Man tasered at John Kerry forum for asking a question

Too bad nobody tasered John Kerry while they were at it…

…because?

John Kerry has a tendency to babble on as well. That seems to be a justifiable cause.

I’m no fan of excess police force

And the taser may have been a bit much for an unarmed jerk on the ground out numbered by several cops.
That said, the kid was a rude spoiled idiot, in the act of denying others their right of free speech. It is impossible to hold a public forum if any shouting nut must be allowed to go on until they are exhausted. The raving egocentrics feed off attention, and will allow no others to steal back the limelight, once it has them in it’s grasp.
I say he was rightly arrested, and clearly resisting arrest. I’m not surprised that they tasered him. It’s to bad they didn’t have a weight lifting cop who could twist his arm and hustle him out. They need a real bouncer.
In any event, the tradition of whacking the unruly upside the head is as ancient as forums themselves. The person who cannot shut up and let someone else have their turn is not exercising free speech. They are demanding the authority to deny it to others. With rudeness and volume as their tools. Got what he had coming IMHO. The cops were light weight pansies though.

Maybe the police used a lower than usual voltage. They might have had their TASERs set on “annoy” rather than “stun.” No one has reported on this important detail. Why are details like this omitted?

Police are not ushers. Don’t use them as such. And the police shouldn’t allow themselves to be used as such either. Bad things only come from that.

I blame the police. The guy may have been broken stated rules about time limits. He certainly broke rules for effective public speaking. But none of that is cause for arrest. Just usher him on and tell him to get to the point in the next 30 seconds.

Could you imagine having the police usher and enforce a college club board meeting? Violate Roberts Rules Of Order and BAM! Takedown. That’s a tasering and an arrest. :roll_eyes:

this video shows his full question and keeps running up until he is removed from the room.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sE76LQwT6qA

i’ve been to plenty of conferences, and there is always one person who asks a long rambling question that makes everyones eyes glaze over. this person is never dragged off and tasered, where are you when we need you, over-zealous police officers?

and i didn’t even find his question rambly. his build-up was relevant, if a little dramatic. admittedly, trying to squeeze in three questions is pushing it a little bit in the audience ettiquete department, but still it is a far cry from being an arrestable offence.

seriously though, i find this video terrifying. it reaffirms my stance on not entering the U.S. largely on grounds that i don’t think i’d be able to shut up and be quiet in this kind of situation. i’d probably get myself into a lot of trouble.

pix.

I get the same feeling about Germany when I read some news articles about police actions over there and some of your freedom related laws. :wink:

No need to be scared of random arrest over here. There are a few cases, like this one, that give me pause. But on the whole there is no need to concern yourself about random arrest even when protesting or speaking at a public forum (assuming you’re not doing intentional civil disobedience).

They needed to have the big cop state in a loud voice say

“Ask your one question and sit down, or I will drag you outside, screaming and hollering if you want.”
The jerk clearly stated that he intended to give a speech to educate everyone. Asked questions he didn’t allow Kerry to answer, stating clearly that he had several questions that he would ask in between accusations that Kerry was a member of Skull and Bones. A stupid question, Kerry was (like Bush a Skull and Bones alumni), and this is public knowledge. He was a disruptive rude jerk. After pushing away the female cop and establishing his dominance of the floor, this guy would have gone on to force everyone to treat himself as chairman (a post rightly accorded to Kerry). It is not just appropriate, but the actual duty of the “Sargent at arms”, to physically escort this disruptor from the room. Otherwise, only the loudest and most vigorous microphone clutchers may be heard. Kerry is reduced to being a target for the loudest critic in the room.
Those of you who think me wrong, please state why a man who is allowed to ask one question, doesn’t have to follow the rules that the other people, hoping to politely ask a question must follow. How can they ask their question,once a spoiled brat grabs the floor and will not yield ? People came to see Kerry, this guy got to ask any question he wanted, but instead spoke from his ego. If they hadn’t dragged him out, do you think he would have shut up and acknowledged anyone else’s desire to speak? If this sort of behavior is allowed , forums like this will be impossible.
So I see the police as acting to protect freedom of speech in this case. I saw no indication that he was being assaulted because of his question. Rather, he needed to be dragged out, because there appeared little hope that he would ever shut up otherwise. Total spoiled rich brat kid who has grown up feeling he has the right to lecture anyone anywhere at any time. I love how he is so startled that the police don’t realize they have no right to touch him !

