Occupy Wall Street, etc

I don't know what it means, where it's going, but I like that people are saying "we've had enough of this shit."

I really just started watching a bunch of videos on it (this one up top was one) yesterday. I wish I could be there

XnMeX - 10-4-2011 at 10:53 AM

It's because BD has been taking down any post that include the words "Occupy Wall Street".

But to be serious, can someone give me a "I'm too lazy to read into evrything" breakdown of what it is all about?

Johnny_Whistle - 10-4-2011 at 11:05 AM

Our banjo player is taking part in the Boston protest. The demonstrations have been largely peaceful, but that hasn't stoped an NYPD officer or two from macing some folks point blank in the face. There's video of one particular guy doing it a few times. There's also one online of demonstrators marching down Wall Street while folks hang out on their balconies, drinking champagne and waving down to the crowds like Marie fucking Antoinette.

Basically, it's people who are fed up with no one holding the big Wall Street firms accountable for their role in this whole financial mess.

DaveMoral - 10-4-2011 at 11:07 AM

Sure.

Finally left leaning people are getting off their asses and taking to the streets and putting the blame for our current political and economic state firmly at the feet of the corporatocracy. They have identified the problem that corporations and the super-rich have greater access to the halls of power than the people, that our democracy has been effectively stolen(if it ever truly existed in the first place, because near as I can tell it's always been this way right down to the drafting of the Constitution which initially granted voting rights only to white, male landowners) from the 99% of us who aren't super rich, while the other 1% basically controls the way things are financially and politically.

For the most part a clear mission statement has not yet been reached, but I'm sure it will emerge organically as support grows, disparate groups come together(there are certainly elements in the Tea Party that aren't zombies for Fox News) and hammer out just what it is they collectively identify as the Problem and what their demands are for the Solution. Thus far the right has been content with mocking the protestors/occupiers as "hippies" and what not, while the other mainstream media outlets have essentially been calling them disorganized and aimless. Both things, I would say, are pretty far from the truth even in the absence of a list of demands or goals. I mean, they have organized what amounts to a pretty big sit-in at a park on Wall Street, marched across the Brooklyn Bridge, and they've done no violence. They have a "General Assembly" in which they discuss all their goings on and their ideas... and in the absence of funding for things like PA systems, they have implemented an innovative approach to making sure everyone hears what is said by anyone by way of each and every person present repeating what was said by the main speaker. So, for instance, they had Professor Cornel West out one night and he spoke, and every sentence he spoke was repeated by the crowd present. It's a very interesting, and communal way of participation. No one, and everyone, is a leader in this thing... in a way.

DaveMoral - 10-4-2011 at 11:08 AM

Quote: Originally posted by Johnny_Whistle

Our banjo player is taking part in the Boston protest. The demonstrations have been largely peaceful, but that hasn't stoped an NYPD officer or two from macing some folks point blank in the face. There's video of one particular guy doing it a few times. There's also one online of demonstrators marching down Wall Street while folks hang out on their balconies, drinking champagne and waving down to the crowds like Marie fucking Antoinette.

Basically, it's people who are fed up with no one holding the big Wall Street firms accountable for their role in this whole financial mess.

There's also a video of a police captain smashing a protestor with a professional grade video camera head first into the grill of an Audi.

DaveMoral - 10-4-2011 at 11:14 AM

http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/10/03/de-colonize-wall-stre...

October 03, 2011
51
The 99% Talk Back
De-Colonize Wall Street
by VIJAY PRASHAD

False modesty does not become the media. When it comes to the Tea Party or the Taliban, reporters are quick to offer an explanation of their motivations and their demands. When it comes to the protests of the Left, there is reticence to do any real reporting or analysis. Imagine this sentence from the Associated Press’ Verena Dobnik that opens the second paragraph in her article (“Wall Street Protest Accrues Interest,” October 2) on the Occupy Wall Street Protests (now into its third week), “They lack a clear objective, though they speak against corporate greed, social inequality, global climate change and other concerns.” It seems to me that there are at least three clear objectives in this sentence itself: to end corporate greed, to fight for social equality and to create mitigating policies to lessen climate change.

Then there’s the pure condescension. This is from Joanna Weiss of the Boston Globe (September 27), “It’s hard to take a protest fully seriously when it looks more like a circus — some participants seem to have taken a chute straight from Burning Man — and when it’s organized by a Canadian magazine and a computer-hacking group.” Is there now a dress code for democracy?

I spent an afternoon at Occupy Wall Street and in a few minutes got a flavor of the social vision have now inspired similar protests from Boston to San Francisco. “We are the 99%,” say the people who are in Zuccotti Park (Liberty Square). What they mean is simple: social policy in the country is dominated by the 1%, whose will dominates an economy that the International Monetary Fund says has entered the “danger zone.” They are right. In Ron Suskind’s new book Confidence Men, he offers us a window into the advantages given to the financial sector by theObama administration. From one side of the White House, Obama pledged to appoint Elizabeth Warren as the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and from the other, more powerful side, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner assured the banks that this wouldn’t happen. Much the same occurred when Geithner’s Treasury Department prevented the restructuring of the far too powerful Citigroup. Suskind calls Geithner’s refusal to follow what appeared to be a settled decision a “fireable offense,” although Geithner remains very much in office. If Geithner had been fired, he might have accepted the job he had been offered in September 2007 by Stanford Weill, to take over Citigroup. Weill was no longer at the bank, so he had no business making a firm offer to thehead of the New York Federal Reserve. A banking analyst told Andrew Sorkin that the offer has to be seen in another light. “How else can we interpret this but as a nice juicy carrot being dangled in front of the President of the New York Fed by a bank that was going to need Fed help in a big way.” This is the world of finance capital and its politicians.

The gargantuan financial sector got us into this. Even former U. S. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan told Congress in 2008, “Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder’s equity (myself especially) are in a state of shocked disbelief.” But this financial sector has paid nothing for the problems it has engineered.

Instead, ordinary people have been stiffed with the bill for the outrages of the financial class. No wonder that the Occupy Wall Street say the following, “We are getting kicked out of our homes. We are forced to choose between groceries and rent. We are denied quality medical care. We are suffering from environmental pollution. We areworking long hours for little pay and no rights, if we’re working at all. We are getting nothing while the other 1 percent is getting everything.”Government data confirms this sentiment. The latest gloomy report from the Pew Center details the miserable situation in the U. S. Latino sector of society. Latinos have the highest unemployment rate (11%), the greatest decline in household wealth from 2005 to 2009, the greatest food insecurity with a third of households in this condition, and 6.1 million children in poverty, the largest number for any ethnic group. The only political vision for the Latino population, crucial to Obama’s re-election prospects, is going to be more anti-immigrant and xenophobic rhetoric. These are the social consequences of living in a recession, governed by politicians in the pockets of banks.

Occupy Wall Street has a simple message: reduce the power of finance capital over the United States government. Absent such a reduction, there is no rational social policy available for the United States. Neither the Obama government nor whoever wins the next election will be able to move an agenda to benefit an economy in the doldrums. It is to the credit of several unions (including the Transport Workers’ Union and AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka) that they have endorsed Occupy Wall Street. It is likely that on Wednesday, October 5, tens of thousands of workers might join the march from Liberty Square to Wall Street. What would be equally valuable is if the unions declared from Liberty Square that their support in the election of 2012 is conditional on specific policies to constrain the power of the banks. It would be equally valuable if the unions extend their endorsement of the Occupy Wall Street to the call for a primary challenge to President Obama. As our letter that calls for the primary challenge put it,

“In an uncontested Democratic primary, President Obama will never have to justify his decision to bail out Wall Street’s most profitable firms while failing to push for effective prosecution of the criminal behavior that triggered the recession, or his failure to push for real financial reform. He will not have to defend his decision to extend the Bush era tax cuts nor justify his acquiescence to Republican extortion during the debt ceiling negotiations. He will not have to answer questions on how his Administration completely failed to protect homeowner’s losing their homes to predatory banks, or even mention the word ‘poverty,’ as he failed to do in his most recent State of the Union Address, even as more and more Americas sink into financial despair.”

