in various locations around the areas in which we know that you frequent. This includes, your house, your car, the state capitol, and well I won't tell you all of them because that's just no fun.

Full text here. The hopelessly biased State Journal reporters — Clay Barbour and Mary Spicuzza — committed to their "crowds... acquitted themselves nicely" theme go on to trash Fox News for making things look "a lot scarier." They then conclude with a cloying cutesiness you have to live in Madison to fathom:

Some of us in the Capitol press corps were shocked when the Wisconsin 14 fled to Illinois. But after listening to hours upon hours of bickering, accusations and all-out shouting matches at the Capitol, we are considering fleeing to Rockford, Ill., too. Beers at the Tilted Kilt and some CoCo Key Water Resort water slides sound pretty good right now. We get dibs on Sen. Chris Larson's air mattress if he's finally done with it.

Yeah, please go, why don't you? You are useless reporters.  But you won't lose your jobs for this  abject lack of interest in investigating anything. You're there at the Wisconsin State Journal to dish out ice cream news for liberals in Madison's protest playground, where no one can possibly get hurt, and the policeman is your friend.

UPDATE: Tubbs called Meade at 2:15 this afternoon (Saturday) to say they are looking into the handcuffs matter.

Protesters kicked in a wooden panel of a door to the Wisconsin Capitol.

Yesterday a district criminal investigator told Meade that this damage took place on Wednesday night, and Meade got the photographs today:





And let's look at those pictures and think about the question who put handcuffs on the doorknobs that night. The doors have their own locks. Why would the police add more security to the doors than what is provided by those locks? Battering the doors causes the damage you see in those photographs.

And the police were on the scene to protect the Capitol, not abandoning the building. I think that from their perspective, they would not want more security than provided by the locks. Moreover, handcuffs on the doorknobs could be deadly in the case of a fire or some other imminent need for egress.

In addition, when Meade saw the handcuffs, the police had already retreated from the scene. There were protesters in the area. Meade and another observer thought they didn't look like police handcuffs (because they weren't sufficiently shiny and substantial). In the enlarged photograph, you can read the serial number on the handcuffs: 019989. (The second and third 9s could be 5s.)

Finally, the police have not made a statement saying that they handcuffed the doors shut. I think this is a big enough issue that the police should now say whether they did it or not.

ADDED: Meade showed the handcuffs picture to several police officers at the Capitol today (3/11). The first police officer Meade showed the picture to said the handcuffs didn't look like police handcuffs because they were "shitty." He also said that handcuffing the doors is not something the police would do. Eventually Meade made his way to the office of Wisconsin Capitol Police Chief Charles Tubbs, who said he would call him back. Meade left his name and number, and we await Tubbs's call.

This is Meade's photograph of the doors handcuffed closed at the Wisconsin Capitol the night of the Senate's vote on collective bargaining.

If you want to use this photograph, click through to the Flickr page and get the code for it. Don't present it as yours. This post was prompted by Henry, who said:

@Althouse -- I would repost the picture. Get it to the top. Help Google do its job.

"Somebody ought to use that image of the handcuffs on the door in print and TV ads. I think that can have a powerful and visceral effect."

Says a commenter over on Kos, where they swiped Meade's photo and used it without attribution and without linking back to the Flickr page, pursuant to the Creative Commons license.



The blogger assumes the police put the handcuffs on the doorknobs, but that wasn't the perception Meade had Wednesday night:

Protesters are locking the Capitol doors shut from the inside using metal handcuffs, Meade reports from the scene.

He told me that just now, by phone. He got out, and is warning others not to go in. Obviously, it's a terrible fire hazard to make it so people cannot get out of the building easily. Presumably, protesters think it's a good idea to keep the police out, but it is dangerously stupid.

Of course, it's terrible if the police did it too. Indeed, there needs to be a serious investigation into the police behavior throughout the protest. Meade and I have seen quite a bit of evidence that the police were, if not colluding with the protesters and facilitating their activities, turning a blind eye to all sorts of things that they would not have permitted in the normal course of performing their duties. Why did they retreat on Wednesday and allow the building to be retaken? I assume there are some good reasons for letting a mob take over a public building, after hours, and to block the state legislature the following morning. But how dare the police make such an abject public demonstration of their ineffectuality?

ADDED: Is anyone using the Wisconsin Open Records law to get access to the communications between the police and the protesters?

UPDATE: Meade has been trying to get an authoritative interview from the police. He was over at the Capitol on March 11th and got as far as a police escort into the office of Wisconsin Capitol Police Chief Charles Tubbs. Tubbs was there, but talking on the phone. He shunted Meade to a secretary, to take Meade's name and number. A phone call was promised. We're still waiting for the phone call.

