First-person account of the shoe throwing at Richard Perle 2005

[grasswire]

http://www.museworld.com/archives/001697.html

"Did you hear about the flying shoe?

Maybe I should back up. Tonight there was a debate between Howard Dean and Richard Perle in Portland, OR. You all know who Dean is. Perle is one of the architects of PNAC, the group that planned the invasion of Iraq long before 9/11. He's a neocon's neocon, one who will unapologetically defend their aims without bothering to disguise it in froofy talk like Bush does.

The debate started with each person giving a fifteen-minute opening statement. Perle's was highly disciplined but relatively simplistic. 9/11 changed everything, we didn't take terrorists seriously beforehand, they saw us as weak, they attacked us, and it was up to us to preemptively attack the states that harbored them to protect ourselves.

Somewhere in there he made reference to the military loss of life, and how he's recently become aware that Oregon has suffered disproportionately in that regard. He then proceeded to express how he felt for us in return.

I imagine that Perle is a pretty smart guy. Maybe he isn't, but in this case I have to believe that he knew that the audience would see that comment as crass. I think Perle's got a bit of a nasty streak in him.

You'd expect it would make someone want to go ballistic.

Enter Bruce. :-) A 52-year old man comes running down the right aisle, screaming "MOTHERFUCKING LIAR! LIAR!". He ran up to the stage, and... and threw his shoe at him. He missed. The funny part was that the shoe bounced off the back of the stage, and went right back to him. He stopped, momentarily confused, and then picked up the shoe and threw it at him again.

He got tackled on the ground in the audience. Perle continued to try to talk. ("He's passionate, but luckily he's inaccurate.") "Bruce" continued to scream, "LET ME UP, MOTHERFUCKERS!" and then as they finally carried him out of the hall, he was screaming, "WHORE! WHORE! HE'S A WHORE!" (Perle: "It's all right, there's a certain repetition to his theme.")

Honestly, it was pretty entertaining. I'm normally made very uncomfortable by things like that, but from where I was sitting, I think people generally enjoyed the whole display."

[Democrats_win]

1. He threw it at him again....That's great!

How does that saying go?

"...and the shoe throwers will lead them."

Naw, that's not it, but it could be. Hope.