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Cheri Honkala – Handcuffed to the Starting Gate from R.F. Shunt on Vimeo.
Just who is spoiling things for whom?
When Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala, Green Party candidates for the presidency and vice-presidency, tried to enter the presidential debate at Hofstra University they were arrested and handcuffed to chairs for nine hours, with no access to their lawyers. When nationally recognized candidates for high office are treated this way, it’s a travesty – whether you plan to vote for them or not. How did we get to this place?
In the video, Cheri talks about the arrest as well as her remarkable personal journey from homeless single mother to national activist. I apologize for the length – 11 minutes – but there is much to be said here. And most importantly I wanted to give Cheri as much space as possible to tell her amazing and moving story.
66 Comments
RF, your “link” does not “work”.
Might you try again?
DW
Here it is, David.
A fine woman, a fine role model. The poor have been made unclean, not just invisible, even as more and more of us are sliding into poverty, joblessness, hopeless financial futures.
Thank you, RF Shunt, for bringing it.
Thank you, wendy, much appreciated.
Although I forgot to so state in my first comment, my appreciation to RFShunt … and recommended!
DW
A very compelling video, RF, which I hope might find a wide and warm reception at FDL.
This is another diary which I consider deserves to be front-paged, just as I consider that its message deserves to be heard and, as I am certain it shall be, greatly appreciated by the entire FDL community.
DW
So glad she made the decision to fight back against this system of conformist sleep walkers. Every time Cheri and Stein and OWS protesters get arrested the legitimacy of the current regime gets knocked down about ten pegs. We must be at minus 2970 by now!
Hey DW. It appears the method for embedding video has changed. I had to get some help.
And thank you, thank you for the kind words @4.
Thanks, Wendy.
Cheri’s a remarkable human being, isn’t she?
Nicely done sir, and you have a great voice for this too
Thanks so much, although you might want to get your hearing checked.
My recorded voice sounds like a tree-frog played through a kazoo to me.
A wonderfully brave, kick-ass Inconvenient Woman! I love her!
Please tell me, though; while I was listening I got distracted by a phone call, then went back to working on a post that’s coming hard…did she mention if they got bathroom breaks? When I read that not only were they handcuffed to their chairs, but BOTH hands were cuffed, my rage boiled over, and I imagined what that was like. That led me to posting this second video with her speaking of the arrest and incarceration.
I’ve pretty much decided to vote for these women. ;o)
So true.
Although with this person, I don’t think fighting back is a decision – more like a strand of DNA with her.
Mahalo for front-paging it, Ellie…! ;-)
Mahalo, RFShunt, for this excellent post…! Are Jill and Cheri down in Boca Raton for tonite’s debate…?
I asked her about that and she said she believed they would have let them use the bathroom if asked. She said the bigger problem were the cuffs, the more they moved, the deeper they dug into their wrists.
That part’s not in the video because you have to cut somewhere – I always hate when I have to make those kind of decisions.
I’ve heard her speak. And she gets it.
Therefore the elites find her a threat.
Mahalo back at you, Tuttle.
I’m not in contact with them, but tonight’s the 3rd party debate on ora.tv, so Jill Stein is there for certain.
http://www.ora.tv/
No kidding. Neither Obama nor Romney opened their elite mouths about the poor last debate.
These “Christians” might want to brush up on their Bible verses.
Something like, the first shall be last…
If third party candidates can be treated like this, we are already in a totalitarian situation, period. Blame it on local law enforcement, or whatever, how many actual power possessing beings have objected to this whole episode?
Spot on.
It took me 11 minutes of video – you said it in 15 words.
Yes.
One thing that passed by me during the interview was that she said there were secret service among the arresting officers. I only glommed onto that in editing.
During the visit she had no secret service detail that I could see. Aren’t they supposed to be protecting her, not arresting her?
Thanks for this. Very important and recommended.
Whether you think Third Party candidates, such as Stein/Honkala, are bogus or stupid or ridiculous (as some claim), this kind of treatment of ANY citizen, much less legitimate candidates for POTUS, is, for me, incredibly chilling. I simply cannot shrug my shoulders & write it off as “no big deal,” or that Stein/Honkala have run a “pathetic” campaign or whatever.
Of course, we’ll never see this info in the corp owned propoganda Wurlitzer bc the PTB don’t want the
sheep99% to see how OUR rights are being taken away from us step by step, inch by inch, mile by mile, protest by protest.Best of luck to Stein/Honkala for their courage and willingness to, if nothing else, put themselves out there and walk this walk.
