Does this look like fizzle to you?
From Common Dreams.org:
"On Thursday afternoon, Occupy Together "meetups" could be found in 575 cities that stretched across the world to places as diverse as Athens, Greece, and Wellington, New Zealand."
Increasingly, as this looks to have legs, we can expect it could impact the 2012 elections.....AND the interim politics as well.
I don't know that the tea partiers had these numbers, at their peak, but they certainly don't any longer, and never in so many places. Now it looks as if the movement may be coming to Laci's neighborhood...
From MSNBC.com World News:
Occupy Wall Street-style protests spread to Britain
By William Kennedy for msnbc.com
LONDON — A young woman spray-paints the final letter on a floral-patterned sheet. Unfurled it reads: "Occupy London, 15 Oct, occupylsx.org."
The small group of assembled activists applaud its look. “I love the kitschiness of it. It’s so ‘Laura Ashley’ English — perfect for a protest,” one says, namechecking the British brand known for its prim-and-proper fashions.
Inspired by the Occupy Wall Street protests on the other side of the Atlantic, demonstrators plan to establish a tent city in London’s City financial district next weekend.
This movement aims to unite the United Kingdom’s far-flung activist communities in addressing "the inequality of the financial system," Wargalla said.
'Not just dirty hippies'The dozen hipster-chic men and women making signs on Saturday in a funky, tropical-themed club in north London’s Hackney borough have varied protest backgrounds. Some come from "Free Bradley Manning" and anti-nuclear campaigns, others from the Spanish 15-M movement, which occupied Madrid on May 15.
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William Kennedy An activist prepares a banner ahead of the Occupy London protest planned for Oct. 15. |
The mood was upbeat as aerosol fumes rose past African drums, palm tree cutouts and a faded pennant seeking to "Free Mohammed Hamid" — a street preacher who called himself "Osama bin London". He was convicted in 2008 of running terrorist training camps in the U.K.
“We’re the beginning of something,” said Ronan McNern, a member of U.K. rights group Queer Resistance who has a background in public relations. “People are not stakeholders in democracy, in the workings of the nation anymore. This [movement] gives a lot of hope for the future.”
Occupy London's members largely identify with the "We are the 99 Percent" slogan made popular by protesters in the U.S.
"There's something about the fact that 15,000 people are trying to march down Wall Street that is uniquely exciting," said Naomi Colvin, an activist who worked to get alleged Wikileaker Bradley Manning out of confinement "What’s happening in Wall Street is in a way a culmination of things that have gone on in southern Europe and the Middle East."
“We’re asking the government to be more accountable for regulating [the financial sector] in the interests of a few people, rather than the majority.
“Having a group of tents somewhere in London is quite symbolic,” she added. “This is now a city that most of the people working in can’t really afford to live in.”
By Sunday morning, Occupy London had more than 1,500 followers on Twitter and 3,000 had signed up to attend next weekend's event near the London Stock Exchange.
“I think it will only get stronger of time, just as we’ve seen in Wall Street,” Wargalla said.
But that will not be easy, McNern warned. “To sustain something like this in the British winter will be a nightmare,” he said.
Where is the rage, the 99% are sheeple and racists, preventing John Lewis from speaking.....
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QZlp3eGMNI&feature=channel_video_title
Baaaahhhhh, baaaaahhhh, baaaaahhhh, baaaaahhhh, baaaaahhhh, baaaaahhhh.......
what a bunch of sheep...
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ReplyDeleteWhat a legacy you are trying to astroturf......
ReplyDeleteAnti-semetic union thug.....
as if there is any other type of union member.....
Racists wrote something that doesn't hold up under close scrutiny.
ReplyDeleteJohn Lewis was welcomed.
He didn't address the audience because of their procedures of their general meetings on topics.
In other words - Lewis was welcomed and given respect, but his wish to speak was inconsistent with their existing agenda. It is my understanding that he was cheered by the crowd and is welcome to come back at any time. THAT is hardly racist, nor does it make the crowd 'sheeple', a phrase I associate with the low information fox-news watching tea party low brows.
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ReplyDeleteYeah right,
ReplyDeleteIn the 10 minutes the sheep were braying in response to their sheep herder, they could have heard him speak...
Instead they spent spent that time putting on a show and then sent him packing with a jazz hand pat on the head.
They sure were a good little Lilly white smiley faced flock of priveleged, mind numbed, racists....
"Here is your hay to sleep in, and remember to pay the shop keepers to use their bathrooms."
It seems that some of our commenters are as usual not very good at fact checking the poison propaganda that emanates from Fox News.
ReplyDeleteFor example, if you listen closely to the protester arguing with the man in the yamuka, the protester also identifies himself as being Jewish.....so if you are claiming anti-semitism, that would seem a contradiction. Rather that protester defines the conflict as pro-rich and pro-corporation versus the other 99% of us.