UPDATE 2: Tubbs called Meade back at 2:15 pm on Saturday to say that the matter is under investigation. He said he'd have more on Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning.

Chaos at the Wisconsin Capitol tonight.

Meade returns with photos of people entering, as the state troopers stand by:





The mass scene in the rotunda tonight:



AND: Protesters stream into the building, and some of the doors are handcuffed shut:



Here they come:

"A 12-year-old Queens girl was hauled out of school in handcuffs for an artless offense - doodling her name on her desk in erasable marker..."

Headlines The Daily News. Why make a star out of a kid that defaced school property with graffiti? She's an especially cute girl, willing to pose with her wrists together in the handcuff position. I'm sure some readers appreciate the entertainment on that level. Do we know the whole story of why she was arrested and why handcuffs were deemed necessary?

The girl and her mother dish up the quotes:

"I started crying, like, a lot," said Alexa. "I made two little doodles. ... It could be easily erased. To put handcuffs on me is unnecessary." Alexa, who had a stellar attendance record, hasn't been back to school since, adding, "I just thought I'd get a detention. I thought maybe I would have to clean [the desk]."

"She's been throwing up," said her mom, Moraima Tamacho, 49, an accountant, who lives with her daughter in Kew Gardens. "The whole situation has been a nightmare."

Is stoking the victimhood feelings of your child like this a good idea? The girl did wrong, as she knows. She should apologize, straighten up, and rededicate herself to schoolwork. The mother should not tolerate the child's sickly overreaction — even if she believes the school is too harsh in its response to crimes committed by kids in school.

A class action lawsuit was filed by the New York Civil Liberties Union last month against the city for using "excessive force" in middle school and high schools. A 12-year-old sixth-grader, identified in the lawsuit as M.M., was arrested in March 2009 for doodling on her desk at the Hunts Point School.

Fine. Let the courts review the patterns and, if the schools are violating the law, provide a remedy congruent with the legal violation that leaves room for the schools to preserve discipline and good order.

"The image of Alterman in handcuffs is not only funny, it is, on a conceptual level, just."

Ooh! Dennis Perrin is exulting in the Alterman arrest:

... I must confess that reading about Eric Alterman's brush with the law in New Hampshire gave me a happy jolt this morning, for the image of Alterman in handcuffs is not only funny, it is, on a conceptual level, just. This guy is one of the biggest pricks in American political journalism, a classic liberal elitist devoted to the US corporate state, and a firm believer in the "gatekeeper" role of what passes for intellectual culture in this country. And, naturally, Alterman considers himself one of the gatekeepers....

"Ever since the beginning of blogging-time, I have worried -- in public and on blogging panels -- about the loss of the media's gatekeeper function . . . Particularly when the media profess to strive toward objectivity, punditry/gatekeepers play a crucial role. My problem with the punditocracy has never been that they are pundits, but that they are so incompetent at the job they do."

Right. What we need are "competent" gatekeepers to make sure that the rabble know their place. And Alterman is more than willing to help keep this arrangement in place.

Sadly, Alterman got off easy, with not so much as a single baton strike to the gut, or a brief shot of pepper spray in the face.

Yikes. I had something to say about the Alterman arrest in my 7:15 post, and I considered going into my extraneous antagonism to Alterman, but decided to leave it at just a reaction to his presentation of the incident. But now that Dennis has raised the larger question, let me remind you of this post of mine, attacking Alterman for saying we need "some sort of, you know, blogging -- you know -- council, where we could condemn people." And this one. And this NYT column I wrote (free IHT reprint), where I said I "rankled" at his "impulse to control." So I've got to agree with Dennis that there's some poetic justice when the wannabe gatekeeper gets ousted.

"If you handcuff yourself to a tree you would die fairly quickly but maybe not as quickly as you would like."

When I clicked to this story from Drudge ("Artist died 'handcuffed to tree'..."), I assumed it was about an art project that had gone terribly wrong, but it turns out to be a suicide by a mentally ill man who happened to be an artist. His sister is quoted: "His idea was to kill himself but he couldn't do it because he couldn't upset everybody, including the people who would find his body." She speculated that he chose this method, selecting a very remote place, so that no one would ever see his body. In fact, only his skeleton was found. How do they know it wasn't murder? He tried the same method of suicide before -- and spent four days freeing himself after he changed his mind. Indications are that he changed his mind the last time too. Very sad.