Feds Helped Coordinate Occupy X Crackdowns 803
Lawrence_Bird writes "The Feds helped break up the Occupy protests by providing advice and assistance from the FBI and DHS. From the article: 'Oakland Mayor Jean Quan said on Monday that her city and others across the country coordinated their crackdowns of Occupy Wall Street camps. Rick Ellis, a Minneapolis-based journalist for Examiner.com, reports that these cities also had the help of the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation." In related conspiracy news, apcullen wrote in with a story by Time Magazine guest columnist Naomi Wolf who claims: "Instead of imminent safety issues, the timing of the crackdown was far more likely to do with the fact that the Occupy movement was planning something media-savvy at last: a 'carnival' on Wall Street on Thursday in which protesters would telegenically tell their individual stories of hardship, job loss and disenfranchisement. It is that event that posed a 'safety risk' — to the efforts of Wall Street and the Bloomberg administration to manage the narrative."
New boss, same as the old boss (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:New boss, same as the old boss (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't worry, I'm sure he'll be giving us a fresh new round of bullshit promises in the Fall when he needs us to vote for him again.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Really...
And those were?
--
And half those orgs are biased. I used to have some respect for FactCheck.org, but they've done out and out hit pieces on things for which solid evidence existed.
Re:New boss, same as the old boss (Score:5, Insightful)
Just off the top of my head, he's broken promises regarding:
- Ending the wars. Regrettably Bush was responsible for the draw-down in Iraq. Obama just held to the agreement.
- Human rights. He's deporting people in droves. He's murdering citizens based on the decisions of a secret council.
- Transparency. His administration is seeking to weaken the Freedom of Information Act. He doubled-down on prosecutions of whistle-blowers. He's stonewalling on Solyndra and Fast-n-furious.
- Guantanamo. Still going strong.
- Medical Marijuana.
Hell, he just added a new foreign base in Australia. Do we really need to expand our military into Australia?
There are 3 pages of broken promises over at politifact: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter/rulings/promise-broken/ [politifact.com]
Sure, other presidents might have been worse. I don't care. I voted for a guy who promised he'd be different. He wasn't. He lied.
Re:New boss, same as the old boss (Score:4, Insightful)
The sad thing is that the health care program he created is probably actually worse than nothing at all. It's just a big handout to insurance companies. It pisses people off with insurance mandates. And it doesn't even guarantee coverage. All it has *really* guaranteed is that now we'll never have a true single-payer government-backed system in the U.S. Thanks to that hand-out to the insurance industry, we just lost our best, and likely last, chance at the superior (and cheaper) kind of system they have in Canada and the UK.
Just fucking sad.
Re:New boss, same as the old boss (Score:4, Informative)
As the original submitter I'd just like to add the one line that was truncated from my submission:
Nixon must be smiling!
For me, the issue isn't if the local coppers break up the protest (for instance, in NYC it is on private property not owned by the protesters) but that the DHS and FBI are helping coordinate the effort. I take a dim view of the Feds being involved in this in any manner unless it is happening in Washington DC.
Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:5, Insightful)
Did you really think you could threaten the powers-that-be and not have them turn the full force of the government they control on you at some point? Did you really think that just because they supported protests in the Middle East that they would tolerate them HERE against THEMSELVES? Come on.
Re:Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm fairly certain the constitution says "... or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
It doesn't say anything about turning a public park (privately owned I know) into an encampment for the convenience of the protesters.
Why can't they protest, then go home and come back the following day. Convenient, no, but that's the price of admission.
Don't misunderstand, I fully support those advocating the fight against corp and govt corruption, cronyism etc.
I just don't agree they should be able to take over a public park and deny the rights of the other citizens access to it.
I also find it highly ironic that some of the protesters relying on the 1st amendment to enable their protest, also take offense
to the very same freedom of the press that amendment enables.
Re:Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:5, Informative)
I just don't agree they should be able to take over a public park and deny the rights of the other citizens access to it.
I don't think that they denied anyone access - it's just that you'd have to listen to those damn drum circles and put up with a higher population density. Even so, I don't think there are laws against making a park uninviting, unless you want to start talking about "public nuisance" laws, in which case, you could probably charge anyone at any protest.
Look at it this way - not many people want to use parks between 10pm and 5am (which is why most curfew laws aren't vigorously protested). If the OWS folk had simply showed up each day (without camping) between the hours of 5am and 10pm, they would have been just as "disruptive" to the general populace even though they were not permanently camped. I'm not sure how you prevent this sort of "permanent protest" without also getting to the point where you can step on other protests that are shorter-lived.
Re:Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't say anything about turning a public park (privately owned I know) into an encampment for the convenience of the protesters.
It doesn't say anything about NOT turning a public park into an encampment. Camping in a public park is a peaceable assembly, therefore Congress can make no law prohibiting it. End of story.
Don't misunderstand, I fully support those advocating the fight against corp and govt corruption, cronyism etc.
No, no you don't really. If you did, you'd realize that the inconvenience caused by OWS is negligible compared to the evil done by those on Wall Street. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brothers eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?
I just don't agree they should be able to take over a public park and deny the rights of the other citizens access to it.
OWS protesters are citizens too. You're advocating that they be denied use of the park. Do you not see the hypocrisy?
Re:Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:5, Informative)
Because the right of the people to assemble peaceably doesn't have a time-limit? "You may assemble, but not at night. Limit your protests in public spaces to ten hours a day" isn't in the Constitution.
No, but just because you are protesting doesn't allow you to violate the law. If there are laws in place restricting the ability to set up a camp in a park, bring in generators, create health code violations etc., it must apply equally to all citizens.
I also find it highly ironic that some of the protesters relying on the 1st amendment to enable their protest, also take offense
to the very same freedom of the press that amendment enables.
I don't know what you're referring to here, and I'm curious about it.
Here's a few examples
http://www.pixiq.com/article/occupy-wall-street-activists-assault-and-threaten-videographer [pixiq.com]
http://www.pixiq.com/article/reporter-assaulted-investigating-who-pooped-and-peed-on-the-bank [pixiq.com]
http://www.pixiq.com/article/occupy-dc-activist-threatens [pixiq.com]
Granted, these idiots are the 1% of the 99% that really give the well meaning protesters a bad name
Re:Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:5, Interesting)
No, but just because you are protesting doesn't allow you to violate the law. If there are laws in place restricting the ability to set up a camp in a park, bring in generators, create health code violations etc., it must apply equally to all citizens.
I see your point, and I concede. I approve of civil disobedience, but the disobedience in question should apply to laws you disagree with. Unless they're protesting against laws that restrict the ability to camp in a park, they shouldn't camp in the park.
Here's a few examples...Granted, these idiots are the 1% of the 99% that really give the well meaning protesters a bad name
Yeah, I agree with you completely. People start with the reasonable intent of trying to make themselves heard and then cross the line by wanting to drown out the voices of the opposition.
Re:Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:5, Insightful)
Did you really think you could threaten the powers-that-be and not have them turn the full force of the government they control on you at some point?
I believe both Gandhi and Rev. King counted on just that full-force response. It's rather the 'point' of a protest to get the powers that be to acknowledge you...and that acknowledgement, going back millennia, is usually full force/too far and results in the protesters getting some semblance of what they want, eventually anyway.
The OWS movement will need to do what the Tea Party did...actively influence election outcomes. Granted they have to do it without massive funding of the Koch's and Fox's relentless propoganda. But it can be done.
The mantra of the temperance movement back in the day comes to mind. "We don't need to win the election, just swing it to someone else". Once they show enough force to knock off a few incumbents, then the power starts flowing.
Re: (Score:3)
The OWS movement will need to do what the Tea Party did...actively influence election outcomes.
The OWS movement are actively influencing election outcomes. Just not the way they want to.
If Obama loses the election, it will be in no small part due to the OWS movement.
Re:Suprised they went on as long as they did (Score:5, Insightful)
I believe both Gandhi and Rev. King counted on just that full-force response. It's rather the 'point' of a protest to get the powers that be to acknowledge you...and that acknowledgement, going back millennia, is usually full force/too far and results in the protesters getting some semblance of what they want, eventually anyway.
Yes. I'm blown away by the lack of understanding of how protest and civil disobedience works. It's SUPPOSED to be inconvenient, it's SUPPOSED to attract attention and disrupt society, it may very well involve BREAKING LAWS, so long as the law-breaking is non-violent, and it is SUPPOSED to elicit government response, perhaps violent response.
Protest is not about politely asking for X, Y and Z, and the government saying "Hmm, let me think about it." Protest is about putting yourself in harms way to demand X, Y, and Z, and if you have to *non-violently* break laws to do that, then that's just part of the package. It's impossible to overstress how critical the "non-violent" part is. You? You're just standing there. The police? They're beating the crap out of you, spraying you, possibly shooting at you. No matter how much you disagree with somebody, a normal person will have a serious problem with the government brutalizing people who are doing nothing violent.
Re:They were allowed to exist as long as (Score:5, Informative)
OWS on the other hand is a genuine grass roots movement without any leadership, without media savvy, without spin doctors, without even self-policing to root out the hooligans and vandals who are attracted to any protest movement. Time will tell, which one is real and which one is astro-turf.
The 1% had even stronger media control, and even stronger stranglehold on the government machinery in the past. They were broken. If the 1% are smart they will voluntarily and peacefully allow the taxes to go up and bring deficit under control in a more equitable manner. If not, it is going to be a lot more ugly than a bunch of hippies camping out in some public park.
Mayor Quan Denies This (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Mayor Quan Denies This (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure they just all did it at the same time (including Toronto). It was just a big coincidence, like telco SMS rate increases & bandwidth capping...
Re: (Score:3)
This was a good thing (Score:3, Insightful)
having an organized approach and being advised by experts was a lot better then every group of police doing it themselves.
Re:This was a good thing (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, because when stamping out freedom, you want to do it in the most professional and organized way possible.
I suppose this is "a lot better" from the perspective of the fascists who want the protestors to disappear, but from the perspective of someone who's tired of the robber barons running the show, this is definitely worse.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Freedom of speech doesn't include freedom to shit all over the streets, block the free movement of others, and create a health hazard. I 100% support their right to speak, primarily because so much of their speech is anti-capitalist, and want them to be seen and heard for exactly what they are. But Jebus, the areas where these guys have been have become a health hazard.
