Tag: occupy

by Dan Beucke / Bloomberg News / October 27, 2011

Depending on your point of view, the Occupy Wall Street movement may be 1968 — or 1970 — all over again. And this week may mark the point where the bank protests go viral — or take a dangerous turn for the movement and those who support them. Such is the struggle by both sides to assign symbols to OWS.

Police attempts this week to clear protesters from encampments in Oakland, Atlanta, and other cities, complete with tear gas and horse-mounted police, brought to mind images from 1960s and ’70s era anti-war clashes. Then, on Tuesday night, Scott Olsen, an Iraq war veteran, was seriously injured after apparently being hit in the head by a police projectile.

My thanks to the San Diego Occupiers who attended the City Council meeting on October 25^th, to abbajerry for the video and Rocky Neptun for his commentary. The mic check and call for a resolution at the morning meeting was truly thrilling! Although I was not present at the meeting I did watch the two non agenda item public comment segments that are available in the City’s online video archive (the opening credit incorrectly displays Monday’s date of October 24th). The last comment period came at the end of the 4 hour session, late in the afternoon. I applaud the dozen or so occupiers who stayed there in order to provide public testimony on behalf of the movement.

Tents have returned to the Occupy San Diego protest at the Civic Center Plaza. During the night time General Assembly held Tuesday, Oct. 25, tents began to appear. By last count there were eight new tents erected, and was described as “a direct action” event by those who pitched the tents on the concrete in the shadow of City Hall. The tents appeared to be newly purchased and several had “99%” written or painted on their sides.

The new tents visibly added to the tension and the daily/ nightly drama at the Plaza, as tents had been banned by the San Diego Police earlier during the occupation. Tents had been banned at the Plaza on Thursday, October 13th, in a memo delivered to the protesters.

Tuesday, Oct 25:After spending almost an hour discussing an illegal scheme to transfer even more wealth to downtown hotel owners using taxpayers’ money; the San Diego City Council literally turned tail and ran from the council chambers when a coalition of community groups joined the Occupy San Diego movement in asking council members to support their rights to free speech and assembly within the city.

About 60 citizens marched from Children’s Park just before the 10 a.m. Council session and met up with the several hundred young people camped at the Civic Center Plaza. Ignoring the police demands to stay on the sidewalk, protestors took to the streets the entire route.

According to @occupyarrests, as of yesterday, 2,428 people had been arrested nationwide since the start of Occupy Wall Street.

Around 5:00 am this morning (10/25/11) hundreds of riot gear clad Oakland police stormed the Oakland Occupy Wall Street encampment. Reportedly using flash grenades, rubber bullets and tear gas they cleared the area of tents and arrested 70 people. According to legal observer Marcus Kryshka (see Marcus’ video), the police came in very quickly and denied media and legal observers access to the area.

See video inside…

Occupy San Diego activists will march on City Hall tomorrow, Tuesday, October 25, to request that the City of San Diego adopt a resolution similar to the one adopted by Los Angeles, to support the Occupy San Diego protests and are requesting your help by marching with them and signing a petition (which will be presented to the council) to show your support.

You do not need to be a resident of the city to sigh this petition.

Recently, Clare Crawford of the Center on Policy Initiatives noted that, “Even three full-time minimum wage jobs don’t make enough to make ends meet in San Diego County.” Crawford was responding to the release of a report by the Insight Center for Community Economic Development that documented how it now costs a family of three nearly $63,000 to make ends meet in San Diego.

This is according to the 2011 California Family Self-Sufficiency Standard and the grim news is that more than one million San Diegans are living in households earning less than that threshold. That’s close to a third of all San Diegans, much higher than the fifteen percent of San Diegans who fall under the official poverty line.

Why Homelessness Is Becoming an Occupy Wall Street Issue

By Barbara Ehrenreich / TomDispatch.com

As anyone knows who has ever had to set up a military encampment or build a village from the ground up, occupations pose staggering logistical problems. Large numbers of people must be fed and kept reasonably warm and dry. Trash has to be removed; medical care and rudimentary security provided — to which ends a dozen or more committees may toil night and day. But for the individual occupier, one problem often overshadows everything else, including job loss, the destruction of the middle class, and the reign of the 1%. And that is the single question: Where am I going to pee?

Occupy San Diego – our city’s own version of Occupy Wall Street – has expanded. Due to pressure being placed on the Occupy San Diego demonstrators by the police – a pressure which has prevented the protests’ ability to set up its support network, a solidarity station has been opened at Children’s Park in downtown at Island and First. The solidarity site will work to support the main occupation site, the Civic Center Plaza, where occupiers are now in their 15th day.

By late morning yesterday, October 21st, OccupySD activists had unloaded several vehicles worth of food and gear, and had begun to set up support stations that make up the occupy infrastructure. And by mid-afternoon, they had completed the set-up and establishment of the stations that support the movement. So, for the first time since last week, the Occupy San Diego efforts had the full panoply of its sustainability network: the food-line and kitchen, the medical station, sanitation, the library, arts and crafts, and some media.

Demonstrators beaten after arrests – Americans included

Contrary to what much of the media reported, the breaking up earlier this week of the Occupy Tijuana protest was a lot harsher than originally reported. On Tuesday, October 18th, it was reported that up to 50 Mexican law enforcement agents broke up the encampment at 2:30 in the morning, an encampment that had been going on since Saturday, the 15th, and that 26 people were arrested.

However, according to an American present at the protest in Tijuana, the cops came at 7:30 to 8 pm, and ended up arresting as many as 60 people, many of them from this side of the border. David Fugate was at the site, and he told me that they were very peaceful, were holding signs and some were chanting near the intersection of Revolucion and 8th Street, on a grassy area.

At San Diego City College today more than a hundred students staged a walkout in solidarity with Occupy San Diego. After holding a rally at Curren Plaza where many students spoke to an enthusiastic crowd, about 150 protesters marched from the campus, down B Street, chanting and addressing pedestrians and onlookers, to the Civic Center Plaza to join the Occupy Movement protesters.

By Bob Dorn

The actions of police on October 14, so clearly visible on YouTube, and presumably around the world, is the sort of official mayhem that brings down governments in other parts of the world.

That skin-headed cop with a mace can who wrapped his arms around throats and threw several people to the ground so that their heads crashed into the pavement committed a criminal act. He can easily be identified, and so can others at Civic Plaza on Oct 14 who can be seen provoking people and abusing them.