What I did on my "summer vacation"

For a little over a year now I have been volunteering with the local citizen journalism outfit, The Uptake. The Uptake's core is the committed team of live and almost-live video bloggers who are now earning a lot of praise for their coverage of the RNC and the attendant protests in St. Paul. As my family albums attest, I am not great with a camera, so I have contributed some ad-hoc political commentary, some punditry (most notably at the dramatic DFL Convention where Al Franken wrested the party's endorsement away from a strong challenger, Jack Nelson-Pallmyer). I have also moderated the liveblogs for most of the past two weeks' major party conventions.

So this led me, Thursday night, to the offices of the Uptake, a stone's throw from the Xcel Center.

Others are doing a great job of digging into the various claims and counter-claims regarding the violence attendant to the protests. My purpose here is not to unravel who did what to whom when. The Uptake's coverage at times offers a clear sense of what was transpiring, but also testifies to a lot of chaos. For the moment, I simply wish to observe how depressing the landscape of downtown St. Paul was as I threaded my way through closed streets to get to the office.

It is hard not to feel a sense of shame, as a U.S. citizen, when the mere presence of a major political party in a city prompts waves of outraged protestors, numbering in the thousands. Our democratic process should — in theory — effectively tether the parties to the will of the citizens. Parties ought not inspire massive displays of contempt, disgust, and rage — because they should be representing the will of the people.

This shame is exacerbated by the sense of uncertainty and discomfort one has when simply driving through streets filled with heavily armed police officers and members of the National Guard. While all of the officers I encountered were unfailingly polite and helpful, the aggregate effect of their presence — loaded with riot gear that had the unfortunate effect of making them look like B-movie knockoffs of the "Star Wars" stormtroopers — was to deliver an unmistakeable threat.

We will never know what might have unfolded in the Twin Cities had there NOT been a wave of questionable police raids (my wife and I observed that our own home had most of the common household items listed in one of the warrants) on the eve of the Republican National Convention. I would tend to think that protesters committed to the general notion of peace would tend to speak out and pursue the kinds of civil disobedience that would reinforce and underscore their commitment to peace. But the raids raised the thermostat on the protests. And I've now seen video coverage journalists being arrested, people displaying wounds they attribute to police brutality, and a protester assaulting a police officer.

And I say, we must do better.

Most of the time, when I see my discipline, Rhetoric, referenced in the media, it is presented as the counterpart/opposite of "reality." The New York Times did this just today as the headline for its fact-checking of the convention speeches.

But I'm turning over an idea that I heard Wayne Booth say, as if he were newly discovering it, at a conference a few years back - what if the opposite of "rhetoric" is "war"? What if rhetoric — persuasive communication — is the sole meaningful bulwark we have against "solving" problems with brute force.

To our eternal shame, the bulk of human history has seen the rule of the club supersede the rule of the word. The closed fist had a huge head start relative to the open hand.

I love language and I place great stock in its power, when used effectively and ethically, to resolve even the most difficult of human problems. But last week, St. Paul, Minnesota delivered a series of scenes which shook my confidence in our ability to depend of discursive persuasion. First, I watched as Wednesday night's speeches were celebrated despite their ugliness, their dependence upon ad hominem attacks, and their loose relationship with substantiated facts.

And then, Thursday night, I saw a landscape that testified to our collective uncertainty that citizens could demonstrate against the Republican Party (and in many cases, for peace) without spontaneous violence erupting.

What a sad comment on our current circumstance. I was born into a time of social protest, violence, and suspicion (my mother had an FBI file for her protesting against the VietNam War). In my brief time at the RNC I saw downtown St. Paul hurtle ominously backwards toward Chicago, 1968, and at moments it seemed on the brink of veering toward Kent State.

But this time, the Uptake, documentary filmmakers, citizen journalists, and just plain folks with video cameras were there to record it all as it happened.

Are we ready to face up to what we will see once this archive is sorted, sifted, and clarified?

Are we ready to do better?