Truth be told, the police have screwed up some, but overall, have been pretty damn accommodating when it comes to allowing them to express
Re:This was a good thing (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm really getting tired of all these "ZOMG, Poop!" comments. The protesters tried to bring in porta-potties but were denied. If you want to bitch at anybody about the terrible health conditions, bitch at the city for not allowing the protesters to provide the sensible sanitation arrangements that they tried to.
Interesting, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Interesting, but... (Score:5, Informative)
I know some of the people doing the Occupy Portland livestream, so I would like to hear your or any other person's criticisms of it. Is it the video or audio quality? Camerawork? Lighting? Choice of subjects? What people are choosing to say?
I will pass on any comments you have.
If you would like to see it, it is at
http://occupyportland.org/livestreammedia/ [occupyportland.org]
Re:Interesting, but... (Score:4, Insightful)
However, the students who were shot were indeed unarmed. The truth that they shot unarmed students remains. That is not in dispute. It's just not acceptable to open fire into a crowd of unarmed civilians even if there is a nut with a gun somewhere. You also left out that the prime suspect for firing that .38 was a paid FBI mole photographing protesters.
Absolutely none of that alters the fundamental truth that government forces opened fire on unarmed students in any literal or figurative sense.
You also left out the part of the analysis that caught an actual order to fire.
So yes, it is entirely possible that the guardsmen were telling the truth about hearing a gunshot, but that doesn't really alter anything that matters.
Communism failed: class warfare alive and well! (Score:3)
The OWS movement in some form was inevitable. A movement to galvanize a response to economic inequality would have developed in some other way if OWS hadn't come along. Now they have a nice long winter to plan around kitchen tables across the USA.
MF Global (Score:4, Insightful)
civil disobedience (Score:4, Insightful)
Wasn't this pretty predictable? I can't see how anyone participating in these protests could have imagined that they would be allowed to stay indefinitely without getting rousted by the cops. It's a form of civil disobedience. What is the point of arguing about whether DHS and FBI are involved, about details of the law, about various mayors' secret motivations, etc.? If you do civil disobedience, you expect to get hauled off to jail.
Re:civil disobedience (Score:5, Informative)
Wasn't this pretty predictable? I can't see how anyone participating in these protests could have imagined that they would be allowed to stay indefinitely without getting rousted by the cops. It's a form of civil disobedience. What is the point of arguing about whether DHS and FBI are involved, about details of the law, about various mayors' secret motivations, etc.? If you do civil disobedience, you expect to get hauled off to jail.
Actually, it is only civil disobedience if you ignore the order to vacate. However, even those who did vacate were arrested outside the park as they were leaving. So, yes, once lawfully ordered to leave, some did refuse the order and were arrested. Many more were arrested, however, that had already left.
As for DHS and FBI involvement, it matters, because it is limited federal resources being applied to local problems. Again, the only law being broken was for the failure to leave when told to do so. The FBI and DHS involvement occurred prior to this. Is it really the role of government police authority to be used on citizens when no federal laws are being violated?
The irony is that people camping out in the park may be an embarrassment to city officials, but doesn't cost them much. Arresting and processing them through the legal system is a whole different story.
Re:civil disobedience (Score:5, Insightful)
If you do civil disobedience, you expect to get hauled off to jail.
Exactly. To add, the only way civil disobedience "works" is if people can get enough like minded people together so that when the arrests happen, there is not enough space to hold everyone in the jails and the cost of prosecuting all of the arrested people outweighs the benefits of prosecution.
What the OWS folks really need to do is organize a huge, jurisprudence education campaign to inform people of their rights to judge the law itself. That way if the state decides to prosecute, they will find themselves saddled with juries who will not convict. THAT will deliver the message that the people stand with OWS and their goals. Once the state loses control of the judiciary and their ability to enforce unpopular laws, then we will have real change.
Re:civil disobedience (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't civil disobedience. This is a constitutionally protected peaceable assembly. The ones breaking the law here are the city governments and police.
Re:civil disobedience (Score:4, Informative)
Simple, it is called posse comitatus, though it doesn't seem that it was violated if the Fed's were just advisors. Heck I don't know if it applies to DHS or the FBI, it was as a result of a compromise after reconstruction. It basically banned the use of the Army to enforce local laws, the southerners didn't like it cause it let them selectively enforce their laws depending on a persons race which messed up their world view.
No, posse comitatus does not apply to the DHS or the FBI. If it did, the FBI couldn't even exist. The Posse Comitatus Act of the USA holds that the US Army, and by extension any off-shoot thereof (the US Air Force) cannot be used as a a law enforcement agency. It says ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about the Federal government having its own law enforcement agencies, only that the US Army cannot serve as one.
Idea for OWS - Rose Parade Spoof (Score:5, Funny)
Create a spoof of the Rose Parade on the same day. For example, a Scooby-Doo float that says "Rax the Rich!". (Except RIAA will get to them before the FBI does.)
Protesting too much - (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm going go to out on a limb here and say that the level of animosity directed at OWS is more telling about Slashdot than about the movement itself. Take a look in the mirror for a moment - have you all really had bad firsthand experience with "hippy rapists crapping in the streets downtown" or whatever - or is it more true that OWS has hit a nerve here?
The honest answer is a lot of Slashdotters are either IT people or programmers (or IT people wishing you were programmers) and you ARE part of the 99%. Your jobs CAN and HAVE been outsourced, to a large degree. Your current income level IS a product of outsourcing and capital flight. How much IT support comes from offshore?
How many of you paid a big chunk for a CS degree and are now wondering how you're ever going to pay it off? Still renting? Living with friends? Living at home? Living without health care? Not yet confronted down-the-road looming expenses like kids, a mortgage, your parents' end-of-life care?
Maybe put aside, for a moment, your epigrams about dirty hippies, and think about how OWS is relevant to your own situation.
Re:Protesting too much - (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure lots of individual OWS protesters would benefit from some lifestyle coaching. On the other hand, if you look closely, you'll see that lots of people like lawyers, doctors, technology people have also been contributing time to the movement - it's not just a big party for unemployed people.
But that doesn't really address my point - the level of anger here at Slashdot has less to do with negative interaction with hippies, and more to do with the fact that they've struck a nerve. It's far easier to make fun of the pictures on Fox News than it is to sit down and consider what the real message is, and how it might relate to your own life and prospects. There's very few people here who are going to get rich in some new startup or writing the next Angry Birds. There's a lot of people here who are going to scrape by on part time IT, freelance work and occasionally installing WiFi for the neighbors, and wish they had a 40-hour-a-week developer job with benefits and a path forward. (Or actually working that developer job, and finding out that to hold it really requires something like 60 hours a week.)
It's easier to be angry at or make fun of the protesters than to admit they have a point.
Re:Protesting too much - (Score:5, Insightful)
There's very few people here who are going to get rich in some new startup or writing the next Angry Birds.
Nobody wants to hear that. Most people cherish the fantasy that one day they'll be rich, especially while they're young. After they've been in the workforce for a few years, been at startups, or have tried to start their own small businesses, they learn the details of how societies and economies work. They slowly realize that the accumulation of great wealth is very hard to do by strictly legal or ethical means. Very hard. Very very hard. So hard in fact that one comes to question whether it is even possible at all via strictly legal or ethical means.
Re:Protesting too much - (Score:4, Interesting)
There's a lot of people here who are going to scrape by on part time IT, freelance work and occasionally installing WiFi for the neighbors, and wish they had a 40-hour-a-week developer job with benefits and a path forward. (Or actually working that developer job, and finding out that to hold it really requires something like 60 hours a week.)
Heh. I think this is becoming one of those transatlantic divides, as strong as the attitude toward guns.
Here in the UK, a 40-hour working week is considered long. We have a thing called the European Working Time Directive that makes it illegal for your employer to ask you to work any longer than that, and I agree with it 100%. It blows my mind that Americans put up with 60 hours a week. Do you do anything but work? I'm not trying to insult anyone here, so please don't get the wrong idea - but is it just a cultural thing that makes you OK with 60 hours a week (and 3 jobs - WTF???) - or do you think about it the same way we would?
If you were asked to work 60 hours a week over here, you'd probably have good reason to sue your employer.
Re:Protesting too much - (Score:4, Interesting)
That is definitely the right attitude, you absolutely need to keep an eye firmly on the goal of staying employed and benefiting your employer. It is important to make money from gainful employment so that you can spend it on products. Consume, do not reflect on your position in life. You should accept it, and ridicule anyone who tries to cast aspersion on the ruling class.
Re:Occupy... (Score:5, Informative)
You don't get it. OWS is protesting fraudsters like Christy Mack and Susan Karches [rollingstone.com] and the increasing disparity between wage growth between the upper and lower clases.
Re: (Score:3)
with an upfront investment of $15 million, [Christy Mack and Susan Karches] quickly received $220 million in cash from the Fed
What the fuck?
Those securities were valued at $253.6 million, though the Fed refuses to explain how it arrived at that estimate.
What the fuck!?
Gary Aguirre, a former SEC official who was fired years ago after he tried to interview John Mack in an insider-trading case.
Seriously?
Muammar Qaddafi received more than 70 loans from the Federal Reserve
Holy what the flying shit!?
hundreds of millions of Fed dollars were given out to hedge funds and other investors with addresses in the Cayman Islands[hello, subsidized tax evasion]. Many of those addresses belong to companies with American affiliations, including prominent Wall Street names like Pimco, Blackstone and . . . Christy Mack.
I'm calling the gun store with all my phones at the same time
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
How much did Michelle Obama's last vacation cost?
Less than GWB, the most frequent vacationer president of all time?
Re:Occupy... (Score:5, Insightful)
You say that as if it's a bad thing. Ponder it for a moment and realize how much more he could have messed up this country if he wasn't a slacker.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Or why doesn't the OWS crowd complain about the heads of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac receiving millions in bonuses ... at the same time that they're asking the feds for another bailout? :)
I guess that doesn't count.
Re:Occupy... (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't understand a thing about this protest do you?
I think you can blame the protesters for that
Re: (Score:3)
I am, and I guess a lot of bankers are, too, happy that they decided to turn for the soap kind of liberty box first. They are at the point where they cannot grin and bear it anymore, so they start using the liberty boxes.
I hope they don't have to reach the fourth. I have a gut feeling that they would eventually use it if no other way to reach an agreement can be found.
Re:Occupy... (Score:5, Insightful)
The utter refusal of the Occupy protesters to become politically engaged--as in, organizing, canvassing, petitioning, fundraising, and eventually voting--is what dooms them far beyond anything else.
The Tea Party would've been a footnote if not for the fact that they became highly politically organized and actually went after elections. I'm not going to hold my breath that Occupy protesters will try something novel like, say, primarying Congressmen next spring.
But they don't want to change the system from within, they want to destroy it and rebuild from scratch. Whether one agrees with that as a goal or not, it's simply not something that is going to happen by staging street rallies and sit-ins and camping in parks.
Re:Occupy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Do us a favor, watch any news source that is not Fox News and come back to the table.
Either your satire is lost on me or more likely given what I've heard from a lots of folks, people actually believe what you're saying and think that is what they are protesting. They are protesting corruption on a never before seen scale, companies that have grown too large for even the federal government to control. Bringing attention to the laws that have been bought and paid for is a noble goal and I'm not sure why you feel the need to belittle people that have the audacity to stand up and speak about the core issues of what is wrong with America these days. Wallstreet has unprecedented control over the country but of course they are not alone which is why you are seeing protests happen all over the place. There are many guilty people.
You don't have to be jobless to see how banking laws have stacked the deck against American citizens. You don't have to be jobless to understand the ridiculous debt required to go into almost any professional field these days. Hell, I went almost 100k in debt to get my degree. I had no trouble paying it off because of a number of factors that simply don't apply to most people. When you are relying on the right people discovering you, landing a good job that actually let's you pay off a targeted college degree becomes like getting picked for the latest NBA draft when they aren't striking that is.
This I got mine so fuck off attitude is extremely prevalent these days and it makes me sad to see what was one of the most generous nations on earth turning on itself because times are tough due to retarded policy decisions targeted toward Reaganomics which was a concept proven false even before it was ever deployed. You have 30 years of bad laws that have been building to this point and a congress unwilling to do anything for the President even when the President is proposing Republican ideals. We're one country, we're supposed to be on the same team, not fighting each other. I hear class warfare again and again from the likes of Fox News and Rush, forgetting that the war has been going on for decades and only now are people disenfranchised enough to speak up about it.
Instead of drowning out their words try listening to them. It's a rally with lots of people so yeah, there are nut jobs, but that doesn't change the heart of the issue which is very real regardless of your membership status in the middle class or above.
Re:This begs an interesting question... (Score:5, Insightful)
How is that possible? (Score:5, Insightful)
Huh? How is it even possible for a small group like that to be "threatening the economy"? No, don't answer that. Real terrorists might read your answer and use it against America.
How could crime have "ramped up" when there were so many cops standing around watching them?
Re:How is that possible? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ask the folks in Oakland [chron.com]. Starting a bonfire in the middle of a street is not exactly brilliant, and neither was the vandalism.
Re:How is that possible? (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah, but this happens in Oakland even without the occupy protests.... its a shithole (I've lived there.)
Re:How is that possible? (Score:5, Funny)
In Oakland we usually called that Sunday Evening after the Raiders Win and or Lose.
Re:How is that possible? (Score:5, Insightful)
Two wrongs don't make a right, but if you punch someone in the face, don't be surprised when they hit you back.
Re: (Score:3)
It really all just depends on how you define "wrong" in the first place. To one person, one of those things might be considered "wrong," and the other considered "right." So it isn't that they think that two wrongs make a right.
"threatening the economy" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Im sure my employer (a consulting firm) just manufactures money out of thin air; clearly wall street does the same.
Re:"threatening the economy" (Score:5, Insightful)
The question practically answers itself. (Score:5, Interesting)
How could crime have "ramped up" when there were so many cops standing around watching them?
Watch the videos from Oakland. The protesters viciously assaulted the police nightsticks, shields, tear-gas cannisters, etc. with military-grade abdominal muscles, heads, and faces.
I'd tell you to watch the New York videos, but the media blackout was quite effective.
Interesting, isn't it? (Score:5, Insightful)
During a war, our military can "embed" reporters with front-line combat units.
But with what appears to be a peaceful protest (in NYC), the police have to remove the media from the area.
Re:Interesting, isn't it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course. If the police are about to do something they know is going to lead to violence and protest, they sure as hell don't want anybody there to report on it. They don't want an abundant supply of evidence to demonstrate that they violated laws and/or people's rights -- which that action is almost guaranteed to provoke.
For the same reason that "free speech zones" aren't intended to foster free speech.
My bet is that most of the people who got arrested will never be charged because there is no grounds for the arrest in the first place. Just some heavy handed police intimidation.
Re:How is that possible? (Score:5, Insightful)
Easy, if that small group is a small group of bankers, they can very easily threaten the economy of a whole country. Heck, they can even threaten the economy of the whole world.
