Hmmm... Female police inspector avoids both violence & arrests while protesters occupy intersection

[qb]

near Minneapolis Wells Fargo.
http://www.startribune.com/politics/statelocal/131853758.html
About 200 protesters then sat down in the intersection at 6th Street S. and Marquette Avenue. But instead of arresting them, police diverted traffic.

"We'll stand here and let them have their First Amendment rights," said Minneapolis Police Inspector Kris Arneson. "I don't think they will be here that long."

She was right. After 20 minutes, they got up and marched to the Hennepin County Government Center plaza, site of OccupyMN, a protest against corporate power.
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[Scuba]

1. I thought billy clubs and mace were SOP? Or is that just the "Bloomberg Method"?

[rbixby]

2. The MPD and Hennepin County Sheriff have been amazingly accomodating

I think they get that they're the 99% too

[petronius]

3. The Sheriff's comment could be read a couple of ways:

Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek said, "Ninety-nine percent of the people are lawful and orderly, and they want to exercise their free speech. It's the one percent who want to create conflict or raise it to the level of arrest. We have no interest in engaging the one percent."

It's obvious what he meant, but I chuckled a bit (and then I thought it'd be nice if he would engage the 1%)...

[Downtown Hound]

4. Maybe all the bad press they got from the RNC a few years ago had an impact.

Their cops went out of their way to attack protesters then, often with an insane amount of force.

[Downwinder]

5. They must not have a big insurance fund to draw on

like they had for the RNC.