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Occupy Reading (MA) will send contingent to Boston for Occupy the Courts protest
Reading 99 percent will send a contingent to the Occupy the Courts protest in Boston on Jan. 20. They are exploring the possibilities of a local resolution opposing corporate personhood and money as speech. Economic justice is an important overriding principle for the group.
http://tinyurl.com/6vymh47 Nationwide: Day of Action – Occupy the Courts! (announcement with details about event mentioned above) Occupy the Courts will be a one day occupation of Federal courthouses across the country, including the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., on Friday January 20, 2012. http://tinyurl.com/6pbbzop Global Revolution HQ Raided in Bushwick; 6 Arrested A prominent source for Occupy Wall Street’s global outreach and live streaming was reportedly shut down by the New York City Police Department last night. Global Revolution, a website which has broadcast Occupy Wall Street coverage since the movement’s inception in September, claims it received an eviction notice at its Brooklyn studios on Monday night. The notice states the production space is “imminently perilous to life,” and adds, “Violators of the Commissioner’s Vacate Order are subject to arrest.” http://tinyurl.com/7yh5qt3 The Morning Crawl. There are 848 stories in today’s crawl, a compilation of RSS news feeds from MSM and major alternative media. Go here for the crawl or click the “continue reading” link below to continue reading the digest, which has much fewer links but may include more articles from smaller sources and commentators that publish less frequently.
Occupy Wall Street’s Livestream Operators Arrested Occupy Wall Street is in the middle of one of its day-long marches in New York Tuesday, protesting the National Defense Authorization Act, but for those following along on the Global Revolution livestream, the real action is happening in the broadcast studio itself. That’s because police have apparently just raided the Brooklyn studio of Globalrevolution.tv and taken some of the project’s key volunteers into custody. The raid Tuesday follows a notice to vacate that police delivered to the Bushwick studio on Monday night. Victoria Sobel, a Global Revolution volunteer, said Vlad Teichberg and a guy named Spike, both of whom maintain the live feed aggregator, had been taken into custody by police, along with four or five others. http://tinyurl.com/7xj9qtu Global Revolution TV Has Been Evicted From Their Brooklyn Production Space Global Revolution reports that after last night’s eviction, the police returned today to arrest six people: Six people in total were arrested at 13 Thames between 2-3pm on January 3rd and charged with Trespass, Obstructing Governmental Administration and Resisting Arrest. They are likely to remain in jail overnight. http://tinyurl.com/7lhfjy8 Occupy: Biggest story of 2011 looks like it will be around for awhile Occupy Wall Street was one of the biggest stories of 2011. And it’s beginning to look like it’s going to be around for awhile. The Occupy movement was one of the main themes of the first day of the four-day College Convention 2012 in Concord. Mark Provost, a member of Occupy Boston and Occupy New Hampshire, was one of the first to speak. He said while there can be argument about whether Occupy Wall Street is good or bad, “I don’t think there’s any debate that this country needs it.” He also spoke of the “scandalous level” of inequality in the U.S., saying the movement “strikes at the heart of a growing class consciousness.” http://tinyurl.com/7prcm7k Naomi Wolf: The streets of 2012 What does the New Year hold for the global wave of protest that erupted in 2011? Did the surge of anger that began in Tunisia crest in lower Manhattan, or is 2012 likely to see an escalation of the politics of dissent? The answers are alarming, but quite predictable: We are likely to see much greater centralization of top-down suppression — and a rash of laws around the developed and developing world that restrict human rights. But we are also likely to see significant grassroots reaction. What we are witnessing in the drama of increasingly globalized protest and repression is the subplot that many cheerleaders for neoliberal globalization never addressed: the power of globalized capital to wreak havoc with the authority of democratically elected governments. From the perspective of global corporate interests, closed societies like China are more business-friendly than troublesome democracies, where trade unions, high standards of human-rights protection, and a vigorous press increase costs. Rift in Occupy Buffalo leads some protesters to form splinter group A rift over Occupy Buffalo’s short-lived expansion into Lafayette Square has formed in the movement, leading to the formation of a new splinter group, now calling itself Occupy Western New York. “The tactics are different, but the goals are the same,” Occupy Western New York organizer and occupier Chris Phillips said in explaining the split before a news conference Tuesday. “We are deeply concerned about the rift,” he said. “They’re our brothers and sisters. They’re like family to me. It’s kind of like an open wound. It’s been very painful.” http://tinyurl.com/77nxbcs In Springfield, postal workers seek support from Occupy as government threatens to shut rural processing center Postal workers protesting a plan to close Springfield’s mail processing and distribution center hope others voice opposition to the plan tonight at a public meeting. Closing the facility, which has about 260 workers, would eliminate good-paying jobs and mean mail would take several days to deliver, American Postal Workers Union local president Bruce Lincoln said.
