This is a big, complicated subject, and there’s no way I’m going to do justice to all its facets — or even mention them all — in a single blogpost. But let’s start with Burlington police chief Shawn Burke blaming “agitators” for triggering conflict at the infamous March 11 ICE action in South Burlington.

Yeah, well. First, the real “agitators” at the scene were the goon squads from ICE, conducting a wrong-headed, overly aggressive action designed more for intimidation than law enforcement. If not for them, there would have been no protest at all. (Scorecard: The ICE agent who started it all has officially acknowledged he was mistaken, and the three people taken into custody have all been released. So what exactly did it accomplish, eh?)

Second, I’ve been hearing officials blame “agitators” for causing all the trouble since my teenage years at the height of the Vietnam War, and it goes back even farther than that. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., outside agitator extraordinaire.

Third, well, effective agitation seems to be our best tactic in the face of galloping authoritarianism, so Chief Burke can spare me the pearl-clutching. The official processes of our putative democracy have proven to be largely ineffectual. Is it any wonder that some are choosing to take it to the streets?

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