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Title: Occupy Wall Street Plans May Day Global Disruption of Status Quo
Source:
Bloomberg
URL Source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012- ... ption-of-status-quo-may-1.html
Published: Apr 30, 2012
Author: Henry Goldman and Esmé E. Deprez
Post Date: 2012-04-30 12:01:15 by Brian S
Keywords: None
Views: 2200
Comments: 3
Occupy Wall Street demonstrators, whose anti-greed message spread worldwide during an eight-week encampment in Lower Manhattan last year, plan marches across the globe tomorrow calling attention to what they say are abuses of power and wealth. Organizers say they hope the coordinated events will mark a spring resurgence of the movement after a quiet winter. Calls for a general strike with no work, no school, no banking and no shopping have sprung up on websites in Toronto, Barcelona, London, Kuala Lumpur and Sydney, among hundreds of cities in North America, Europe and Asia. In New York, Occupy Wall Street will join scores of labor organizations observing May 1, traditionally recognized as International Workers’ Day. They plan marches from Union Square to Lower Manhattan and a “pop-up occupation” of Bryant Park on Sixth Avenue, across the street from Bank of America’s Corp.’s 55-story tower. “We call upon people to refrain from shopping, walk out of class, take the day off of work and other creative forms of resistance disrupting the status quo,” organizers said in an April 26 e-mail. Occupy groups across the U.S. have protested economic disparity, decrying high foreclosure and unemployment rates that hurt average Americans while bankers and financial executives received bonuses and taxpayer-funded bailouts. In the past six months, similar groups, using social media and other tools, have sprung up in Europe, Asia and Latin America. The Occupy movement in New York has relied on demonstrations and marches around the city since Nov. 15, when police ousted hundreds of protesters from their headquarters in Zuccotti Park near Wall Street, where they had camped since Sept. 17. Banks have pooled resources and cooperated to gather intelligence after learning of plans to picket 99 institutions and companies, followed by what organizers have described as an 8 p.m. “radical after-party” in an undetermined Financial District location. “If the banks anticipate outrage from everyday citizens, it’s revealing of their own guilt,” said Shane Patrick, a member of the Occupy Wall Street press team. “If they hadn’t been participating in maneuvers that sent the economy into the ditch, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation.” New York police can handle picketers, according to Paul Browne, the department’s chief spokesman. “We’re experienced at accommodating lawful protests and responding appropriately to anyone who engages in unlawful activity, and we’re prepared to do both,” he said in an interview. About 2,100 Occupy Wall Street protesters in New York have been arrested since the demonstrations began, said Bill Dobbs, a member of the group’s media-relations team. In U.S. District Court in Manhattan today, four City Council members accused JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), Brookfield Office Properties Inc., Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, of suppressing free speech and using excessive force against protesters. Organizers describe the May Day events as a coming together of the Occupy movement, with activists also calling for more open immigration laws, expanded labor rights and cheaper financing for higher education. Financial institutions remain a primary target of the protests. “Four years after the financial crisis, not a single of the too-big-to-fail banks is smaller; in fact, they all continue to grow in size and risk,” the group’s press office said in an April 26 e-mail. Five banks -- JPMorgan, Bank of America, Citigroup Inc. (C), Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC), and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) together held $8.5 trillion in assets at the end of 2011, equal to 56 percent of the U.S. economy, compared with 43 percent in 2006, according to central bankers at the Federal Reserve. Occupy Wall Street began planning for May Day in January, meeting in churches and union halls with a decision-making system that avoids a single leader. Instead, participants rely on group “break-out” sessions in which clusters discuss such tasks as crowd-building, logistics and communications. About 150 attended an April 25 meeting at the Greenwich Village headquarters of the Amalgamated Clothing & Textile Workers Union, making last-minute preparations for how to deploy legal and medical help; site selection for picketing; purchasing, production and distribution of protest signs; and how to talk to reporters. The meeting convened inside the union hall basement, where attendees arranged chairs in a circle as three facilitators asked each of the assembled to identify themselves by first name and gender -- he, she or they. Most appeared under age 30, though gray-haired baby boomers also participated. One of the older attendees pulled a ski mask over his head to protest the presence of a photographer from Tokyo. Tomorrow, beginning at 8 a.m. in Bryant Park, scheduled events include teach-ins, art performances and a staging area for “direct action and civil disobedience,” such as bank blockades. Tom Morello of the Grammy Award-winning rock band Rage Against the Machine along with 1,000 other guitar-playing musicians will accompany a march to Union Square at 2 p.m., according to the maydaynyc.org website. That will be followed by a “unity rally” at Union Square at 4 p.m.; a march from there to Wall Street at 5:30 p.m.; and a walk to a staging area for “evening actions,” which organizers at the April 25 meeting said would be the so-called after-party. Occupy-related events are planned in 115 cities throughout the U.S., from college towns such as Amherst, Massachusetts, and Ann Arbor, Michigan, to Los Angeles, Houston, Chicago and Philadelphia. In San Francisco, a group calling itself the Golden Gate Bridge Labor Coalition abandoned a plan to close the span while carrying on with a day of picketing to support bridge, ferry and bus workers seeking reduced health-care benefit costs, according to its website. Across the bay in Oakland, protesters said they intend morning marches on banks and the Chamber of Commerce, followed by an afternoon rally and a march downtown. “We’re looking forward to vigorously asserting our constitutional right to protest and giving a loud outcry about Wall Street and greed,” Dobbs said. “We’re hoping this will make a splash. We hope it will bring a lot of more people into the Occupy movement.”
