Hundreds of Trump supporters and counter-protesters face off at Berkeley rally

[jpak]

Source: LA Times

About 500 pro-Trump demonstrators and counter-protesters faced off Saturday morning at a “Patriots Day” rally in Berkeley, where the two groups have violently clashed on city streets twice in the last three months.

About 10 a.m., dozens of counter-protesters dressed in black and wearing masks tore down a plastic netting that separated the two groups in Martin Luther King Jr. Civic Center Park. The Trump supporters moved forward with American flags and chants against “communists.”

Two counter-demonstrators were led away by police in handcuffs.

At one point, a loud explosion could be heard in the park and fist fights broke out among members of both groups. Berkeley police, wearing riot helmets, immediately rushed in and the crowd moved back.

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Read more: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-berkeley-trump-rally-20170415-story.html

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Looks likes a real beat-up scene on CNN

[nocalflea]

1. dozens of counter-protesters dressed in black and wearing masks

Another attempt to discredit liberal Berkeley ?

[wryter2000]

4. Probably true

Anarchists. They show up at almost everything around here. I was amazed there weren't any at the Women's March in Oakland.

They deliberately cause violence. They're the ones attempting to discredit the rest of us. Of course, the willing press helps out.

[red dog 1]

7. The so-called "anarchists" were probably paid agent provocateurs.

You're right, they deliberately cause violence & attempt to discredit the rest of us.

The term "agent provocateur" is French for "inciting agent"

"An agent provocateur ..may be employed by the police or other entity to discredit or harm another group (such as a peaceful protest or demonstration) by provoking them to commit a crime, thereby undermining the protest or demonstration as a whole."
(Wikipedia)

[former9thward]

11. That is a charge that is made every demonstration (from people who have never been to Berkeley)

And it is false. There has been violence at Berkeley demos since the 60s. I participated in some myself in 1969 as a west coast organizer for SDS. Berkeley has always had plenty of people, anarchists and lefties, who feel violence is justified at demonstrations. The police in Berkeley have never had to pay people for this. Plenty willing to do it for free.

[wryter2000]

16. Yup

I've seen them in action in Oakland, too.

[7962]

24. Thanks for pointing that out. For some reason, nobody wants to believe it.

These guys need to be unmasked and revealed. Not just Berkley, they show up everywhere
And i dont care WHO is marching/protesting/rallying; if they get attacked they have every right to defend themselves. In this country, everyone has the RIGHT to have a march without being attacked
All this shit is going to do is get the next trump rally backers to make sure they bring a lot more "muscle" to beat the hell out of these black hooded idiots.

[FigTree]

27. And the Figaro was printing the same on May 3rd 1968.

And that's just in reference to the French quote.

[red dog 1]

28. "and the Figaro was printing the same on May 3rd 1968"???

What happened on May 3rd, 1968?

(I know that "Le Figaro" is a French newspaper)

[FigTree]

30. That was the first riot

of the French 1968 spring, which lasted about a month, resulted in a general strike and eventually ended De Gaulle's presidency. Similar story in Prague, Berlin, Gdansk a few years later of Watts a few years earlier (i.e."guerillas fighting with gangsters&quot .

[Achilleaze]

5. Yup

[AntiFascist]

29. The right-wing has been messing with leftist radicals for decades...

in Acid Dreams, Marty Lee, states (pg. 173):

It was a typical sixties scene: a group of scruffy, long-haired students stood in a circle passing joints and hash pipes. The setting could have been Berkeley, Ann Arbor or any other hip campus. But these students were actually FBI agents, and the school they attended was known as "Hoover University." Located at Quantico Marine Base in Virginia, this elite academy specialized in training G-men to penetrate left- wing organizations. To cultivate the proper counterculture image, they were told not to wash or bathe for several days before infiltrating a group of radicals. Refresher courses were also held for FBI agents who had successfully immersed themselves in the drug culture of their respective locales. For months they had smoked pot and dropped acid with unsuspecting radicals, and now the turned-on spies had a chance to swap stories with their undercover comrades. Former FBI agent Cril Payne likened the annual seminar to a class reunion. Between lectures on the New Left, drug abuse, and FBI procedure, the G-men would sneak away to the wooded grounds to get stoned while American taxpayers footed the bill.

[turbinetree]

2. Oath Keepers showed up, oh big whoopee f***ing deal

maybe these assholes should reread the part of the constitution that says something about the emolument clause that there fearless chicken hawk leader is in violation of--------------since they don't know shit about the Constitution.