Re:How is that possible? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:How is that possible? (Score:5, Insightful)
They were planning disrupting Wall Street. In other words, they were threatening the economy and even Bloomy can't allow that.
Huh? How is it even possible for a small group like that to be "threatening the economy"?
I think it's be adequately demonstrated that a small group of people in control of Wall Street can, in fact, utter destroy the economy.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Insightful)
They have disrupted wall street
They are gaining support, and crime ins't 'tamping up'. That's hyperbole generated by the media and repeated by people who take what the media says at face value.
When adjusts for the increase in population, crime is the same or lower.
No, they didn't.
Re: (Score:3)
Please explain how.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Interesting)
As someone who works on Wall St (in financial services, but not for a bank/hedgefund/trading desk of any kind), I can tell you definitively that they have not disrupted "Wall St" in any way, other than vaguely disrupting foot traffic on the street that is named Wall. The fundamental thing people seem to not understand is that Wall St is really just a tourist attraction these days. Only a handful of guys still work on the stock exchange floor and almost no trading is done there. And the banks all moved their offices to midtown, Jersey City or Connecticut years ago. If they go through with their Wall St Carnival or whatever the hell they plan, it will accomplish nothing but getting a bunch of people arrested, as they've been told repeatedly that will happen if they do anything on Wall St itself without a proper permit.
Re: (Score:3)
> I can tell you definitively that they have not disrupted "Wall St"
Yet. They were planning to disrupt the major businesses on this Thursday to force Wall Street to close. That was when the hammer had to come down. Even if most actual business has moved elsewhere the imagery would have been bad and if the NYSE actually closed it would have been front page news.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
I beleive Wall st trading closed briefly when a carraige bomb was set off at the front doors. Since then, I don't think anyhting that's happened physically to the building has mattered, it's all electronic any more (though the 9/11 disaster did cause a great many failovers, the process largely worked).
Only the imagery would be relevent, and it's not the businessmen who would have been lauged at, believe me.
The NY OWSers were rousted because local businesses had had enough. That's how the world works - no vast conspiracy, just local cops knowing who's important when it comes to avoiding a stink.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Interesting)
It sounds like they need to disrupt wallstreet digitally.
this would actually be something good for anonymous's army of script kiddies to apply themselves to.
Essentially, you flood the automatic trade daemons with false quote data. You don't do this the way your typical con-man does, which is to selectively quote false prices to change the aggregate stock prices in such a way as to sweeten his own investment opportunities; instead, you selectively quote false prices to initiate a bear market, and drive down trading, if not encourage wholesale shorting of major stocks. Banks create money from thin air, this would return that conjured money back to the void whence it came.
Alternatively, if you don't want to have a hand in destroying the world economy on such a drastic scale, you could instead work from the standpoint of simply creating congestion. Remember those stories of new fiber runs being laid for wallstreet traffic, because a few ms of latency can translate to millions of dollars of lost trades? Bingo. Latency would injure wallstreet.
Both approaches lend themselves well to scriptkiddies. Anonymous is missing an epic opportunity.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Informative)
Not an occupier, but have been down there at Occupy Portland on and off almost since it began.
>Drug overdoses in the camp went from none, to one per week, to multiple per week.
This could be true. It reflects Portland's general drug problems, and is not really high for the number of people there. Trying to pin it on the protest is not really honest.
>Reports of sexual assaults in the tents and makeshift structures were coming out almost daily.
Were these reports from within the camp, or from opponents outside of it? We are talking about regular camping tents set up in a public space, not really the kind of place where sexual assault would go easily unnoticed.
>Vandalism to the parks and surrounding businesses went out of control
I saw one spray paint graffiti on a wall, which is unfortunate but not out of character for the area. The protesters brought plenty of cardboard to make signs with, and almost all the messages and art were done on boards, not surrounding structures.
>I haven't gone down there myself
Well, that explains a lot
>the parks will require major repairs and some businesses were closed
The grass in the park died due to the tents, and I think the restrooms were clogged. However, the occupation did set up a fund to pay for that, I have no idea whether they have paid out of it though. As for businesses, I don't know of any that closed, though the 7-11 reported some shoplifting.
>The last straw was the elements in the camp seeking confrontation stock piling shields and weapons including molatov cocktails, rocks, sticks and homemade frag grenades made with glass and fireworks.
Where did you hear this, on Fox News? I did not see anything of that sort going on. The fuel for the generators was placed in a locked cage at the suggestion of the fire marshal a couple of weeks ago.
>I heard people starting to talk about forming an angry mob with their own sticks and rocks to go down and confront the camps if the police didn't do anything.
Do your friends beat up homeless people for fun?
>The mayor was/is sympathetic to the protesters but simply had to go with the national effort to crack down because a mutiny in his own police department and community was brewing.
The mayor and powers that be are simply trying to sweep problems of the city under the rug, or disperse them where they don't have to see them. The homeless problem, the drug problem, the unemployment problem are all problems of the city as a whole, but they want to be able to ignore that so they don't want a single, highly visible concentration of it.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Informative)
Read his post again,
I haven't gone down there myself, but friends of mine that work for the city tell me
He hasn't been down there, but he seems to have been modded to +5 at this time anyways. Let's see if my reply to him will, given that I HAVE been there.
