Cameras have caused quite a stir at Keene City Hall in the past and recent weeks have only seen an increase in the amount of drama surrounding these devices. Whether it is in a court room or a clerk’s office, local liberty activists have made many attempts at capturing the civil servants in action only to be thwarted by police and bureaucrats. At the focus has been a sheet of paper hung on the wall, the text of which declares a ban on the use of cameras in various areas of the building. The paper, which court personnel have alleged to be a lawful judicial order, carries no indication of any official authority nor bears any marking that would confirm its legitimacy. Inquiries about the ordinance from which the “order” is derived have been met with rhetoric and no real answers.
Keene liberty activists once again have a paper dedicated to the happenings in Keene, NH. I have finished the first issue of The Free Keene Press. Meant to be an extension of the Free Keene blog with a bent directed at the community of Keene. The FKP will start out as a single page inside the New Hampshire Free Press.
The NH Free Press was once titled the Keene Free Press when Kat Kanning, the paper’s creator, lived in Keene. Now like a seed inside a piece of fruit the next iteration of a local Keene newspaper is borne within the pages of the former one.
My goal is simply to have one more avenue of communication with the individuals who inhabit the Keene area. I will not shy away from controversy or contentious content but instead I hope to give insight where there is confusion. I have plans to expand this paper and to do some actual investigative reporting but for now it will start out small and grow into whatever it becomes.
If you have any ideas or thoughts in how to make this a better paper please share them and if you would like to lend you time in any way be sure to let me know.
You will find a .pdf of this first issue among the links to the right, titled Press. http://press.freekeene.com
Please direct any special comments or inquiries to press@freekeene.com
A great deal has happened these last several days involving activists and various Law Enforcement Agencies around Keene, NH. Many videos have been posted and much outrage expressed. In the end I think the heat of the moment causes us to lose sight of the reality and perhaps creates an illusionary world where one does not exist.
I might catch hell from my friends for posting this but I’m the type of person who speaks his mind regardless.
In general the Keene Police Department and the local Sheriffs have acted in a very professional manner and have shown a great deal of restraint in dealing with activists. Most notably, Lt. Shane Maxfield. In every incident I have seen involving the Lt. he has been calm and communicative, dare I say honorable. This is reality. Whether you like the job they do, the actions they take or the orders they follow, we are fortunate to have good humans in those uniforms. And they are human, just as we are, subject to the same flaws and features, the same mistakes and misjudgments.
I do take issue with the way Patrick was carried today and the way Sam was likely treated, I do take issue with the orders to arrest peaceful activists for victimless crimes and I do take issue with the use of force in general to achieve a hegemony of the State over the Individual. One need only read my previous blog entries to see how I feel.
Robin Hood paid a visit to downtown Keene this week and came to the rescue of some individuals whose parking meter had expired, saving them from the clutches of the Meter Maid!
Senior Freelance Field News Corespondent Jim Johnson filed this report:
