WA: yippee!

Here in the South Sound, tomorrow's district court docket looks to be pretty zesty. One of the Port of Olympia anti-war protesters has issued a call to the barricades:

Urgent: Court solidarity needed for Port of Olympia arrestees

This is it! The big, final pre-trial hearing! Either they take over 20 of us to trial, or we all walk. It'll all be decided Friday morning, and we need your solidarity!

The courts have tried to scare us... They've threatened jail time. They've offered "deals" with such stipulations as not being able to be arrested for the same offense again within a year, not being able to be in the secured area of the Port of Olympia, and having to pay $200 restitution per person to that very port. Not one of these terms is acceptable.

...(T)he way I see it, they can go to Hell with their "deals." I can spend ninety days in jail. I can work $1000 worth of community service. But I don't back down from nobody...

We're hosting a party, right there in our courtroom! Thurston County Courthouse... this Friday morning at 9 am... ...(C)ome on down and hang out with the Olympia 22 in a show of solidarity! There'll be fun, music, dancing. The party begins tonight, will move to the courthouse in the morning, and will go on even after the prosecution throws our cases out the window...

Good luck with that, really; write and tell us how well it goes. This could be an entertaining spectacle if those courtrooms in Building 3 weren't so cramped.

For a contrast, read this report from a protester who did take one of those "deals." As the Pythons might say, "Splitter!"

Update: here's an article from the Olympian.