Civil Rights movement is resurgent, needs protection

The "Occupy" movement has synthesized the actual aspirations of the people across the USA. Unlike the artificial "Tea Party" movement which has been engineered to be exclusively for Christian Dominionists who worship money (the free market), the new Civil Rights movement has metastasized with leaders who are poor and of so-called minorities.  Across the USA, their priorities remain the same: "SERVE THE PEOPLE"

2011-12-06 "‘Occupy’ protesters reclaiming foreclosed homes in 20 cities" by David Edwards
[http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/12/06/occupy-protesters-reclaiming-foreclosed-homes-in-20-cities/]
David Edwards has served as an editor at Raw Story since 2006. His work can also be found at Crooks & Liars, and he's also been published at The BRAD BLOG. He came to Raw Story after working as a network manager for the state of North Carolina and as as engineer developing enterprise resource planning software. Follow him on Twitter at @DavidEdwards.
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The 99 percent movement, which has been evicted from many of their encampments across the country, is finding common cause with thousands of homeowners who are also being evicted from their homes.
Even though the movement has often been criticized for a lack of defined goals, Tuesday’s “Occupy Our Homes” action in at least 20 cities makes it clear that they are standing up to banks to reverse foreclosures.
“We’re in the neighborhood in New York City that had the highest number of foreclosure filings in 2010 to send a message that the economy is failing the 99 percent,” Vocal New York organizer Sean Barry told Raw Story from a Brooklyn neighborhood as about 200 protesters chanted in the background.
“We’re here because [there are] a lot of empty buildings owned by Wall Street banks and we’re going to liberate them.”
Tasha Glasgow, the single mother of a 9-year-old daughter and a 5-year-old son, was expected to be one of the first occupants of a reclaimed home. Barry said that Glasgow, who had been in and out of the shelter system in New York City, had been slated to get a Section 8 voucher before budget cuts by Mayor Michael Bloomberg put an end to that promise.
“We’ve gained access to the home, and we’ve got the support of the neighbors,” Barry explained. “They’re going to start occupying it. … And then, there’s going to be 24/7 eviction defense by Occupy Wall Street.”
There were over 40 events planned in more than 20 cities Tuesday, but that is just the beginning.
“When it comes to Wall Street’s control over our economy, our democracy and our lives, there’s few better examples than the housing crisis,” Barry noted. “Occupy Wall Street is going to continue to support this national Occupy Our Homes campaign, and both defend homeowners who are being threatened with eviction due to foreclosure, and to move families that need homes into vacant buildings that banks are just sitting on.”
Photo: Vocal New York [http://twitter.com/#!/VOCALNewYork/status/144124667450494976/photo/1]

For the regular people who are making the "Occupy" events a reality, some had to have been fooled by how well the "Tea Party" movement was treated by the police in the past...
2012-01-30 "Violent Big Government Tyranny Continues Against Occupy Movement as Fake 'Grass Roots' 'Tea Party' 'Movement' Continues Not to Give a Rat's Ass" by Brad Friedman
[http://www.bradblog.com/?p=9097]
 