Pooling Resources
Police Prepared
Come Together
Planning Meeting
Raging Musicians
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#1. To: Brian S (#0)
So........................? LOL!
It's early yet, most occupiers sleep all day and take "direct action" in the late afternoon and evening. These "Black Bloc" community organizers are getting an early start. SEATTLE -- Downtown Seattle erupted in chaos Tuesday as black-clad May Day demonstrators marauded through the downtown shopping district, smashing plate glass windows at banks and retail outlets, spray-painting cars and slashing tires. Some arrests were reported in May Day protests in Portland, Ore., as well. Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn signed an emergency order authorizing police to confiscate sticks, tire irons, hammers and other implements that might be used for continued destruction, though the worst of the mayhem appeared to have died down by midafternoon. The order was targeted at protesters who carried flags and protest signs on long, heavy poles during marches that began shortly after noon. Police say the protesters then converted the poles to implements of urban destruction, attacking targets from Starbucks to NikeTown. “The 1st Amendment uses of 5-foot-long, 3-inch-wide sticks is outweighed by our authority … to confiscate weapons,” McGinn said at a hastily called news conference. “When you get a group of people who are committed to cause damage, carrying weapons that they are using in a way that they’re flags or some other type of item … [then] they move quickly and disperse rapidly and hit multiple points, it’s difficult for the police to react fast enough to respond to that,” the mayor said. Intense protests also broke out in Portland, where police reported at least a dozen arrests during long-planned May Day marches. Authorities said the problems in Seattle began after a group of about 300 apparently peaceful protesters marched from Seattle Central Community College, formerly the scene of the long-running Occupy Seattle camp, toward the heart of downtown at Westlake Park. From there, a group of about 75 protesters adopting the “black bloc” style of black clothing and masks began attacking banks, stores and a few upscale cars. “By 12:35, we had reports from officers of paint and rocks flying, hammers and tire irons being used to damage property,” McGinn said. There were also reports of “sound bombs” and firecrackers being used, and local television showed a small fire in one location. But arrests were difficult because many of the black bloc protesters then changed their clothing and blended back into the crowd, authorities and witnesses said. Police Chief John Diaz said he had received worrisome reports before Tuesday’s events that anarchist groups were planning to disrupt the city’s traditional May Day marches. “This is a city that loves protests, that’s proud of their ability to have protests, and the vast majority of the time, we’re able to do it quite well,” Diaz told reporters. “It’s extremely unfortunate that we have small groups of people wanting to hijack these events,” he said. “There has been a couple of arrests, and I guarantee there will be more before the end of the evening.” Police said the courthouse used by judges of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals was among the buildings damaged, along with branches of Wells Fargo, Bank of America, HSBC and Homestreet banks. In Portland, nonviolent protesters marched through the city and through a major downtown shopping mall, banging drums and chanting, “Whose streets? Our streets!” Police said protesters left the city’s Waterfront Park at about noon and almost immediately began walking into traffic, where they were confronted by police who made several arrests. At least two banks reported vandalism, including damage to an ATM and broken glass doors, with additional damage reports still flowing in, the Portland Police Bureau said in a statement. Additional marches were planned throughout the afternoon in both cities.
Obama's watch stopped on 24 May 2008, but he's been too busy smoking crack to notice.
There has been a couple of arrests, and I guarantee there will be more before the end of the evening.” Oh my God, how stupid can some people be? "I know, let's all dress in all black. That way the cops won't know who did it!" LMAO!!! They should be prosecuted under the RICO Act, for organized crime. Then lobotomized, for being stupid.
#2. To: We The People, Brian S (#1)
(Edited)
So........................?
May Day in Seattle: Black-clad protesters smash bank, shop windows
Protesters smash shop windows during May Day protests in Seattle. (Joshua Trujillo / Seattlepi.com / May 1, 2012) 
"We (government) need to do a lot less, a lot sooner" ~Ron Paul
#3. To: hondo68 (#2)
These "Black Bloc" community organizers are getting an early start.
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