The processing center already has seen some cuts and more are expected, Lincoln said. “During the Christmas season, some of the mail took two weeks to get to the rural facilities,” he said.
http://tinyurl.com/6pzpkec
Postal unions under the gun
The proposed elimination of 120,000 postal jobs has been delayed–for now. But United States Postal Service executives insist that sweeping reductions in the workforce are needed to cover a $5.5 billion budget gap in retirement benefits–a deficit that was manufactured to justify an attack on postal unions.
.. . . Beyond the cost to service, the rush to close allows officials to cut sweet real estate deals for themselves or their friends. In 2011, the USPS Office of the Inspector General discovered USPS management is leasing 982 properties from current and former employees. This came on the tail of a management kickback scheme involving the USPS vehicle fleet. The closures are also a way for USPS to do an end run around the recently ratified APWU contract. The postmaster general’s “Village Post Office” experiment of moving postal products into supermarkets and convenience stores will replace federally employed, unionized retail clerks with nonunion, minimum-wage workers and kiosks. The APWU contract isn’t directly violated; the USPS simply moves union members’ work elsewhere. Man missed flight after leaflets hold-up John Charles Culatto – rumoured to be an Occupy London protestor – was due to fly to Malaga on Christmas Eve when security scanners found the leaflets in his hand luggage. It is not known whether the leaflets were connected to the economic protests which have seen hundreds campaign outside St Paul’s Cathedral. Mr Culatto missed his flight because he initially refused to remove the leaflets from his bag. “Security staff were concerned that he may cause disruption by distributing the leaflets on the flight or in the departure lounge and distribution of any leaflets on the premises requires prior permission from the airport.” http://tinyurl.com/7c9pyke Occupy Iowa protesters heckle Romney at Iowa caucus speech Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney dealt with chants of “Stop the war on the poor!” from Occupy Iowa protesters during a campaign speech in Clive, Iowa, Monday night, The Des Moines Register reports. ‘Uncommitted’ wins some delegate seats in Iowa after Occupy protest vote effort Iowa City’s precinct 15 appears to have elected 3 Obama county delegates and a single uncommitted delegate. Iowa City’s precinct 17 elected 5 Obama delegates and 2 for uncommitted. Another commenter to Bleeding Heartland, a progressive blog in Iowa, notes that he was the person who put uncommitted over 15% in his precinct – resulting in 6 Obama delegates and 1 for uncommitted. ‘Occupy’ protesters say voices were heard at caucuses Occupy Des Moines declared its own winner Tuesday in the Iowa caucuses: “the 99 percent.” After a chaotic week of demonstrations, protesters added up some other numbers: protests at 10 locations, 61 arrests, visitors from about 20 states and seven countries, and $2,000 raised. Tuesday night, they celebrated. “We are gathered in celebration of a true winner,” said Aaron Jorgensen-Briggs. “It’s not a corporate candidate. Not a bought-and-paid-for political puppet serving a bought-and-paid-for political party. But a powerful and effective grass-roots political movement of, for and by the people of the U.S., the 99 percent.” Associated Press slams Occupy performance during Iowa caucuses Following Tuesday’s vote in Iowa, on which the movement had little impact, Occupy organizers are pledging to stage more protests in New Hampshire and South Carolina as the presidential nomination process moves east. But the smaller-than-expected crowds, a muddled message that was mostly ignored by candidates, and tactics that seem to limit their appeal raised questions about its long-term viability. http://tinyurl.com/6p6ptch Obama Signs Police State Legislation President Barack Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) into law on New Year’s Eve. The bill provides a massive $662 billion for the US war machine and makes unprecedented inroads into democratic rights, authorizing the US military to seize individuals anywhere in the world and hold them in a military detention facility indefinitely, without a trial or any other legal recourse. Congressional Democrats and Republicans ratified the NDAA in a series of House and Senate votes in November and December that beat back nearly all efforts to set limits to the presidential power to arrest and imprison without trial or charge. As Republican Senator Lindsey Graham emphasized during the congressional debate, the legislation defines the entire world to be part of the battlefield against Al Qaeda, including the territory of the United States itself, making every human being on the planet, including every American citizen, a potential prisoner of the American military. Obama fails to appoint administrator to new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Today was the day that legal experts and many aides in both parties thought President Obama would provide a recess appointment to Richard Cordray, his nominee to administer the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. But a senior administration official who would not be quoted told reporters at a