I suspect that anything that doesnt mesh with people's conception of "rag tag group of oppressed and innocent protesters" will never get modded up
Apparently not. Look at the MS or Apple threads, there are always people who get modded up for having a contrarian view.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
This is part of why you're polling worse than the tea party right now. No one listens to an argument while being insulted, even if the argument is correct. Also, nice use of the No True Scotsman fallacy.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
This.
I've never seen so much negative press directed at a group of Americans exercising their first amendment rights. OWS clearly scares a lot of people. Even the Westboro Baptist Church doesn't generate this kind of negative publicity.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Informative)
Apparently you didnt follow any of the coverage of the Tea Party.
The coverage of the Tea Party (at least for the first six-nine months, before people figured out they were a bunch of Koch-funded ex-Birchers) was mainly positive in the mainstream media and followed almost immediately, regardless of what you may have heard from your right-wing blogs.
Now look at the OWS coverage. It was almost completely ignored by the mainstream media for the first week, generally discounted thereafter (They don't have an agenda! They aren't serious!), and then actively denigrated by reprinting local government press releases (Homeless and ex-cons are taking over hippie-land! Something must be done!). Not to mention the fact that mainstream media is still using the Tea Party (and its advocates) as "the" representatives of conservative thought in this country - even though it's popularity even among self-identified conservatives has fallen through the floor.
Corporate, mainstream media is still giving conservatives blowjobs while lobbing brickbats at liberals. There is no "liberal media". Mainstream media is overwhelmingly in the pocket of conservatives and (more importantly) the corporate masters for whom they are the "useful idiots" (ala Stalin).
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Informative)
GAH! You are willfully ignorant if you don't know what their agenda is at this point.
They are NOT! pissed off about people making money. Communists are the extreme minority of the protesters.
They are pissed about corruption in the system that disenfranchises the vast majority of people for the personal gain of a handful of plutocrats.
The vast majority of them don't give a damn about rich people being rich. The problem is that being rich means you can make other people poor.
What do we want done about it? Campaign finance reform for one. Balancing the budget by eliminating tax breaks and raising taxes on those most capable of providing the burden. Cutting graft and corrupt influences from the government.
Re: (Score:3)
Huh? I didn't see a lot of negative press about the tea party. I've seen a lot of negative news about some of their members, like Illinois' own Joe Walsh, a deadbeat dad who campaigned on "fiscal responsibility", Cain and Perry's tard moments (and Cain's sexual harrassment), stupidities like this. But not about the rallies themselves (well, except the one where they booed the wounded veteran because he wa gay).
Do you have some links to this negative coverage by established news outlets that isn't some blog
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
> I've never seen so much negative press directed at a group of Americans exercising their first amendment rights.
OWS has pretty much zero to do with the 1st Amendment. So there is your first mistake. Nobody denied them the right to protest. Squatting on property that isn't yours isn't a speech issue, it is a trespass or theft issue. As for negative press, see the Tea Party for a real example of negative press. And they did it all within the system. They bought permits, paid for portapotties, etc.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Insightful)
> They had a coherent agenda that a child could understand
It's amazing how eloquently that sums up everything that's wrong with the Tea Party.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Informative)
Squatting on property that isn't yours isn't a speech issue, it is a trespass or theft issue.
That's simply a bogus argument:
1. The reason the protesters were on private property rather than public property is that they'd been barred from using public property.
2. The owners of the private property never objected to the protester's presence there. In order for being on someone else's property to be considered trespassing, the owner has to not want you to be there (e.g. if I walk through a church parking lot and nobody complains, that's not trespassing).
3. The private property in question was actually required, by city ordinance, to be open to the public at all times, so even if they had objected they weren't allowed to do anything about it.
No permits
You don't need a permit to stand on a sidewalk holding a sign, unless you are planning on blocking something. The initial protests were in places the protesters had every right to be without a permit. The police responded with pepper spray.
paid for portapotties, etc.
The Occupy Wall St general meeting which is more-or-less in charge requested permission to have portapotties brought in, paid for by the protesters. The police refused to allow that.
Hell, most left the place cleaner than when they arrived.
When Bloomberg first suggested that people would have to leave the park so it could be cleaned, the protesters responded by cleaning up the park before the deadline.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Informative)
Well, others have already responded to most of your post, but I wanted to respond to the pervasive myth that there's no clear goals. There are. But the media refuses to cover them. Just like you said they did to the Tea Party.
Go down to Wall Street or any of these other occupations and you will figure out the goals pretty quickly. Increase taxes on the wealthiest 1% and on major corporations (or at least close loopholes.) End the wars and bring our troops home. And end unlimited corporate campaign contributions (or possibly private campaign funding entirely.) Those are the goals. And they're extremely obvious if you set foot in any of the Occupy protests I've been to (Pittsburgh and NYC)
But then, I've sat there and watched the mainstream media -- I've watched cameramen literally walk up, ignore the hundred gathered around while someone is speaking about all these national issues, and instead spend ten or twenty minutes taking various shots of the five people playing drums and dancing, intentionally constructing their shots so that the people actually talking about these issues won't even appear in the background.
