Occupy Wall Street 3: Now What?

interviewing josh eidelson from the nation on my show this weekend re: this low wage organizing work that's been going on. inspiring stuff.

I have been fucking loving the news of the Detroit fast food strike

http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/05/10/detroit-experiences-what-may-be-largest-fast-food-strike-yet/

hell yeah

That is so amazing/inspiring.

just got word that dc cops have visited a half dozen of my friend's houses today.

fuck.

arrests or just "visits"?

unclear. rumors of a couple of arrests, but the simmering panic + security culture are such that people are being really vague about it over any means of communication that can get subpoenaed

2 arrests confirmed.

they raided a house I'm at all the time. Fuck. Goddammit.

oh geez :/

wow ok, feeling some feelings here

that sucks, man. you got a lawyer you can call in a worst case scenario?

yeah, we're in good with nlg people & i've got the number in memory.

one of three back in the world already, still mum.

ugh hoos stay free

Friend who turned himself in after finding out his house was raided while he was working is now being held for a week. All I'm hearing is "it isn't a felony," but they're still holding him for a week.

Held for a week on a misdemeanor charge! Fuck that noise.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/401832_10151433963502293_1826174651_n.jpg

friend of mine quipped 'and thus the pacific northwest comes to the east coast'

lil grandiose given we think he's out soon, but i gotta ride for my man

he's out today--after holding him for the week the gov lawyers suddenly realized "gosh, we haven't even filed the paperwork on this yet: you know what? nevermind."

arrested on a bogus charge. held for a week. charge dropped.

and he was one of a few other surprise arrests too. they're trying to put down a chilling effect pretty hard.

but in any case--he's out and we're relieved.

damn, while i wasn't looking tidal went and got all upscale

http://tidalmag.org/about/

that said the articles in it feel intensely actively dull and recycled and going-through-the-motions except the bond/ratings agency article which just makes no sense and the choice of lorde poem which is almost actively offensive in this context, but at least it has an obvious agenda. outside of that this notion of 'theory' is like high-minded platitudes.

not exactly a rupture, no.

I'm interested that you find the Audre Lorde so poorly placed. Why?

"Workers rise and win
and have not lost their chains
but swing them
side by side with the billyclubs in blue
securing Wall Street
against the striking students"

4real? is this in any way relevant to anything that's happend in the past two years (or twenty even)? (leave aside if it even made sense when the poem was written -- still in the long wake of france '68). insofar as there was any agreed upon message or set of grievances from occupy, isn't this directly contrary to that?

a big span of the time that ppl were able to stay in zucotti was bought by the intervention of the labor movement, and in return they get this shit printed about them?

I just wrote a long thing and zing ate it f me

the lazy sunday night answer to your first point of the poem's relevance at the time is read this

http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1328752617l/8614946.jpg

hard hat riot in '70 was a real and contemporaneous thing

as to why tidal printed it here, i'm not sure, though it could be read as a reminder that apparent natural allies can be mobilized against 'us'.

maybe it should run some piece on how some feminists opposed the fifteenth amendment next. good job building alliances guize.

i've wondered often what your ~positive~ interest in this stuff is, s. clover, only because many of the posts i've seen of your itt seem to trend negative on these projects 'as implemented' though not 'as a whole.' this makes me uncertain but curious where you're coming from politically.

penny lewis has a revisionist riposte to that hard-hat history just published http://www.amazon.com/Hardhats-Hippies-Hawks-Vietnam-Movement/dp/0801478561/ref=la_B00CF6GDZS_1_1

she writes about it in the chronicle of higher ed, but it's subscription-only online. looks quite interesting http://chronicle.texterity.com/chronicle/20130517b?pg=10#pg10

i've wondered often what your ~positive~ interest in this stuff is, s. clover, only because many of the posts i've seen of your itt seem to trend negative on these projects 'as implemented' though not 'as a whole.' this makes me uncertain but curious where you're coming from politically.