 The fully-militarized, post-9/11 Big Government Police State in these United States continues unabated, even as we've had to turn our attention here, of late, away from the Occupy Movement to cover the pretend democracy known as the 2012 Presidential Race.
Because there has yet to be any accountability for the unprovoked violence against peaceful Occupy demonstrators by the Oakland Police Department last October [http://www.bradblog.com/?p=8869], nor for its Acting Police Chief Howard Jordan, who appears to have blatantly lied to the public and media about that violence [http://www.bradblog.com/?p=8890], nor for their atrociously lawless renegade Mayor Jean Quan, the OPD was able to use many of the same tactics once again over the weekend to round up hundreds of peaceful demonstrators.
This time, the OPD upped the ante by arresting some six journalists --- in violation of both Quan's previous (apparently pretend) directives, as well as the Department's own supposed procedures --- even as each of the journos claim to have clearly identified themselves as members of the media prior to being detained nonetheless. (At least the OPD didn't shoot at them this time [http://www.bradblog.com/?p=8900].)
Among those six journalists attempting to do their jobs, was Mother Jones' Gavin Aronsen, who has been covering the Occupy movement on the ground in Oakland and San Francisco for months. He is a superb journalist who I had the privilege of working closely with last year [http://www.bradblog.com/?p=8728] in the course of my "Secret Koch Tapes" exclusives that I ran at MoJo in September [http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/09/exclusive-audio-koch-brothers-seminar-tapes].
Here's Aronsen's appalling account of what happened before and after his arrest on Saturday in Oakland [http://motherjones.com/mojo/2012/01/journalists-arrested-occupy-oakland]. It includes this passage near the end for additional context (and for those who pretend to care about the Constitution, who I will get to in a minute):
[begin excerpt]
"The Bay Area Occupy movement has got to stop using Oakland as their playground," Oakland Mayor Jean Quan said in a statement during last night's arrests that made no mention of her police department's lack of regard for journalists' First Amendment protections. Last week, the United States dropped 27 spots in Reporters Without Borders' annual press freedom index due to police treatment of journalists covering the Occupy Wall Street movement [http://en.rsf.org/press-freedom-index-2011-2012,1043.html]. By Josh Stearns's count, more than three dozen reporters have been arrested since the movement began last year in Manhattan [http://storify.com/jcstearns/tracking-journalist-arrests-during-the-occupy-prot].
[end excerpt]
Oakland isn't the only Occupy hot-spot where police appear to be continuing to abuse their Big Government powers to violently strip private citizens of their Constitutional rights. In Washington D.C., one of the few cities where Occupy encampments, until now, have been allowed to remain in place, police have announced that will be coming to an end as of a Monday deadline. Today.
To prepare for their big day, over the weekend the D.C. Police distributed "eviction notices" and warmed up their Tasers, as seen in this outrageous video shot on Sunday in our nation's capitol...
[http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/crime-scene/post/one-protester-tased-arrested-at-occupy-dc/2012/01/29/gIQAxqRKaQ_blog.html]

Had that ever happened to one --- just one --- so-called "Tea Partier", this nation would likely have descended into an all-out shooting civil war by now. Yet similar police abuses have been seen against Occupiers in state after state [http://www.bradblog.com/?p=8929].
Such that what is seen in the video above, and the other acts mentioned, were done to fellow citizens whose Constitutional Rights the "Tea Party" doesn't give two shits about, their fake "grass roots" "movement", apparently, couldn't care less about any of these clear cases of the very "Big Government Tyranny" and stripping of Constitutional rights that they have long been allowed to pretend they give a damn about. They don't. They care about nothing more than electing Republicans to office. Period. The Constitution has absolutely nothing to do with any of it.
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COMMENT #2 [Permalink]
...  David Lasagna  said on 1/30/2012 @ 10:47 am PT...
Horrifying video.
What's the backstory here? Looks like those cops enter the park and go right for that guy. As soon as he sees them he seems to know they're coming for him saying,"They're coming at me. They're coming at me." And before that you hear a voice(I assume it's the guy capturing the video) explaining to someone something that sounds maybe like-"I think they're going to arrest the student rep now." He says this with a little chuckle.
So what's going on? Why do the cops beeline for that guy? What was he supposed to have done, if anything? Why do they taser him for no apparent reason? Why are no words spoken by the cops, at least that you can hear on the video?
Unless there is some extrordinary reason which is not readily apparent from the video I think all those cops should have to do serious jail time. Extra time for the woman who did the tasering. This kind of behavior must not be allowed to stand.
This country is becoming increasingly and more dangerously lout of control.
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COMMENT #5 [Permalink]
...  David Lasagna  said on 1/30/2012 @ 12:52 pm PT...
Libconlib @3--
Don't understand your comment at all.
1. If cops had gone to a Tea Party rally and singled someone out outta the blue and tasered them, I would be horrified in that case, too. I don't care about the political stripes of who's being tasered. When I see ANYONE being tasered unnecessarily it freaks me out. I know it could just as easily be me being electrocuted. From what I can tell the use of tasers by law enforcement in this country is way, way outta control.
2. I don't see anything here as fighting across party lines. I think one of the points Brad is trying to make here is along the lines of hey, here's the sort of thing that the Tea Party is always screaming about--government abuse of power-- and while you never actually see this type of shit coming down on Tea Party activists, you DO see it coming down all the time on the heads of Occupiers. So where are the Tea Partiers when the shit they rail against is actually happening in real time to American citizens? Why aren't they putting their money where their mouths are and standing in solidarity with their Occupy Brethren and Sistren?
The answer would seem to be that though as you say both movements have much in common there is at least a faction of the Tea Party movement who seem to see progressives only as yet another "them" or "other".
Pointing that out is not fighting across party lines, in my view. It's naming the beast, in this case hypocrisy or inconsistency of word and action, so as to make it more visible.

