Keene Sentinel columnist Steve Gilbert has written a piece appearing in today’s paper:
So what do you make of Free Keene? Any idea what it wants?
The local group — it may or may not be an arm of the N.H. Free State Project — gleefully moved into City Council chambers last week with its so-called “Keene City Hall drinking game.”
In it, several members of Free Keene wanted to give the appearance of drinking bottled beer during the City Council meeting, though “not a beer” was printed on the labels.
As expected, the mayor, city councilors and police were unable to ignore what most of us would consider a spectacle of disrespect and took action.
Two people at the meeting were arrested on charges of disorderly conduct, a commonplace result of the group’s actions over the last year or so.
Like a recurring dance, Free Keene’s members routinely challenge — you could even say taunt — local police to arrest them as they straddle the line of the law.
Sometimes police move in and make arrests; many times they don’t.
Their actions haven’t directly endangered the public, but they do potentially tie up police if more serious situations are developing across the city. And that has happened.
Free Keene members want to wring publicity out of their actions, from stories in the press to videos they shoot themselves and post on their website, freekeene.com. No doubt they’d love to catch the police in a moment of anger, trip them up, so to speak, and capture it on camera.
It’s pretty obvious the police, in turn, are using restraint. It’s like a strange cat-and-mouse cartoon, with the mouse trying to tempt the cat into something foolhardy.
Free Keene members also appear regularly on Cheshire TV, host a syndicated radio talk show on WKBK and are regular callers on talk shows hosted by others.
Hard to say how many people are Free Keene members, but the same dozen or so are consistently seen and heard in a city of more than 22,000.
At the Pumpkin Festival last October, when the daily “4:20” pot smoking protests were percolating in Central Square, hundreds of festival-goers watched police arrest four people accused of smoking marijuana in front of city hall.
In the interim, we’ve witnessed several demonstrations of disobedience, including the recent baring of breasts in Central Square.
Thursday’s “drinking game” seems to have ratcheted things up a bit. The story was picked up by the Associated Press and went national — I read it on the websites of the Houston Chronicle and Toronto Sun. It’s a great way for Free Keene to attract recruits from around the country.
Free Keene’s own detailed website is updated constantly and the “drinking game” right now is a huge feature, complete with video. And since the first one was such a success, well, you know what’s coming.
“Plans are in the works for the next City Council drinking game, Aug. 19th, 7 p.m. Mark your calendar, it’s going to be a special event,” was posted this morning.
So what do you think of Free Keene?
In talking with many people in breakfast nooks over the weekend, ball games during the week and downtown at lunchtime, it seems the group doesn’t have much public support.
Interestingly, “petulant” is used quite a bit. Many say they are perturbed that group members are trying to embarrass Keene. And there is anger that Central Square is often used as the group’s staging area.
When you see online reader comments in out-of-town newspapers, it’s apparent quite a few people think Keene is bubbling over with “loonies.”
Free Keene uses the phrase “peaceful evolution,” in describing its goals. Liberty, individual rights and less government are all blanket catchphrases under that philosophy.
As for the Free State Project, an initiative to attract 20,000 pro-liberty activists to New Hampshire, it seems considerably tamer than Free Keene. It claims its primary goal is to get like-minded people to move here, but emphasizes not through civil disobedience.
You can see the philosophical similarities and differences through their websites.
Both even double as quasi chambers of commerce, as they try to attract new members. The Free State Project touts 101 reasons to move to New Hampshire and Free Keene touts 130-plus reasons to move to Keene. Dozens of them highlight the best our regions have to offer, outside of government and politics.
Free Keene even has these nuggets on its website: “Keene cops not as nasty as bigger cities like Manchester.”
And, “Keene bureaucrats tend to not be as unfriendly as bureaucrats in other cities.”
But here’s the kicker, and the absolute truth:
“Establishment confused, angry, and unsure of what to do about liberty activism in Keene. … It must be frustrating to be a bureaucrat or politician in Keene.”
