Yea, I agree, if you notice that is a common theme they use for many things; "it's for their safety". The mayor in Oakland used that premise also on the news.
I think that was the line when the robots took over in that futuristic Will Smith movie?
I think the public is being conditioned to accept the erosion of their civil liberties under this "reasoning" in a whole bunch of formats. It's a gradual erosion process.
breaking up an unlawful assembly is not an erosion of your civil liberties
Some creative ideas for your unsolicited credit card applications:
breaking up an unlawful assembly is not an erosion of your civil liberties
As a matter of fact, it is. I'm curious as to what your definition of 'civil liberty' is if it doesn't include protection of the Bill of Rights. The Bill of Rights, by the way, includes "the right of the people peaceably to assemble" in the First Amendment. For what it's worth, the supreme court has clarified and confirmed that we still uphold the right to assemble as a civil liberty:
''The privilege of a citizen of the United States to use the streets and parks for communication of views on national questions may be regulated in the interest of all; it is not absolute, but relative, and must be exercised in subordination to the general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order; but it must not, in the guise of regulation, be abridged or denied.''
"The right of the people peaceably to assemble for the purpose of petitioning Congress for a redress of grievances, or for anything else connected with the powers or the duties of the National Government, is an attribute of national citizenship and, as such, under the protection of and guaranteed by, the United States. The very idea of a government, republican in form, implies a right on the part of its citizens to meet peaceably for consultation in respect to public affairs and to petition for a redress of grievances.
I'm also curious as to how you defined your ideology. It's fairly clear to me that there's no basis in reality. If not based in real life, then from where are your ideas formed?
I'm also curious as to how you defined your ideology. It's fairly clear to me that there's no basis in reality. If not based in real life, then from where are your ideas formed?
hey curtkram, did you see the part before the part you bolded?
''The privilege of a citizen of the United States to use the streets and parks for communication of views on national questions may be regulated in the interest of all; it is not absolute, but relative, and must be exercised in subordination to the general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order; but it must not, in the guise of regulation, be abridged or denied.''
for example this : 'Farther south, police in San Diego descended early Friday on an encampment that had housed demonstrators at the Civic Center Plaza and Children's Park for three weeks. They arrested 51 people who faced charges including illegal lodging, illegal drug use, unlawful assembly and blocking officers from performing their duties.'
not an erosion of our civil liberties and a perfect example 'based in reality' that defines my (follow-the-constitution) ideology.
"All of the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arises, not from the defects of the Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit, and circulation."
John Adams
"Whoever controls the volume of money in our country is absolute master of all industry and commerce... and when you realize that the entire system is easily controlled, one way or the other, by a few powerful men at the top, you will not have to be told how periods of inflation and depression originate"
James Garfield (moment before they shot him in the face)
"The Government should create, issue, and circulate all the currency and credit needed to satisfy the spending power of the government and buying power of consumers. By the adoption of these principles the tax payers will be saved immense sums of interest.
The privilege of creating and issuing money is not only the prerogative of government, but it's the government's greatest creative opportunity".
Abraham Lincoln (moments before they shot him in the face)
What did they do in Oakland, which triggered your comment "breaking up an unlawful assembly is not an erosion of your civil liberties," that would suggest the people in the park were somehow preventing "general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order?"
The people were allowed to congregate in the park. Then the police stepped in, "in the guise of regulation" to deny the protestors their rights to be there. Now, they are allowed to congregate in the park with the same behaviors and infrastructure they had before. If whatever they were doing was a danger to the public, they wouldn't have been allowed back, would they? What's going on in Oakland is largely publicly available information. They have their own website, a livestream channel, twitter, and reporters from traditional media. If whatever they had been doing was all that horrible it would have been publicly available.
Also, you are justifying your stance on the Oakland event by claiming people in San Diego were busted with drugs. Oakland is not San Diego. Your follow-the-constitution ideology is condemning people in Oakland for a crime committed in San Diego.
Also, you are justifying your stance on the Oakland event by claiming people in San Diego were busted with drugs. Oakland is not San Diego. Your follow-the-constitution ideology is condemning people in Oakland for a crime committed in San Diego.
Rats and drugs mar Occupy Oakland tent city, officials say
By Sean Maher
Oakland Tribune
Posted: 10/18/2011 12:35:37 PM PDT
Updated: 10/19/2011 02:30:58 PM PDT
OAKLAND -- City officials said Tuesday they may have to shut down the Occupy Oakland tent city in coming days because it is attracting rats, alcohol and illegal drug use.
A pre-existing rat problem around Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, which public works employees are normally able to keep under control, has been exacerbated by the demonstrators' presence, said city administrator spokeswoman Karen Boyd.
The problem "has gotten worse with all the food and people and couches," Boyd said. Because the protest has people cycling in and out, she added, the city is having to repeat the message about how to store food and keep the area safe.
Boyd said she wasn't sure how to describe the extent of the growing rat problem, but that it's been reported in complaints by local businesses, workers and even the demonstrators themselves.
This comes on the heels of increasing reports of illegal drug and alcohol abuse, fighting, and sexual harassment in and around the camp of about 100 tents, Boyd said. The protest has destroyed the grass lawn and it's not clear yet how much the overall expense to the city will be.
"In an effort to communicate with a group that has no clear leaders, she added, city staffers began passing out fliers around the camp asking for the group for help with several safety issues.
"They've been largely compliant," Boyd added. For now, the plan is to let them stay, "As long as they are peaceful and respectful of the rights of all the users of the plaza."
In the interest of public health and safety, it looks like the mayor established a line of communication with the protestors and they were within their constitutional rights as long as they comply with the safety standards set by the city. The protestors did comply. Do you know what changed? If so, did it really justify tear gas, flash grenades, and rubber bullets? It sort of sounds to me like the city might be creating excuses under "the guise of regulation."
The best part is about the grass. I'm pretty sure the cost of tear gas cans and grenades far exceeds replanting grass seed next year. Not a net gain for Oakland.
