Serving OB, the Peninsula and San Diego Beaches
By Sandra Dibble / SignOnSanDiego / October 18, 2011
TIJUANA — Some two dozen protesters in Tijuana affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street movement were arrested early today by police forces for sleeping in a public right-of-way. The detentions occurred at 2:15 a.m. near a traffic circle in Tijuana’s Rio Zone, according to Heriberto Garcia, Baja California’s human rights ombudsman.
On September 17, 2011, several thousand New Yorkers took over a small park in lower Manhattan, a block from Wall Street itself. Wall Street itself had been blocked from the demonstrators by New York’s finest.
The protesters took over Zucotti Park, a private space, and set up their encampment – and the Occupy Wall Street movement took off. This past weekend, there were over 100 Occupy actions in this country, and over a thousand around the world. A thousand. Get your mind around that.
Soon after Occupy Wall Street took hold, others followed: Occupy Boston, Occupy Denver, Occupy San Francisco, Los Angeles, and even Occupy San Diego, which had its first over-night “occupation” on Friday, October 7th.
But look at this – in one month, in exactly one month, this movement has changed our world. For how long – it remains to be seen. One month. This is incredible.
By Mike Chek / Special to the OB Rag
Occupy San Diego has lots of friends and supporters. Over this past two week period, they’ve come out with donations and statements of support. This has been great!
But right now – Occupy San Diego NEEDS HELP!
If you support us – then we need you to get on the phone immediately. We need you to call the Mayor of San Diego and the City Council immediately. We need you to tell them – tell them – not ask – to get the police off the backs of the activists of Occupy San Diego!
While it remains to be seen whether the Occupation of America, from Wall Street to San Diego, will be able to sustain its amazing initial momentum, it has unquestionably struck a nerve and sparked a national discussion about class, power, and politics. The heavy weights at the New York Times have recently staked out an interesting range of opinion on the occupation movement.
You have Paul Krugman, the paper’s reliable progressive, observing the panic of the plutocrats and astutely noting that, “The way to understand all of this is to realize that it’s part of a broader syndrome, in which wealthy Americans who benefit hugely from a system rigged in their favor react with hysteria to anyone who points out just how rigged the system is.”
This past weekend witnessed a dramatic increase of Occupy Wall Street type actions across this country and around the globe. Something like 1500 cities and towns across planet Earth had actions and events on Saturday, October 15th. There were over 100 in the United States. This weekend’s events were also supplemented by the Anti-Austerity and Anti-War demonstrations that coincided with many Occupy actions, as they did here in San Diego.
The Occupy Movement is growing so quickly that activists within can hardly stay up on its developments. So, we’ve put a little something together. This is not an all-inclusive summary but an attempt to hit the high-points.
Statement of Support
by Josh Pechthalt, the president of California, AFT
The California Federation of Teachers endorses the “Occupy Wall Street” movement. Occupy Wall Street, and its local variations, represent the legitimate response of the 99% of us adversely affected by growing wealth and income inequality in America. The richest one percent of the population has doubled its share of the nation’s income over the past twenty years. Yet during this time the wealthy received massive tax cuts, a major cause of public budget shortfalls that hurt students, make our streets less safe, and harm the health of children and seniors.
After a large peace march down from Balboa Park ended with a rally at the Civic Center Plaza, the occupation of the Plaza continued. Nearly one thousand occupiers and supporters had gathered for the rally at its peak.
Even though police had ordered all sleeping bags to be removed from the Plaza and had banned “illegal lodging” in it as well, about one hundred demonstrators slept in the Plaza last night, Saturday night.
Here is the schedule for Sunday, October 16, 2011, at Occupy San Diego:
11:00 a.m. – Teach-in at Plaza on “structural inequality”
4:00 p.m. – Daily March around the Gaslamp
7:00 p.m. – General Assembly
Come inside for more reports on Occupy San Diego and its offshoots….
News from Frank:
About 500 people are rallying right now at the San Diego Civic Center Plaza and the general agreement is that they will stay put.
By Mike Chek / Special to the OB Rag
During yesterday’s pepper-spraying and roughing-up of Occupy San Diego demonstrators by San Diego Police, one officer stood out in his duties. Officer “Blondie” (we don’t know his true identify) clearly was The Hammer as officers cleared out tents at the Civic Center Plaza.
The SDPD had ordered all tents to be removed from the Plaza and at 8 am Friday, October 14th, dozens of officers had arrived to enforce that order. And through some minor jostling of non-violent demonstrators who had circled the half dozen tents, the officers did remove the tents.
We just spoke to a member of Occupy San Diego at Civic Center Plaza, and they gave us the following schedule of fun and games for protesters today, Saturday, October 15th – all decided by the most recent General Assembly.
9:30 am – Logistics meeting at the Plaza
11:00 am – Some in Plaza will proceed to the Peace Rally at 6th and Grape.
11 – 12 noon – Peace activists will be bannering above I-5
1:00 pm – Occupy San Diego will march through Balboa Park to the World Beat Center along Park Blvd.
Handed a printed ultimatum late afternoon Thursday, October 13 to either remove all tents by midnight or get arrested, the 150 Freedom Occupiers at the San Diego Civic Center held a democratic general assembly and decided to peacefully resist the assault on their rights of free speech and assembly.
The occupiers, mostly youth , many of color, had been camped near City Hall since Saturday to proclaim solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street protests nationwide and to begin a movement of youthful confrontation with local injustice.
In a tense day marred by two arrests and the pepper-spraying of demonstrators at what remains of the Occupy San Diego encampment at the Civic Center Plaza, it ends in a compromise that allows protesters to sleep one more night in the Plaza in sleeping bags. The compromise does not allow for occupiers to have any tents – except the one that does remain as a symbol of the seven-day occupation.
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