Wall Street "Occupation" Starting Today

Taking their cue from the sidewalk sleepover protest this summer known as "Bloombergville",  thousands of demonstrators are expected to converge in the financial district today for some free-floating street theater in what is being called the Occupation of Wall Street.  It's the latest in a whole series of protests against budget cuts and financial malfeasance -- but this time, the event is getting the attention of the mainstream media.

Do you suppose it's because the whole Arab Spring phenonemon now holds a certain trendy allure for the corporate journalists?  The first Wall Street "Day of Rage" last March sponsored by New Yorkers Against Budget Cuts only got mentioned in a few independent blogs and Al Jazeera, even though it attracted thousands of people.  This time, the anti-consumerism magazine "AdBusters" was doing the (loose) organizing and perhaps is savvier at publicity and use of social media to get the message out... via Twitter and Facebook.

All indications are that this day of leaderless, mellow musical rage will be similar to previous demonstrations, but some media (especially right wing media) are forecasting a Marxist bloodbath.  Mayor Michael Bloomberg was on the radio warning that the high youth unemployment rate could lead to riots in the streets -- though he didn't really specify his streets, on this particular day.

The culmination of today's events will be a 3 p.m. rally at Chase Square. According to the website OccupyWallSt, the NYPD is expecting total crowds of about 5000. Participants hope the protests last until December, or at least through Monday, when President Obama is due in town to speak to the U.N. (and raise some bundled Wall Street cash).*

This summer's peaceful encampment ended after a few weeks with the arrests of what were called "The Bloombergville 13" on charges of obstructing traffic.  In New York City, it is legal to sleep on the sidewalks as long as you only take up half the walkway so as not to trip up pedestrians. And despite what the poster above advises, tents are supposedly illegal within the city limits. If you come, bundle up.  The nights are getting nippy in the concrete and steel canyon.




Wall Street Day of Rage, March 2011 (it was peaceful)



* Update: Live feeds and tweets can be found here.http://www.livestream.com/globalrevolution

Eat with Barack and Fight the Attacks!

The title of my latest email from Barack was "Karen, Can We Meet for Dinner?"

 I don't know about you, but this is the first time in my longish life that I have ever opened a dinner invitation only to find out that it's a bait and switch gimmick to win a coveted date with the man of my dreams -- that first I will have to plunk down 15 bucks and even then, I have only a slim chance of winning dinner with Barack. Wow. And they said the Clintons were tacky for renting out the Lincoln Bedroom.


That creepy email went unanswered by me, and,I suspect. by thousands of other disappointed lovesick "folks" who are aghast that Dear Leader would be renting himself out this way -- because today I got a follow-up missive from Campaign Manager Jim Messina, titled "About That Dinner".

Karen --
You got an email from the President a couple days ago, inviting you to sit down to dinner with him.

 (And I didn't even have the decency to RSVP.  How veddy rude).

I know some people might think this is just some kind of trick or something. It's not. 

( Actually, I thought it was totally legit until you brought up the tricky part yourself, you idiot.) 

The fact is that someday soon, four people reading this note right now will be on a plane to have dinner with President Obama in Washington, or Chicago, or wherever he might be that day. 

(It will definitely be in Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina.... or in any battleground state that has a restaurant with a condemned shovel-ready bridge in the background.) 

Think about that for a second. The four people who win will sit down with the President of the United States of America -- not for a two-minute photo-op or a quick meet-and-greet, but for a private meal with face-to-face conversation. That's just not something too many people will ever get to do.

(Ten minutes for a bolted-down meal sounds so pleasant. What if he asks a question and my mouth is full of chili-dogs or whatever folksy food is on the menu?) 

The President obviously has very little time to spend on anything related to the campaign. And this is how he chooses to spend it -- having real, substantive conversations with people like you.

(All those frequent taxpayer-funded Air Force One trips to factories in battleground states have absolutely nothing to do with the campaign.  They are high governance in its purest form.  And speaking of purest, no purists allowed at this meal.  Only centrist pragmatic progressives, preferably from the independent heartland of the polls).

This is really something you should be a part of.

(But I won't be, because the odds of this happening are about on a par with getting on "Dancing With the Stars" or being struck by lightning.) 

Donate $15 today and you'll be automatically entered for the chance to have dinner with President and three other supporters.
Worst-case scenario: you don't get selected.

(Uh-uh. Worst case scenario is one in six Americans now lives in poverty and if selected, couldn't afford a new outfit for the dinner, let alone gas for the trip to the airport.  Let alone the 15 bucks.) 

 But if you donate, you'll have pitched in to support an organization that's funded at the grassroots level by folks across the country -- not Washington lobbyists or special-interest PACs. You'll have given this campaign a boost, however small, to hire organizers, open offices, and build our organization this fall so it's ready for the hard work ahead of us. 

(There are two campaigns: the folk-funded one using unpaid f***ed folk slaves, and the real one, funded by Wall Street and union-busting billionaire hotel chain heiresses from Chicago.)

And best-case scenario, you'll find yourself sitting across the dinner table from President Obama.

(I can think of about a million better case scenarios in my own particular life and in the lives of the American underclass in general, thank you very much).

 So give it a shot -- donate $15 or more today:

Thanks,
Messina

(Why do you always close your emails with just your last name?  There has to be some deep and disturbing psychological explanation for it, and frankly, I don't want to know what it is.)

Reported!  The Evil John Bolton Falsely Accuses Obama of Hating Your Guns.

Speaking of disturbing.... I have been meaning to write about another weird email I got a few days ago from "Messina". It seems he wants folks like me to troll the internets looking for trash talk about Barack and then report back to a very special website to report the trash. It's called AttackWatch.com. and it's filled with scary grainy photos of Obamenemies such as John Bolton, who is spreading the outrageous false rumor that Barack wants to take away everybody's guns!  The horror!  We certainly have to nip that untrue rumor right in the bud, pragmatists!  Because Obama is very much pro-Second Amendment and reneged on his campaign promise to ban assault weapons.  He even wants to keep the clips, because the answer to the Gabby Giffords shooting is that we can all just get along in a bipartisanshippy way.

Next thing you know, some evil Teabagger will be spreading the awful rumor that the Dinner With Barack sweepstakes is a scam.

Panic, Fire, Indict

As I watch the Republican debates, I realize that we are on the brink of a crazy person running our nation. I sit in front of the television and shudder at the thought of one of these creationism-loving, global-warming-denying, immigration-bashing, Social-Security-cutting, clean-air-hating, mortality-fascinated, Wall-Street-protecting Republicans running my country. -- CNN contributor James Carville.

As I saw the clip of James Carville waxing hysterical about the Tea Party candidates, I couldn't help but wonder how he can, in good conscience, draw a paycheck from the same network that "teamed up" with the Tea Party Express to present a travesty of a GOP debate Monday night.  The only thing worse than watching some of the reverential 9/11 coverage on CNN was being subjected to the pre-debate hype. Interspersed with the endless images of collapsing towers, it was a real double dip treat of fear dished out by a cable TV "news" outlet seemingly now vying with Fox for all those Koch Brothers advertising dollars.

In any case, I enjoyed Carville's colorful tirade.  Another quotable quote from his laundry list of advice to Obama:

 Fire somebody. No -- fire a lot of people. This may be news to you but this is not going well. For precedent, see Russian Army 64th division at Stalingrad. There were enough deaths at Stalingrad to make the entire tea party collectively orgasm.

Since the Republicans won the erstwhile solidly Democratic seat of Anthony Weiner the other day, the Democrats are already in full panic throttle.  Did you notice that first thing this morning, the White House suddenly let it be known that Social Security is now off the Grand Bargaining Table?  This, just a day or two after it floated a trial balloon to telegraph that Obama still wanted those benefits cut. It probably had more to do with septuagenarian crooner Pat Boone's Republican robocalls warning NYC voters of Obama's plans for their benefits, and the subsequent Congressional GOP rout, than with any change of heart on the president's part toward the well-being of retirees.  If it's not about his re-election, it doesn't exist.

Now that Obama can no longer take New York for granted, maybe he'll set foot here for a purpose other than collecting millions at the fund-raising dinners of his wealthy bundlers. New York State extends far beyond Manhattan and Westchester. Just ask the drowned communities in the Hudson Valley and Catskills.

But as far as indicting any Wall Street miscreants is concerned, it's not gonna happen. He begged banker tool Timothy Geithner to stay. He just hired banker tool Bill Daley to be his chief of staff. The last thing in the world Obama would ever do would be to dump on his own constituency. 

Hymne a L'Obama

"If you love me, you've got to help me pass this bill." -- Barack Obama, North Carolina speech.

"If the sun should tumble from the sky,
If the sea should suddenly run dry,
If you love me, really love me,
Let it happen, I won't care.

If it seems that everything is lost,
I will smile and never count the cost,
If you love me, really love me,
Let it happen, darling, I won't care.

Shall I catch a shooting star?
Shall I bring it where you are?
If you want me to, I will.
You can set me any task.
I'll do anything you ask,
If you'll only love me still". -- Edith Piaf, Hymne a L'Amour

King of Swing (States)

Normally, when  somebody in a frenzy-whipped Obama campaign rally yells out "I love you", the perennial candidate/sometime President replies: "I love you back!"  In this case it was probably too much to expect a response along the lines of "If you love your country, support this bill."  

Unfortunately when we set him any task (like a Public Option, protecting the environment, stopping the wars), he does virtually nothing that we ask.  It does indeed seem that everything is lost, and the cost is all on us.

A Teacher's View

Guest Post by Valerie Long Tweedie

People who buy into the idea of Charter Schools think they will be getting a private school education on the government's dime. They believe that their children will be in a school where the school will pick and choose the students and only the best students will get in - the riff-raff will have to go somewhere else. (Where they don’t specify – but it is the old “not in my backyard scenario.”) The problem of how to educate children with special needs will not be addressed. These are the expensive children to educate so no charter school will want them. I think anyone can see where this is going – “My kid is the only one who is important and to hell with the rest of you.”

This selfish, amoral attitude is the problem with our youth today – and it is equally a problem with the adults. As a nation, we have lost our compassion and our generosity; that belief that I am willing to have a little bit less so that someone else, less fortunate than I, can have a little more.  THAT is what is wrong with our world today - no empathy, no ability to try to walk in someone else’s shoes, no appreciation for the advantages that have been afforded us and a recognition that others are not always equally advantaged. When I talk to conservatives complaining about the welfare state, saying charity is not the government’s job, I always ask them, “How much did you give to charity last year?” They always sputter about sponsoring some child in Mexico and giving to their church. The truth is, there isn’t much “Christian Charity” to be found these days and that is not the fault of the public schools.

I was a teacher in public school in Washington State until five years ago. In days gone by if there was a fight on the playground, we would have a class meeting about it. We would discuss how it happened and look at the situation from all sides. We would discuss what was fair and what was right and sometimes, we would acknowledge that someone behaved badly because (s)he was frustrated and hurt. We would talk about whether letting someone play as opposed to excluding that child was really such a terrible price to pay for having a good learning environment where everyone felt valued. I valorised children who were kind and patient and inclusive. Those kids got leadership positions – because they WERE leaders. These class meetings took time, but educators realised that schools were microcosms of society and the parents, teachers and society as a whole accepted that one of the tenets of public education was to socialise children as preparation for them being contributing members of American society. Looking back, I realise how important these lessons were to instilling democratic values in our students. 

 But in the years leading up to my leaving the States, school was about one thing and one thing only – test scores. Teachers were told on a daily basis how the “schools were failing our students” and what a crappy job teachers were doing. As if all teachers had to do was open up their students' heads and pour in the knowledge. Time for class meetings and “morality” lessons had to be stolen from the curriculum and weren’t considered a good use of class time. Morality and socialising were seen as being in the domain of parents (only) – great if you were blessed with great parents, not so great if you had a dysfunctional family. 

I have taught in high socioeconomic public schools in both the U.S. and Germany and in low socioeconomic public schools in the U.S. And I have taught in private schools all over the world as well - some of them prestigious, some of them low fee parochial. The truth is this: how well children learn and how well they get along with others is heavily influenced by their home environment. If kids are less moral today – more selfish, more inconsiderate, more disrespectful and more focussed on material possessions than they are on their fellow man – that is more a reflection of their families and the values they are being taught at home than it is of the schools they attend. I can tell you, as a teacher, I love having kids in class who are taught to consider someone else and not just themselves. But in our world today, parents are focussed on wanting to make their child feel wonderful and unique, but unfortunately have neglected to teach these same children that others matter just as much as they do.

Saving Adolescent Degenerates, Conservative Style

It is of course pure coincidence that right before the House Republicans bring up a bill to help fund profiteering "charter schools" with taxpayer dollars, David Brooks writes a column about a three-year-old sociological study purporting to find that today's youth are degenerate, selfish and stupid. This sad state of affairs, he insinuates, results from those inept, unionized public schools falling down on the job. He conveniently fails to mention that the study and resulting book he so glowingly shills were funded by a major right-wing conservative "philanthropist."  He conveniently fails to mention the charter schools legislation coming up for a vote today.