Aside from the Oakland Commune, another encampment receiving the same "death" treatment is the one in the District of Colombia:
2012-01-31 "Police targeting Occupy DC protesters one by one?"
[http://occupycyberspace.wordpress.com/2012/01/31/police-targeting-occupy-dc-protesters-one-by-one/]
On Monday the US Park Police in DC have decided to start implementing a ban on overnight camping. Since its genesis, the Occupy DC encampment hasn’t fallen victim to harsh crackdowns by law enforcement, making it one of the longest standing occupy movements. The tents in McPherson Square have been pitched for approximately four months, but now protesters are not allowed to sleep while occupying. As of Monday evening there have been no arrests. But will that change?



The worst action done by anybody associated with the "Occupy" encampment in the District of Colombia was a crappy smoke bomb thrown over the White House fence:
2012-01-18 "Smoke Bomb Thrown at White House" by Ben Nuckols from "AP" newswire and carried by all of the mainstream press:
WASHINGTON (AP) — As hundreds of Occupy protesters massed outside the gates of the White House, an apparent smoke bomb was thrown over the fence Tuesday night, forcing authorities to disperse the crowds. President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama were not in the White House when it happened — he was taking her out for a night on the town to celebrate her 48th birthday.
There were no arrests in the incident, said George Ogilvie, U.S. Secret Service spokesman.
Several hundred protesters affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street movement converged on the West Lawn of the Capitol Tuesday to decry the influence of corporate money in politics and voice myriad other grievances.
Organizers had touted the rally, known as Occupy Congress, as the largest national gathering of Occupy protesters to date and secured a permit that would have allowed up to 10,000 people to participate. By mid-afternoon, the protest appeared to have fallen far short of those goals.
Still, participants said they were optimistic about the strength of the Occupy movement, which began in September when protesters pitched tents in a lower Manhattan park. The movement has since spread to dozens of cities, including Washington. While many cities have moved to evict the protesters, the National Park Service has allowed encampments to remain in two public squares near the White House. "I'm encouraged," said Jon Wynn, 63, of Snow Camp, N.C., who traveled to Washington to attend the protest and visit friends. "There's energy here, even if there's not a whole lot of people."
The protest comes amid numerous polls that show 84 percent of Americans disapprove of the job Congress is doing, near an all-time low.
While the rally was mostly peaceful, there were some scuffles between police and protesters along walkways leading to the Capitol. By mid-afternoon Tuesday, four people had been arrested — U.S. Capitol Police said — one for allegedly assaulting a police officer and three accused of crossing a police line.
The Occupy movement includes activists who want to change government from within and anarchists who oppose all government. Tension between the two camps was evident at Tuesday's gathering, where some taunted police while others participated in earnest group discussions about how to influence their elected representatives.

At the "Occupy" encampments across the USA, a major worry remains that the "criminally insane" walk amongst them, carrying weapons or threats of violence. 
Remember the "Jesus Shooter" of November, 10th, 2011? He was the most frightening example of the criminally insane, who mingled with the "Occupy" encampment in the District of Colombia...

2011-11-11 "Shots Fired Near White House" by Sarah Maslin Nir from "New York Times"
[http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/12/us/shots-fired-near-white-house.html]
Shots were fired from at least one car about a block away from the White House Friday night, and a loaded AK-47 assault rifle was recovered from the scene, the Secret Service said. The episode does not appear to be connected to the White House. President Obama was in California and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. was in New York for Veterans Day observances, according to their public schedules. Secret Service officers heard gunfire near Constitution Avenue and 16th Street around 9 p.m., said Ed Donovan, a spokesman for the Secret Service. Two cars drove off west on the avenue before one, a black Honda, was found abandoned near 23rd Street, Mr. Donovan said. Witnesses told officers that a man fled the car on foot. Officers found the loaded assault rifle in the car, Mr. Donovan said. The authorities were searching for the people who may have been involved.

2011-11-16 "In a Video, White House Shooting Suspect Called Himself ‘Modern-Day Jesus Christ’" by Elizabeth Harris for "the Ledge" blog from "New York Times"
[http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/19/in-a-video-white-house-shooting-suspect-calls-himself-modern-day-jesus-christ/]
In a video intended as an audition tape for Oprah Winfrey, the 21-year-old Idaho man accused of firing an assault rifle at the White House last week expressed frustration with the United States government and called himself “the modern-day Jesus Christ that you all have been waiting for.”
Wearing a large crucifix around his neck and a shaggy beard, Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez read from what appeared to be a set of prepared remarks, saying that because the government was “bullying these other countries for their oil, our freedom is at stake.” But for much of the video, Mr. Ortega-Hernandez is focused on what he calls his mission, dictated by God, “to lead the world to Zion.” He asks Ms. Winfrey for a platform.
“There is still so much more that God needs me to express to the world,” Mr. Ortega-Hernandez said. “It’s not just a coincidence that I look like Jesus.”
Shortly after 9 p.m. last Friday night, gunfire was heard in the vicinity of the White House, and a black Honda Accord with Idaho license plates sped away. It was found seven blocks from the White House just minutes later. Inside, officials discovered an assault-style semiautomatic rifle. Both Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle, were out of town at the time of the shooting.
On Wednesday, Mr. Ortega-Hernandez was arrested in Pennsylvania and subsequently charged with attempting to assassinate President Obama. According to officials and court documents, Mr. Ortega-Hernandez became convinced that the government was “conspiring against him”; he had called Mr. Obama “the Antichrist” and said he “needed to be taken care of.”
CNN reported that the video was recorded just weeks before Mr. Ortega-Hernandez was arrested.


2011-11-18 "Accused White House shooter: I'm new Jesus" by ALIYAH SHAHID from "New York Daily News"
[http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-11-18/news/30416891_1_maria-hernandez-accused-white-house-federal-court]
 The bearded Idaho wacko accused of trying to kill President Obama with a long-range rifle round thinks he is the second coming of Jesus Christ.
 A bizarre video of Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez, who was charged with attempted assassination on Thursday, shows the 21-year-old making a pitch to Oprah Winfrey to cast him on her show.
 “You see, Oprah, there is still so much more that God needs for me to express to the world. It’s not just a coincidence that I look like Jesus,” Ortega-Hernandez said, with his hair slicked and a crucifix around his neck, in the rambling, 20-minute video.
“I am the modern day Jesus Christ that you all have been waiting for.”
 In the footage, obtained by Idaho TV station KBOI, Ortega-Hernandez reads from a note pad as he discusses his stint as a gangbanger, pushes for the legalization of marijuana and wonders aloud about why people spend time drinking and partying.
 “Please do not take me as a joke or as a deception. I have never felt so sure that I was sent here by God to lead the world to Zion,” Ortega-Hernandez professes.
 The video was shot in September by Ramon Bailey, a student at Idaho State University, KBOI reported. Bailey said he filmed the spot after Ortega-Hernandez approached him and said he wanted to shoot a “commercial.”
 Bailey said the taping was so off-the-wall and disturbing that he didn’t even bother to edit it.
 Ortega-Hernandez, who hails from Idaho Falls, is due back in Federal court in Washington D.C. on Nov 22.
 Authorities say he fired nine rounds at the White House last Friday, one of which penetrated an outer window of Obama’s living quarters before being stopped by an inner layer of bullet-proof glass.
 The President was en route to Hawaii at the time of the attack.
 Ortega-Hernandez, who abandoned his ride near the White House, was later nabbed at a Hampton Inn in Indiana, Pa., some 200 miles from Washington.
 Despite questions from officials as to the crackpot’s sanity, his mother, Maria Hernandez, told the Post Register in Idaho that her son has no history of mental illness.
 “He has different ideas than other people, just like everyone, but he was perfectly fine the last time I saw him,” she told the newspaper. “He might be saying weird stuff that sounds crazy, but that doesn’t mean (he) is crazy. He might be confused and scared.”
 According to court documents, a witness told investigators that Ortega-Hernandez had reportedly said Obama was the “Anti-Christ,” the “devil” and that he “needed to kill” the President.
 If convicted, he faces life in prison.

The "Jesus Shooter" had become international news

2011-11-20 "White House shooter was on ‘god’s mission’ to kill ‘devil’ Obama" by AlbLebanon Editor
[http://www.alblebanon.com/content/white-house-shooter-was-on-gods-mission-to-kill-devil-obama/]

Source:http://www.bangaloremirror.com
The suspected gunman who opened fire on the White House was charged Thursday with attempting to assassinate the President of the United States or his staff.
Idaho man Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez, 21, was arrested at a Pennsylvania hotel after he shot an assault rifle at the White House believing that he was Jesus and President Barack Obama was the Antichrist, according to court documents and those who knew him.
At one point, he even suggested to an acquaintance the president was planning to implant computer tracking chips into children. Meanwhile, details have emerged about further items found in Ortega’s car, which included a baseball bat and brass knuckles.
At his first appearance in court in Pennsylvania Thursday, Ortega sat quietly, his hands free but his feet shackled.
He said only, “Yes, ma’am” when he was asked if he understood that he would be going back to Washington to face the charge. Ortega is accused of firing nine rounds from an AK47 at the White House Friday night, cracking one one window close to the President’s bedroom.
Police said that Ortega had become ‘obsessed’ with Obama and that God had given him a personal mission to attack the White House.
“He hates the president, he hates Washington, he hates society,” another official told the Washington Post.
Gunfire was heard between the White House and the Washington Monument on Friday evening. An abandoned car with an assault rifle with a scope and nine spent shell casings were later discovered by police inside.
The FBI have revealed the semi-automatic assault rifle was a Romanian Cugir SA.
Police believe that the gunman opened fire across a lawn from half a mile away around 9:30pm then ran off.
When the White House was checked Tuesday, a bullet was found to have smashed through a window.
It was only stopped from going inside the White House by the bulletproof glass interior layer behind it. A second round was found outside.
Authorities are investigating Ortega’s mental health and say there are indications he believed his attack on the White House was part of a ‘personal mission from God’, according to a law enforcement official. A US Park Police said he was ‘unstable with violent tendencies’.

Unfortunately, because the "Jesus Shooter" had been mixing in with the divine flock at the Occupy encampment near the White House, the monopolized media organs of the fascists started to call Oscar Ortega-Hernandez the "Occupy Shooter", only his vibe wasn't mixing in as a stereo-typical "naive leftist" or "marxist/anarchist". Being a devotee to Jesus, Oscar Ortega-Hernandez was quietly forgotten to the layperson as it would not be in the interest of the Christian ruling class to insult their own ideology.
2011-11-17 "Fox Falsely Dubs Alleged White House Attacker As "'Occupy' Shooter""
[http://mediamatters.org/research/201111170007]
Fox & Friends claimed that alleged White House shooter Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez had been "tied to [the] Occupy" movement, even calling him the " 'Occupy' shooter." In fact, investigators have reportedly "found no connection between him and the Occupy protesters."

Fox & Friends Dubs Ortega-Hernandez The "'Occupy' Shooter" -
Fox & Friends Graphic Claims Shooter "Tied To Occupy" Movement. During the November 17 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends, co-host Gretchen Carlson asked Fox News contributor Michelle Malkin: "It looks like this White House shooting suspect may have tried to blend in with the Occupy protesters in D.C. when he came from out West. So I pose this question to you this morning: What would have happened if a tea party person had tried to do that?" Malkin responded that "there is now conflicting testimony or evidence of whether he was in the Occupy D.C. camp, but apparently, reportedly, allegedly there is somebody within that movement who has confirmed that he was there at the camps." Malkin later noted that "the guy was just completely off his rocker and had nothing to do with any coherent sense of political ideology." But during the segment, onscreen text continued to tie Ortega-Hernandez to the Occupy D.C. movement: [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 11/17/11]


 
 In Fact, Investigators Have Reportedly Found "No Connection" Between Ortega-Hernandez And Occupy D.C.
Washington Post: Investigators "Have Found No Connection Between [Ortega-Hernandez] And The Occupy Protesters." From a November 16 Washington Post article [http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/white-house-shooting-suspect-arrested-in-pa/2011/11/16/gIQAdK3PSN_story.html]:
In trying to determine why he recently traveled to the nation's capital from the western part of the country, investigators searched the Occupy D.C. campground near the White House but have found no connection between him and the Occupy protesters, according to three law enforcement officials familiar with the case.
One of the officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is continuing, said the motive for the gunfire might have been simple anger: Ortega-Hernandez "hates the president, he hates Washington, he hates society," the official said. [The Washington Post, 11/16/11]
Comments:
by nerzog (November 17, 2011 12:56 pm ET)
"Ortega-Hernandez hates the president, he hates Washington, he hates society..."
 Sounds more like a Teabagger, to me.
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by David2012 (November 17, 2011 12:59 pm ET)
He's from Idaho, too. They may want to be a little careful here.
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by Martinking68 (November 19, 2011 11:52 am ET)
He also believed Obama to be the antichrist like a quarter of all Republicans think is at least possible.
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by CoolSlaw (November 18, 2011 10:05 am ET) 7 1
 What Fox news is doing here is really scary propaganda and misinformation straight from the pages of "1984", "running man", "Enemy of the State" or "V for Vendetta".
 They are literally trying to shift public sentiment about an organization by knowingly lying about the affiliations of a violent criminal. We know Fox lies and distorts all the time, but it's especially destructive and egregious when they knowingly falsely attribute acts of violence to smear individuals and groups for political gain.
 They tried to imply the Gabby Gifford's shooter was some wild eyed progressive. That was false and irresponsible, but this latest attempt takes it a step further by casting a specific organization, in this case Occupy Wall Street, as being responsible.
 Fox News has gone way too far with this.
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by turtledoubledeuce5333 (November 18, 2011 12:48 pm ET)
 Fox knows damn well that this guy is likely not involved with the Occupy group. They don't care about the truth and never have, it's all about demonizing those they don't agree with. This shooter was just an opportunity to do that. They have no journalistic integrity whatsoever.
 What I find particularly interesting is that Fox went out of it's way to promote the Tea Party rallies, grossly over-stated their attendance and all but celebrated their existence. Now, with the Occupy demonstrations, they've gone out of their way to downplay their size, lie about them and try everything in their power to destroy them. Is that fair and balanced? Is that being a news organization? How anyone can still call them that is mind-boggling at this point. The fact is that the Occupy protests completely dwarf the Tea Party events, and it's not even close, but you would never know that if all you watched was Fox News.
 Bill O'Reilly recently arrogantly declared the Occupy movement over. On the contrary, Bill. It's Fox News who's done. Sure, you'll still have your stupid little show on that joke of a news channel but you're the ones who have failed. The Occupy movement is growing more every day, despite your channel's best efforts to silence it. You tried to steer a country in one direction, and you succeeded in some parts of the country by getting these Tea Party clowns elected, but that success will be short-lived. You aren't going to kill the Occupy movement. Fox News is insignificant.
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by matrixbio2014 (November 18, 2011 5:00 pm ET)
 They didn't call him "muslim occupy shooter"? Faux is losing its touch among those who negatively stereotype.
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by CoolSlaw (November 19, 2011 8:59 am ET) 4  
 It's in the specific way they've assigned this shooter to the Occupy Wall Street movement.
 Previously they would mislabel and imply the behavior of a criminal as coming "from the left" or assign high profile public figures as those whose rhetoric "inspired" the shooter.
 With this latest jump, we've fully entered that realm where Fox news has done exactly what science fiction authors, and totalitarian regimes have exposed us to. They are using the power of their influence over the public to create downright hatred of a group of private citizens by assigning blame to them for what is essentially an act of terror....with absolutely no evidence to support their claims.
 It's sometimes hard to see the grades of "slippery slope", but I think Fox just sent us down a significant new portion of that downward slide.