Arrests and mayhem across the country. Portland, Austin, San Diego, Tampa, Atlanta, Nashville, etc...
Is it too soon to call it the American Spring '12? The movement looks likely to survive the winter in smaller numbers and then gain full steam come spring time. The economy's definitively not going to make any gains by then. If anything, it's getting worse. Yet again.
It's one making the rounds of the FB this morning.
Honestly, laws in this country are nonsensical. I'm old enough to realize, finally, that when they first started designating "protest areas" - in the late 80s, was it? - that all the folks older than me yelling "This is the first step in a long slow erosion of our civil rights!" were absolutely correct.
The point of a protest is to shake things up! Trashing private property, like at the WTO Seattle meetings, is never acceptable. But using public space for public means is what this country is about going back to having a common green for everyone to graze their cows safely. If it "inconveniences" you on your walk to work, too bad: we're all inconvenienced every time we end up behind a bus or trash truck when we drive but that doesn't mean banning buses and trash pickup is a smart solution! Pick another of the myriad public sidewalks for your route.
We've become so fearful of each other as a society, so instantly enraged at the thought of someone expressing a view different from ours, and so eager to figure out how to sue everyone else that we're going nowhere but deeper into the hole we've already dug into.
newguy, American Fall is a far, far more likely outcome here. I'm feeling exceptionally pessimistic about the US' potential to improve at all right now. Intellectually we're lazy, greedy, and ignorant.
newguy, American Fall is a far, far more likely outcome here. I'm feeling exceptionally pessimistic about the US' potential to improve at all right now. Intellectually we're lazy, greedy, and ignorant.
I agree, unfortunately. The merger between corporations and the state is all but complete at this point, and I just don't see a rosy solution at this point.
Oct 31, 11 3:16 pm ·
·
These peaceful protest suck. Somebody needs to chop off a banker's head...or at least set something on fire. Otherwise I'm gonna change the TV channel. For realz, yo !
"It is time for us to come together and build a new world through the power of the individual and the community. We are not here to make requests of a corrupt political system - we are here to take our lives back into our own hands. We are not acknowledging subservience. There is no higher power than the power of the people. We are not asking for assistance. We are declaring independence. Our demand is not to those in power, it is to those individuals still silenced. Join us.
We are the 99%. We are not afraid. We are not waiting. We are working to make a better world."
It will not improve significantly until it all falls apart...too many people getting rich off the status quo. The protests need to continue, but I think the best chance of having a real effect is if the banks collapse again and the movement influences politics enough to let them fail this time!!!
There's the $211 million fine JPMorgan paid in July to settle charges that it defrauded local governments in 31 states—along with the $130 million it returned to municipalities it was accused of duping.
There's the $722 million in fines and restitution payments it made after JPMorgan confederates were caught paying off officials in Jefferson County, Alabama (home to Birmingham), to secure a municipal finance deal that nearly bankrupted the county.
There's the fact the bank was in so great a rush to evict people from their homes that it admits that some of its people might have forged foreclosure documents—a problem so widespread that it felt compelled to suspend 56,000 foreclosures while it investigated its own behavior.
Or maybe the biggest sin is the central role JPMorgan has played—and continues to play—in the rise of what might be called the “poverty industry”: all those businesses that exploit the working poor, such as the payday-loan industry, where lenders charge 400 percent interest on short-term, small-denomination loans against a person's next paycheck (or their Social Security or unemployment payments).
And don't forget the Bernie Madoff connection. Perhaps it's not fair to blame JPMorgan for Madoff's sins just because the infamous fraudster used Chase to handle billions of dollars in investors' cash. Nonetheless, Madoff trustee Irving Picard has pointed an accusing finger at the bank. He has sued the bank for $6 billion, claiming that not only should it have known about the fraud, it did know. In June 2007, 18 months before Madoff's fraud was exposed, an officer in the bank wrote an email to colleagues reporting that another bank executive “just told me that there is a well-known cloud over the head of Madoff and that his returns are speculated to be part of a Ponzi scheme.” The bank, the suit contends, had withdrawn all but $35 million of the $276 million it had invested in Madoff-linked hedge funds by the time the fraud was revealed. A JPMorgan spokesman “vigorously” denied Picard's charges—and Picard has responded by tripling damages to $19 billion.
Goldman Sachs is widely reviled for duping its own clients by selling them shares in a mortgage-backed security the investment bank dubbed Abacus. But JPMorgan had its own Abacus. It was called Squared CDO 2007. And according to the Securities and Exchange Commission, JPMorgan's behavior was just as contemptible as Goldman Sachs's. It, too, let a hedge fund secretly choose the subprime loans in a product that the hedge fund wanted to bet against; it, too, failed to inform clients purchasing shares in Squared that it had let a hedge-fund manager rig the game.
In June, JPMorgan Chase (without denying or admitting guilt) paid $154 million to settle Squared-related charges filed by the SEC—equal to less than two days' worth of company earnings that quarter. The bank also returned $126 million to clients who lost money on Squared and, for good measure, paid $57 million to investors who lost money in a second, similar deal called Tahoma CDO-I.
There's the $211 million fine JPMorgan paid in July to settle charges that it defrauded local governments in 31 states—along with the $130 million it returned to municipalities it was accused of duping.
There's the $722 million in fines and restitution payments it made after JPMorgan confederates were caught paying off officials in Jefferson County, Alabama (home to Birmingham), to secure a municipal finance deal that nearly bankrupted the county.
There's the fact the bank was in so great a rush to evict people from their homes that it admits that some of its people might have forged foreclosure documents—a problem so widespread that it felt compelled to suspend 56,000 foreclosures while it investigated its own behavior.
I would not call this duping at all.
These municipalities and states knew exactly what kind of phony-baloney investment markets these things were when they got into them in the first place. This completely ignores the fact that municipal government has far more responsibility for these problems than both the supplier (banks) and consumer (homeowners).
The reason these governments got their hands dirty in these investment products is four-fold:
1. Their tax forecasts never fully accounted for rapid declines in value— this can happen outside of a recession when a group of people decide one neighborhood or city is better than another.
2. Their tax forecasts never fully included the cost of discounts, tax credits and other incentives used to enter into the pissing contest of attracting speculative development from everything to land swaps to free infrastructure to delayed impact fees.
3. These governments never fully accounted for the immense cost it takes to maintain relatively empty developments and pre-developments especially when any of these developments are not generating any significant revenue. Furthermore, at least a dozen states have passed laws in the last four years eliminating eminent domain and tax certificate sales— there's little governments can do in mediating excess inventory through public channels.
4. These governments never adequately built economic models asking if any of these developments could produce any actual surpluses of money and wealth. In fact, most of the accounting of many of these developments always depended on the inclusion of some sort of social safety net or non-general-fund income to keep them sustained, e.g. HUD block grants or CDO bonds.
The value of the dollar is wholly dependent on having ever wealth-accumulating real estate. If your urban and suburban markets don't facilitate the actual positive net production of wealth, not only do you have an non-fixable situation but you have a situation where your purchasing power declines as rapidly as the environment where that power comes from.
Weak cities make weak dollars.
Very few in this equation (supplier [banks], regulator [government] and consumer [citizen]) actually stopped and asked if the spending spree of last decade was feasible, economically-sustainable or even practical.
By ignoring the movement they hope to continue to prolong the false equivalency of the right and suck up billions of dollars in campaign advertising for the coming election. As the movement grows (and the economy crumbles), the blatant bias and hypocrisy of the corporate media will become apparent even to those who still believe it.
It is only a matter of time before corporate media is occupied.
I am really impressed with how the Oakland protest went overall. What an incredible show of strength.
I am bummed it got out of control after midnight in Oakland. From what I can gather it was a very small group of people (100) out of an estimated 7000. I am not sure how Occupy can effectively respond to this type of infiltration into the movement.
When I marched, a colleague told me stories about when they protested the Vietnam war, police would send in small groups of people to stir up trouble in the crowd.
I have my new community bank account all set up, I will be disengaging from the tentacles of the evil big banksters this Saturday.......
My local occupy movement is hosting an outdoor screening of a Michael Moore film @ City Hall, I am bringing popcorn for everyone.
Do not participate in the 2012 elections until election day. Boycott the corrupt practice of electing politicians by corporations. Focus on OUR election of 870 delegates to OUR National General Assembly who will draft and deliver OUR petition for a redress of grievances and demand change or a clean sweep of all candidates in both parties in the 2014 election by a new independent party. The cycle of corruption must end now.
"When I marched, a colleague told me stories about when they protested the Vietnam war, police would send in small groups of people to stir up trouble in the crowd."
Yup, this happens still. Youtube is full of videos of police instigators getting outed.
"I have my new community bank account all set up, I will be disengaging from the tentacles of the evil big banksters this Saturday......."
That's awesome! Facebook page for the event has 76k participants. So when at your local evil bank pay attention to see any others doing the same.
"My local occupy movement is hosting an outdoor screening of a Michael Moore film @ City Hall, I am bringing popcorn for everyone."
Oh, bring donuts! Michael Moore will be there. He's been rolling his way down the west coast in the last week visiting each occupy. I want a Michael and Keith photo on here! I will pay top internet dollar for it!
This past Friday, the General Assembly of Liberty Square voted to adopt an additional coordinating body called a Spokes Council.
The proposal was put forth by the Structure Working Group, which was born out of numerous discussions in the GA on the need for a more accountable body for operational decisions around the occupation. The main challenges the Spokes Council aims to address are: effective coordination between Operations Groups and Caucuses; making responsible, accountable and holistic budgetary decisions; and the ability for the GA to engage in broader movement discussions, rather than being bogged down with time consuming, uncoordinated funding requests.
A spokes council is a directly democratic structure that was inspired by the Quakers and numerous indigenous cultures and used widely in the Women’s Movement, the Anti-Nuclear Movement, and the Global Justice Movement.
The spokes council structure that the GA adopted can be reviewed at http://www.nycga.net/spokes-council/. This structure will evolve as our movement grows and our needs change. Join an Operations Group or Caucus if you would like to participate in the Spokes Council. The Spokes Council will also be open for unaffiliated folks to observe. All are welcome.
The first spoke council assembly will meet this Friday at 7pm, location TBA. This information will be posted on the NYCGA website as soon as we are able to confirm it.
“Corporate profits as a percentage of gross domestic product are 13 percent versus an average of 9 so profits are doing very well but really at the expense of labor,” Gross said. “It’s labor that is being laid off and not rehired and labor that is not earning an attractive wage. It’s due to globalization and that there are choices for corporations.”
Also, I would add I see a huge business shift in the needs of "human" labor (one of the choices for corporations) due to technology. This is in architecture and everything else. I am not saying it is necessarily bad, but it is radically changing the mix very quickly.
Yea, I am not a huge fan of Moore, but anytime I can interact w/ my fellow occupiers and show support, I am there. I did some market research at my new community bank and asked if she had seen an increase in walk-ins opening new accounts, she said definitely yes.
Also, I would add I see a huge business shift in the needs of "human" labor (one of the choices for corporations) due to technology. This is in architecture and everything else. I am not saying it is necessarily bad, but it is radically changing the mix very quickly.
Sorry Newguy. Iran won't be enough of a war to get the economy going. We'll need to fight China to do that. The risk, of course, is that we might lose.
The other problem is the shear amount of debt we have now. Are you sure we have the borrowing capacity to ramp up for a war? It would be a big problem if we attacked China only to discover that we couldn't afford to pay for it (we're in a far worse leverage position than we were in before WW1 or WW2). They ramp up on war-related production, we can't keep up and end up going hyperinflationary for all the new money we'd have to print, we lose, they impose reparations on us, and voila, we're the Weimar Repubilc all of a sudden, some charismatic teabagger takes advantage of all that discontent and declares himself fuehrer.. and we all know what comes next. In the end, we all end up glowing in the dark :)
On second thought, this war-stimulus thing is a very bad idea.
Referring to a speech by Chomsky in Madison Wisconsin:
Chomsky invoked Germany during the Weimar Republic, and drew a parallel between it and the United States. “The Weimar Republic was the peak of Western civilization and was regarded as a model of democracy,” he said. And he stressed how quickly things deteriorated there.
“In 1928 the Nazis had less than 2 percent of the vote,” he said. “Two years later, millions supported them. The public got tired of the incessant wrangling, and the service to the powerful, and the failure of those in power to deal with their grievances.”
Urbanist, I think you guessed it, we'll simply push a button and print 3 trillion to fund a future military action. Get ready for your gallon of milk to cost like $12.95...
I agree w/ both of you guys, I think military action in Iran is very possible, I will read those links Miles posted.
Question, what do you think would happen if the Chinese decided to dump all their US $ all at once?
Sorry Newguy. Iran won't be enough of a war to get the economy going. We'll need to fight China to do that. The risk, of course, is that we might lose.
Urbanist, I agree with you. It's a terrible idea. I still think it's a high probability, though, and that terrifies me. The problem, as I see it (with my limited knowledge) is that if Israel decides it wants to preemptively strike Iran, we'll have little choice but to jump in (and probably drag Britain in as well). And, as some of those articles suggest, China would be compelled to join Iran. I guess that's one way to wipe out our debt to China, eh? Fight a proxy-war with them in Iran? I dunno, I'm probably getting ahead of myself, but the picture painted does not look pretty.
I think its more than just military industrial complex this time. 7 billion people and growing and a world that cannot yeild enough oil to support their appetite. I'm not a conspiracy guy, but I think the world is heading for an inevitable ww3 senario. Who's going to willingly stop growing, not the US, not China. Scary shit!
China and Russia will side with Iran. The result will be a big fucking mess. During WW2 we were the only ones with nukes...this is a much different and more dangerous situation. Russia alone has enough to blow the world up 10 times over. Scary and sad. Never underestimate the stupidity of the human race.
Kieth, that's an interesting thought exercise. How would the Chinese dump their money? Just ask their bank to convert it to euros so it's merely a switch of currency? Can they do that, or would there have to be a certain amount of euros available for such a transaction to occur? Or would they have to invest it in something like buying debt from some other country (I hear Greece is paying top dollar for people who want to buy debt) or spend US dollars on buying other countries resources, invest in manufacturing, things like that? I don't think they can just call the US and say 'we want our money back,' partly because we don't have it. When you say US $ you mean US debt, right?
Unless someone like Perry gets into office (which is only remotely possible), I can't see any wars starting anytime soon. If you saw his response to the latest Israel/Iran drama it is quite scary.
The public has no taste for war. After losing, more or less, two wars and cost us trillions, I don't see any war going forward for a long, long time. Unlike previous days, people are focused on what things cost (admittedly, I had no idea of the 'cost' of war, and I think most didn't, now that we do know there won't be many we are involved with).
Curtram, yes I meant US treasuries, of which I think China owns somewhere around 1 to 1.5 trillion. Again I am a financial novice, but my understanding is if China decided to dump it's US debt on the open market, it would essentially crash our currency (I know there are lots of arguments why this will not happen). Or even if they simply stopped buying our debt, who is going to step in? It seems to me to be a huge political liability with a nation that we disagree on many critical points. I think denying the influence this arrangement can have on us is naive.
Have you guys seen this? It's. Fucking. Awesome. Scott Walker should be drawn and quartered, figuratively of course.
I do think this is a good next step for the Occupy movement. Make people uncomfortable, both the wealthy and powerful who have gotten us into this mess, and the regular folk who are managing to muddle through. The more people realize the game is rigged the more those in power will understand they can't rely on the rigging always working in their favor.
Also, since Adbusters apparently sparked this whole movement, and they have always been supporters of humorous civil disobedience (Buy Nothing Day, Barbie Liberation Organization, etc.), it seems like a good direction. Disrupt their fear-controlled places of gathering just as they are disrupting our protests on public land!
#OccupyWallStreet
Yea, I agree, if you notice that is a common theme they use for many things; "it's for their safety". The mayor in Oakland used that premise also on the news.
I think that was the line when the robots took over in that futuristic Will Smith movie?
I think the public is being conditioned to accept the erosion of their civil liberties under this "reasoning" in a whole bunch of formats. It's a gradual erosion process.
breaking up an unlawful assembly is not an erosion of your civil liberties
Some creative ideas for your unsolicited credit card applications:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgkSiyIUz_w&feature=share
at 2:05 'hello big bank clerk. please join a union.'
lol unions
breaking up an unlawful assembly is not an erosion of your civil liberties
As a matter of fact, it is. I'm curious as to what your definition of 'civil liberty' is if it doesn't include protection of the Bill of Rights. The Bill of Rights, by the way, includes "the right of the people peaceably to assemble" in the First Amendment. For what it's worth, the supreme court has clarified and confirmed that we still uphold the right to assemble as a civil liberty:
HAGUE v. COMMITTEE FOR INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION
''The privilege of a citizen of the United States to use the streets and parks for communication of views on national questions may be regulated in the interest of all; it is not absolute, but relative, and must be exercised in subordination to the general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order; but it must not, in the guise of regulation, be abridged or denied.''
United States v. Cruikshank
"The right of the people peaceably to assemble for the purpose of petitioning Congress for a redress of grievances, or for anything else connected with the powers or the duties of the National Government, is an attribute of national citizenship and, as such, under the protection of and guaranteed by, the United States. The very idea of a government, republican in form, implies a right on the part of its citizens to meet peaceably for consultation in respect to public affairs and to petition for a redress of grievances.
I'm also curious as to how you defined your ideology. It's fairly clear to me that there's no basis in reality. If not based in real life, then from where are your ideas formed?
I'm also curious as to how you defined your ideology. It's fairly clear to me that there's no basis in reality. If not based in real life, then from where are your ideas formed?
His Ass!!!
Meanwhile on the sunny side of the street, the biggest foreclosure company in NY state throws a Halloween party where the entire office dresses up as homeless people who got foreclosed on.
hey curtkram, did you see the part before the part you bolded?
''The privilege of a citizen of the United States to use the streets and parks for communication of views on national questions may be regulated in the interest of all; it is not absolute, but relative, and must be exercised in subordination to the general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order; but it must not, in the guise of regulation, be abridged or denied.''
for example this : 'Farther south, police in San Diego descended early Friday on an encampment that had housed demonstrators at the Civic Center Plaza and Children's Park for three weeks. They arrested 51 people who faced charges including illegal lodging, illegal drug use, unlawful assembly and blocking officers from performing their duties.'
not an erosion of our civil liberties and a perfect example 'based in reality' that defines my (follow-the-constitution) ideology.
Holy Shit is that real?
My 8 year old walked up and asked what the picture is, and I told him....he said, "What a bunch of Assholes"
FRaC I hope you appreciate the irony of some of the constitutionalist views:
"We need the 2nd amendment in order to protect ourselves from the tyranny of the government."
"but but but camping in a city park overnight is ILLEGAL"
If you are going to obey all the laws why the hell do you even need 2nd amendment?
I think your ideology may be one of convenience.
Imagine if the occupy crowd was walking around with guns like the tea party folks were? They would be called terrorists.
We need some famous old farts quotes here.
"All of the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arises, not from the defects of the Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit, and circulation."
John Adams
"Whoever controls the volume of money in our country is absolute master of all industry and commerce... and when you realize that the entire system is easily controlled, one way or the other, by a few powerful men at the top, you will not have to be told how periods of inflation and depression originate"
James Garfield (moment before they shot him in the face)
"The Government should create, issue, and circulate all the currency and credit needed to satisfy the spending power of the government and buying power of consumers. By the adoption of these principles the tax payers will be saved immense sums of interest.
The privilege of creating and issuing money is not only the prerogative of government, but it's the government's greatest creative opportunity".
Abraham Lincoln (moments before they shot him in the face)
And yes, 95% of all money in current circulation is created by private financial institutions.
What did they do in Oakland, which triggered your comment "breaking up an unlawful assembly is not an erosion of your civil liberties," that would suggest the people in the park were somehow preventing "general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order?"
The people were allowed to congregate in the park. Then the police stepped in, "in the guise of regulation" to deny the protestors their rights to be there. Now, they are allowed to congregate in the park with the same behaviors and infrastructure they had before. If whatever they were doing was a danger to the public, they wouldn't have been allowed back, would they? What's going on in Oakland is largely publicly available information. They have their own website, a livestream channel, twitter, and reporters from traditional media. If whatever they had been doing was all that horrible it would have been publicly available.
Also, you are justifying your stance on the Oakland event by claiming people in San Diego were busted with drugs. Oakland is not San Diego. Your follow-the-constitution ideology is condemning people in Oakland for a crime committed in San Diego.
Also, you are justifying your stance on the Oakland event by claiming people in San Diego were busted with drugs. Oakland is not San Diego. Your follow-the-constitution ideology is condemning people in Oakland for a crime committed in San Diego.
http://www.mercurynews.com/bay-area-news/ci_19139574
Rats and drugs mar Occupy Oakland tent city, officials say
By Sean Maher
Oakland Tribune
Posted: 10/18/2011 12:35:37 PM PDT
Updated: 10/19/2011 02:30:58 PM PDT
OAKLAND -- City officials said Tuesday they may have to shut down the Occupy Oakland tent city in coming days because it is attracting rats, alcohol and illegal drug use.
A pre-existing rat problem around Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, which public works employees are normally able to keep under control, has been exacerbated by the demonstrators' presence, said city administrator spokeswoman Karen Boyd.
The problem "has gotten worse with all the food and people and couches," Boyd said. Because the protest has people cycling in and out, she added, the city is having to repeat the message about how to store food and keep the area safe.
Boyd said she wasn't sure how to describe the extent of the growing rat problem, but that it's been reported in complaints by local businesses, workers and even the demonstrators themselves.
This comes on the heels of increasing reports of illegal drug and alcohol abuse, fighting, and sexual harassment in and around the camp of about 100 tents, Boyd said. The protest has destroyed the grass lawn and it's not clear yet how much the overall expense to the city will be.
(rest of story at linky above ..)
From the article:
"In an effort to communicate with a group that has no clear leaders, she added, city staffers began passing out fliers around the camp asking for the group for help with several safety issues.
"They've been largely compliant," Boyd added. For now, the plan is to let them stay, "As long as they are peaceful and respectful of the rights of all the users of the plaza."
In the interest of public health and safety, it looks like the mayor established a line of communication with the protestors and they were within their constitutional rights as long as they comply with the safety standards set by the city. The protestors did comply. Do you know what changed? If so, did it really justify tear gas, flash grenades, and rubber bullets? It sort of sounds to me like the city might be creating excuses under "the guise of regulation."
The best part is about the grass. I'm pretty sure the cost of tear gas cans and grenades far exceeds replanting grass seed next year. Not a net gain for Oakland.
Arrests and mayhem across the country. Portland, Austin, San Diego, Tampa, Atlanta, Nashville, etc...
Is it too soon to call it the American Spring '12? The movement looks likely to survive the winter in smaller numbers and then gain full steam come spring time. The economy's definitively not going to make any gains by then. If anything, it's getting worse. Yet again.
I like the sound of "American Spring" a lot more than "American Fall"
Not sure this image attachment will work:
Honestly, laws in this country are nonsensical. I'm old enough to realize, finally, that when they first started designating "protest areas" - in the late 80s, was it? - that all the folks older than me yelling "This is the first step in a long slow erosion of our civil rights!" were absolutely correct.
The point of a protest is to shake things up! Trashing private property, like at the WTO Seattle meetings, is never acceptable. But using public space for public means is what this country is about going back to having a common green for everyone to graze their cows safely. If it "inconveniences" you on your walk to work, too bad: we're all inconvenienced every time we end up behind a bus or trash truck when we drive but that doesn't mean banning buses and trash pickup is a smart solution! Pick another of the myriad public sidewalks for your route.
We've become so fearful of each other as a society, so instantly enraged at the thought of someone expressing a view different from ours, and so eager to figure out how to sue everyone else that we're going nowhere but deeper into the hole we've already dug into.
newguy, American Fall is a far, far more likely outcome here. I'm feeling exceptionally pessimistic about the US' potential to improve at all right now. Intellectually we're lazy, greedy, and ignorant.
j.arleo said: Imagine if the occupy crowd was walking around with guns like the tea party folks were? They would be called terrorists.
Right on Donna! Also these crackdowns sure seemed to be coordinated at a national level in terms of timing etc...
newguy, American Fall is a far, far more likely outcome here. I'm feeling exceptionally pessimistic about the US' potential to improve at all right now. Intellectually we're lazy, greedy, and ignorant.
I agree, unfortunately. The merger between corporations and the state is all but complete at this point, and I just don't see a rosy solution at this point.
These peaceful protest suck. Somebody needs to chop off a banker's head...or at least set something on fire. Otherwise I'm gonna change the TV channel. For realz, yo !
Well, I was wondering when some legal eagles were going to step in and challenge some of the cities' "rules" regarding public gatherings:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/31/us/tennessee-occupy-protests/index.html?hpt=hp_t2
"(CNN) -- A judge told Tennessee officials on Monday to stop enforcing new rules that have been used to arrest Occupy protesters in Nashville."
The most succinct statement yet from OWS:
"It is time for us to come together and build a new world through the power of the individual and the community. We are not here to make requests of a corrupt political system - we are here to take our lives back into our own hands. We are not acknowledging subservience. There is no higher power than the power of the people. We are not asking for assistance. We are declaring independence. Our demand is not to those in power, it is to those individuals still silenced. Join us.
We are the 99%. We are not afraid. We are not waiting. We are working to make a better world."
http://occupywallst.org/article/call-action-join-month-global-uprising/
It will not improve significantly until it all falls apart...too many people getting rich off the status quo. The protests need to continue, but I think the best chance of having a real effect is if the banks collapse again and the movement influences politics enough to let them fail this time!!!
JPMorgan Chase CEO on the #OWS and other banking related issues.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2016674404_dimon3.html
and what went down in Seattle during his stalk at the University of Washington School of Business award ceremony
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2016674412_occupyseattle03m.html
Where to start?
There's the $211 million fine JPMorgan paid in July to settle charges that it defrauded local governments in 31 states—along with the $130 million it returned to municipalities it was accused of duping.
There's the $722 million in fines and restitution payments it made after JPMorgan confederates were caught paying off officials in Jefferson County, Alabama (home to Birmingham), to secure a municipal finance deal that nearly bankrupted the county.
There's the fact the bank was in so great a rush to evict people from their homes that it admits that some of its people might have forged foreclosure documents—a problem so widespread that it felt compelled to suspend 56,000 foreclosures while it investigated its own behavior.
Or maybe the biggest sin is the central role JPMorgan has played—and continues to play—in the rise of what might be called the “poverty industry”: all those businesses that exploit the working poor, such as the payday-loan industry, where lenders charge 400 percent interest on short-term, small-denomination loans against a person's next paycheck (or their Social Security or unemployment payments).
And don't forget the Bernie Madoff connection. Perhaps it's not fair to blame JPMorgan for Madoff's sins just because the infamous fraudster used Chase to handle billions of dollars in investors' cash. Nonetheless, Madoff trustee Irving Picard has pointed an accusing finger at the bank. He has sued the bank for $6 billion, claiming that not only should it have known about the fraud, it did know. In June 2007, 18 months before Madoff's fraud was exposed, an officer in the bank wrote an email to colleagues reporting that another bank executive “just told me that there is a well-known cloud over the head of Madoff and that his returns are speculated to be part of a Ponzi scheme.” The bank, the suit contends, had withdrawn all but $35 million of the $276 million it had invested in Madoff-linked hedge funds by the time the fraud was revealed. A JPMorgan spokesman “vigorously” denied Picard's charges—and Picard has responded by tripling damages to $19 billion.
Goldman Sachs is widely reviled for duping its own clients by selling them shares in a mortgage-backed security the investment bank dubbed Abacus. But JPMorgan had its own Abacus. It was called Squared CDO 2007. And according to the Securities and Exchange Commission, JPMorgan's behavior was just as contemptible as Goldman Sachs's. It, too, let a hedge fund secretly choose the subprime loans in a product that the hedge fund wanted to bet against; it, too, failed to inform clients purchasing shares in Squared that it had let a hedge-fund manager rig the game.
In June, JPMorgan Chase (without denying or admitting guilt) paid $154 million to settle Squared-related charges filed by the SEC—equal to less than two days' worth of company earnings that quarter. The bank also returned $126 million to clients who lost money on Squared and, for good measure, paid $57 million to investors who lost money in a second, similar deal called Tahoma CDO-I.
more ...
There's the $211 million fine JPMorgan paid in July to settle charges that it defrauded local governments in 31 states—along with the $130 million it returned to municipalities it was accused of duping.
There's the $722 million in fines and restitution payments it made after JPMorgan confederates were caught paying off officials in Jefferson County, Alabama (home to Birmingham), to secure a municipal finance deal that nearly bankrupted the county.
There's the fact the bank was in so great a rush to evict people from their homes that it admits that some of its people might have forged foreclosure documents—a problem so widespread that it felt compelled to suspend 56,000 foreclosures while it investigated its own behavior.
I would not call this duping at all.