― steening in your HOOSless carriage (BIG HOOS aka the steendriver), Sunday, May 19, 2013 9:16 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4v3etuIw-aM

well yeah, and 'stayin alive' does a lot to muddy the waters by talking about points where labor dovetailed with the anitwar movement, and that a lot of rank and file--particularly vietnam vets--were completely anti-war. would def like to read that though, looks great.

xp

yep - as lewis puts it in the preview, vets protested as vets, chicanos as chicanos, soldiers as soldiers

i am curious (clover)

lol clover i wonder if u might enjoy wiiiai's breakdowns of obama (& bush before him) SOTUs & pressers http://whateveritisimagainstit.blogspot.com/2013/05/obama-press-conference-and-so-i-make-no.html

notes

- foreclosed & threatened homeowners from around the us occupied the steps of the DOJ for the last two days, upon arrest/tazing/eviction they've moved on to occupying holder's old law firm (where lanny breuer now works) and are locking down right now: http://t.co/3vk5uGmZv9

- yesterday a few hundred workers at federal buildings went on a one-day walkout strike. friends of mine organizing for months to make that happen. big win for them, really fuckin proud. today a lot of those strikers are being barred from returning to work. info on how to help: http://bit.ly/11YrfiY

RT @our_dc: Quick Pita and Flamers manager said workers can come back tomorrow for their 11am shift! #goodjobsnation #unity #u1

New rules to regulate derivatives, adopted last week by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, are a victory for Wall Street

That's from the New York Times

http://truth-out.org/video/item/16500-banks-win-big-as-regulators-refuse-to-rein-in-700-trillion-derivatives-market

A discussion of it from elsewhere

http://www.occupyhomesmn.org/hbor_victory?recruiter_id=67

After a year and a half of on-the-ground anti-foreclosure organizing with homeowners publicly standing up and fighting the banks' abuse, the Minnesota legislature passed the Homeowner Bill of Rights almost unanimously--61-1 in the Senate and 123-0 in the House. National analysts are calling this legislation the strongest Homeowner Bill of Rights in the country. This victory shows that the community pressure Occupy Homes MN has helped to build--from grassroots organizing to the hearing rooms at the Capitol--can force legislatures to take steps toward holding Wall Street accountable. This legislation does not solve the housing crisis, but it does enforce basic protections against some of the banks’ worst practices.

Chris Hedges: "Camden and Detroit succumbed first. You and I are next."

http://www.nationofchange.org/rise-or-die-1369144349

rumors of a thing at zuccotti this weekend

when i thought it was rumors/a joke i responded 'yeah what the hell'

now that i think its serious i'm realllly hoping its not actually happening

When I started seeing the reoccupy talk I was sort of jokingly down for it--"eh, what the hell?"--but I'm really struggling to see the point

"We will strike a blow against austerity and capitalism and ~the 1%~ by sitting in this park until we are painfully removed in 12 hours!"

"Then a series of follow up actions about the police response where the message of the original occupation gets lost! Then full communism!"

[homie suggests 'why don't we start shutting shit down? banks, bridges etc']

@hoosteen 1h
@p____ but that doesn't just *start* spontaneously, right? Like, that takes real comm orgz'ing, the kinda work we *oughta* be doing

@hoosteen 1h
@p_____ instead of spending energy and time and attention on reprising a song we all know the end of already

‏@hoosteen 53m
Agree. Doubt reoccupation will accomplish this RT @OccupyWallSt: @hoosteen What has changed? Nothing. Jail the bankers, reclaim our economy.

‏I guess what I'm getting at is that if "nothing has changed" since we took public space two years ago, what will change by doing it again?

Wasnt in the meetings, maybe @OccupyWallSt has secret strategy to use reoccupy to ignite something. Happened once. But again, w/same tactic?

Like why are we re-fetishizing Tents in A Park as if that Solves Capitalism? Is it still 2011? Have we learned literally nothing?

‏Obv all solidarity and love to folks taking action at Z Park tomorrow. I'm just wondering if there are better uses of our collective energy.

sry for tweeting

Splitter!!

amazing scenes in istanbul http://t.co/LidM7Gfh0S

maxberger Max Berger 51s
Reason I love New York no. 4221: Zuccotti Park is filled with Turkish people in solidarity with #OccupyGezi

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BLsURnrCYAEYq_Z.jpg

also essex antifa stood the fuck up today

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BLsBu9vCQAECrky.jpg

EDL tried to march and essex antifa blockaded them for 5 hours

friend of mine was in Turkey for work, got out this morning

will stop by Liberty Sq if i have time