The "slippery slope" slides to the depth of the worst of fascist propaganda such as the following from an influential conservative journal. Notice how the language used against anyone associated with the "Occupy" movement resembles the propaganda used by the worst of Latin America's "little Hitlers":

2012-01-30 "Head of Occupy DC "Fun Committee" Gets Tasered. Are We Still Having Fun?" by JWF from

[http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=49168]
JWF is a guest blogger for Human Events and the proprietor of Jammie Wearing Fools.
---
As the Occupy DC savages are preparing to be kicked out today, police on Sunday needed to use a little extra force to subdue one of the occupiers [http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/crime-scene/post/one-protester-tased-arrested-at-occupy-dc/2012/01/29/gIQAxqRKaQ_blog.html].
[begin excerpt]
Tensions between Occupy DC protesters and law enforcement increased Sunday afternoon with the arrest of a demonstrator and the approach of Monday’s noon deadline to enforce a ban on overnight camping.
Tempers flared around midday after police subdued a protester in McPherson Square with an electric shock. Several protesters accused the police of using excessive force, saying the demonstrator had been handcuffed by two police officers before a third used the electronic device to stun him.
Police on scene confirmed that a person had been subdued with a Taser and arrested but gave no further details.
The encounter occurred as Park Police passed out flyers warning of the deadline to begin enforcing a longstanding ban on camping overnight in the square and Freedom Plaza. A protester, who is known as “Lash,” became angry when police entered his tent, other demonstrators said.
[end excerpt]
According to far left fringe site Crooks and Liars, this "Lash" creature is head of the Occupy DC fun committee [http://crooksandliars.com/andrew-metcalf/end-occupy-dc].
[begin excerpt]
Lash, the head of the fun committee, said he and a small group of people would be staying in the park. They would not sleep for as long as humanly possible.
[end excerpt]
Well, I guess he managed to get some sleep, as after his shocking run-in with police he passed out and puked.
Good times, good times.
Another place where they need tasers, along with tear gas and water cannons, is out in Oakland, where these wild beasts went on a rampage Saturday resulting in hundreds of arrests.
[http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/01/29/BA4T1N07OE.DTL]
[begin excerpt]
Oakland officials and Occupy protesters confronted the fallout from their increasingly toxic conflict on Sunday, a day after the tensions reignited in chaotic, often violent demonstrations that resulted in at least 400 arrests. Once again, each side blamed the other for sparking the violence.
City officials took stock of the damage from Saturday's clashes, which included injuries to three police officers and several protesters, as well as vandalism inside City Hall.
There, dozens of protesters had broken in with a crowbar, grabbed an American flag, and ignited it on the front steps.
"It's like a tantrum," Mayor Jean Quan said while showing the damage inside the building, which included a broken model of City Hall she estimated to be 100 years old. "They're treating us like a playground."
Quan said Occupy Oakland had "refused to be nonviolent" and, as a result, was "turning off the rest of the movement." She said police would step up efforts to obtain restraining orders against some protesters to keep them from approaching City Hall.
[end excerpt]
Amazingly, the media continues to float the canard that it all started out peacefully [http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/oakland-assesses-damages-occupy-movement-cops-clash-article-1.1013718].
[begin excerpt]
Then came Saturday, which started peacefully enough — a midday rally at City Hall and a march. But hours later, the scene near downtown Oakland had dramatically deteriorated: clashes punctuated by rock and bottle throwing by protesters and volleys of tear gas from police, and a City Hall break-in that left glass cases smashed, graffiti spray-painted on walls and an American flag burned.
[end excerpt]
It always starts "peacefully" yet winds up with violence. The media fails to see the irony [http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_19843262].
[begin excerpt]
"This particular faction of Occupy ... they're very violent and I'm going to be asking for a lot more mutual aid," Quan said, adding that the weekly marches prevent the city's police force from patrolling other parts of Oakland. "They are hurting the neighborhoods by continuing to do this on Saturday nights."
[end excerpt]
It's a shame we no longer have a functioning Justice Department in this country or this nonsense would come to a halt today.
Here are some of the "peaceful" occupiers burning the American flag. But whatever you do, don't question their patriotism.