These municipalities and states knew exactly what kind of phony-baloney investment markets these things were when they got into them in the first place. This completely ignores the fact that municipal government has far more responsibility for these problems than both the supplier (banks) and consumer (homeowners).
The reason these governments got their hands dirty in these investment products is four-fold:
1. Their tax forecasts never fully accounted for rapid declines in value— this can happen outside of a recession when a group of people decide one neighborhood or city is better than another.
2. Their tax forecasts never fully included the cost of discounts, tax credits and other incentives used to enter into the pissing contest of attracting speculative development from everything to land swaps to free infrastructure to delayed impact fees.
3. These governments never fully accounted for the immense cost it takes to maintain relatively empty developments and pre-developments especially when any of these developments are not generating any significant revenue. Furthermore, at least a dozen states have passed laws in the last four years eliminating eminent domain and tax certificate sales— there's little governments can do in mediating excess inventory through public channels.
4. These governments never adequately built economic models asking if any of these developments could produce any actual surpluses of money and wealth. In fact, most of the accounting of many of these developments always depended on the inclusion of some sort of social safety net or non-general-fund income to keep them sustained, e.g. HUD block grants or CDO bonds.
The value of the dollar is wholly dependent on having ever wealth-accumulating real estate. If your urban and suburban markets don't facilitate the actual positive net production of wealth, not only do you have an non-fixable situation but you have a situation where your purchasing power declines as rapidly as the environment where that power comes from.
Weak cities make weak dollars.
Very few in this equation (supplier [banks], regulator [government] and consumer [citizen]) actually stopped and asked if the spending spree of last decade was feasible, economically-sustainable or even practical.
So huge riots in Oakland last night. Not a peep from mainstream US media. In fact, CNN removed the entire occupy section.
A conservative Canadian paper picks up the story.
Port of Oakland (fifth largest) was effectively shut down.
edit: there is some news from US sources, but they are downplaying the whole thing.
By ignoring the movement they hope to continue to prolong the false equivalency of the right and suck up billions of dollars in campaign advertising for the coming election. As the movement grows (and the economy crumbles), the blatant bias and hypocrisy of the corporate media will become apparent even to those who still believe it.
It is only a matter of time before corporate media is occupied.
View of the Oakland Dock protests from a chopper. That's a shit ton of people!
I am really impressed with how the Oakland protest went overall. What an incredible show of strength.
I am bummed it got out of control after midnight in Oakland. From what I can gather it was a very small group of people (100) out of an estimated 7000. I am not sure how Occupy can effectively respond to this type of infiltration into the movement.
When I marched, a colleague told me stories about when they protested the Vietnam war, police would send in small groups of people to stir up trouble in the crowd.
I have my new community bank account all set up, I will be disengaging from the tentacles of the evil big banksters this Saturday.......
My local occupy movement is hosting an outdoor screening of a Michael Moore film @ City Hall, I am bringing popcorn for everyone.
oh oooh what michael moore film?!?
Do not participate in the 2012 elections until election day. Boycott the corrupt practice of electing politicians by corporations. Focus on OUR election of 870 delegates to OUR National General Assembly who will draft and deliver OUR petition for a redress of grievances and demand change or a clean sweep of all candidates in both parties in the 2014 election by a new independent party. The cycle of corruption must end now.
"When I marched, a colleague told me stories about when they protested the Vietnam war, police would send in small groups of people to stir up trouble in the crowd."
Yup, this happens still. Youtube is full of videos of police instigators getting outed.
"I have my new community bank account all set up, I will be disengaging from the tentacles of the evil big banksters this Saturday......."
That's awesome! Facebook page for the event has 76k participants. So when at your local evil bank pay attention to see any others doing the same.
"My local occupy movement is hosting an outdoor screening of a Michael Moore film @ City Hall, I am bringing popcorn for everyone."
Oh, bring donuts! Michael Moore will be there. He's been rolling his way down the west coast in the last week visiting each occupy. I want a Michael and Keith photo on here! I will pay top internet dollar for it!
FRaC, thanks for the copypasta.
This past Friday, the General Assembly of Liberty Square voted to adopt an additional coordinating body called a Spokes Council.
The proposal was put forth by the Structure Working Group, which was born out of numerous discussions in the GA on the need for a more accountable body for operational decisions around the occupation. The main challenges the Spokes Council aims to address are: effective coordination between Operations Groups and Caucuses; making responsible, accountable and holistic budgetary decisions; and the ability for the GA to engage in broader movement discussions, rather than being bogged down with time consuming, uncoordinated funding requests.
A spokes council is a directly democratic structure that was inspired by the Quakers and numerous indigenous cultures and used widely in the Women’s Movement, the Anti-Nuclear Movement, and the Global Justice Movement.
The spokes council structure that the GA adopted can be reviewed at http://www.nycga.net/spokes-council/. This structure will evolve as our movement grows and our needs change. Join an Operations Group or Caucus if you would like to participate in the Spokes Council. The Spokes Council will also be open for unaffiliated folks to observe. All are welcome.
The first spoke council assembly will meet this Friday at 7pm, location TBA. This information will be posted on the NYCGA website as soon as we are able to confirm it.
Well according to Bill Gross (Bond Guru),
“Corporate profits as a percentage of gross domestic product are 13 percent versus an average of 9 so profits are doing very well but really at the expense of labor,” Gross said. “It’s labor that is being laid off and not rehired and labor that is not earning an attractive wage. It’s due to globalization and that there are choices for corporations.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-04/pimco-s-gross-says-u-s-is-mired-in-an-anemic-jobless-recovery-tom-keene.html
Also, I would add I see a huge business shift in the needs of "human" labor (one of the choices for corporations) due to technology. This is in architecture and everything else. I am not saying it is necessarily bad, but it is radically changing the mix very quickly.
Yea, I am not a huge fan of Moore, but anytime I can interact w/ my fellow occupiers and show support, I am there. I did some market research at my new community bank and asked if she had seen an increase in walk-ins opening new accounts, she said definitely yes.