White House background briefing Tuesday that Obama will not take advantage of that opening. The Republican Candidates’ Economic Agenda for the 1 Percent This Tuesday, Iowans will officially kick off the process to nominate the Republican candidate for president. A close examination of all of the GOP candidates’ records and policy positions reveals that Mitt Romney is not the only candidate who “represents the one percent.” All of the Republican candidates share at least one thing in common: an economic agenda that will benefit the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans at the expense of the other 99 percent. All of the candidates would take us back to the Bush-era policies that increased income inequality, resulted in the worst job growth in decades, exploded the deficit and national debt, and ultimately crashed the economy. Indeed, the policies proposed by the candidates would not only embrace this failed economic agenda, they would take it even further. http://tinyurl.com/7p6ehxj New York Times Gives Millions to CEO While Pushing Concessions on Union Writing earlier this year in an article titled “Why Not Occupy the Newsroom”, New York Times media columnist David Carr wrote on the seething inequality between top managers in the news industry and workers: The optics of the bonuses are far worse than the practical impact. Newspapers are asking their employees for shared sacrifice and their digital readers to begin paying. So, lucrative packages won’t cut it. As newspapers all over the country struggle to divine the meaning of the Occupy protests, some of the companies that own them might want to listen closely to see if there is a message there meant for them. http://tinyurl.com/6r43pl2 Chris Hedges “Brace Yourself! The American Empire Is Over & The Descent Is Going To Be Horrifying” (video) 2011: A Year in Revolt Fueled by anger at the growing disparities between rich and poor, frustrated by government policies that benefit a tiny elite at the expense of the majority, and tired of the establishment’s failure to address fundamental economic inequalities, OWS offered a new solution. We built a People’s Kitchen to feed thousands, opened a People’s Library, created safer spaces, and provided free shelter, bedding, medical care, and other necessities to anyone who needed them. While cynics demanded we elect leaders and make demands on politicians, we were busy creating alternatives to those very institutions. A revolution has been set in motion, and we cannot be stopped. http://tinyurl.com/6pd2ptk Flying While Anarchist: The Black Bloc Whipping Boy For the Security State There was once a bargain offered to the more privileged inhabitants of the world’s more privileged nation states. It went something like this: We will treat people with brown skin and funny clothes who talk funny and follow a funny religion as if they were criminals. We will at worst lock them up without actually following the normal procedure for dealing with suspected criminal activity, and at best just make their lives more inconvenient and demeaning on a fairly regular basis. Freedoms that are promised to you, the white-skinned, clean-cut, affluent men and women who speak English fluently and are nationals of the right countries, will not be afforded to them. You can travel with ease around most parts of the world; they will be faced with constant restrictions and obstacles. It was a horrible bargain, but taken at face value and viewed strictly in terms of self-interest without any solidarity (as it was meant to be viewed), the deal had appeal for those on the privileged side. But like all divide-and-conquer deals offered by those in power – setting the middle class up against the working class, the working class against the “undeserving poor,” or white workers against immigrants and people of color – it was ultimately a sham. Two events from the holiday season point towards the breaking of this bargain, and the revelation that, in fact, once those in power have realized they can get away with treating someone a certain way, they gain the appetite to treat anyone they like that way. Guy Fawkes Takes to Malaysia’s Streets in New Year Protest Skipping New Year Eve celebration parties, hundreds of people in Guy Fawkes masks gathered in downtown Kuala Lumpur last weekend in a peaceful protest to demand greater democratic freedom in the country. The “V For Merdeka”, or “V For Freedom”, event centered on recent legislation passed by Malaysia’s parliament that opposition parties and human rights activists say will curtail protest marches in the country. The Irish squatters taking on empty homes and a bankrupt system As Ireland reels from yet another austere budget and a year of economic pain, a group of young activists have begun to take over empty properties spawned by the boomand abandoned by banks and property developers across the country. The squatters, linked to Ireland’s Occupy movement, say they plan a mass occupation of houses and flats owned by the Irish government’s “bad bank”, National Asset Management Agency (Nama), which took over thousands of properties that speculators handed back after the crash. |
One Response to “The OB Media Rundown for 1/4/12”
Reading 99% will be Jan 4, 7:30 – 9:00 p.m. at the Reading Senior Center, 49 Pleasant Street. Please spread the word so we can grow our group.