Minnesota Independent

Flyers distributed around Twin Cities to dissuade RNC Johns

By Jeff Severns Guntzel | 09.04.08 | 11:24 am

All through Minneapolis and St. Paul a coalition called the Action Network to End Sexual Exploitation in Minnesota has been distributing fliers to raise awareness about prostitution and human trafficking in Minnesota and to dissuade visitors in town…

Palin on energy policy, and two costumed men who have her back

By Jeff Severns Guntzel | 09.03.08 | 7:51 pm

In her prepared remarks for tonight, Sarah Palin has this to say about energy policy: “Our opponents say, again and again, that drilling will not solve all of America’s energy problems — as if we all didn’t know that already.…

RNC Day Two Diary (Part II): Armies of the night

By Jeff Severns Guntzel | 09.03.08 | 9:16 am

Continued from part I.
Leaving the Xcel Center, I walk outside and search for whatever gate will spit me out of the security zone the closest to the State Capitol. Riot police are shadowing a march organized…

RNC Day Two Diary (part I): Huck and me; on the convention floor

By Jeff Severns Guntzel | 09.03.08 | 8:38 am

Tuesday’s adventures began with my shoulder and Mike Huckabee’s shoulder touching–though he didn’t seem to notice. It ended in front of Babani’s Kurdish Restaurant with a column of riot police who, after firing multiple exploding tear gas canisters a half hour earlier, said “thank you” and “we really appreciate it” in their final effort to disperse the remnants of a particularly dynamic march.

RNC Day One Diary: All roads lead to Kellogg Boulevard

By Jeff Severns Guntzel | 09.01.08 | 11:30 pm

Though thousands marched through the streets of St. Paul today without incident, it was difficult to ignore a roving group of protesters who were sometimes marching and sometimes dashing their way through a parade route they reinvented by the minute. Minnesota Independent’s Jeff Severns Guntzel followed them to the day’s chemical-soaked climax.

The anatomy of a march: Veterans for Peace event ends in arrests

By Jeff Severns Guntzel | 08.31.08 | 7:41 pm

When Code Pink’s Medea Benjamin took the stage at the Veterans for Peace rally in front of the State Capitol building today, where hundreds of activists gathered…