The study Brooks touts was led by Christian Smith, professor of Notre Dame University, chronic and grateful recipient of much largesse from the Lilly Foundation, the charitable trust begun by pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly.  This foundation is a major funder of such right-wing think tanks as the Hudson Institute and The Manhattan Institute.  According to Right Wing Watch, the latter entity has among its many goals the funding and promotion of .... charter schools!  Entities embracing free market capitalism and evangelical Christianity are magnets for Lilly money. 


In his column, Brooks writes of the sociologists' brain-picking of 230 anonymous slackers:

Smith and company found an atmosphere of extreme moral individualism — of relativism and nonjudgmentalism. Again, this doesn’t mean that America’s young people are immoral. Far from it. But, Smith and company emphasize, they have not been given the resources — by schools, institutions and families — to cultivate their moral intuitions, to think more broadly about moral obligations, to check behaviors that may be degrading. In this way, the study says more about adult America than youthful America.

Translation: today's youths are totally laid-back and just too cool with everything... gay rights, women's rights, immigrant rights, civil rights.  The public schools are simply not teaching them to be judgmental idealogues like David Brooks.  The callow young people must be carefully taught to develop prejudices and reactionary thought processes.  And their parents are just a bunch of lazy hippies to have raised such a generation of free thinkers.


Which brings us to H.R. 2218, The Empowering Parents Through Quality Charter Schools Act.  This bill, coming up for a vote in the House today, will make it easier for the privatized, non-union Charter Schools to set up shop.  How it empowers parents is anybody's guess, but I think empowerment in GOP-speak means profits for charter schools.  Because without charter schools, the parents of David Brooks's addled imagination are a bunch of wet noodles, and his conservative friends cannot profit.


So when the Republicans bitch and moan that we have too much debt to fix up our crumbling schools and hire back all those laid-off teachers, it beggars belief that they would be willing to fund construction and renovation of charter schools.  Well, no. It doesn't.


Isaiah Poole of Campaign for America's Future explains it this way: 

It would give federal funding priority to states that repeal limits on the number of charter schools that can be chartered or the percentage of the state's school-age population attending charters. It would also give priority funding to states that finance charter schools at a level comparable to public school funding. And it contains assistance to charter schools to help with construction or repair costs.

We've had 20 years of experience in charter schools since the concept was born in Minnesota in the early 1990s, and what we've learned in that time is that charter schools are not a panacea. "The media regularly covers great charter schools, and news stories about low-performing public schools abound," notes the Education Justice website. "It would be easy to conclude that charter schools are, on average, better than public schools. It would also be wrong." 

Which brings us back to the David Brooks screed.  In his inimitable passive-aggressive oblique fashion, he is cheerleading the destruction of the public education system without coming right out and saying so.  He instead pretends to care about the angst of a new Lost Generation which needs to be brought out of its amoral darkness and into the bright light of capitalism, and taught how to be part of the greater society.  He just doesn't mention it's the Society of Elites and that their saviors are out to make a fast buck educating them the conservative way. Because greed is so damned good.



More Academic Fanfare for the Uncommon Man



Saluting Generation 911

Our elected officials have taken a solemn vow not to politicize the 10th anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks.  Apparently, they meant on 9/11 itself, when they will show up and allegedly shut up.  But I guess Nine Eleven Eve doesn't count, because  President Obama unashamedly chose to politicize the event in his weekly radio address on Saturday morning. 

Slick product of an award-winning marketing campaign that he is, Obama couldn't resist coining a new phrase to mark our national day of celebratory paranoia.  He calls those who serve in the military and homeland security "our extraordinary 9/11 generation."

That sounds even more patriotic-trendy than The Greatest Generation, who are dying off at alarming rates and are just so World War Two.  And then there's the "Me Generation" of selfish draft dodging baby boomers  who want to cut their own grandkids off at the knees in their gluttonous consumption of Medicare.  Gen X is just too anonymous and conspiracy theory-sounding and let's face it, closing in on middle age. Millennials  conjure up visions of unemployed slackers living in parental basements.... and the unemployment crisis in general.  We can't have that during a re-election campaign, can we?