No, neither of the two “Money” candidates wish to bother to acknowledge the poor. Who gives a fack about them? They are lazy moochers, who ended up poor because they *deserve* it. Isn’t that what all the good “Christiany” & “Mormony” churches “preach” these days??
Cool…! I’ll probably watch that on the computer, while I watch the G-men beat the Cards…! ;-)
Despite being a Political Junkie, and, FP being my forte, I have no desire whatsoever to watch the Prez debate…!
Clearly: No. Not if you DARE to be a Third Party candidate speaking out against our
totalitarian fascist oppressorsfabulous representatives of the 1%!Thank you. I certainly feel that way. It’s why I put so much of my opinion into this – and was more than a little concerned about the potential to be too much bloviation. You reassure me.
Ya done good! Keep it up!
Well done. I mean, very well done.
Yesterday I’d decided not to vote at all: the Green Party isn’t recognized in North Carolina, and Stein and Honkala aren’t on the ballot. The ‘down ticket’ candidates I know absolutely nothing about (I could be casting a ballot for The Boys From Brazil unwittingly).
Today I’ve changed my mind and will vote early and write in their names.
What sort of software did you use to make your compilation? Did you use your own gear? I ask hoping that your answer will encourage others to use multimedia for MyFDL diaries. It’s very effective.
Obama sure taught them a lesson. Ordered strapped to a chair for nine hours. That’s the kind of torture that Obama says America doesn’t do.
The Queen of Hearts from Alice In Wonderland:
Who’s been painting my roses red? WHO’S BEEN PAINTING MY ROSES RED? /Who dares to taint / With vulgar paint / The royal flower bed? / For painting my roses red / Someone will lose his head.
Terrific video, thank you. She’s amazing.
Hard to believe what is allowed to happen. We should already be at the pitchfork and torches stage. Voting for Stein/Honkala is a matter of conscience now; otherwise, you are voting for the choice of staying on the Titanic and drowning or jumping into the cold dark Atlantic and drowning because the lifeboats are not coming to save us.
According to their website (updated 10/19) they were still petitioning for write-in status in NC.
http://www.jillstein.org/ballot
She has my vote! Dr Jill Stein is the real deal.
My great appreciation, to you Elliot, for front-paging this video, and I agree, RF does have a most excellent narrative voice.
DW
Great diary, thanks for posting, RFShunt. Recommended.
I agree with Elliott about your voice. You are a great narrator.
I’ll take Cheri (and Jill, of course) over all the phony progressives in the Democratic Party. That goes for Bernie Sanders too.
Thanks so much AitchD.
I do use my own gear. I’m a video post-production person – so it’s what I do for a living.
The software is Final Cut Pro on a MacbookPro – but I would tell you not to get hung up on gear. A cheap modern camera does an amazing job. So can an affordable editing program – if you take the time to learn it thoroughly. If you’re serious, though, I would tell you to invest in a good microphone. Sound makes sooo much difference. I put a wireless mic on Cheri and did some sweetening (audio processing)
Thanx for posting this video. I made the decision to vote for Jill and Cheri long ago (Well, it’s my third election voting Green).
But what got me choked up on this clip was imagining her presiding over the Senate. I’m relying on perhaps a shaky premise that respect for the office would carry her day every day, but I just feel also that she would make good on that station. She’s got the basics in her character.
Shoot, I don’t think most of us know how to embed a Vimeo video, RF. And thank you for the bathroom break info; I hope it’s so.
@ Ready 16: I made that point about Obama to TBogg yesterday, nor did OBomba mention the poor in his past two SOTUs, if memory serves. Someone said Romney mentioned the poor in one debate, but I dunno what he said.
Time for all of us to coalesce around the notion that we all need to care that *all of us* have plenty to live, love and thrive, and the planet as well.
I’ll also be lining up at your hearing testing center. I like the sound of your voice.
However, the first time I heard mine recorded, I was horrified.
Thanks for this important video!
Ain’t she though?
And thank you, Mary, for your kind words
The North Carolina absentee ballot I received a few weeks ago has clear and marked write-in spaces for President and Vice President, for Governor, and for Soil and Water Conservation District Supervisor, but not for any other offices. Along with Democrats and Republicans only Libertarian candidates are on the ballot and only for President and Vice President and Governor.
The ballots for early voting (begun Oct 19) have already been printed, so I suppose (whatever ‘write-in status’ means) if the Stein petition of NC succeeds, the electronic voting on Election Day will comply (whatever that means).
I’ve no idea how early voting in my district will work, whether it’s electronic/computer or a written paper ballot. If it’s electronic without a write-in option, I’ll fill out my absentee ballot instead and write their names in. I mean print their names on the write-in line and fill in the oval space.
