Working in breaking news journalism can be taxing and it is certainly not an old mans game. I was reminded of that fact over the past few days when I was lucky to join the working press and cover some aspects of the G-20 summit in Pittsburgh. The amount of energy and time to get any story is all consuming, but to get the big picture story of an international event takes a lot more time and effort and brains.
Over the past week there had been rumblings of plans of some sort of anarchist attack on the G-20, or at least some sort of disturbance. The summit got underway and it was obvious Pittsburgh was prepared for anything. Even with press credentials we could not get through the road blocks set up about 16 blocks from actual convention center.
That actually worked for us, since we never had a plan to cover the politicians or the "events" staged for the gullible and subservient world press corps. I knew going in that for me, the real story would be the public reaction to the meeting and the various protests. Over the past few summits of G-20 leaders, there had been wildly violent and disruptive protests. Pittsburgh had planned for this, hiring police from around the region and supplementing those with national guard units.
I will add details later, with video from the original, unauthorized protest all the way to the night time tear gassing and police brutality that even sent me to the hospital last night.
Those words and images will come in the next few days, as it stands, it is painful to type with two fingers.
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