Honk for Peace!

CommonDreams:

A U.S. district judge ruled Thursday that the city of Ferndale violated the First Amendment right to free speech when it punished anti-war protesters on Woodward and drivers who honked to support them.

District Judge Denise Page Hood, who read her opinion from her Detroit bench, said the city failed to show the honking was excessive or posed a safety hazard. Most importantly, the honks’ “message of peace” — just as that of the protesters — is protected by the U.S. Constitution.

“For Ferndale to now claim that a honk is simply a honk is disingenuous,” she said.

Nancy Goedert, a 74-year-old Ferndale resident and member of the activist group Raging Grannies, was delighted with the ruling and said she would return to Woodward and Nine Mile, where an anti-war vigil has been held every Monday since 2002. She was ticketed in June for holding a sign that read “HONK FOR PEACE.”

“This time we won’t have to put the little line on top that says, ‘Ferndale cops say don’t,’” she said.

Maybe the Ferndale cops wouldn’t have a problem with honking for war? Great job, Raging Grannies!

Martin Luther King Leads Us Still

by willyloman

They will not give us what we will not take. That much is clear.

An article posted at TPZoo included a video taped confrontation between a peace activist and a supporter of the current administration. I viewed the video and left a comment and went back to work on a project of mine. But it lingered in me. Somehow, I know I am wrong; I am configured wrongly at a time when all around us, precision of purpose is the only relevant virtue left to choose.

As I attempted to lose myself in the mundane business of everyday living, this thing grew inside me and I began to recognize it as a voice not my own, somewhere from long ago, speaking to me. Directly to me. A voice I had heard, and thought I understood. But I knew nothing till today.