Truth about Occupy Wall Street movement

[CoolDrMoney]

US citizens of all political persuasions are still reeling from images of unparallelled police brutality in a coordinated crackdown against peaceful OWS protesters in cities across the nation this past week. An elderly woman was pepper-sprayed in the face; the scene of unresisting, supine students at UC Davis being pepper-sprayed by phalanxes of riot police went viral online; images proliferated of young women – targeted seemingly for their gender – screaming, dragged by the hair by police in riot gear; and the pictures of a young man, stunned and bleeding profusely from the head, emerged in the record of the middle-of-the-night clearing of Zuccotti Park.

But just when Americans thought we had the picture – was this crazy police and mayoral overkill, on a municipal level, in many different cities? – the picture darkened. The National Union of Journalists and the Committee to Protect Journalists issued a Freedom of Information Act request to investigate possible federal involvement with law enforcement practices that appeared to target journalists. The New York Times reported that "New York cops have arrested, punched, whacked, shoved to the ground and tossed a barrier at reporters and photographers" covering protests. Reporters were asked by NYPD to raise their hands to prove they had credentials: when many dutifully did so, they were taken, upon threat of arrest, away from the story they were covering, and penned far from the site in which the news was unfolding. Other reporters wearing press passes were arrested and roughed up by cops, after being – falsely – informed by police that "It is illegal to take pictures on the sidewalk."

In New York, a state supreme court justice and a New York City council member were beaten up; in Berkeley, California, one of our greatest national poets, Robert Hass, was beaten with batons. The picture darkened still further when Wonkette and Washingtonsblog.com reported that the Mayor of Oakland acknowledged that the Department of Homeland Security had participated in an 18-city mayor conference call advising mayors on "how to suppress" Occupy protests.

To Europeans, the enormity of this breach may not be obvious at first. Our system of government prohibits the creation of a federalised police force, and forbids federal or militarised involvement in municipal peacekeeping.

I noticed that rightwing pundits and politicians on the TV shows on which I was appearing were all on-message against OWS. Journalist Chris Hayes reported on a leaked memo that revealed lobbyists vying for an $850,000 contract to smear Occupy. Message coordination of this kind is impossible without a full-court press at the top. This was clearly not simply a case of a freaked-out mayors', city-by-city municipal overreaction against mess in the parks and cranky campers. As the puzzle pieces fit together, they began to show coordination against OWS at the highest national levels.

Why this massive mobilisation against these not-yet-fully-articulated, unarmed, inchoate people? After all, protesters against the war in Iraq, Tea Party rallies and others have all proceeded without this coordinated crackdown. Is it really the camping? As I write, two hundred young people, with sleeping bags, suitcases and even folding chairs, are still camping out all night and day outside of NBC on public sidewalks – under the benevolent eye of an NYPD cop – awaiting Saturday Night Live tickets, so surely the camping is not the issue. I was still deeply puzzled as to why OWS, this hapless, hopeful band, would call out a violent federal response.

That is, until I found out what it was that OWS actually wanted.

The mainstream media was declaring continually "OWS has no message". Frustrated, I simply asked them. I began soliciting online "What is it you want?" answers from Occupy. In the first 15 minutes, I received 100 answers. These were truly eye-opening.

The No 1 agenda item: get the money out of politics. Most often cited was legislation to blunt the effect of the Citizens United ruling, which lets boundless sums enter the campaign process. No 2: reform the banking system to prevent fraud and manipulation, with the most frequent item being to restore the Glass-Steagall Act – the Depression-era law, done away with by President Clinton, that separates investment banks from commercial banks. This law would correct the conditions for the recent crisis, as investment banks could not take risks for profit that create kale derivatives out of thin air, and wipe out the commercial and savings banks.

No 3 was the most clarifying: draft laws against the little-known loophole that currently allows members of Congress to pass legislation affecting Delaware-based corporations in which they themselves are investors.

When I saw this list – and especially the last agenda item – the scales fell from my eyes. Of course, these unarmed people would be having the shit kicked out of them.

For the terrible insight to take away from news that the Department of Homeland Security coordinated a violent crackdown is that the DHS does not freelance. The DHS cannot say, on its own initiative, "we are going after these scruffy hippies". Rather, DHS is answerable up a chain of command: first, to New York Representative Peter King, head of the House homeland security subcommittee, who naturally is influenced by his fellow congressmen and women's wishes and interests. And the DHS answers directly, above King, to the president (who was conveniently in Australia at the time).

