Those who would trade essential liberty for temporary safety deserve neither liberty, nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin, printerNew York – The battle lines are drawn, and the events of the next two days will tell a tale of either a fight for freedom, a flight to safety, or the death of a dream.
Clearly, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the New York Police have planned a confrontation that leaves #OccupyWallSt protesters plenty of room to escape, to flee, to retreat - and quit the field.
They have responded by regrouping and flanking the authorities, popping up in multiple locations all over the map of lower Manhattan.
Veterans of jungle fights in far-flung hamlets, the intense and vicious fighting in urban squares and other geometric shapes formed by streets and alleys, the mountain passes and swampy cul de sacs of disputed redoubts worldwide will recognize the tactics and the predictable thrust and parry of ambush and quick retreat so well-known to the profession of arms.
The original rallying point, the occupied square block called Zuccotti Park by its private owners and Liberty Square by the occupiers, is a stone's throw from the site of the World Trade Center, and a brisk walk from Wall and Broad, the financial epicenter of the world and a monetary buffer zone with a world controlled by the ebb and flow of currency, the worth of real estate and the gauge of precious metals, building materials, food, energy – virtually any commodity that may be bought, sold, traded, hedged or placed on the long come, pass, or fade line in this endless crap game the friendly natives call, simply, the market.
The psychological warfare operations that have been carried out on a daily basis for the past two months are significant precisely because there is so much at stake in this fulcrum and loci of freedom the friendly natives call, simply, “downtown.”
Here, President George Washington was sworn in at the original presidential inauguration, placing his hand on the Holy Bible, an observance established by his own request when he sent a subaltern to the local Masonic Temple to retrieve the lodge's altar copy of Holy Writ.
There, the bronze bull stands ready to charge, hooves dug into the pavement, snout lowered and deadly horns aimed at any interlocutor.
Tomorrow's planned action by protesters is an announced move to expand operations in a confusing minuet involving subway hub points at 16 locations in the 5 boroughs, City Hall, and the New York Stock Exchange. OccupyWallSt websites and the more militant Anonymous communiques, say protesters plan to provoke further confrontations with the authorities at multiple locations in Manhattan, ending at City Hall Park near the terminus of the iconic Brooklyn Bridge.
The question of the day is this. Can they carry out their plans, provoke multiple confrontations at a myriad of locations throughout this teeming exercise in territorial imperative known as New York, New York, and do it all with no central rallying point, a communications hub, or a place to plant their flag?
Yesterday's headline in the New York “Times” read “Surprise Nighttime Raid, Then a Tense Day of Maneuvering in the Streets.”
The central question, unanswered as yet, remains.
Was it really that much of a surprise, or was the raid in which police rid Liberty Square of sleeping bags, tents, cooking equipment and food not actually part of a planned confrontation – a response to stimuli planned and well-reasoned, then carried out on the whispering winds of the social network - Facebook, Twitter, the Internet's thousands upon thousands of e-mail accounts, URL's and blogs?
As Occam's Razor demands, each thing, reduced to its simplest proportions, consists of exactly what? Think about it. What would New York's finest be doing to keep busy if this development had not occurred, had resourceful young people possessed of native wit and a keen local knowledge of the terrain and the footpaths of power not not chosen to erupt in protest?
Like the skirmishes in Cairo, Damascus and Baghdad, this battle will no doubt become the focus of military study in academies throughout the globe, as well-known and intimately scrutinized as key battles in civil wars fought throughout the ages.
It bears watching, this funny falling-down ritual fight for freedom that has erupted in The Big Apple.
Keep your eyes peeled, focused on the friendly skies.
As we have all learned at a grievous price, nothing is certain and surprises seem to come out of the blue.
God save the United States of America.
- The Legendary
It has often been said that success has a thousand fathers while failure is an orphan. - President John Fitzgerald Kennedy (click here for the minority report)
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