And since these fucking 'oath keepers' go around and say they are defending this paper, maybe they should look at there right wing speaker of the house and ask him why he is violation of the constitution of the chicken hawk and the emolument clause are not being questioned.

And then maybe if they can get there head out of there proverbial asses, maybe they can enlighten themselves if they haven't heard that there chicken hawk leader committed TREASON while he and his gang were having newly installed cabinet members laundering money through a bank on island in the Mediterranean called CYPRUS for the fucking Russians

[Fast Walker 52]

17. haha, seriously.

[wryter2000]

3. You can't find 500 Trump supporters anywhere near Berkeley

They must have come in on busses.

The masked counter-protestors had to be the local anarchists who do their best to ruin all peaceful demonstrations around here. A pox on both their houses!

[nocalflea]

6. Oakland has it's share of scuzzy whites.Doubt many of them participated.

But , yeah , Berkeley is a " funny " place for this group to make a stand.

[wryter2000]

14. Not Oaktown

There are bad people everywhere, but for the most part, my hometown is full of really great people. We elect Barbara Lee every two years like clockwork.

[red dog 1]

8. They probably did "come in on buses"

See reply # 7

[former9thward]

12. Trump got 95,000 votes in Alameda (Berkeley) county.

They would not have to drive too far.

[wryter2000]

15. Maybe from Livermore

[DK504]

18. Exactly what I was thinking.

they had to have come over from Hayward and Concord and all those awful suburbs 50 miles away from the Bay Area. Of course they all say they are from San Fran.

A woman on the plane to San Francisco said she was from SF, I said; Oh me too where do you live she said Hayward. she then asked me where I lived, I was in South of Market at the time. Then she hits me with a "oh, you really are from SF." Uh yeah....Those sweltering suburbs are not the Bay Area.

Sorry if someone lives out there, don't mean to insult.

[rockfordfile]

19. If you read the piece, one of the fascists came from Missouri

[Initech]

9. The deplorables are the ones starting the violence.

Hey deplorables! We are not Antifa! Antifa are a terrorist organization!

[red dog 1]

10. "Al Alegria, 31, of Sacramento, said he came to Berkeley to help defend Trump supporters"..

(From the OP)
..."He said he pursued a counter-demonstrator down a side street and found himself surrounded by a dozen protesters in black masks who he said attacked him with sticks and pepper spray."
"These people create violence all the time....somebody has to stand up to them," said Alegria.

"Somebody has to stand up to 'THEM'"???...Who the hell are "them"?

Hey Al Alagria, the "dozen protesters in black masks' who attacked you were NOT anti-trump "counter protesters", they were PAID agent provocateurs, who attacked you because you dared to chase one of their own down a side street.......Get your facts straight, asshole!


K&R!

[Igel]

22. Got evidence?

Or is "feeling" and "suspicion" by a progressive = "observed and reproducible fact", comparable to, I don't know, repeatedly measuring the mass of an object using a NISD-calibrated scale?

Because unless you've had your feelings and suspicions calibrated and verified by objective measurement, it's fake. Misleading. Either you're misinformed, utterly biased, or intentionally lying. Not sure there's a third option. But since we like playing fast and loose with claims, let's just say you're lying. It's fake news.

And we know the source of fake news.

Wait. That means you're either a paid Russian or Trump agent provocateur. Who needs evidence, I have doubt and suspicion, those bulwarks and stalwart allies of good, true, pure critical thinking everywhere. Not.


I wonder if that calibrated scale would show you have the same weight as a duck?

[7962]

25. Boom.

[Maxheader]

13. Against Communism?

They obviously haven't read donnys christmas card list...

[rockfordfile]

20. The "trump supporters" Are just your typical un-American fascist.

[Rollo]

21. Oh, there are people who just like to pick fights...

Like one of my sister's co-workers. He lives in Oakland, is a biker, and moonlights as a bar bouncer. He has bragged about going to show up at one of the Berkeley right vs. left melees and beat up whoever he concludes is acting like more of an asshole at the time.

Can't wait to see him on the six o'clock local news

[Odoreida]

23. Both sides are engaging in rough cosplay. It means nothing. n/t

[Sunlei]

31. dressed in black and wearing masks, always the violent ones. with their own cameraman following.

Creating photo opportunities everywhere they go. Pictures and footage that for some reason always show first on Republican-controlled fox fake news.