I was in Chicago for the '68 event, trying to act the part of "student journalist" rather than active demonstrator. I was caught by surprise walking down a side-street when a crowd of demonstrators in an adjacent street were attacked by cops. Suddenly, both ends of the block where I was walking were blocked by police, swinging billy clubs and closing in from both directions. I was knocked down to my knees, hard enough to tear my jeans and draw a little blood, cuffed, and dragged into a storefront that had been commandeered as a temporary lockup. Before we could be loaded into paddywagons and taken to a real jail, the cops were suddently called elsewhere, leaving us behind and letting us go.

When I heard the story of the young innocent-bystander martyr Neda, I was definitely remoinded of my own Chicago '68 experience.

The main difference is that I'm alive to tell about it while Neda and who-knows-how-many other Iranians are dead. Bad as Daley and his cops were, they weren't as downright murderous as the thugs supporting various dictatorships around the world.