Protesting in Madison Square Garden

A crazy day. absolutely maddening with this apartment situation. found a place. then the building decides that they don’t want a musician in the place. asks for five months rent up front. fine I say. Here it is. then they say there is a board I have to go through to get approved. This is just to rent mind you. has nothing to do with buying. Just to rent a place. they check your credit, your work history, your taxes, its insane. Dealing with that all day. And then off to Madison square Garden to protest the gw bush acceptance speech with thousands of others.

Called Chapper this morning and told him “dude come by my hotel. I have a ton of calls to make but you we can hang out and you can order room service and watch me work for a few hours. Oh yeah, and will do me a favor and buy me a broom...” “A what dog?” “A broom. I need a broom. Just find one and bring it to me.”

So old Chapper arrives and actually throws a broom on the bed. I was pretty impressed I have to say. Of course I unscrewed the broom part and just used the long handle to hold my signs I was making. So after this ungodly long day where I learn that I am not getting this huge sum of cash I thought I was getting on the phone now and on top of it I have to come up with five months of NEW York rent to the tune of about ten grand, and something they call brokers fees to the tune of another three grand, and so now I have this sudden realization that I am broke. Like flat broke. Like I can’t buy lunch in two hours if I get this apartment. And I don't even know if I will be approved for it anyway. But worse than that, how am I going to live? this fear shoots through my body and honestly I had this uncontrollable urge to lie down and go to sleep. Its all my body could do because it was like I went into a panic. But I didn't because I had to go to this stupid meeting at the realtors to have them rape me and take all this money from me.

Anyway, I made it through and then after that I called boo boo kitty and said c'mon lets go march and protest the evil empire. So I get dressed up in my newest character, the general, who made quite a stir at the MTV vmss, and I go to hail a cab to get to the protest. Boo boo says to me, “what kind of a protester stays at a five star hotel while he's trying to rent a park avenue apartment and then takes a cab to the protest site?”

“babe, this has nothing to do with money or class or style. This rebellion against bush has to do with good versus evil. There are those of us who are poor hippies fighting this battle. There are those of us who are rich protesting I'm sure. And yes there are even those of us who are poor but live like we’re rich, like myself, completely committed to seeing that this guy is brought down. So lets just catch our cab and catch up to our fellow peeps. we got some protesting to do.”

we get to the site. and what was it like? Think tens of thousands of people carrying signs crowded into ten city blocks. From 20th street to 32nd street. All the way up eighth avenue. Shoulder to shoulder. Everyone carrying signs and screaming and shouting and chanting various rallying cries of the revolution. I feel very much at home in the large protest groups. Like I am among family. No matter where I go in this country of ours to protest for one cause or another I always feel very safe and homey with all the other fight-the-good-fighters.
Boo boo who was following me was very scared because we were literally surrounded by riot police on all four sides of us. she was shaking from the fierce energy in the air. On the one hand you have this angry crowd of ten or so thousand people who want to get through to Madison square Garden but the police won't let them. and then on the other side of the barricades you have these riot police with guns and batons ready to beat the shit out of us. So the energy is tense and thick and angry. But I gave her some quick lessons I've picked up along the way to catch her up a bit

Don't taunt the police. They are just doing their job. They aren't the enemy. Even though they may be working for the enemy now, a lot of times they just don't know it. cops are people just like us.

If they move in on us, don't run away with the crowd. Just walk to the side very slowly and casually and get to a sidewalk and act like we are observers. We are not here to get arrested. We are here to get the message on live TV and to the world media. Getting arrested will not help the message at all.

If they move in on us and attack us and you fall do not get back up. stay down for a few seconds and try to get to the sides. Their instinct is to chase people running not to attack someone who is already down.

If you see a live camera tell me and we will go to the live camera to get our signs on live TV. That is our goal.

If we are interviewed by reporters stay on point. That means don't talk about who you are or why you are there or about the police or the arrests or any of that. that's the circus. But that is not what is important. Use your few seconds of live media coverage to talk about the message itself. We are not the story. The message is the story. The people’s rebellion against the evil regime is the story. Remember that. don't get caught up in all of this craziness.

So she quickly learned and we gave plenty of interviews. I learned this. a hippie dressed like a hippie carrying a peace sign is one thing. it’s a common thing. but a man dressed up in a military uniform carrying a sign around that reads ‘world we’re sorry’ is an entirely different thing. it’s a powerful message. I posed for more pictures and gave more interviews tonight than I think I have in my entire ten year music career. So the message was loud and clear and easily understood.

I'm tired. Going to sleep. I am now worried about all of my friends down in Florida due to this hurricane coming. A very unexpected turn of events.

Chechen terrorists have attacked a school in Russia.