In Illinois, unless a candidate has filed some required paperwork for write-in status, they don’t count the vote (not to start a side discussion of vote counting issues!), don’t know if there are similar restrictions in other states. Also, in IL you are supposed to able to request a list of “official” write-ins when you vote. It will be interesting to see what to expect in the remaining few states where they’re still petitioning,
We’ve been so programmed by the corporate media that for most folks, it’s hard to tell anymore what’s pitchfork-worthy. That’s why I got so opinion-y with this – you have to point out, again and again, the ridiculous things we take as being “normal”
It came home to me with the secret service thing. When Cheri said that the secret service was among the arresting officers, that should have set off fireworks in my brain. Instead, it just kind of went past me – accepted as O.K.
We can’t let the MSM define the new normal.
You use the best. Thanks for the reply. I have a MacBook Pro, and for editing all media have used the iMovie program that came bundled with it, the features allow rather high-looking production quality (though I imagine Final Cut Pro is much easier and quicker to get something out the door).
I hope Jane Hamsher will check out your thread and initiate something on FDL’s BYTEGEIST blog to encourage a threaded conversation about making video diaries, so posters with various operating systems and editing programs can chime in with advice.
Oh my. Good to know the bad news. I’ll have to wait now…
They’ve had my vote since I learned they’re on the ballot here.
Speaking of choked up – you can’t really tell in the finished vid because of how I ended up cutting it, but although she’s probably told the story of breaking the news to her son that they were becoming homeless hundreds of times – you can hear her getting that catch to her voice. In the un-edited footage you can see how much this still affects her, years later.
You might want to look at the new FCPX. Apple wants $300 for it and it’s pretty darn good. A lot of pros aren’t going that way (myself included) because it’s missing some media management features – but those only make sense when you have to respond really fast to client demands. It’s very iMovie-like and will let you have more a lot more control than iMovie.
Also I have this dream of being able to do online, remote, distributed, group video editing on free open-source software. Maybe one day I’ll find a coder who can help make that happen.
Cheri — if you’re reading — the sweater is beautiful and speaks of simplicity and elegance. (Never mind that it’s my favorite color.)
You are the best-dressed candidate in 2012!
Stein files lawsuit against the CPD
Last week Green Party presidential candidate Dr. Jill Stein was arrested, along with VP candidate Cheri Honkala, attempting to get into the presidential debates in Hempstead, New York. This week her fight continues with a lawsuit filed today against the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD), claiming that the CPD, Democratic National Committee, and Republican National Committee, together with the Federal Election Commission and Lynn University, had deprived her of her constitutional rights to due process, equal protection, and free speech, as well as her statutorily protected civil rights.
The lawsuit sought both an emergency court order enjoining tonight’s CPD presidential debate from taking place, as well monetary damages.
http://www.jillstein.org/lawsuit_cpd
What a national disgrace. I’ve been voting Green since Nader 2000 and will this time. I will not even watch this last fake “debate” put on us by corporations and corporate whores, for there is only one question anyway—-which of you is the biggest war-mongering whore for oil and Israel? Fuck this noise.
You can WRITE THEM IN, friend!
x2. Cheri Honkala’s words are of someone who survived the systematic cruelty of The Machine and turned around and took it on. YEAH!
Will they be counted?
You won’t watch? And miss Bob ‘Oswald-Acted-Alone’ Schieffer?
Sorry, don’t have time to read all the comments – yes, they are in an expanded coverage I believe, democracynow.org
You may be right about declining legitimacy. But I suspect that the detention of Stein and Honkala demonstrates that the Green Party doesn’t have enough political power to keep from being arrested by the Secret Service, as opposed to being protected by them. The effect of showing off this weakness may be to push voters away from the Greens. The arrest likely steels the resolve of Greens and others so dedicated, but may put off those on the fence entertaining the idea of voting third party. In other words, I don’t think this fiasco helped the Greens, unfortunately.
Indeed. And calling it “incredibly chilling” is an understatement. There is one political party in the US: The one whose members wear the US flag lapel pin. None others need bother. This is the partisanship of which Obama and Romney speak: to come down on any illegitimate pretenders to the throne by arresting them for–what was it?–”parading without a permit”?
If one is going to bother to vote for a President, the only vote that matters at all is a vote for a third party candidate. Such a vote is almost meaningless, but at least it keeps the act from being completely meaningless. And for those who think Obama v. Romney represent a meaningful, free, democratic choice, they might take a look at this video and the one where Stein and Honkala get arrested. When such folks can honestly explain how the exclusion and detention of these Green candidates reflects a legitimate, functioning representative democracy, I’ll believe them when they tell me how important it is that their team captain win the White House. Until then, these Rep and Dem voters are as responsible for what happened to Stein and Honkala as the cops who put the cuffs on them.
