A Plea to the Protestors in New York

Please, please, keep the protests this week (and always) peaceful. I wrote yesterday that Republicans appear to be on track to have what could be a rather tremendous convention. One of the best ways for those who are opposed to much of what will be preached, and proposed inside Madison Square Garden over the next four days to detract at least somewhat from the successfulness of the convention is to stage strong protests directly outside of the Garden. However, this can and will only be a successful strategy if the protests remain peaceful. Images of dissenters being cuffed on the ground and loaded into police wagons does nothing but hurt your causes -- many of which I must admit, I believe strongly in. I guarantee you there will be no arrests taking place inside Madison Square Garden, so arrests outside of the Garden only make those on the inside appear to be the more logical ones; that the people on the inside represent mainstream American values -- a word that, much to my own dismay, seems to have been kidnapped by the political world -- more than those on the outside. The last thing the Republicans want to see outside Madison Square Garden this week are strong peaceful protests. Why? Because these do nothing to help them. If anything they will hurt them. Violent, chaotic, arrest filled protests however, will not help them. They will hurt you.