First Amendment

Rage Against The Machine have always been a band with very strong political views - they have been fiercely critical of the Republicans' policies, and have actively campaigned against them. In fact, they have always demonstrated publicly at Republican conventions.

This year's Republican convention was held in Minneapolis, and as always, RATM showed up. Of course, they protest equally vocally against both political parties, it's just the Reps who bear the brunt of RATM's anger-laden music.. what was different at Minneapolis however was that the local authorities crashed an open peace rally-concert in the park and actually cordoned off the stage to prevent RATM from playing! What was the last time that The Man so scared of a person/group getting his message out to the masses that this was done?!

Throwing out a bunch of flimsy excuses, the local cops actually prevented RATM from playing their set - so being the mavericks they are, they huddled up with a megaphone and performed a-capella versions of their rallying cries "Bulls On Parade" & "Killing In The Name Of"..

Video from the park can be seen here. The NYT & StarTribune carried articles too.

What bothers me most here is the blatant disregard for the First Amendment -

Freedom of expression consists of the rights to freedom of speech, press, assembly and to petition the government for a redress of grievances, and the implied rights of association and belief.

What happened to that? Of course, you heard none of it because the massive cover-up job done here, involving the press as well. The friggin' country was either too enamored by the charming and feisty speech of Sarah Palin, or else was gawking at the circus sideshow performance this whole Sarah Palin nomination affair has become - all depends on which way you look at it.

Anyways, RATM lives on.. still spreading their message of freedom - as someone recently put it:
"The only difference between the two parties is marketing.. electing Democrats to end the war is like drinking light beer to lose weight.”