A toothed challenge to the status quo would bring the unions to endorse this call. With the Republicans unable tosettle on a candidate who has any room for reason, it is imperative that the election-cycle not go by without a serious challenge to finance capital’s chosen instrument, the Obama team.

It proves the Occupy Wall Street movement right that the New York Police Department has now arrested over one thousand of their number, far more than the government has arrested from the suites of the banks. The 99% pay the social cost, as the 1% condescends to reality.

VIJAY PRASHAD is the George and Martha Kellner Chair of South Asian History and Director of International Studies at Trinity College, Hartford, CT His most recent book, The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World, won the Muzaffar Ahmad Book Prize for 2009. The Swedish and French editions are just out. He can be reached at: vijay.prashad@trincoll.edu

Colin - 10-4-2011 at 11:22 AM

slightly off subject yet slightly relevant....this guy has a hell of a point https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150311478847717

DaveMoral - 10-4-2011 at 11:39 AM

Just watched that, and want to say thanks to SOIA for bringing it to my attention.

Discipline - 10-4-2011 at 01:19 PM

slightly off subject yet slightly relevant....this guy has a hell of a point https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150311478847717

He speaks the truth.

clevohardcore - 10-4-2011 at 01:37 PM

Everyone needs to wake up. Including me.

Colin - 10-4-2011 at 11:39 PM

SWAT teams protecting Bank Of America in St. Louis & refusing customer withdrawals?????????

Six66Mike - 10-5-2011 at 02:00 AM

October 15th is apparently the next big day of action. I might head out to the Brisbane one.

Six66Mike - 10-5-2011 at 02:01 AM

And stolen from a thread I started on BW&BK forums:

This is bloody cool.

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2011/10/01/semper-fi-marines-co...

Quote:

“I’m heading up there tonight in my dress blues. So far, 15 of my fellow marine buddies are meeting me there, also in Uniform. I want to send the following message to Wall St and Congress:I didn’t fight for Wall St. I fought for America. Now it’s Congress’ turn.

My true hope, though, is that we Veterans can act as first line of defense between the police and the protester. If they want to get to some protesters so they can mace them, they will have to get through the Fucking Marine Corps first. Let’s see a cop mace a bunch of decorated war vets.I apologize now for typos and errors.

Typing this on iPhone whilst heading to NYC. We can organize once we’re there. That’s what we do best.If you see someone in uniform, gather together.

A formation will be held tonight at 10PM.

We all took an oath to uphold, protect and defend the constitution of this country. That’s what we will be doing.

Hope to see you there!!”

And from his Facebook, this guy didn't create the message as the page indicates but relayed it on because he will also be there.

Quote:

To all my Facebook friends....PLEASE note that the message from the Marine who i...s going to "OccupyWallSt." with his buddies was sent to one of the co-organizers of our organizing team for the Oct.6 action in D.C.

I am NOT the Marine that sent the message...(I was Army Infantry, '71-'74)....MANY hundreds of my fellow veterans are doing the same thing in D.C., starting on Oct.6. I simply shared the fine message from the Marine. :>) ....thank you all for making that message go viral.

I just find it incredibly awesome that troops who signed up to defend the country and constitution are doing just that, defending the right to protest and be pissed off about a system that is shafting the millions of citizens within its walls. This is what the armed forces were supposed to be about, I'm stoked there's folks out there who will stand up for their country regardless who the enemy is.

Six66Mike - 10-5-2011 at 02:02 AM

And another post:

One thing is for sure, it definitely resembles the Arab spring and hopefully those vibes continue to spread around the world.

From the video clip on YouTube I watched of the bridge protest (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1tCYAEDl6g) one thing stood out more than anything else.

The people united will never be defeated.

This is truth. There are more plebs than elite's, there are more people than police, and there are apparently military personnel who still hold true their vows to defend the nation. Uprising is good.

As for banks, Thomas Jefferson said it best, a long long long time ago before any of this happened.

Quote:

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.

Colin - 10-5-2011 at 10:28 AM

Johnny_Whistle - 10-5-2011 at 10:48 AM

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-05/anonymous-vows-to-a...

BDx13 - 10-5-2011 at 12:44 PM

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2011/10/05/natpkg-irepor...

DaveMoral - 10-5-2011 at 02:46 PM

Philly's supposed to be starting up today outside City Hall.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-6-2011 at 09:32 AM

slightly off subject yet slightly relevant....this guy has a hell of a point https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150311478847717

He speaks the truth.

The problem with this video as amusing as it may be, some one would have to be naive enough to believe the people who got us in this mess were some dolts that just bumbled us into this. If we were as smart as them it'd be you and I sitting on mountains of money now. Not them.

BKT - 10-6-2011 at 02:55 PM

slightly off subject yet slightly relevant....this guy has a hell of a point https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150311478847717

He speaks the truth.

A very good point. We are in this mess because we were put in this mess on purpose by a group of incredibly intelligent and powerful people that knew they would make a killing from it. Essentially it was the biggest heist ever pulled in human history and they all got away with it.

BKT.

clevohardcore - 10-6-2011 at 05:03 PM

slightly off subject yet slightly relevant....this guy has a hell of a point https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150311478847717

He speaks the truth.

^^^^ Very true, but think of this. What if they are not done? What if what they want is not complete?

DaveMoral - 10-6-2011 at 05:39 PM

Word. We got grifted. Big time.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-6-2011 at 05:49 PM

I don't believe for a minute theyre done. why would you stop the push before your enemy is cleared from the field? They've kept us distracted with video games and mtv and gay marriage and every other smokescreen in the handbook. Glad I don't have children tho worry about.

DaveMoral - 10-6-2011 at 10:25 PM

This whole Occupy movement really needs to turn into a revolution. I don't kid myself for a minute that it will, but that's what's needed. Wipe the fucking slate clean. Get the crooks out of the halls of power. Maybe demolish the halls of power themselves and trying something completely new.

DaveMoral - 10-7-2011 at 04:49 PM

http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/10/07/fed-up-and-taking-to-...

From Tahrir to Wall Street
Fed Up and Taking to the Streets, But What are the Demands?
by ESAM AL-AMIN

People across the globe are angry. Fed up with their corrupt and inept governments, people have taken to the streets. The furious protesters have come from all walks of life: students, workers and farmers, men and women, young and old, urban and rural, the working poor and the struggling middle class.

Undoubtedly, the Arab Spring has inspired people around the globe to take matters into their own hands. In essence, the masses have given up on their elected officials, whom they see as selling out to the multinational corporations and the super rich in their societies.

From Chile to Greece and from England to India, people are standing up, demanding their rights, and denouncing corrupt policies and systems that favor the haves and stick it to the have-nots.

There’s been a global assault by unrestrained capitalism for the past four decades. From Chile and Argentina and other Latin American countries in the 1970s, to Poland, Russia, South Africa, and the Asian crisis in the 1990s, and from post-invasion Iraq to the tsunami-stricken countries in the past decade, neoliberalism imposed its grand global agenda.