The 9/11 Generation of Obama's imagination is youthful, virile, bellicose and nationalistic.  Maybe he and his PR flacks got the idea from the old "Pepsi Generation" ad campaigns, whose creator said:

  "For us to name and claim a whole generation after our product was a rather courageous thing that we weren't sure would take off." The Pepsi Generation was one of the first and best known instances of what came to be known as "lifestyle marketing". It focused on portraying Pepsi drinkers as possessing desirable qualities such as youth, rather than on the characteristics of the product itself. ... "Pepsi was young, spirited, people doing active things—playing volleyball on the beach.... but younger we said in mind, in attitude, in feeling. Young in spirit. Young in heart."

And since Obama's own young, hip campaign logo bears some resemblance to the Pepsi symbol, the Nine Eleven Generation gizmo can't be far behind:




Be All That You Can Be, Nine Eleveners!



Here are a few choice excerpts from the president's remarks today, along with some totally gratuitous and and unpatriotic interpretations. ( His words speak volumes all by themselves, but who can resist this fish-in-a-barrel opportunity).

At the same time, even as we reflect on a difficult decade, we must look forward, to the future we will build together.  That includes staying strong and confident in the face of any threat.  And thanks to the tireless efforts of our military personnel and our intelligence, law enforcement and homeland security professionals—there should be no doubt.  Today, America is stronger and al Qaeda is on the path to defeat.

It's been a whole decade, yet all two dozen members of al Qaeda are merely "on the path to defeat."  We are in Endless Wartimes and have spent ourselves into  the ground in a Military Industrial Complex boondoggle.  We look forward, not backward, by choosing not to prosecute the Bush War Crimes.

We’ve taken the fight to al Qaeda like never before.  Over the past two and a half years, more senior al Qaeda leaders have been eliminated than at any time since 9/11.  And thanks to the remarkable courage and precision of our forces, we finally delivered justice to Osama bin Laden.

I killed Osama, I killed Osama, I killed Osama. Justice is for courtrooms and Judge Judy.

We’ve strengthened the partnerships and tools we need to prevail in this war against al Qaeda—working closer with allies and partners; reforming intelligence to better detect and disrupt plots; investing in our Special Forces so terrorists have no safe haven.

We poured billions into the coffers of defense contractors.  I am best buddies and allied with my partners, the CEOs of G.E. and Honeywell.  We redefined "intelligence" to mean mediocrity, and warrantless wiretapping, and spying on American citizens.  The government definition of "reforming", as you all know, is slashing -- as in, "reforming" Medicare. 

We have disrupted plots orchestrated by FBI operatives themselves in order to entrap citizens.  Real plots have been thwarted by airplane passengers jumping the Underpants Bomber and a couple of street vendors spotting a smoking car in Times Square. But the system worked. Homeland Security Chief Janet Napolitano justified her job by saying so.  A whole bunch of those Special Forces we invested in got shot down in a helicopter after they performed a "night raid" in an Afghan village.  Their dog died too. No word on civilian casualties in that night raid.

We’re constantly working to improve the security of our homeland as well—at our airports, ports and borders; enhancing aviation security and screening; increasing support for our first responders; and working closer than ever with states, cities and communities.

We just ordered a few more million dollars' worth of rapi-scanners for Airport Security Theater.  We will continue groping down nonagenarians and removing their Depends to make you safe. We are forcing cities to participate in our "Secure Communities " program, resulting in the deportation of more Dream Act candidates than in any previous administration.  New York, Chicago and Boston may not opt out.  Their police officers must ethnically profile and send information on all likely suspects and innocent bystanders directly to Homeland Security.

A decade after 9/11, it’s clear for all the world to see—the terrorists who attacked us that September morning are no match for the character of our people, the resilience of our nation, or the endurance of our values. They wanted to terrorize us, but, as Americans, we refuse to live in fear...... They wanted to draw us into endless wars, sapping out strength and confidence as a nation....

And they pretty much succeeded.  Actually, the ruling elites of America succeeded in capitalizing on an act of mass murder/blowback by drawing us into endless wars and making the Security State a very lucrative proposition.  The strength and confidence of a nation has been sapped by the Wall Street psychopaths who still roam free.  They are the real terrorists.

I feel like Matt Taibbi -- who, stuck in a Florida airport last weekend, had the choice between sitting before a blaring TV speech by the president, or joining a group of screaming, plastic weapon-wielding Disneyworld kids high on sugar in a crowded lounge. He chose the latter.