Also, I would add I see a huge business shift in the needs of "human" labor (one of the choices for corporations) due to technology. This is in architecture and everything else. I am not saying it is necessarily bad, but it is radically changing the mix very quickly.
use masonry!
Careful, they may be getting around that soon also...
Although I am not sure about the website name, I read about this effort awhile ago:
http://cosmopolitanscum.com/2011/09/23/the-worlds-first-printed-building/
How do we get out of a great depression? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14678859
Simple, find an enemy and go to war with them.
Iran, coming soon:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/world/middleeast/united-states-plans-post-iraq-troop-increase-in-persian-gulf.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-15595657
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-15580907
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/07/201171775828434786.html
http://rt.com/usa/news/obama-war-iran-abdi-539/
http://rt.com/news/iran-report-nuclear-attack-565/
Lost generation, here we come.
A good portion of that may be for the purpose of manipulating oil prices.
Sorry Newguy. Iran won't be enough of a war to get the economy going. We'll need to fight China to do that. The risk, of course, is that we might lose.
The other problem is the shear amount of debt we have now. Are you sure we have the borrowing capacity to ramp up for a war? It would be a big problem if we attacked China only to discover that we couldn't afford to pay for it (we're in a far worse leverage position than we were in before WW1 or WW2). They ramp up on war-related production, we can't keep up and end up going hyperinflationary for all the new money we'd have to print, we lose, they impose reparations on us, and voila, we're the Weimar Repubilc all of a sudden, some charismatic teabagger takes advantage of all that discontent and declares himself fuehrer.. and we all know what comes next. In the end, we all end up glowing in the dark :)
On second thought, this war-stimulus thing is a very bad idea.
Referring to a speech by Chomsky in Madison Wisconsin:
Chomsky invoked Germany during the Weimar Republic, and drew a parallel between it and the United States. “The Weimar Republic was the peak of Western civilization and was regarded as a model of democracy,” he said. And he stressed how quickly things deteriorated there.
“In 1928 the Nazis had less than 2 percent of the vote,” he said. “Two years later, millions supported them. The public got tired of the incessant wrangling, and the service to the powerful, and the failure of those in power to deal with their grievances.”
Urbanist, I think you guessed it, we'll simply push a button and print 3 trillion to fund a future military action. Get ready for your gallon of milk to cost like $12.95...
I agree w/ both of you guys, I think military action in Iran is very possible, I will read those links Miles posted.
Question, what do you think would happen if the Chinese decided to dump all their US $ all at once?
Sorry Newguy. Iran won't be enough of a war to get the economy going. We'll need to fight China to do that. The risk, of course, is that we might lose.
Urbanist, I agree with you. It's a terrible idea. I still think it's a high probability, though, and that terrifies me. The problem, as I see it (with my limited knowledge) is that if Israel decides it wants to preemptively strike Iran, we'll have little choice but to jump in (and probably drag Britain in as well). And, as some of those articles suggest, China would be compelled to join Iran. I guess that's one way to wipe out our debt to China, eh? Fight a proxy-war with them in Iran? I dunno, I'm probably getting ahead of myself, but the picture painted does not look pretty.
"Im don't know what weapons will be used in ww3, but ww4 will be fought with sticks and stones."
Einstein
I think its more than just military industrial complex this time. 7 billion people and growing and a world that cannot yeild enough oil to support their appetite. I'm not a conspiracy guy, but I think the world is heading for an inevitable ww3 senario. Who's going to willingly stop growing, not the US, not China. Scary shit!
China and Russia will side with Iran. The result will be a big fucking mess. During WW2 we were the only ones with nukes...this is a much different and more dangerous situation. Russia alone has enough to blow the world up 10 times over. Scary and sad. Never underestimate the stupidity of the human race.
Kieth, that's an interesting thought exercise. How would the Chinese dump their money? Just ask their bank to convert it to euros so it's merely a switch of currency? Can they do that, or would there have to be a certain amount of euros available for such a transaction to occur? Or would they have to invest it in something like buying debt from some other country (I hear Greece is paying top dollar for people who want to buy debt) or spend US dollars on buying other countries resources, invest in manufacturing, things like that? I don't think they can just call the US and say 'we want our money back,' partly because we don't have it. When you say US $ you mean US debt, right?
Unless someone like Perry gets into office (which is only remotely possible), I can't see any wars starting anytime soon. If you saw his response to the latest Israel/Iran drama it is quite scary.
The public has no taste for war. After losing, more or less, two wars and cost us trillions, I don't see any war going forward for a long, long time. Unlike previous days, people are focused on what things cost (admittedly, I had no idea of the 'cost' of war, and I think most didn't, now that we do know there won't be many we are involved with).
Curtram, yes I meant US treasuries, of which I think China owns somewhere around 1 to 1.5 trillion. Again I am a financial novice, but my understanding is if China decided to dump it's US debt on the open market, it would essentially crash our currency (I know there are lots of arguments why this will not happen). Or even if they simply stopped buying our debt, who is going to step in? It seems to me to be a huge political liability with a nation that we disagree on many critical points. I think denying the influence this arrangement can have on us is naive.
The example I have read about is in the 1950's where we threatened Britain with a similar action over the Suez canal:
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2011/08/19/pm-is-debt-the-kryptonite-of-americas-superpower-status/
Have you guys seen this? It's. Fucking. Awesome. Scott Walker should be drawn and quartered, figuratively of course.
I do think this is a good next step for the Occupy movement. Make people uncomfortable, both the wealthy and powerful who have gotten us into this mess, and the regular folk who are managing to muddle through. The more people realize the game is rigged the more those in power will understand they can't rely on the rigging always working in their favor.
Also, since Adbusters apparently sparked this whole movement, and they have always been supporters of humorous civil disobedience (Buy Nothing Day, Barbie Liberation Organization, etc.), it seems like a good direction. Disrupt their fear-controlled places of gathering just as they are disrupting our protests on public land!
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