Its main emphasis was on privatization, deregulation, and massive cutbacks of state subsidies that benefit the poor and the middle class. This scheme was forced on numerous societies by international organizations such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Trade Organization (WTO), G-8 countries, and the multinationals, through support of military dictatorships, providing questionable massive debts, and sometimes even by direct military intervention.

Since the 2008 severe global recession, people have witnessed how mega-banks and multinational corporations were bailed out by compliant politicians with several trillion dollars of public money. In return, the multinationals and the super rich continue to bankroll the campaigns of these same politicians who voted for the huge bailouts or handed out massive business subsidies, while cutting down programs that help the middle class or aid the poor. Meanwhile, tens of millions of people were losing their jobs and made impoverished as a result.

In the United States, the richest country on earth, the numbers are staggering:

The top one per cent of Americans own forty-two per cent of all wealth, while the richest twenty per cent hold eighty-seven per cent of the country’s wealth. Furthermore, the richest 11,000 American households have more income than the bottom 25 million households (over 75 million Americans.)

According to Forbes magazine, during eight years of the Bush administration, the 400 richest Americans, who now own more than the bottom 150 million Americans, increased their net worth by $700 billion.

In 1955, IRS records indicated that the 400 richest people in the country were each worth an average $12.6 million, adjusted for inflation. Today, the 400 richest increased their average wealth to $3.45 billion, an increase of 274 fold.

In 1955, the richest tier paid an average 51.2 per cent of their income in taxes that included loopholes. Today the richest Americans pay less than 17.2 per cent of their income in taxes, almost the same rate as declared by billionaire-investor Warren Buffet.

In 1955, the proportion of federal income from corporate taxes was 33 per cent. Today it decreased to about 7.4 per cent. In 2009, GE generated $10.3 billion in pre-tax income but ended up owing nothing to Uncle Sam. In fact, it recorded a tax benefit of $1.1 billion. Big Oil giant Exxon Mobil, reported in 2009 a record $45.2 billion profit, but paid none of it to the IRS.

Meanwhile, fifty million Americans have no health insurance while 46.2 million (one in six, and twenty-two per cent of all American children) live in poverty, the most in fifty-two years.

According to the latest labor statistics over 14 million Americans are jobless, while over 30 million are underemployed. Five million people have already given up looking for work after one year.

But if the Arabs’ anger at the repression and corruption of their governments has led to the popular uprisings and protests throughout this year, will the greed and unholy alliance between unrestrained capitalism and the political class, produce mass protests across America?

If the answer is yes -as witnessed by the nascent and growing Occupy Wall Street protests in New York and a dozen other cities- then what are their demands?

Part of the success of the Arab Spring was the lack of central leadership that governments could crack down, as well as its mass appeal, especially among the youth. Similarly, the American protesters have so far lacked a central leadership that can be manipulated or coerced, but in fact the protests have grown and spread through the use of social media, especially among the young people.

In the streets of Cairo, Tunisia, Sana’a, Benghazi, and Hama, millions of demonstrators through unyielding determination and sustained efforts have had clear demands: the fall of the corrupt systems and the call to real democracy and self-determination.

But it is not clear what the American protest movement’s objectives are beyond the general expression of anger of the 99 per cent against the greed and indifference of the super rich and the multinationals in the country.

In short, the movement needs to articulate specific demands that will fundamentally alter the power structure in this country, not only by restraining unchecked capitalism but also by returning the decision-making powers back to the people. While some of these demands might be short-term, others should be long-term, so that decades of reckless policies are reversed and dangerous military adventures are rolled back.

As for such demands, here are a few suggestions:

1) Paying a fair share of taxes. The Bush-Obama free lunch for the super rich should be declared over. Moreover, to address social security insolvency, payroll taxes should be applied on all income over $250,000 with no cap. For the long term, the country must tax not only income, but also wealth over $10 million at perhaps one-half per cent per year. This revenue could be split between local, state, and federal governments, if only to address the deterioration of the country’s basic infrastructure. If a person is to enjoy the country’s security and prosperity, one needs to contribute to that through a small surtax on that wealth.

2) The right to healthcare, education, and a living wage must be guaranteed rights to every citizen. They are not privileges. A person or a family should be afforded health coverage and a decent education, without incurring debts or becoming poor.

3) The end of the police and surveillance state. Constitutional principles and civil rights, which have been encroached upon by the PATRIOT Act and other aggressive and intrusive federal statutes, must be restored. There is nothing more threatening to the American way of life than the undermining of basic rights and freedoms in the name of security.

If a president has the power to declare an American citizen an enemy of the state, and order his execution without the constitutional guarantee of due process of law, then no one is protected.

4) Comprehensive electoral reform that includes the following: Congressional seats must be drawn by independent federal judges according to fair and rational standards. Money in congressional districts and political elections should be capped and limited to individuals from the same districts or states. The media must be required to give equal access to all viable candidates. Elections should be held over multiple days, including a weekend. The archaic Electoral College must be abolished. Presidential as well as senatorial and congressional elections must allow for first and second choices on the ballot so that voting for third party candidates would not be considered a “wasted vote.” In essence, the fate and future of American democracy depends on implementing such reforms.

5) An end to the empire. The policies of funding unrestrained defense budgets, hundreds of military bases and costly adventures around the globe must come to an end. There are over 750 military bases around the globe costing hundreds of billions every year.

The late Chalmers Johnson convincingly made the case in his Blowback trilogy when he said, “To maintain our empire abroad requires resources and commitments that will inevitably undercut our domestic democracy and in the end produce a military dictatorship or its civilian equivalent. The founders of our nation understood this well and tried to create a form of government – a republic – that would prevent this from occurring. But the combination of huge standing armies, almost continuous wars, military Keynesianism, and ruinous military expenses have destroyed our republican structure in favor of an imperial presidency. We are on the cusp of losing our democracy for the sake of keeping our empire. Once a nation is started down that path, the dynamics that apply to all empires come into play – isolation, overstretch, the uniting of forces opposed to imperialism, and bankruptcy.”

In the long term, one of the best policies to democratize the country is to reinstate the draft. Multinational corporations, politicians, and the super rich in this country have no qualms about sending the American military (the overwhelming majority of which is comprised of the poor and middle class) to places around the world to secure their interests. If they knew that their sons and daughters may have to serve and face the ultimate sacrifice, they would think ten times before entangling America in an unnecessary military adventures.

In effect, each American, rich or poor, should be required to serve his or her country for a designated period of 12-15 months. Some could serve in the military, while others could work to rebuild the infrastructure in this country. Still others could serve around the world in a peaceful capacity, for the betterment of humanity.

If the anger and disgust of the American people with the status quo continues to grow and spread, the insistence on these demands will ultimately produce real changes and reforms. As Frederick Douglass said, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”

Esam Al-Amin can be reached at alamin1919@gmail.com

Discipline - 10-7-2011 at 05:12 PM

Waiting to hear about government foot soldiers taking to the streets.

Colin - 10-8-2011 at 07:23 AM

I'd just love to see the American military completely turn on the government & join the people. I'd also love to see every single greedy lying cocksucker in power shot in the face too. I have my fingers crossed

Bank Transfer Day

BDx13 - 10-13-2011 at 09:06 AM

Just read about this. Interesting way to express your frustration with the man or show your support for the movement if you're not into standing in the rain for weeks at a time.

Info:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=281139538577206

http://www.facebook.com/Nov.Fifth

Coverage:
http://gawker.com/5848966/new-holiday-for-the-99-percent-ban...

http://www.thestreet.com/story/11274526/1/bank-transfer-day-...

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2011/10/kristen_c...

http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-budgeting/article/113658/ba...