Kicking these women around.. says so much about everything we are experiencing today in this country. Mostly, I am pained that they were so sorely disrespected by authority to de-legitimize them. So sorry and so embarrassed that this is my country. So sad! Thank you women. You two give us true hope for change. And you make us realize how awful our leaders are.
It would be great if the League of Women Voters joined their lawsuit against the commission and the parties. We will follow this closely to see if they get some well-deserved satisfaction and damages.
I dashed off to watch DemocracyNow’s presentation – much, much better than either of their past two efforts – it really jelled this time. And Rocky and Jill just wiped the floor with the other two. I started out not liking having to listen to O and R, and then because Stein and Anderson were homing in on their weaknesses, I actually enjoyed it! Kudos to Amy’s team, they did a three hour marathon and made it exciting to watch!
And thanks so much, RFShunt, for this excellent presentation. I love that idea of Cheri supervising the Senate – just love it! I was thinking too that Rocky Anderson and Jill make such a good team – he’s so strong on foreign policy that he would be super as Secretary of State, impossible not to like. He’s such a good man, he would have her back – well, they just make a great threesome!
Thanks RF, very powerful.
Yes, it is a shame what this country has come to.
I have spent the last couple of years telling everyone who would listen what a Trojan Obama turned out to be. The last few weeks, I’ve gotten quite an enthusiastic reception when discussing third parties. Everyone, and I mean everyone, regardless of political leaning, is receptive to voting Green party, just to get a third party with campaign finance money.
If I had not made up my mind a couple of years ago to vote Green, this alone would have persuaded me.
What in hell have we come to in this country? Or, what in hell have we come back to? This is straight out of 1890 or so.
No constitutional right to bathroom breaks, although I guess an argument could be made under the 8th amendment (cruel and unusual punishment). But they did have a constitutional right to speak to their attorney and that was denied.
And these are high profile women. Just imagine what happens to people with no media megaphone or political clout. The mind boggles.
What campaign finance money? Did the FEC finally release the matching funds earned by about six candidates, but withheld by the Obama administration?
Add 1 more Green vote. The police are out of control or controlled by others in the shadows.
I’d like to correct one thing. I’m pretty sure that Jill Stein mentioned, perhaps in her opening remarks to the town hall Democracy Now piece, that she did get to call her lawyer. I don’t want us going off on a tangent where the facts don’t merit that.
I did go to her explanation at the ivn debate, and here is that:
“… So I went to protest that debate, was arrested at the entrance not even to the debate hall, just the entrance of Hofstra University where I and my running mate, Cheri Honkala, were not allowed even to pass. We were arrested, but not only were we arrested, we were put into very tight, plastic handcuff restraints. We were then taken to a secret, undisclosed location, a black site, where we were handcuffed to metal chairs for eight hours until after 11 pm, we were arrested shortly after 2 pm, and no one was… Our staff actually did quite a bit of sleuthing of their own. They were finally able to override the intelligence of Homeland Security and the Secret Service doesn’t say all that much about the effectiveness of Homeland Security and the Secret Service that my untrained campaign was able to get around their black out and actually find me at that site. They were then told they would be arrested if they stayed on site, even when they were back at the debate site. They were told they would be arrested if they stayed at the entrance for simply being a member of the Green Party…” [my bold]
Thank you, juliania, for the clarification and the additional news.
On a slightly different subject, have you a link to Obama’s the “one indispensable nation” quote?
I should very much appreciate such a link.
As always, much respect and admiration to you.
DW
Hey Juliania,
Thanks for the nice words about my piece.
I talked at some length to Cheri’s “handler” – a young environmental attorney. The only reason she or Jill Stein got to consult with their attorneys at the end of the nine hours was that he and Jill Stein’s handler spent that entire time on the phone piecing together clues to finally deduce their whereabouts.
He told me the secret service was actively mocking him when he talked to them, and it was only from secretaries and administrative assistants that he was able to get any info – and only them because he would drop what little facts he had to make them think he knew more than he did.
It was only when they finally showed up at the location that they had found on their own after all that hard work that the police finally relented and allowed them to contact counsel.
I couldn’t confirm what he was saying from a second source – and didn’t go the route of getting comment from the Hempstead police or secret service. The news aspect of the story had gotten old by that point. That’s why the video is an essay and not a news piece.
I’ll bet that 999 out of 1000 law enforcement goons don’t distinguish between the Green Party and Greenpeace (whose disruptive actions have often made headlines).