The Rising American Police-State

Surely not in America. No! But here it is, and we have overwhelming evidence. The police all over the nation are being portrayed as pepper-spraying beaters of old ladies and pregnant women. They come out in riot gear to attack people exercising their First Amendment Right. We have civil disobedience, and as always, our ever-militant police forces are up in arms.

I no longer trust the police to keep me safe. I no longer trust the police to enforce the law. I no longer trust the law.

Listed below are examples of excessive police force, the cover-ups, and attempts to sabotage the movement, not necessarily in chronological order. I have included the publishing dates.

• US cops tried to erase online evidence of brutality - 26 Oct, 2011
• Occupy movement: police reaction in pictures - 11 Nov, 2011
• ‘Occupy Wall Street’ Update: Alleged Police Brutality Caught In Pepper-Spray Video - 25 Sept, 2011
• Severe police brutality at Occupy Oakland - 26 Oct, 2011
• Occupy Wall Street: NYPD Resorts to Violence, Arrests Outside Zuccotti Park - 15 Nov, 2011
• 84-year-old: subdued with pepper spray, overwhelmed by attention - 17 Nov, 2011
• New Footage of Citibank Arrests: Undercover Cop Shoves Elderly Woman, Protesters Dragged Inside - 24 Oct, 2011
• Occupy Wall Street Protesters Rally Around Injured Iraq Vet - 27 Oct, 2011

So those are a few examples. The sad thing is that when I looked at business-related websites for a few articles, every last one of them tried to discredit the movement, a few even telling where in the article one could find a rebuttal/dismissal. It was disheartening.

Here's one last article from The Guardian, a UK news source. This is required reading for everyone, I feel, because it really gets to the heart of the matter of why the police are retaliating so harshly, why businesses are raising lobbyists to discredit the movement, and why news sources that receive corporate funding are portraying the protesters as not having a clear message. Their message is very clear to anyone who will listen.

• The shocking truth about the crackdown on Occupy - 25 Nov, 2011

The mainstream media was declaring continually "OWS has no message". Frustrated, I simply asked them. I began soliciting online "What is it you want?" answers from Occupy. In the first 15 minutes, I received 100 answers. These were truly eye-opening.

The No 1 agenda item: get the money out of politics. Most often cited was legislation to blunt the effect of the Citizens United ruling, which lets boundless sums enter the campaign process. No 2: reform the banking system to prevent fraud and manipulation, with the most frequent item being to restore the Glass-Steagall Act – the Depression-era law, done away with by President Clinton, that separates investment banks from commercial banks. This law would correct the conditions for the recent crisis, as investment banks could not take risks for profit that create kale derivatives out of thin air, and wipe out the commercial and savings banks.

No 3 was the most clarifying: draft laws against the little-known loophole that currently allows members of Congress to pass legislation affecting Delaware-based corporations in which they themselves are investors.

When I saw this list – and especially the last agenda item – the scales fell from my eyes. Of course, these unarmed people would be having the shit kicked out of them.

That sums it up.

J

The UC Davis English Department Rocks.

Here's a link to their site. Here's what it says:

The faculty of the UC Davis English Department supports the Board of the Davis Faculty Association in calling for Chancellor Katehi’s immediate resignation and for “a policy that will end the practice of forcibly removing non-violent student, faculty, staff, and community protesters by police on the UC Davis campus.” Further, given the demonstrable threat posed by the University of California Police Department and other law enforcement agencies to the safety of students, faculty, staff, and community members on our campus and others in the UC system, we propose that such a policy include the disbanding of the UCPD and the institution of an ordinance against the presence of police forces on the UC Davis campus, unless their presence is specifically requested by a member of the campus community. This will initiate a genuinely collective effort to determine how best to ensure the health and safety of the campus community at UC Davis. 

Bravo.  It's not likely to happen, but kudos for them for saying so on their website.

Article Link: Wall Street Isn't Winning - It's Cheating.

Wall Street Isn't Winning – It's Cheating

Link comes from Rolling Stone Magazine (rollingstone.com). 

This article makes many good points on debunking the assumptions the uninformed and willfully ignorant make about the Occupy Movement and what it's about. In a nutshell, people don't hate the rich. They don't hate money. They hate greed and the fact that huge corporations can lie, cheat, and steal without reprimand. The points in the article:

• Free Money
• Credit Amnesty
• Stupidity Insurance
• Ungraduated Taxes
• Get Out of Jail Free

The above are all unfair advantages the major corporations have that people are finally sick of our government permitting. There's quite a bit more, but I'd encourage everyone to read this article. You'll find your eyes opened quite a bit wider than they were.

Keith Olbermann Speaks Out Against Mike Bloomberg (11.15.11)

Article: Illegal During Watergate, Unlimited Campaign Contributions Now Fair Game

Click here to read more from NPR.

The 2012 presidential campaign is already being shaped by new rules for political money. The Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling allows corporations to jump into the presidential contest, as lower-court rulings and the Federal Election Commission provide new avenues through which corporate money can flow.

The likely result: Corporate involvement in presidential politics on a scale not seen since the Watergate scandal of the 1970s. The critical difference: This time, it's legal.

 Just another reason to be pissed off at the corporations. The alliance between Corporate and Political is too disgusting for words. I really can't think of anything clever to say about this because it just pisses me off so much.