Johnny_Whistle - 10-13-2011 at 06:11 PM

"If you decide to celebrate Bank Transfer Day, but also celebrate Guy Fawkes Day, don't wear your mask to the bank! Bank tellers don't like it when customers wear masks of any sort."

You'd think this would be obvious, but there's always that one dope...

Six66Mike - 10-13-2011 at 07:26 PM

I've already done that almost annually since I moved here. I've been with most of the big banks and local credit unions here. Currently with NAB which is a big bank, they slashed/cancelled all account keeping fees etc and I get cashback every time I use my credit card, where my credit union started charging me annual fees to have one so I got rid of them.

2 more interesting stories:

Bloomberg moving to end the occupation - http://occupywallst.org/

And in the Occupy Brisbane group, Facebook started deleting events and removing custom graphics as copyright material and changes access to the group.

BDx13 - 10-13-2011 at 08:56 PM

BDx13 - 10-13-2011 at 08:56 PM

World War II Veteran, 94 Year Old Sylvia Jordan, Occupy Wall Street:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/25478784@N03/6216774973/in/phot...

CR83 - 10-13-2011 at 10:12 PM

SWAT teams protecting Bank Of America in St. Louis & refusing customer withdrawals?????????

Go St. Louis!

Wait, never mind....

Johnny_Whistle - 10-14-2011 at 10:51 AM

Quote: Originally posted by BDx13

That can't be real, because Rush Limbaugh told me yesterday that none of the protesters have ever contributed anything to society. Could he possibly have been lying?

clevohardcore - 10-14-2011 at 03:25 PM

I know from what I hear on conservtive radio is that its all blown out of perportion and the only people protesting are unemployed rich kids who live with mom and dad. Not people who protect society and been construtive individuals. That would make no sense. Why would normal individuals who only want the ebst for everyone want to protest against the rich out of control powers that be?

JawnDiablo - 10-14-2011 at 07:19 PM

that's because conservative radio is run by the same shitbags who will not give it any time on the evening news...

Six66Mike - 10-14-2011 at 07:32 PM

I watched the weekend morning show today and the top news story was the Occupy movement in all the capital cities here today. Hoping to see some good coverage on the 6pm news. The Courier Mail (Murdoch paper), Brisbane MX (free transit paper) and the Brisbane Times have all run stories in the last couple days about the Occupy Brisbane event which started 33 minutes ago.

Still contemplating taking the bus in with my 2 youngest kids for a bit but it's probably not gonna happen with nap time coming up soon. Wife won't be back from her gigs til late this afternoon.

DaveMoral - 10-15-2011 at 09:46 PM

RT, a Russian English-language news network, is covering the shit out of OWS. Good stuff too. On the ground, talking to real folks. They have a pretty good interview with Immortal Technique.

BDx13 - 10-15-2011 at 11:52 PM

24 people arrested in greenwich village citibank fro trying to close their accounts:

http://theintelhub.com/2011/10/15/nypd-criminals-arrest-prot...

http://www.correntewire.com/no_orange_jumpsuits_for_bankster...

considering jp morgan chase just made a $4.6M contribution to the NYPD, this has left a lot of people scratching their head.
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2011/10/03/jpmorgan-chase-buys-...

Six66Mike - 10-15-2011 at 11:55 PM

Australia had a few thousand spread out over the cities. Brisbane & Sydney reported around 50 campers overnight to start things off, apparently that's more than NY had when they first started. Nothing like the scale of turnout around the world on the 15th though.

Madrid was massive, Barcelona, Rome, Santiago, Brussels... tens of thousands (some in the hundred(s) of thousands) in every location. The video footage from Madrid shows a huge crowd of people.

People protested in a Citibank, all of them got arrested including a customer, video is part of this story - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/blog/2011/oct/15/occupy-wall...

DaveMoral - 10-16-2011 at 11:08 AM

^I thought the people protesting in Citibank were all customers who were originally trying to cash out their bank accounts as a form of protest, and when they were refused they started protesting.

This is the same shit that happened during the Great Depression. Banks refused to give people their money from their accounts.

Colin - 10-16-2011 at 11:48 AM

RT, a Russian English-language news network, is covering the shit out of OWS. Good stuff too. On the ground, talking to real folks. They have a pretty good interview with Immortal Technique.

I'd like to check this out

DaveMoral - 10-16-2011 at 05:03 PM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlBg8GtoHR0

Six66Mike - 10-17-2011 at 03:59 AM

https://www.facebook.com/OccupyTheMusic/

I made a page to try & collect musicians, band pages etc to a common group. Primary to grab the musicians/performers/bands but the fans are welcome as well.

If you're on Facebook and have a band/personal profile, or just wanna follow it go like this page & help me spread the word.

Need an icon/logo or other design too, I'm terrible at that shit.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-17-2011 at 07:05 AM

^I thought the people protesting in Citibank were all customers who were originally trying to cash out their bank accounts as a form of protest, and when they were refused they started protesting.

This is the same shit that happened during the Great Depression. Banks refused to give people their money from their accounts.

I just closed out an account the other day (to move it to another bank for my convenience) they asked me why...I said I was moving and no one made a peep and they cut me a check w/n 5 minutes.

I'm not going to pretend to be surprised at these sensationalistic news stories where people can't take their money out of a bank that they walk into with protest signs and video cameras. I'm just not that naive.

You want to walk into a bank or any place of business and cause a scene, then act like you're surprised that you cant get service because you're acting like you've been raised by wolves?

DaveMoral - 10-17-2011 at 07:54 AM

^I don't think that's the case at all, and frankly the bank shouldn't be denying their account holders any service even if they are walking in with a political point to make. More to the point, the police shouldn't be cracking heads to assist in denying people their own money.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-17-2011 at 08:01 AM

To elaborate on that point...the whole bank thing just further displays the disgusting sense of entitlement Americans have about everything.

We want our cake and we want to eat it to. It's walking into a McDonalds screaming about how meat is murder then stepping up to the counter with cameras in tow (so you can post it to your social media site so everyone know's you did it) and demanding a Big Mac.

If you're at "war" with corporate America and the 1% then BE at war. Go into the bank and by any means necessary, get your money. I don't want to hear how "I should'nt have to lie" to get my money out...you know who thinks like that? People who think everything in life belongs to them and they deserve things because they're entitled. You know what difference they make in the end. None. They post their blogs and facebook rants about the evil empire and that's it.

If "everyone" went into the bank as polite customers, withdrew their funds and left, the banks wouldn't be able to turn people away. Is there a law about protestors not being customers...probably not...but a bank is a business and businesses have a right to refuse service under any muddy circumstances they can come up with...so go ahead and give them a reason to push you out of the door and a loophole to keep your money.

So please America, lets all keep waving signs and pretending like we're offended by WHAT WE LET corporate America do to us while they fed us Snickers and Wonder Years then drive in our fucking SUV's with our 10 babies after the protest to Target.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-17-2011 at 08:02 AM

^I don't think that's the case at all, and frankly the bank shouldn't be denying their account holders any service even if they are walking in with a political point to make. More to the point, the police shouldn't be cracking heads to assist in denying people their own money.

I watched the bank of America video. Police didn't "crack" anyones head. They said it sounded like an issue for lawyers.

Colin - 10-17-2011 at 12:50 PM

To elaborate on that point...the whole bank thing just further displays the disgusting sense of entitlement Americans have about everything.

We want our cake and we want to eat it to. It's walking into a McDonalds screaming about how meat is murder then stepping up to the counter with cameras in tow (so you can post it to your social media site so everyone know's you did it) and demanding a Big Mac.