In other words, for the DHS to be on a call with mayors, the logic of its chain of command and accountability implies that congressional overseers, with the blessing of the White House, told the DHS to authorise mayors to order their police forces – pumped up with millions of dollars of hardware and training from the DHS – to make war on peaceful citizens.

But wait: why on earth would Congress advise violent militarised reactions against its own peaceful constituents? The answer is straightforward: in recent years, members of Congress have started entering the system as members of the middle class (or upper middle class) – but they are leaving DC privy to vast personal wealth, as we see from the "scandal" of presidential contender Newt Gingrich's having been paid $1.8m for a few hours' "consulting" to special interests. The inflated fees to lawmakers who turn lobbyists are common knowledge, but the notion that congressmen and women are legislating their own companies' profitsis less widely known – and if the books were to be opened, they would surely reveal corruption on a Wall Street spectrum. Indeed, we do already know that congresspeople are massively profiting from trading on non-public information they have on companies about which they are legislating – a form of insider trading that sent Martha Stewart to jail.

Since Occupy is heavily surveilled and infiltrated, it is likely that the DHS and police informers are aware, before Occupy itself is, what its emerging agenda is going to look like. If legislating away lobbyists' privileges to earn boundless fees once they are close to the legislative process, reforming the banks so they can't suck money out of fake derivatives products, and, most critically, opening the books on a system that allowed members of Congress to profit personally – and immensely – from their own legislation, are two beats away from the grasp of an electorally organised Occupy movement ... well, you will call out the troops on stopping that advance.

So, when you connect the dots, properly understood, what happened this week is the first battle in a civil war; a civil war in which, for now, only one side is choosing violence. It is a battle in which members of Congress, with the collusion of the American president, sent violent, organised suppression against the people they are supposed to represent. Occupy has touched the third rail: personal congressional profits streams. Even though they are, as yet, unaware of what the implications of their movement are, those threatened by the stirrings of their dreams of reform are not.

Sadly, Americans this week have come one step closer to being true brothers and sisters of the protesters in Tahrir Square. Like them, our own national leaders, who likely see their own personal wealth under threat from transparency and reform, are now making war upon us.
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tldr; read it you fuck

[FunnyDog]

has obama said anything about this or am i completely in the dark here? i know he's addressed the occupy movement, but has he mentioned anything about the police brutality?

[rtil]

things have been this way since the end of WWII - it's only now that a considerable amount of people have woken up to the fact that the wealthy minority control everything in this country. ows is not "the 99%", it's really more like the 99.9%. doctors, lawyers and plastic surgeons, etc, they're not who OWS is trying to speak to. it's literally .1% that have a grip on most of the nation's wealth - i don't think this is what our nation is supposed to be like.

the only thing ows needs to show is the rise of income of the super wealthy vs the average american. 30 years ago a college student could have a minimum wage job and easily pay to go to college, before that is was practically free - that is a fantasy story now. more and more americans are getting shoved into poverty because their income barely nudges every year while food, fuel and bill costs rise steadily. but the rich get richer, and fox news is telling us that they're the job creators and they shouldn't carry an equal tax burden. well it's been like that for 11 years, so where the hell are all the jobs and investment? they hoard money and they don't care about jobs or people.

thankfully i think websites like change.org and demandprogress have made great waves in congress by massing up hundreds of thousands of signatures and forcing congress to do the will of the people. most members of congress are comfortably wealth and painfully out of touch with society - but they don't want to lose their jobs. and when they get petitions, calls, faxes and emails saying "don't vote for this, or we won't vote for you", they listen.

but that's not to say there aren't any honest members of congress. there are a few fighters out there, and a few running for office next year that everyone should keep an eye out for, like alan grayson (who was voted out by an establishment republican in 2010). we need term limits, no loopholes, tax reform, bush tax cut expirations, campaign finance reform, campaign spending caps and repeal of citizens united "corporations are people" law. any congressman, woman or senator who doesn't believe in any of those things in that list needs to get kicked out immediately.

also i think you're going a little overboard comparing ows violence to tahrir square/egypt. protestors in egypt are getting KILLED by their own MILITARY - this is a far cry from ows.

