well where to start
(1)asking if you drive a car, in this case is like askink if you still beat your wife/husband -- lets' get real -- if you want to discuss --discuss -- if you want to play word games -have fun -- we are stuck in a situation where many people do not have a choice -- they have to drive - in order to survive -- and the alternative is not going bACK TO HORSE CArt --but to get the oil companies(and others)to stop surpressing cleaner technolagies --so they can make the extra billions--
(2)now --are some here advocating the idea --that protests are wrong-or should not be allowed? if that were the case -we wouldn't have unions --- we would still have black and white only water fountains and the things that went with them --we might possibly still be in Viet Nam --might have no enviormental laws at all etc.
(3)regarding the demonstrations of the 50's and 60's - all that i know of or was involved in were planed to be non-violent -- just a couple of things about that --in some cases violence was started by onlookers who disagreed with the protesters (i experienced this personally a few times)in some cases the violence was started by the police ( i experienced this once -by i was beaten badly and arrested -finger printed and photographed-the photo didn't do any good my face was beaten into unrecognizability)
(4)years later -because of the freedom of information act -- it came out that the FBI had undercover agents snitches actually start trouble to discredit the protestes(does anyone smell a rat in seattle?) this had been standard practice since the days of union organizing and probably since recorded history --
in closing i have been involved in exercising my constitutional RIGHT since the 50's and i have NEVER and no one i knew or saw in these demonstration ever started and violence --at the most some defended themselves from attack --(from nightsticks-bottles-bats-2x4's etc.0
so what shall we do? nothing? i for one am overjoyed to see so many people caring!

peace (Y) thosp

please fogive the spelling