If you're at "war" with corporate America and the 1% then BE at war. Go into the bank and by any means necessary, get your money. I don't want to hear how "I should'nt have to lie" to get my money out...you know who thinks like that? People who think everything in life belongs to them and they deserve things because they're entitled. You know what difference they make in the end. None. They post their blogs and facebook rants about the evil empire and that's it.

If "everyone" went into the bank as polite customers, withdrew their funds and left, the banks wouldn't be able to turn people away. Is there a law about protestors not being customers...probably not...but a bank is a business and businesses have a right to refuse service under any muddy circumstances they can come up with...so go ahead and give them a reason to push you out of the door and a loophole to keep your money.

So please America, lets all keep waving signs and pretending like we're offended by WHAT WE LET corporate America do to us while they fed us Snickers and Wonder Years then drive in our fucking SUV's with our 10 babies after the protest to Target.

well put

clevohardcore - 10-17-2011 at 02:00 PM

well put

DaveMoral - 10-17-2011 at 06:22 PM

I think the McDonald's analogy falls apart when you consider the very different qualities of the businesses here. A McDonald's provides a service that is a very different kind of service to that of a bank. And there's a distinct hypocrisy in someone doing a meat is murder thing and then asking for a Big Mac to eat. On the other hand, banks actively seek out your patronage and effectively become your employees when you hire them to hold your money for you and pay them for other means of utilizing your money, like debit cards, online bill pay etc. A bank is a great deal more personal than McDonald's. The Big Mac in your analogy is not your property, and the ridiculousness of asking for one after just condemning the service is obvious. On the other hand, you have patrons of the bank in question walking in demanding their property(their hard-earned cash) back from the company they have employed to hold it and keep it safe for them. Even if they are indignant and down right rude, the bank absolutely needs to cancel their services and render their property back into the care of their former patrons. And police interfering with people getting their own property back is simply madness.

Of course bank customers are entitled in this situation, and it's not an unfair or undue expectation of entitlement I might add. It's their property that they are demanding back from the people they had initially employed to hold it for them.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-17-2011 at 06:57 PM

Fair enough. Ignore the McDonalds analogy (which you spent way to much time debunking, I was clearly coming out of left field on that one and was a minor point in the argument to begin with)... the rest still stands. The person going in guerrilla and getting their shit gets their shit. The person going in looking for attention didn't. That's not fair, that's life. Life's not fair.

The point is what kind of dumb dumb thinks that going into a bank with a camera and signs is a way to accomplish what you want? Those people that work there are not the 1%, they're some poor schmuck who happens to be using that to feed their family instead of Kmart or McDondalds (sorry) and are just trying to keep their job. I'm sure the last thing they want to do when they go into work is be yelled at by people probably making more money then them when they're probably worried sick whats coming next for themselves as well.

Yes that's someones money in their bank and yes they deserve the right to get it back...but the bank can't be having a bunch of retards running loose in there either.

People are hurting and shits fucked up. You're either tying to get attention or you're trying to get your money. One makes a dent (however minor) one makes a dull clank and goes away. Either be about the action or be about the words and self glorification.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-17-2011 at 07:00 PM

...and I'd also like to see actual information other than hearsay on people getting their heads cracked over trying to get their money out.

Why You Shouldn't Compare Occupy Wall Street to the Tea Party

BDx13 - 10-18-2011 at 09:56 AM

http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2011/10/18/why-you-shouldnt...

With the Occupy Wall Street protests gaining steam in the U.S., it seems obvious to link it with the other grassroots movement that recently shook up American politics — the Tea Party. My colleagues' pieces number among a flurry of others pondering the parallel. Michael Scherer recast Occupy Wall Street as the Tea Party of the American left. Roya Wolverson suggested how the two movements, coming from diametrically-opposed sides of the political spectrum, could find common ground (and perhaps actual policy influence) in their mutual distaste for a Washington dominated by the vested interests of corporations. But while the similarities are noteworthy, they obscure more relevant truths about Occupy Wall Street, the supposedly inchoate movement that has transfixed the American media in recent weeks. I enumerate these truths after the jump.

1. Occupy Wall Street is an expression of a global phenomenon. A cursory glimpse at newspapers over the weekend would have shown scenes of mass protest across European capitals and cities elsewhere in the world, all in solidarity with the anti-greed protesters in New York. The Tea Party, for all its early brio, commands no such solidarity, nor does it care for it. It's a hyper-nationalist movement in the U.S., lofting the totems of the Constitution and the flag. Few viable political factions across the Atlantic advocate the Tea Party's anti-big government, libertarian agenda (though the xenophobic, culturally-conservative wing of the Tea Party would perhaps see eye to eye with Europe's Islamophobic far-right).

Many of the Occupy Wall Street's participants, on the other hand, consciously see themselves as part of a worldwide uprising, a flame first kindled by the Arab Spring and borne across the Mediterranean by anti-austerity protesters in Europe. In all three settings, social media has played a vital role in mobilizing and organizing the disaffected and the disenfranchised. In all three settings, activists and protesters have drawn to varying degrees from a toolbox of leftist, anarchist protest tactics and made do with minimal institutional support or funds. And in all three settings, the protesters have pulled together sympathizers from across myriad political camps within their countries and somehow made a virtue out of their movement's lack of central leadership. The U.S. economy may not be facing the same existential pressures as those of Greece or Spain, nor are American protesters facing the sort of desperate brutality meted out on brave dissidents in Tunisia, Egypt, or Syria. But the call for social justice echoes the same across continents.

2. Occupy Wall Street is fueled by youth. Reporters covering the ongoing occupation of Zuccotti Park have encountered and profiled a host of characters from all walks and stages of life. One of my favorite interviews so far has been Marsha Spencer, a 56-year-old grandmother who can be found on weekends at the Park's western edge, knitting gloves and scarves for fellow protesters. She makes no bones about what's driving Occupy Wall Street — young people: college students saddled with years of debt, 20-somethings struggling to land a job, and an entire generation banging its head on what seems to be the ever-lowering ceiling of their possibilities. "It's all about them," Spencer told me on a rainy morning last week in Zuccotti Park.

Not true for the Tea Party, whose typical supporter is older, wealthier, and whiter than the American demographic average. It is a movement, by and large, of the haves — not the have nots. "It's essentially reactionary," says David Graeber, a professor of anthropology at Goldsmiths College, University of London, who helped set up Occupy Wall Street's much-heralded General Assembly and is one of the first people to push the movement's now ubiquitous slogan 'We are the 99%'. "The Tea Party core group is white middle-class Republicans who are angry that they seem to be losing their position of preeminence in society." The ranks of Occupy Wall Street, on the other hand, are most heavily populated by young people, who, says Graeber, "are supposed to be the ones at the forefront, re-imagining their society." Their protest fits into a long continuum of student and youth rebellions, most recently seen in the Mediterranean rim countries mentioned above.

3. Occupy Wall Street may prove much harder to co-opt into the political mainstream. Many have speculated what direction Occupy Wall Street will turn as it picks up momentum and encroaches on the U.S. 2012 Presidential campaign. Will the protest get co-opted by the country's big unions? Will D.C.-based advocacy groups like MoveOn.org try to exploit for its own ends the success of motley, diverse bands of protesters occupying dozens of downtowns across the U.S.? And, most importantly, will Occupy Wall Street radicalize the Democratic base the way the Tea Party energized the far-right of the Republicans?

