By Marisa Handler

Tens, or even hundreds, of thousands of protesters are now headed to New York City to face an estimated 48,000 attendees of the Republican National Convention in a massive show of people power that could have a profound impact on the presidential race.

Yet with city officials denying necessary permits to the protesters and adopting the bunker mentality of a police state, the volatile situation could devolve into chaos, raising interesting questions of political strategy versus the power and necessity of popular dissent.

"I think this will be a historic confrontation between the forces that believe in free speech and democracy, and the forces of militarism and corporate greed," Medea Benjamin, cofounder of Code Pink and Global Exchange, told the Bay Guardian.

Maya Jones, a steering-committee member of the Bay Area chapter of Not in Our Name, agreed.

"We are mobilizing and outreaching to get critical mass in New York," she told us. "We intend to carve out a space for a climate of resistance that all people can step into."

Both Code Pink and Not in Our Name are planning "feeder marches" for Aug. 29, the day before the convention begins, to lead into the mass march planned by the national antiwar coalition United for Peace and Justice. Organizers estimate 250,000 people will participate in the UFPJ march and rally, even though the city has refused to grant a permit for the rally at Central Park.

And that permitless rally would take place in the heart of a city on lockdown. Department of Homeland Security secretary Tom Ridge has designated the convention a "national special security event," which places the New York Police Department and other local law enforcement agencies under the charge of the Secret Service. Administration officials have justified the show of force as necessary to prevent a terrorist attack.

"The city has been trying very hard to discourage people from coming to protest, and to get their residents to leave," Benjamin said. "A response like this begins erasing the margins between terror and dissent."

A total of 75 government agencies will play a part in the barricading of New York using helicopters, undercover cops, armed federal agents, vast "frozen zones" of city streets closed to the public, and fighter jets from a National Guard unit based in Troy, N.Y.

"These measures will severely restrict the ability and the right of people to protest," Robert Irminger, a member of the marine division of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, told us.

Massive numbers of protesters, inadequate space to protest, and a city under something akin to martial law: will this make for total chaos during the convention?

"Maybe they want chaos," Katz said. "They've been doing everything they can to incite chaos and violence, to try and marginalize the message the protesters are sending."

Parallels have been drawn between this convention and Chicago's Democratic National Convention in 1968, where brutal televised clashes between police and protesters were credited with handing the election to Nixon, who, like President Bush, ran on the promise of heightened security.

Organizers are trying to avoid that scenario by emphasizing to protesters the need to remain peaceful and nonviolent. Yet they also say both the world and voters in this country need to see vigorous dissent right now.

"Even if it's really messy, the fact that there are a million people in the streets saying no to Bush will be heard," Jones said.

The Republican message machine is already attributing any kind of protest – no matter whether it's Green, moderate, or Black Bloc – during the convention to the provocation of the Democratic Party, a message protesters are working to counter. They believe a massive crackdown on the protests could backfire on the Republicans.

"Maintaining overt empire requires restraining domestic dissent, as empire cannot survive very much democracy," said David Solnit, who is going to New York with the Code Orange affinity group of Bay Area-based Direct Action to Stop the War. "I see the RNC as an opportunity for people in the U.S. to start asserting people power."

Even if the Aug. 29 march goes smoothly, Aug. 31 has been billed as a day for civil disobedience and massive street-based direct action.

Carwil James is an activist with Anarchist People of Color, an organizing forum "working for a world in which popular direct democracy replaces the state." James said the Aug. 31 action will illustrate the diversity of popular resistance to the Bush regime.

Protesters also note how ridiculous it will be to blame the demonstrations on Democrats, given how that party created caged "protest pens" during its convention in Boston last month.

"There's an atmosphere of timidity that progressives have right now," Solnit told us. "They say we can't afford to criticize Kerry. This is a deadly mistake. He's more right-wing than Nixon, and we'll spend the next four years fighting him." The Democrats, Benjamin agreed, "are mildly afraid of the people. The Republicans are intensely afraid."

Nonetheless, the people are heading to New York in droves, and myriad creative efforts are underway to accommodate them.

"There's a real New York energy to this," said James, who has been organizing in Manhattan for weeks. "Here's a party coming to our city that rejects so much of what New York is: immigrants, people of color, artists, queers, renters. New Yorkers feel that the Republicans are interlopers. I think it's symbolic that most Republicans coming are paying a lot of money to hotel owners, while the tens of thousands of us coming to protest get to stay with our friends."

What next? The Bay Guardian will have several writers and photographers in New York City for the convention and protests, and you can follow our coverage in our next two print editions and online at sfbg.com.