What the predictable set of characters! Perhaps if they have something like a platform that the public can support, they may find it easy to accept whatever dates and locations are available for their rallies. As it is, all they seem to be looking is to get as much attention for themselves. Looking childish. What a fall from grace for Boris Nemtsov.

We call these journo rallies, because a journalist brings along a protesting buddy, so they aren't all journalists in the 'protest'. There is a simple recipe for a journo rally: 1. Pick a place or time that is already booked. 2. If you can't find a double booking, put in the paperwork so it doesn't comply with the rules. 3. If all else fails use an alternative route, time or place that is illegal. Then go for your journo rally, following the journo rally recommendations: 1. Make sure foreign media is there 2. Make sure you include any western controlled human rights group you can get 3. Make sure the journo protester is as old as possible Then sit back and watch the Westen people get hoodwinked!

What is the difference in an authorized rally and an unauthorized rally? How can an unauthorized rally become an authorized rally so they can be considered legal? Russian life sounds complicated. Back in the sixties almost everyone rallyed and demonstrated in the United Stated. It was kind of like organized chaos. Some of the bad actors even smoked funny stuff and acted strange. They called these activities freedom of assembly and freedom of speech. I guess it was just growing pains or coming of age for America, or perhaps the end of innocence in America. Russia may be going through puberty like America during the sixties.

@ rally, agree, and we also busted heads in the '60s and '70s, too. Check out then-Governor Reagan's response to the hippie protesters in "People's Park" in Berkeley. Kent State, Ohio, also comes to mind. Then there were the labor riots a century ago that were lethally put down by either the army or the police, or even private security thugs hired by the factory owners. I think this episode is indeed part of the growing pains for Russian democracy. Hopefully the police will refrain from shedding blood this time.

@ rally When there is an organized gathering in a public place, street etc. then the State has to secure the gathering, to make it safe. There is the difference between the state that cares about its people and safety of such an event and the one which doesn't. The first one cares about what general freedom and well-being and therefore, if the gathering is not appropriate or safe, or inflicts on the others (because NOT EVERYBODY wants to say and think what you do, and NOT EVERYONE wants you to block the street or whatever...) than there is the right to organize in an organization, party, citizen group and so on, which is only yours and nobody can take it from you (unless if you want to act against the State and the Constitution). You can rally all day long, there in the US. Those who decide would just say "let them rally, we'll do it our way". Btw, what did they achieve, the protesters, besides being high and acting strange. Freedom of speech is extremely important but is also just next to freedom to be stupid and arrogant. We want to be free of those attention-grabbing hypocrites.