They did, he responded aggressively. When they turned the mike off he screamed at them and ran flailing his arms.

Once they had him on the ground and clearly asking him to stay on the ground he kept trying to get up.

Both are at fault, really. Neither one really did the entire situation in or handled it well for that matter. Both parties could have handled it much better/differently to make for a better outcome. This is not advocating or putting down anything. The man even if not at fault should have not resisted arrest. Not saying that it makes unnecessary force the correct way of handling things, which is certainly what it looked like. Al/ though it is hard to tell much about situations like that from a video.

Sigged.

He did not scream or flail till the cops tried to subdue him…the cops were responsible for this riot, not Andrew.

With that said, the newest CNN article (Cops on leave after Taser incident, student's behavior under scrutiny - CNN.com) says that it is true that Andrew did put on kind of a show (“yelling as loud as he could as to sensationalize his presence,” according to the police report.") but Kerry was fine with Andrew’s question (“Kerry protested, “That’s all right, let me answer his question.””). Kerry also said: “I believe I could have handled the situation without interruption, but again, I do not know what warnings or other exchanges transpired between the young man and the police prior to his barging to the front of the line and their intervention.” Whatever that is worth.
But then says that out of sight of the cameras, Andrew was “lighthearted.”
So I don’t know if it was completely a show or if he just wanted to get his point across and was using drama to do the job.
Only time will tell, I guess.

We must have watched different videos then. When the first person says his time is up or whatever he responds quite aggressively.

Some people have anti-cop attitudes to begin with and seem to think that police even being in the room is an act of aggression and justify acting out against them.

Maybe Tasing is a bit much, but when you act aggresive toward, run from, and flail about trying to get away the police do have a right to detain you.

He acted really pissed off and said something like, “THANK YOU, for cutting my mic, thank you,” in a sarcastic tone, and the cops started pulling him back then. He was mad, but was not yet a threat whatsoever.

I was referring to the first time he approached to step down. He says, “I’ll ask my question, thank you very much” and his tone IS quite aggressive.

On top of that if the CNN article that you posted is accurate the Q&A portion was over and he just went up to the mike and started talking. The last time I checked the freedom of speech doesn’t give you the right to interrupt.

A story from a few years ago, Floridian police used a taser to disable a 12 year old girl and a first-grader in unrelated instances: http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/11/14/children.tasers/

Is Florida a model of fascism? Blazing tasers and lost voting records, machine Disney and machine Bush, heavily, violently anti-Cuban…

Both of those sound reasonable. If a young girl was running through traffic lights and got hit my a car people would still blame the officer for not detaining her for safety issues. If she was skipping school to hang out and smoke/drink something tells me she is not the type to listen to anybody. In this situation it was probably the best option. As for the little kid, if he was upset enough to threaten to cut his leg it might have been the only choice. If he was that upset would he really cave in for candy? Once again if the kid did actually cut his leg the officers would be blamed and the parents complain even more. What is better a kid with a piece of glass in his leg or a slightly disoriented/ possibly mildly hurt child.

Kerry was on the stage talking, and then directed Meyer to ask a question. In the middle of Meyer talking, he was interupted by the police, and he said that. When his mic was cut off, he said sarcastically, “thank you for cutting my mic, thank you”. He was dragged away from the mic by the police, and then Kerry said. “That’s alright, let me answer his question.” Meyer said while being dragged away and not resisting, “whoa, whoa, are you arresting me, I didn’t do anything wrong.” The crowd cheered.

Actually, I am one of the poorest spanish speakers on my block. Not only is South Florida not anti Cuban, it is Cuban. And violently anti Castro !:slight_smile: