Oakland, CA police versus their city’s administration!

I’m both amused and upset by this open letter from the Oakland Police Officers’ Association to the people of that city. Here’s an excerpt.

As your police officers, we are confused.

On Tuesday, October 25th, we were ordered by Mayor Quan to clear out the encampments at Frank Ogawa Plaza and to keep protesters out of the Plaza. We performed the job that the Mayor’s Administration asked us to do, being fully aware that past protests in Oakland have resulted in rioting, violence and destruction of property.

Then, on Wednesday, October 26th, the Mayor allowed protesters back in – to camp out at the very place they were evacuated from the day before.

To add to the confusion, the Administration issued a memo on Friday, October 28th to all City workers in support of the “Stop Work” strike scheduled for Wednesday, giving all employees, except for police officers, permission to take the day off.

That’s hundreds of City workers encouraged to take off work to participate in the protest against “the establishment.” But aren’t the Mayor and her Administration part of the establishment they are paying City employees to protest? Is it the City’s intention to have City employees on both sides of a skirmish line?

It is all very confusing to us.

There’s more at the link. My response is twofold:

• Yes, if the Mayor and city authorities can’t get their act together, they deserve to be publicly pilloried;
• However, if the Oakland police have, indeed, acted as brutally and unprofessionally as they’re alleged to have done during recent demonstrations, methinks the officers doth protest too much!

There’ll be more coming out about this mess in days and weeks to come, I’m sure.

Peter