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The Resistance: An Obituary

The Chevron in Toronto. A lot of wobblies run the paper."

There was also a black and white poster, apparently from the police station, showing a full-sized outline of a man's body with a rating system for the most vulnerable parts to shoot at.

During the Resistance, someone always sat at the desk to answer the phone. When the Resistance was very big, that was a very important position. Walrus had been there most of the days I spent there. He was also there now.

"We had a demonstration for the Presidio trials."

"How did it turn out?"

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"Not one of the best."

All I knew about the demonstration was the sign spray-painted on the entrance to the Cambridge Common that says "Presidio 7 -March 24," Last Fall, the Resistance had called for a draft card turn-in on November 14. We had spent many early morning hours hiding from police cars in order to stencil Omegas and "Nov. 14" all over Cambridge- buildings, sidewalks, walls, everywhere. The style was still the same.

"What happened then?"

"WE GOT INTO a lot of high school organizing. The Collective decided that it should be in white working class areas."

"What's the Collective?"

"We organized it in December and January. You probably remember we had a cabal of six people making decisions."

Everyone always said we had a cabal of six people making decisions. It was true that I had never made a decision. I was also sure, however, that I had never wanted to. Someone had to make decisions and six seemed as good a number as any.

There were a lot of intellectual bullshitters. We got rid of them."

"How many are in the Collective now?"

"About six or seven. We decided that people could help make decisions only if they did something."

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