[Sinitron]

countdown to soviet resurgence

[redmongoose]

Gil Scott-Heron - The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

[FunnyDog]

it'd be cool if north korea would do something for once

[emanhattan]

as a non-american citizen, i feel sorry that your goverment has become so powerhungry, delusional and abusive. I think there is a deep correlation between recent senate actions that would jeopardize freedom of speech: The congress trying to pass a bill so that the goverment can censor whatever they want off  the internet (they say its just to prevent piracy, but the bill is very ambiguous and agenda-driven), senators trying to make it ok for the goverment to use the ARMY on american ground to capture and imprison whoever they want without a trial.... this abuse of media and force to try and silence the OWS movement. i mean i dont want to sound like a conspiracy theorist but i dont think these are isolated events

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/16/sopa-internet-censorship-online-piracy-house-hearing_n_1098255.html
http://www.aclu.org/blog/national-security/senators-demand-military-lock-american-citizens-battlefield-they-define-being/

remember, people who sacrfice freedom for security will have neither.

whats scary is that this exact movement has already ocurred in my country and with a similar development and goals. the fuckin goverment relies too much on banks, creates debts accountable to nobody, prints money to  pay off these debts (if you printed money, you would go to jail. the federal reserve prints money and nobody sends them to jail) and then redistributes that poverty to everyone.

and heres the thing...poeople who are artistically creative, leaders of student groups, people who are intelectually capable, and people who work in the press and in television all are very dangerous to people in power, people who are dictators... and i can see this goverment trying to silence them  by any means necessary. first they will censor stuff, then theyll use phisical violence, then.... well. those who think that the american goverment would never have the balls to use lethal weapons against protesters will be proven wrong sooner or later.


..i really hope that the best people in congress act NOW to prevent more violence.

and why the fuck hasnt obama appeared on tv to talk more about this?

[Gladius]

OWS protesters should be hosed with skunk so they can know what they smell like

goddamn HIPPIES

[FunnyDog]

the police and obama are on the same side

[redmongoose]

obama said that he supported occupy wall street when it began but I'm pretty sure that was a publicity stunt

[FunnyDog]

lots of things he does is a publicity stunt. don't get me wrong i'd prefer obama over any of these GOP clowns but let's get real, he's just as financially stoned as newt palin

[rtil]

the bill you're talking about would actually allow corporations to censor the internet and not just the government, which is even worse.

and yeah, the wealthy feel threatened, so they are using anything in their power to protect their greed. but i doubt the will of the people can be stifled for long in a country that prides itself on freedom. unless enough of us have been brainwashed enough by fox and friends to really think "trickle down economics" has been working at all for the last decade

[rtil]

also on the subject of obama - he is mostly a coward like the rest of the democrats who refuses to stand up for what he really believes in. he has caved in to the republican congress so much over the last 4 years, and that's exactly what they wanted. the GOP strategy for the last 4 years? make sure obama doesn't get re-elected. how do you do it? block all his legislation and make it look like he didn't do anything. and that's what they got. so it will be up to the democrats to show americans that the GOP let the situation willingly get worse just so that they could make obama look bad.

[trent bortknob]

the government is so goddamn shady

[FunnyDog]

obama's a turkey

[trent bortknob]

we should make punk rock about the government to help boost morale i think that'll be really unique and great

[Sinitron]

make me emperor of the world first order of the day is to behead every politician ever and put their heads on pikes around the statue of liberty that will show them who's boss

[Fluffkomix]

Does anyone else feel like this is just a future predicted by Transmetropolitan?

edit: Also don't forget to cite your sources!

[ZennyPLUS]

As I said before, my vote goes to the guy who sends the most jobs overseas and has the fastest plan to bankrupt America.

[ZennyPLUS]

On a more serious note, let this be known. The farther people are pushed into a corner, the sooner they'll retaliate. With the gap in wealth getting so big and the lack of jobs. If this continues, it will no longer be an occupation of public property, it will be the heads of the wealthiest companies and politicians comfortably position on pikes on the grass of the White House. Blood will run on the streets and havoc will ravage entire cities. It'll be the American Revolution 2.0 with the wealthy against a mass of pissed off middle and low-middle class Americans.

There will be amends, it's matter of how it'll go down. Throats will be slit OR it can be done democratically.