This is truly yet another reason why the change has to start with US and the government needs to be reformed.

My Problem with the Occupy Movement

I read the forums on http://occupywallst.org. A lot of what I see there is anger towards a faceless 1% simply characterized by "corporate greed". I do see people saying things that are intelligent, well-thought out, and constructive, but I do see quite a bit of people latching onto a catch phrase and repeating it ad nauseum. I'm not saying they don't understand what they're doing, but I think that it's not helping the movement very much. This is the biggest argument against the Occupy movement that I've seen: people aren't being concrete in their arguments, in stating their goals, and generally have no plan. So I thought about what I would do if my voice were to be heard.

I think the first thing is that I would list the major issues being addressed in real and concrete terms without resorting to fallacious tactics. No buzz words (like "corporate greed"), no creating an unjustified conflict (The 99% vs the 1%), no inflammatory language. Yes, those things excite people and get them to join, but it removes from the credibility of the movement (note: the Tea Party resorts to the same tactics). Why not look at the actual issues?

• Tax breaks for corporations
• Outsourcing jobs with no consequences
• Campaign donations from major corporations
• Funding war on credit
• Abuse of public welfare systems
• Too-low tariffs on imported goods
• People supporting companies that outsource
• People supporting large banks
• People using cheaper-made imported goods

These are just a few of the issues, but in my mind, they are the most concrete. And readers, do you notice that I turned some of this back around on people? We have a responsibility. We are part of what allows this, you know. We vote for our leaders, we buy the cheapest material without thinking of the consequences, we bank with Chase and Citibank and their kind. The government may be part of the problem, the corporations looking at their bottom line may be part of the problem, but WE are part of the problem, too. We cannot deny our own responsibilities.

None of us are entitled to having our demands met without sacrifice. Yes, most of us work hard for our incomes and still struggle. Many of us are victims of circumstance (for example, my husband and I were both laid off, his from his company closing, and mine from outsourced jobs). This doesn't mean that we stop working and ask for our debts to be canceled, because our decisions are part of why we have these debts, and the other part is the events out of our control and how we react to them.

What can the Occupy movement do to encourage individual responsibilities? Leaving the big banks was a good idea (even if Citigroup did call for arrests of these people). This needs to keep happening. Lists of companies that outsource the majority of their labor should be made so that people know who to boycott (by their own choice). If financially possible, people should refinance their homes with smaller local banks to keep money in their local economies. Sitting in a park shouting catch phrases may bring the initial attention, but that attention should be further directed and channeled into means of promoting real action.

I still support the Occupy movement. There's so much potential if only they would live up to it! It's getting people together, getting them talking, and getting attention, but none of this will do any good without directing it towards concrete goals.

Numbers May Lie

How many of these "I'm not one of the 99%" signs have you seen? They say similar things: I work hard, I have a small house, I pay my credit cards, I'm not complaining. I've seen plenty of them. The problem is that these are people who, for the most part, miss the entire point of the Occupy movement. Even the ones who do seem to understand the issue don't sympathize with those who are trying to change things because, as they see it, this is our bed and we better lay in it. (I pray I'm making an accurate generalization, because this has been the attitudes I have most been exposed to.)

That being said, I think there are people flocking to the cause out of "Sheepism", meaning that it looks like the cool thing to do, they hear things they generally agree with, and are looking for an outlet. I know that's not the entire case, but that's also something I've been exposed to within the movement. These people are also missing the point.

How did the 99% thing start? Well, it came from this chart (borrowed from SodaHead):

As you can see, the chart shows that the rich are getting richer and the not-rich are staying about the same. I can pull up any number of other resources from the US Government that outlines this, but as far as I can see, this simple chart is the catalyst that started the reaction from a composition of unemployment, a depressed market, and a government that allows businesses to outsource our jobs and puts our wars on a Visa Card (aka credit).

Now all of you who say you're not in the 99% should be more accurate. The statistics say that like it or not, if your income isn't over $750,000, you're in that 99% category. You may not support the movement, but you are still included in that statistic. Your claim is inaccurate. When the Occupy movement speaks, they're including you even if you don't include yourself.

How about numbers? Numbers do lie, they can be manipulated. There are some who claim a different percentile, others who say they are happy with their lot. And who knows, maybe the Occupy movement is manipulating the numbers. Maybe the government is, too. We all do what we want to make our causes seem correct. We hide smugly behind our "proof" and use it to disprove someone else. We're all trying to be a little superior, aren't we?

Not really so, I think. The way I see it, everyone's tried to get a leg up on the other. Good intentions led to corruption and mismanagement. I'd love to have the giant cosmic reset button on our government or summon the spirits of the Founding Fathers so they could say, "Damn you, kids, that's not what we meant!" I wish we could fix the salaries of politicians so they can be in government because they love our country, not because the pay is good. I wish we could break the bond of friendship and need between our government and business and make it how it should be: the governing and the governed.

There's nothing wrong with being rich. There's nothing wrong with having a mortgage and working hard for dinner. Complacency is wrong. Greed is wrong. Sending our jobs overseas is wrong. Letting people starve on the streets is wrong. Police hurting people trying to exercise their First Amendment right is wrong. Being "right" without listening to each other is VERY WRONG.

Put the numbers aside and start paying attention to what people are saying.