At present, it's hard to see how Occupy Wall Street can generate the left-wing, Democratic versions of Rand Paul or Michele Bachmann. Few of the protesters one speaks to have any tolerance for either political party, which they say are both equally enmeshed in a political system entirely beholden to vested corporate interests. The Tea Party, boosted by financial titans and one of the U.S.'s most influential cable news network, was able to make the leap from grassroots anger to effective Beltway politicking. Occupy Wall Street has no such benefactors nor mouthpiece, and will have to undergo a massive — and potentially divisive — transformation should it become the sort of tempered, streamlined (what many would deem 'compromised') political player that can actually throw its weight behind the Obama Administration. For the time being, it remains a social movement far more interested in the sort of "direct democracy" practiced during occupations than that which gets negotiated in the corridors of power in D.C. The sentiments below may have been expressed by an exasperated Greek blogger in June, but they reverberate around Zuccotti Park today:

We will not suffer any more so that we can make the rich, even richer. We do not authorise any of the politicians, who failed so spectacularly, to borrow any more money in our name. We do not trust you or the people that are lending it. We want a completely new set of accountable people at the helm, untainted by the fiascos of the past. You have run out of ideas.

4. Occupy Wall Street still believes in politics and government. And this is where another important line has to be drawn. Whereas much of the Tea Party's programmatic ire seems directed at the very idea of government — and trumpets instead the virtue of self-reliance and the inexorable righteousness of the free market — Occupy Wall Street more sharply decries the collusion of corporate and political elites in Washington. The answer, for many of the protesters I've spoken with, is never the wholesale dismantling or whittling away of the capabilities of political institutions (except, perhaps, the Fed), but a subtler disentangling of Wall Street from Washington. Government writ large is not the problem, just the current sort of government.

Because, at the end of the day, Occupy Wall Street, like most idealistic social movements, wants real political solutions. Excited activists in Zuccotti Park spoke to me about the advent of "participatory budgeting" in a number of City Council districts in New York — an egalitarian system, first brought about in leftist-run cities in Latin America, that allows communities to dole out funds in their neighborhoods through deliberation and consensus-building. It's the same process that gets played out every day by the activist general assemblies held in Zuccotti Park and other occupation sites around the U.S. To the outside observer, that may seem foolishly utopian — and impracticable on a larger scale — but it's a sign of the deep political commitments of many of the motley protesters gathering under Occupy Wall Street's banner. They want to fix government, not escape from it.

Discipline - 10-18-2011 at 01:58 PM

Here's one thing I've never understood. Why should the 1% have to pay more in taxes than everybody else? If everybody were to pay the same percentage of their income in taxes, then the rich would still be paying more than everybody else. I understand that there are a ridiculous number of tax breaks that rich folks can take advantage of and I'm against that. On the other hand, I don't understand the thinking that they should owe more simply because they are successful. People making huge money are already in a higher tax bracket than us regular types, why should they pay more on top of that?

Jason the Magnificent - 10-18-2011 at 03:33 PM

Here's one thing I've never understood. Why should the 1% have to pay more in taxes than everybody else? If everybody were to pay the same percentage of their income in taxes, then the rich would still be paying more than everybody else. I understand that there are a ridiculous number of tax breaks that rich folks can take advantage of and I'm against that. On the other hand, I don't understand the thinking that they should owe more simply because they are successful. People making huge money are already in a higher tax bracket than us regular types, why should they pay more on top of that?

Because other people want their money. If the poorest person on earth suddenly became the richest...9 times out of 10 he'd take the same tax breaks w/o question. It's just human nature. On occasion you'd have some Bill gates humanitarian type...but realistically everyone else is going to take the money and run.

DaveMoral - 10-18-2011 at 03:43 PM

The rich currently pay a much lower percentage than everyone else. As Warren Buffet mentioned, he payed 15% while he secretary paid something on the order if 35%. The national average on the middle class is 40%in of their annual income is paid in taxes while the top earners average 17%. Some corporions have managed to pay zero income tax. Meanwhile there are forces that would give them more tax breaks while cutting services to the poor. And a flat tax wohld inevitably burden those on the lowest income scale to the breaking point.

Jason, I jumped to conclusions on the police cracking heads thing. Given the track record thus far, I'd say it was a safe enough assumption. One thing I know gor certain is that there were people arrested in that mass arrest that were not part of the protesters but were accused of being so and hauled in.

Johnny_Whistle - 10-18-2011 at 05:16 PM

And let's not forget, a large percentage of the wealth owned comes not from all these people pulling themselves up by their own bootstraps and overcoming the odds. A sizable percentage of them were, as Molly Ivins once said, "born on third base and thought they'd hit a triple." A large chunk also made their fortunes through hedge funds (which work best when stock prices drop, meaning lots of other people get screwed), and from selling securities they knew to be sandcastles, while taking out insurance policies against them. They knowingly took advantage of people who didn't know any better and believed the loan officers when they said they could finally own their own home and they mortgage would be easy peasy to pay off.

DaveMoral - 10-18-2011 at 10:46 PM

Indeed. A lot of these asshats and the corps they work for are highwaymen and con artists.

BDx13 - 10-18-2011 at 10:56 PM

as fanboy, it hurts to count apple among the fiscally creative...

http://www.macrumors.com/2011/10/18/tim-cook-not-religious-a...

Tim Cook "Not Religious" About Holding Cash; 66% of Apple's $81B in Cash is Held Overseas

It's a frequent parlor game amongst Apple analysts and watchers to guess and suggest and hypothesize what Apple should do with its huge and growing cash reserves. As of September 24, 2011, Apple is sitting on $81.57 billion in cash. Apple added $5.4 billion to its cash reserves in the last 3 months, and that would have been significantly higher if, as Horace Dediu points out, not for the more than 6,000 Nortel patents Apple purchased the rights to.

To be more precise, Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer oversees $9.815 billion in cash and cash equivalents, $16.137 billion in short-term marketable securities, and $55.618 billion in long-term marketable securities. In the earnings call with analysts this afternoon, Apple CEO Tim Cook said the cash wasn't "burning a hole in our pocket" and that the company invested very conservatively and didn't want to do "silly things" with the money.

Cook noted that in recent months Apple had acquired several companies, acquired intellectual property, invested in the supply chain, and invested in new stores. In his first comments as CEO about the cash pile Cook said he wasn't "religious about holding or not holding cash," but Apple would continually ask ourselves what is in Apple's best interest and act accordingly.

"It's a topic for the board on an ongoing basis and we will continue to discuss it," Cook said in response to an analyst question. Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer jumped in after Cook was finished answering the question, to point out that more than two-thirds of Apple's $81 billion cash pile was sitting offshore.

The question of offshore cash is an important one, as explained by Reuters:

The U.S. government taxes U.S. businesses on income earned worldwide, but allows them to defer taxes on the money until it is brought back to the United States. As a result, American corporations like to keep the money abroad, particularly as they increase investment overseas.

A number of companies, led by Apple, Google and Cisco have been pushing for a tax holiday on overseas cash holdings to allow the companies to repatriate the money to the

Six66Mike - 10-18-2011 at 11:08 PM

What Dave already said, they have lower tax rates and the corporate tax rates are non-existant. GE actually got a tax refund with all their offshore & tax manipulations. Every sign I've seen in the protests have said flat tax for all, not tax the rich, the people are aware of the scale and inequality.

So for people on 40k a year to have the same tax percentage as people on 1bn a year. And for corporations to pay the same taxes as SME's instead of hiding behind offshore scams even though HQ and 90-100% workforce is in the US.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-21-2011 at 01:31 PM

So the next question. I only follow this stuff loosely (because I really don't believe this country can be fixed no matter efforts people put in as long as our government is bought and paid for)...but people are seriously suggesting student loan debts be forgiven as one of the "demands"?

