When I suggested the other day that Police Commissioner Ray Kelly was a closet supporter of Occupy Wall Street, I was being somewhat ironic. Little did I know Kelly would go this far to publicize the protesters’ cause.
In arresting some seven hundred marchers on the Brooklyn Bridge on Saturday afternoon, the N.Y.P.D. managed to turn the protest into the top story on the BBC World News site. That’s right. The arrests topped the friendly fire killings in Yemen, renewed fighting in Libya and Syria, and speculation over whether Chris Christie will enter the presidential race—all for a peaceful demo involving perhaps two thousand people.
It isn’t clear whether the police deliberately allowed the demonstrators onto the bridge or whether they temporarily lost control of the crowd. But interviews with the protesters suggest that many of them thought they had been given permission to use the roadway, indicating that they weren’t willfully breaking the law. Whatever happened to begin with, the N.Y.P.D. brass clearly seized the opportunity to show who’s boss.