seen at DNC protests

Many, I mean Many Many Many groups have apparently acquired permits to 12-15 square feet of what will eventually be known as the grass that WAS in civic center park here in Denver. They are protesting for and against and not even really on the sides of so many issues you can't really take it all in. Husband and I circled the park a couple of times yesterday checking things out -- we do live here, it would be a shame to say we completely locked ourselves up in our home in the burbs and avoided the entire thing. I saw several groups that I could agree with their basic premise if not their methods. I saw groups that I thought both issue and method were right on. And I saw groups that I absolutely vehemently oppose their issue, their method, and hell at that point, they even had bad hair and stupid shoes (hard to be objective sometimes, smirk). I also saw a couple of groups/signs that bewildered me. One group (on the NW corner of the park, directly across Bannock from the courthouse and right on Colfax was a group dressed in all the same color shirts (which I couldn't read) and doing some hugging/praying/imploring gesture -- arms outstretched and raised just slightly -- I haven't the foggiest what their issue was. Then there was the man walking up colfax carrying a rather tiny sign (in comparison to most, it was really like about a 8.5" x 11.0" piece of laminated paper on a stick) that said "Restore the Constitution". To this sign my husband replied -- well both sides want that, to which I said, then it should read 'Restore MY interpretation of the Constitution'. And the first group that bewildered me, "HUMANITY NEEDS COMMUNISM" - not because I'm not aware people feel that way, but because after over a half century of experiments, I am amazed people can't see the failure of the philosophy. Let me begin by saying that when I was in my first Government class in High School, I came home, and at the dinner table my father asked about school. I said -- We learned about Communism today, and it sounds wonderful on paper. My dad (being a child of the 50's) totally freaked! He never let me finish, he wouldn't hear me again, he was convinced those damn pinkos had brainwashed me and all of my classmates. I believe it took my mom a couple of weeks to get through to him that I had said "ON PAPER". And I maintain to this day that Communism sounds great ON PAPER. However, when you take it off the paper and combine it with um... humanity -- well then it fails. No capitalism, no competition - no competition, no motivation - no motivation, no production - no production, no commerce - no commerce, um no commerce.

Also seen at the protests, lots of police ready to jump in their riot gear and take care of business -- and the most disgusting t-shirt I have ever ever ever seen (which I will never repeat what it says) -- there is a limit to free speech, and people are welcome to disagree with religion, but to pick a specific religious figure and then label that person who a huge percentage of the world reveres as a c-word in huge 6" letters on your shirt - is in my mind criminal and dispicable. In fact, just having the c-word where young people can read it makes me nauseous.