Isn't that a bail out?

BKT - 10-21-2011 at 04:38 PM

So the next question. I only follow this stuff loosely (because I really don't believe this country can be fixed no matter efforts people put in as long as our government is bought and paid for)...but people are seriously suggesting student loan debts be forgiven as one of the "demands"?

Isn't that a bail out?

That demand is a load of fucking shit and it pisses me off to no end. There is a reason a loan is called a loan and not a "give", because you have to pay it back fuck face.

I have started businesses in the past and when I did I made a business plan and I either went to the bank and got a loan or went out and found investors. In all instances I paid the money back, I did not go out and piss and moan like a bitch and try to get out of my responsibility.

When I went to University I got a job and hustled like a mother fucker to pay my way. My parents even offered to pay for my schooling, they had saved up money over the years, but I figured they had done more then enough and I was a capable person who could work.

Forgive student loans? I have never heard anything so absurd in my life. That is not the way the world works. You take out a loan to go to school, your taking a chance. You take out a loan to start a business your taking a chance. You take money from investors your taking a chance. You took the chance deal with the fucking consequences like a man.

End of rant.

I love you all.

BKT.

Johnny_Whistle - 10-21-2011 at 04:40 PM

but people are seriously suggesting student loan debts be forgiven as one of the "demands"?

Isn't that a bail out?

That's kind of the point. All the Wall Street banks got huge amounts of taxpayer-funded bailouts, and then just went back to being the scumbags they are (giving themselves huge bonuses, etc.). Meanwhile, the folks who tried to do the right thing by getting an education (remeber the whole argument that the better the school you go to, the better chance you haver of landing a job? Well they fell for it, and took on huge amounts of debt in the process). A lot of this money was supposed to go towards helping ease the debt burden that their customers had, but in fact none of it did. And no one's held them accountable for that.

My favorite part about this whole thing is the forensic gymnastics the right is doing right now, going from "Where are all the jobs, Obama?!?" to "Why don't all these dirty hippies get jobs?!?" And now there's a movement within the tea parties to get employers to go "on strike" by not hiring more employees, for no other reason than to make Obama look bad. I'm not saying I'm happy with the job he's done thus far, but man, that's some weapons-grade derpitude right there.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-21-2011 at 10:11 PM

Quote: Originally posted by Johnny_Whistle

but people are seriously suggesting student loan debts be forgiven as one of the "demands"?

Isn't that a bail out?

hmmm...so furthering the hypocrisy is the point. gotcha.

DaveMoral - 10-22-2011 at 07:35 AM

Forgiveness of student loans makes perfect sense when consider that the very people they owe money to are the guys that ran the economy into the ground, rendering the education pointless and these now graduates are saddled with unmanageable debt and no jobs because of the greed on Wall Street. Meanwhile, the banks were bailed out and they've been paying out multimillion dollar bonuses to the dopes at the top that ran them into failure crises in the first place AND they did it with taxpayer money.

Bailouts aren't the issue. After all, no one is complaining about the stimulus checks that went to the American people... except that they didn't stimulate shit. It's who got the bailouts and who was saddled with the burden of paying them out. And those very people paying the banks so they wouldn't fail are still saddled with the debts owed to the banks that destroyed the economy and the job market.

How is student loan forgiveness an unreasonable idea being bandied about? I wouldn't call it a demand either, as no one has worked out a list of demands, at this point. They are kicking around ideas and seeing what sticks with the whole group in the General Assemblies. The main thrust of what they are trying to do, say and call for is becoming clearer and clearer and student loan forgiveness is not, to my knowledge, at all part of that. It's an idea that some folks have certainly proposed as part of a solution though. And I don't think it's wholly unreasonable considering.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-22-2011 at 01:33 PM

Anyone I work with who has college age kids has kids studying art management or majoring in concert percussion...so before we make some blanket statement about the big bad wolf blowing all the jobs down I'd like to see actual numbers showing what percentage of these people have actual marketable jobs in the first place.

I know there's people with practical degrees and experience out of work...but far fetched broad brush straw grasping demands/suggestions like this are the reason this is all going to go away in six months.

Discipline - 10-22-2011 at 08:04 PM

Forgiving student debt is unfair to all of those who've paid their loans off like real people do. Also, it can't be a blanket idea. Not every bank received bailouts, so do only people with loans connected to banks that received money get their debt forgiven? How is that fair to everybody else who work their asses off?

Call me biased, but I'm betting a lot of the people who support getting the loans tossed out are left-wing liberal arts students.

clevohardcore - 10-22-2011 at 10:19 PM

Quote: Originally posted by Johnny_Whistle

but people are seriously suggesting student loan debts be forgiven as one of the "demands"?

Isn't that a bail out?

hmmm...so furthering the hypocrisy is the point. gotcha.

^^^^^^^^^^ No, but the reason we are in this fucking mess is the banks knew all along that so many people would take advatage of student loans becasue we are taught that getting an education is the only way to achieve success. They profit huge. We suffer with rediculous student loans that we can't get out of and they won't negotiate or restructure our loans the way the government did the banks.

Look we call all take the side of the righteous and claim if you climbed this hill so you get down on your own type bullshit. Fact is the banks and governemnt have many people and facts to plan before they do things. They knew this would happen eventually and they also knew that they would be bailed out. We got fucked. Too many people with degrees that don't work and too many people with too many loans that they can't get rid of. We got fucked and the powers that be got rich. We all fell for it hook, line and sinker.

So ya, we should get bailed out. We should have been bailed out in the beginning of this mess. Straightening out the peoples debt would then straighten there debt and in turn straighten the countries debt. Then the banks could go back to the original way of lending money. You can't get it unless you have colaterral. Everyone is in the black and happy. Not to mention we all would have learned a very important lesson.

clevohardcore - 10-22-2011 at 10:26 PM

Forgiving student debt is unfair to all of those who've paid their loans off like real people do. Also, it can't be a blanket idea. Not every bank received bailouts, so do only people with loans connected to banks that received money get their debt forgiven? How is that fair to everybody else who work their asses off?

Call me biased, but I'm betting a lot of the people who support getting the loans tossed out are left-wing liberal arts students.

^^^^^^^^ Look it aint just about student loans. It's also about terribel mortgage loans and credit cards. They went crazy extending credit to everyone. Home prices inflated dramatically and everyone lived off credit. Forgiving thsoe who fell victim to this madness is only fair. I am not saying everything should be forgiven. Just select issues.

Jason the Magnificent - 10-22-2011 at 11:07 PM

I guess I just don't believe that EVERYONE is a victim of that. Sure some people were just too stupid to know any better...no doubt. But people generally know what they can afford and what they can't. I don't see anyone out their picketing in rags because they had to use credit cards to eat. All these people closing bank accounts? People living hand to mouth don't have active bank accounts...I've been there. See if Chase gave a shit if I withdrew my $46 from checking. I'm not going to go much further on that before I start sounding like a Fox news pundit and calling people hippies and trust fund babies.

People took the bait and now want to be bailed out of their responsibilities and stupid decisions. People love to live above their means and have their 2.5 kids and nice clothes and nice cars then the bill collector comes and it's "the man" trying to keep them down, when it really was just them trying to buy some American dream they didn't have the cash for.

You want to be out there protesting the government and the banks fine. Lack of jobs because of the economy...100%...more power to you. But the minute you ask for ANY kind of personal bailout you lose any kind of credibility. It's just hypocrisy.

DaveMoral - 10-23-2011 at 12:57 AM

That's bullshit Jason. Pure and simple.

