While we’re waiting for pictures from the Nationwide Labor Day Action to roll in to Freewayblogger HQ, here are my contributions to last weekend here on the west coast.
San Francisco: at least 3 hours @ 8,000 cars per hour.To those of you who intended to participate but got sidetracked, don’t worry. Labor Day weekend was just an arbitrary timeframe: my legal dept. assures me that our First Amendment rights are valid 24/7, 365 days a year. Of course with everything running so smoothly in our nation right now, it might be tough to think of anything to say, but maybe you can say something about how tired you are from all this winning.
Los Angeles: duration unknown. Marin Co.: No attachment necessary — just squeezed into the space Downtown LA, 9,000 cph: duration unknown. Only took about six minutes to trace and paint this sign - I’ll probably be doing a lot more.Can’t help thinking the Dreamers could use a shout out or two. I’m sure there’s plenty who’d like to do it themselves, but I can’t blame them for wanting to keep a low-profile. Technically speaking I guess they don’t really have First Amendment rights like you and I do. Or not anymore.
Brought here illegally by their parents, these scofflaw toddlers feel like they have a right to stay here because it’s the only country they’ve ever known. They say there’s about 800,000 of them, but there’s probably more. Call it a million. Only really a third of one percent of the population… and yet the entire heart and soul of the nation hinges on what happens to them. Politics sure is funny…
Had this up less than two hours after thinking of it. Up for at least two days over the Santa Monica Fwy. May even still be there. Sacramento: squeezed in between rail and fencing. Oakland University Ave. Berkeley: My favorite bay area overpass. Park at the Seabreeze Deli, walk 300 feet or so, drop the signs in the slot, and walk away. Take pix from the pedestrian overcrossing. Backside of sign below. Fencing on hillside by Thurgood Marshall HS next to elevated section of 280.The above sign is a perfect example of the point I’m trying to make. Fencing on hillsides by elevated freeways or flyaway ramps are practically impossible to get to from where they can be seen, but relatively easy for the sign poster once they’ve figured out how to get there to begin with. To reach this particular spot from traffic you have to drive about three miles before you can exit, backtrack three miles and then figure out which of some half-dozen dead-end streets will get you to the fence. Then you have to climb a hill and walk a few hundred feet to actually reach it physically. Signs I put up here generally stay up for weeks, even months. If you can find a spot like this where you live, a few minutes of effort will give you practically a constant voice.
“Him” held over from a previous “Lock him up.” sign mentioned here. San Fernando Valley — Jesus sign to the right.Dear Jesus People, I know you mean well, but your signs are a goddam menace. Using letters two or three inches tall forces people to slow down to read them and putting them on the outside of the fencing allows them to blow into traffic if they come loose. You could easily end up killing someone before they have time to repent, which is precisely the sort of thing that’ll buy you a one-way ticket to the Lake of Fire.
Next to I-405 in Torrance: 25 feet from traffic, 7 miles if you want to get to it. San Francisco next to the 280: pretty much the same deal as the Thurgood Marshall High School fence.I think one of the biggest stumbling blocks we’re facing here at Freewayblogger is the fear that signposting on freeways is against the law. Let me assure you that it is. Even here in California, signs visible from freeways are subject to all sorts of rules and require all kinds of permission. Technically speaking, so does putting up a flag. Of course, there’s a bit of a paradox there, because the moment I have to ask the state’s permission in any way, that’s the moment it stops being “Free Speech” and becomes “government sanctioned speech.” So like the outlaw flag-posters, I figure I’ll just to go ahead and do my thing and if someone wants to arrest me for it, they’re perfectly welcome to. That’s how the system works.
By keeping my signs safe, legible, temporary and posted on freeways where billboards are plentiful, our well-staffed, highly trained legal department assures me I’m essentially covered against charges of endangerment, vandalism and driver distraction but that going to court is always a crapshoot. Nevertheless, I’d consider it an honor to defend what I’m doing in a court of law. And woe be unto any prosecutor who stands before the flag and calls my First Amendment free speech “litter”… I’ll gladly let them know that they might as well be calling the bloody footprints in the snows of Valley Forge“medical waste.”
One of these things is not like the other.Look at the picture above: Those are cops, and they’re passing by my sign calling for the impeachment of the President, and a sign advertising an upcoming Dominican merengue concert. Both of these signs are technically illegal, but the people who put them there did so knowing they were breaking a few rules for the benefit of being seen by thousands of people every hour. The difference, and it’s a crucial one, is that my sign, being a purely political statement, is 100% protected by the First Amendment, Hector’s isn’t. Unless that’s a free concert, where there’s not only no cover but they’re not even selling CDs or merch, their sign qualifies as a commercial advertisement, mine does not. So if Hector “El Torito” Acosta and I are both taken into court, I’m the one who’s going to be dancing out, even though he’s a professional merengue singer and I’ve got the rhythm of a metronome.
San Francisco: Quotation by Groucho Marx. Los Angeles: Rampart Ave. overcrossing. Park, walk approximately 40 feet and drop sign in slot between rail and fencing. Walk back to your car and drive away. Los Angeles: Hollywood freeway southbound. Pasadena Freeway by Dodger Stadium. Marin County: 101 Southbound. Not that hard to reach, but Bay Area signs are generally what I call demographically protected. This wasn’t a Labor Day sign, but put up over a month ago. Easily seen by at least five lanes of some of LA’s densest traffic, and still there as of yesterday. I love it when that happens. Hollywood Freeway northbound. Attached with spring clamp and duct tape. San Fernando Valley: US 101 southbound. Buttonwillow, CA: Temporary post for the sake of the photo. Hoping to repost somewhere by Dana Rohrbacher’s campaign office. Soon enough though we’ll see it applies to many, many republicans. Rohnert Park Novato MarinMind you, these are just my signs - we’re still tallying up the ones coming in from across the country. I spoke briefly with our publicity dept. and they want to hold out for all fifty states before sending out a press release and I think they’re right. So, if you’re listening and you live in Florida, Iowa, Indiana, South Carolina or Maine… just sit tight: you’re covered. The rest of you please send pictures to freewayblogger -at-yahoo-dot-com
Many Thanks!