The movement has a clear message. But of course the media doesn't want you to see it.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to live in public or private spaces at the inconvenience of others, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Oh...there it is.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
You do realize that the first amendment has no qualifiers such as "as long as you never inconvenience anyone", right.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Insightful)
OWS protesters don't scare people. What scares people is what OWS protesters are doing to cities.
What Occupy protesters have done to our cities is insignificant compared to what those on Wall Street have done to our country.
However they aren't just protesting Wall Street, they are protesting capitalism.
Because they understand that in capitalism money makes money faster than honest labor. Capitalism will always end up pooling resources in the hands of the few. This will always give them undue influence in the political process. You can't have a government for the people when you have an economy for the few.
We tried democratic capitalism, it didn't work. We tried totalitarian socialism, it didn't work. We tried totalitarian capitalism, it didn't work. Isn't it about time we tried democratic socialism?
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Insightful)
Unless, you know, people actually pay attention to the behavior of their elected representatives, and refuse to vote for people who go to Washington and promptly start sucking at the corporate lobbying teat. We have ways of removing corrupt officials. We have more than 2 parties in the US. If "The 99%" ACTUALLY WANTED to elect somebody other than the same corporate shills and whores that we keep re-electing to office, it would happen. I don't care how rich the Koch brothers are, if 99% of the population voted for something, and 1% of the population votes for the opposite... by my count, that's a historic landslide win for the 99%.
But something like 60% of the voting-age "99%" don't bother to cast a vote. Because it's easier to bitch than it is to be informed, and involved with the political process.
If people exercised the merest shred of rational thought when it comes to politics, and exercised the barest iota of follow-through on holding their candidates accountable for results, then the government simply wouldn't be for sale to the rich, because it wouldn't matter how rich you are if you're always outvoted.
The root of the problem is the climate in Washington that allows corporations to run amok with impunity, and by extension, the problem is the self-satisfied laziness of the vast majority of "The 99%" that keeps electing the same cast of crooks, whores, and shills to run the government with the same results term after term.
Re: (Score:3)
There's an enormous difference from "some protest groups are retarded" and "the entire movement needs to be shut down".
There is also an enormous difference between truly resisting arrest and being cited for disorderly conduct/resisting arrest by a police guy who is just itching for a reason to jail you.
Granted, it's hard to keep up a protest, but I applaud them for doing what is constitutionally protected.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Insightful)
OWS protesters don't intend to scare people. What should scare people is that the protesters are RIGHT.
http://www.businessinsider.com/what-wall-street-protesters-are-so-angry-about-2011-10?op=1 [businessinsider.com]
They aren't protesting capitalism - they are protesting the government having been totally corrupted by capitalism, to the point where the entire game is rigged. You can malign the OWS as much as you want, and please, by all means, have fun telling whatever stories you want about them. But if some kind of change doesn't happen, the situation for the 99% is only going to get worse.
Re: (Score:3)
It seems to me they'd have been more effective staging rallies every Saturday where normal people might show up. The whole Phish-concert-meets-homeless-shelter thing they had going only scares people away. But these are the same people who think giant puppets and drum circles are going to bring down the most powerful people in the world, so logic... isn't their strong suit.
There still exists a whole lot of anger at politicians(occupy K street, anyone?) and bankers, and hopefully someone will figure out ho
Re: (Score:3)
You hope, I fear. I remember 1789 and 1917, I ain't been there, but I've read my history books.
I'd rather hope for a peaceful settlement and a renegotiation of terms.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Informative)
Too bad the 1%ers don't read history or they'd be a hell of a lot more scared than you are. But the fact that they (or rather, the government they bought) repeated the 1920s [virginia.edu] during the Bush years and almost repeated 1929 shows that they've never cracked open a history book in their lives.
BTW, the link is to a volume that was required reading in an undergrad history class I took in the '70s. It's a very good read. It's also scary how it mirrors the times we live in now.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Informative)
How can an communist complain when someone steals 'their' stuff? Hey, there is no such thing as private property, man.
There is a difference between private property - that which is abstractly recognized as yours by the society to do as you see fit; and personal property - that which physically belongs to you / is used by you. Communism purports to do away with the former, but keeps the latter - the idea is that you shouldn't be able to own, say, a factory single-handedly (because you can't use it alone), but a car is perfectly fine.
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3)
The thing that annoys me about OWS (aside from their incredulous disbelief that their right to speak does not extend to impeding other people's ability to live their lives) is that they're not even protesting a tangible THING. They're setting up strawmen, knocking them down, and declaring moral victory. They're not arguing against anybody real, but percieved injustices against the abstract. And the bit about that that REALLY pisses me off is that any good points they make are therefor dismissed by 'the other side' as a result, battle lines are drawn, and after that point, and people rarely 'change teams'. Fucking douchebags, all...
So... pretty much politics as usual, eh?
Re:Go with the simple over complex theory (Score:4, Informative)
sure it would be nice if we could all just give everyone everything they want...the world dont work that way
FAIL (Score:3)
Oh, I didn't realize only "liberals" were in favor of free speech. Thanks for enlightening us.