The banks, finance capital, all of them sold the people a false bill of goods. The main gripe isn't that people took a legitimate chance with all the facts available to them. Not by any means. They were sold a line of horse shit, didn't have the means and resources to know any better and were out right defrauded by lenders. Pure and simple. Whether it's student loans, or "fixed interest" mortgage payments or whatever else. People have been lied to, manipulated, and in essence stolen from.

You've been edging towards Fox News territory enough in the last few posts you've made that I've begun to wonder where you're even getting your information from. I have yet to find serious, in depth, coverage of OWS and the related gatherings that addresses student loan forgiveness as any kind of serious talking point of the people out on the street. It sounds like something a handful of people out there have probably said and mainstream media misrepresents as being a central focus for OWS.

Goddamn, the whole point of them not having yet come up with a single declaration of their demands is that the grievances are so many and from so many differing points of view that they cannot be whittled down into a convenient sound bite. They may never have such a declaration. This whole sink or swim attitude you're putting out there is characteristic of lasse faire capitalism which is demonstrable unstable and ultimately destructive. Nevermind that the entire premise of "sink or swim" just tosses folks out into the drink without knowing how to swim in the first place.

Frankly, I fail to see, and this is because you have failed to lay it out in any kind of coherent way, why people asking the government or corporations and the super rich to bail them out of the crisis that the government, corporations and super rich got them into in the first place is hypocrisy. The banks drive their business into the ground and they get bailed out and rewards the incompetent execs with millions of taxpayer dollars in bonuses, but the very tax payers get a piddly "stimulus" check in the mail and unemployment benefits reduced, they gradually get their benefits whittled away by their employers and ultimately end up laid off and they say "we need some help, here's what you could do to make our lives a little easier in these trying times that you created" is hypocrisy. I don't see it, frankly. The issue isn't bailouts. It's who was bailed out and why and what they used it for. Bailed out banks didn't get the economy back on it's feet, and yet that was the case they made to the President and to Congress for why they should have been bailed out. They destroyed the housing market, which destroyed the construction business and all associated trades and professions. As a wallpaper hanger my business has been devastated, and I've dealt with the consequences of the burst housing bubble on both sides of this country. I see the wide range of effects that alone has had on this economy. Most of those hurt in the process are small businesses and independent contractors.

I struggle to live within my means and don't use credit cards. But I've seen the advantage those companies take of people in enticing them with credit, particularly with kids fresh out of high school walking around on college campuses. They are ill equipped to deal with that responsibility and are rarely well informed as to the far reaching effect defaulting can have, and the credit card companies like it that way. They are pulling cons on people who don't know the full rule set of the game.

To be blunt, you've been misrepresenting Occupy Wall Street for the last few posts and I think you need to do a bit more research.

Six66Mike - 10-23-2011 at 06:10 AM

Occupy Melbourne & Sydney were shutdown by a show of police force over the weekend.

More fuel to the fire - http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-18/bofa-said-to-split-... and http://dailybail.com/home/holy-bailout-federal-reserve-now-b...

The big banks in the US own something like $600 TRILLION in derivitates (http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27106), global GDP is only 10% of that. Now these are in FDIC insured accounts? There's no wonder people are outraged at the financial system that this type of private debt can be moved into publically insured accounts... on top of the bailouts already handed out.

Bill Maher shed some light on it, again dispelling rumours these protestors are all students that have nothing better to do. Watch this if you're mislead into believing these are just spoilt rich kids - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmusrhoEPyU

Also check out the Tom Morello videos too, political science graduate from Harvard who worked in politics for a time, not just some righteous guitar player from Rage Against the Machine.

Colin - 10-23-2011 at 03:06 PM

while I agree with the protesters on most issues, I gotta say a lot of left-leaning people in my age group & younger I've met have this whole idea that everything should be handed to them & that any time they don't get their way they are being oppressed & all this bullshit. There's been a small occupy protest in my town at a park, which has a curfew of 11PM, & a few people got arrested for trying to camp & wanna make it into some "fuck the fascist police" type of argument. These types need to grow the fuck up. I find it pretty disrespectful to actual victims of police brutality or oppression when someone cries wolf for deliberately breaking a law. There's definitely a few anarchist-types I know who pull this shit, & quite frankly I think a billyclub over the head would serve them well.
Anyway....I had to vent, because I think people like this give the movement a bad name. It's nice to see these pictures of WW2 vets at the protests to show that it's not just a bunch of whiny rich kids

DaveMoral - 10-23-2011 at 08:24 PM

There are Iraq war vets out there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hT2r78OZwns&feature=player_em...

Six66Mike - 10-23-2011 at 10:58 PM

There's a lot of vets out there, BD posted photos before.

BDx13 - 11-1-2011 at 12:09 AM

http://rebuildthedream.com/move-your-money/

BKT - 11-1-2011 at 05:12 PM

A very appropriate video both visually and lyrically for this subject :

http://www.actionrecon.com/2011/11/block-mccloud-vinnie-paz-...

BKT.

Six66Mike - 11-1-2011 at 06:36 PM

Melbourne was booted last week, Sydney recently booted too. Brisbane group released a video and announcement yesterday at how happy they were with the treatment local cops have given them and the total lack of trouble.

Pre-dawn this morning they were raided and evicted by cops on order of Brisbane council. The reason was under a parks and recreation clause about maintaining the park, not to cause harm etc.

Said they were occupying the grass too long and they need to let the ground restore themselves. lol

So they're relocating to the park beside the casino I think, last update I read anyway.

Meanwhile NY authorities are confiscating heaters there, probably in a justifiable attempt to prevent a fire but has an impact on keeping warm as storm's and winter roll in.

Jason the Magnificent - 12-2-2011 at 06:57 PM

Not trying to rabble rouse.

Just curious, for those that follow/followed this closely...it's been over a month since this thread has moved. Does anyone feel anything has/was/is still being accomplished?

DaveMoral - 12-3-2011 at 07:36 AM

I think that OWS has changed much of the political conversation. Before them all the talk was about deficit reduction and spending cuts, after them there's more serious talk about income inequality and just what role money plays in our political system. And while most of the camps have been shut down, demonstrators are regularly coming out in most of the cities they had initially had encampments in. So there's hope that this thing hasn't lost steam and once the winter has passed they'll still be going strong in spring. Maybe with more people joining in.

My fervent hope is that this ends up growing to the extent that it shapes the next election in a big way.

As I see it OWS is nothing short of revolutionary. They are, in essence, talking about a complete overhaul of what our political system has become where lobbyists for multinational conglomerates can keep throwing money at Congressmen and women to get the legislation that they favor and favors them passed while the rest of us get the short end of the stick. I mean, look at the recent Congressional declaration that pizza is a vegetable. They were bombarded by lobbyists from the frozen food providers that clog our schools with the kinds of processed foods that are making American kids fat and sick. And that's not to mention all the subsidies that oil producers get and major tax cuts for the wealthy, loopholes that corporations like GE exploit so they don't end up paying any income tax, etc. To change that is in essence a revolution. And that's going to take time. I don't see that happening like Egypt or Tunisia.

Jason the Magnificent - 12-3-2011 at 09:27 AM

Fair enough...I just don't see money so deep that can get pizza called a vegetable giving two shits about any of us this. That kind of money is power and that kind of power doesn't dissipate because people have signs.

It just seems to me like this has almost become completely out of sight out of mind and I don't believe the American people have enough of an attention span to remember they were doing this by the spring...hopefully I'm wrong.

JawnDiablo - 12-3-2011 at 12:01 PM

I haven't really paid much attention to any of this becasue I am working most of the time

DaveMoral - 12-3-2011 at 06:23 PM