This is selective right wing outrage; rather, many black speakers have addressed the occupy wall street protests across the country, including in New York City, and people of all religions and atheists. It is far more inclusive and broad based than the tea party. Further they have been addressed - and praised for their understanding of the issues - by noted economists and academics.
There have been a few right-wing provocateurs who have tried, largely unsuccessfully, to infiltrate these protests with the intention of being filmed causing trouble.
That is a right wing strategy - see the prank conversation where Governor Walker of Wisconsin thought he was talking to one of the Koch brothers, and openly admitted to considering that tactic himself, and the blog posts by admitted right wing would-be infiltrators as well.
I suppose it is a measure of the protests success that the right has started implementing these tactics.
Were you there? This person was and here is his version of events:
ReplyDeleteI don't speak for Occupy Atlanta, but I have been down there and feel I have a good for peoples views. It seems the media has started a smear campaign on the Occupy Atlanta movement, because of them "not letting John Lewis Speak." I was down at the General Assembly on Friday, and this is not what happened.
First he did not ask to speak. He was asked to speak and said he would. When it was announced that the GA had a special guest and that it was John Lewis he received a HUGE cheer and round of applause. When the proposal for John Lewis to speak was voted on the first time it was probably about 400 for and 2 against. One person didn't want it to be about specific people and the other was against it for procedural reasons. As proposals were revised and other people raised other objections most of which were over procedure it became clear that you couldn't get 100% agreement on this. Throughout the process people continued to thank John Lewis for being there and gratitude for his life long service. This took much longer than the 10 minute smear video would lead you to believe. This did lead to a huge frustration with many people in the crowd and some people definitely left. The thing to take away from this is democracy is dirty and hard.
This wasn't the only consensus that was extremely difficult to reach. It took nearly an hour of proposal, discussion, revised proposal, votes, and re-votes just to agree to occupy the park starting immediately. The facts are that when you have extremely diverse large groups consensus is nearly impossible. The group in Atlanta was old, young, Arab, Asian, Black, Latino, White, Democrat, Independent, Republican, we even had a don't tread on me flag. There were likely undercover cops and certainly people there to simply stir up trouble, and with the format of GA's one person can stall the whole process.
Continued.
ReplyDeleteJohn Lewis said he wasn't upset and that he would return at a later date. As somebody who very proudly voted for John Lewis for the first time (it was my first chance in his district) I was disappointed to not be able to to hear him speak. But it was because of the format of GA and procedural reasons, and I understand that. I hope he will come back to the park and speak, and I hope I'll be up there when he does.
So please people don't jump on the conservative smear wagon if you don't truly know what happened. If you don't understand the south don't jump on the racist stereotype bandwagon. Woodruff (now renamed Troy Davis Park) is literally adjacent from John Lewis's home office. It is on the corner of Auburn Ave the street Martin Luther King Jr. was born and had his church. The other side of the park is Georgia State University one of the most diverse Universities in the country. People in Atlanta know both about Auburn Ave and John Lewis's historical significance in the Civil Rights movement. There is an African American studies library blocks away. This isn't lost on residents. John Lewis has handily won every election he has ever run in this district since 1987. He has never received less than 69% of the vote, and in a bad climate in 2010 received 72% of the vote. The demographics of his district are 37.0% White, 56.1%Black, 2.2% Asian, 6.1% Hispanic, 0.2% Native American, and has a 10% LGBT community. So as you can see it is much more diverse than the country as a whole.
I know it's popular in liberal circles to hate on the south, but grow up this isn't the old south. Hell even in the Civil Rights movement Atlanta was known as the city to busy to hate. I'm not saying there isn't racism in Atlanta or the south for that matter. But it's not the driving factor that some try to make it out to be or seem to want it to be. So try and understand what really happened at the GA with John Lewis and lets all stand in solidarity instead of dividing in to factions.
Here is the interview with John Lewis about how the event unfolded:
podcasts.cnn.net/cnn/services/podcasting/audio/interviews/cnninterviewsa1009.mp3
Lewis contradicts what you are asserting and says that he was not denied a chance to speak.
Lewis contradicts what you are asserting and says that he was not denied a chance to speak.
ReplyDeleteOh, I must have missed the follow up video of that rousing speech he gave.........
No, Raging Idiot, you missed the invitation to come back at another time to speak.
ReplyDeleteI'm still waiting for you Rage, to explain your accusation that people are racists who have embraced speakers like Rev.Sharpton, and numerous other speakers of different ethnic backgrounds.
Were you going to get around to explaining that? Or are you going to try to deny facts, and pin your claims on someone turning up and not fitting in to the existing agenda, and trying to call that racism?
You laugh like a hyena, and if you work very hard, you might attain the value of one. Your tortured excuse for reason is truly sad, and seriously dishonest.
Racist idiot said:
ReplyDeleteOh, I must have missed the follow up video of that rousing speech he gave.........
Yes, you miss quite a bit.
Have you actually been to one of these protests?
Thanks for the laughs.