Of course, it is no secret that "Human Events" publishes propaganda typical of a fascist dictatorship. After all, they are owned by the same people who gave credence to any type of tyranny across Latin America many times worse than Cuba, and who are like family with "Christian" mercenaries who ship cocaine into the USA, like Ollie North and John Singlaub (do a websearch on those two alongside "cocaine" and see what you find). Presenting the "EAGLE Publishing, Inc.":

Now, let's look at actual terrorists who find inspiration in what "EAGLE Publishing" and the "Tea Party" movement hold as its ideology:
2012-01-27 "Three Separate Incidents of Violent Intimidation of Dems by Republican Extremists in One Single Week" by Brad Friedman
[http://www.bradblog.com/?p=9095]
Violent Republican extremism?! What violent Republican extremism?! Oh, this violent Republican extremism...from just the past one week alone...
• A campaign manager for a Democratic congressional candidate in Arkansas came home to find his family's cat killed, with the word "LIBERAL" painted on it. His 5-year old son made the gruesome discovery [http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/post/liberal-dead-cat-arkansas-a-google-search-tells-a-partisan-story/2012/01/24/gIQAukABOQ_blog.html].

• Five Democratic Missouri state Senators --- four of them African-American women --- discovered rifle crosshair stickers placed on the door of their capitol offices [http://articles.cnn.com/2012-01-25/us/us_missouri-senate-targets_1_stickers-health-care-reform-capitol-police?_s=PM:US]. (Maybe they're just "surveyor's marks" though. Right Sarah Palin? [http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/01/palin-aide-symbols-werent-rifle-sights-but-surveyors-marks/69163/])

• A veteran 14-year police sergeant from Peoria, Arizona (near Phoenix), proudly posted a photo he took of a bunch of guys with automatic rifles holding a bullet riddled t-shirt featuring an image of Barack Obama on it [http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/01/27/arizona-cop-investigated-over-bullet-riddled-picture-of-obama/].



No, we didn't go looking for these stories, just happened to come across them. So perhaps there are others out there that we missed this week. Perhaps there is evidence of Democratic extremists similarly targeting Republicans with brutal violence and threats of brutal violence. If so, we haven't seen it.
This all takes place on the very same week in which Arizona's Democratic Congresswoman Gabby Giffords was finally forced to resign from the U.S. House of Representatives [http://www.bradblog.com/?p=9088] while she attempts to continue recovering her brain function after being shot in the head and nearly killed just over one year ago this month in Tucson, AZ (Not far from where the cop near Phoenix proudly posted the bullet-ridden photo of Obama). While six others were killed during the same incident in Tucson, as the shooter used a legal weapon allowing him to get off some 30 shots per clip, federal and state lawmakers have failed to do a damned thing about any of it.
And the election year is just beginning.

And now it comes to this...

2011-01-01 "Jesse Jackson Predicts ‘Somebody Shoot[ing] An AK-47 In The White House’ As A Result Of GOP Criticism" by Frances Martel
[http://www.mediaite.com/tv/jesse-jackson-predicts-somebody-shooting-an-ak-47-in-the-white-house-as-a-result-of-gop-criticism/]
Jesse Jackson, Sr. is worried for the safety of the President. The Reverend made his way to Martin Bashir‘s show today, where he was asked to comment on Republican disrespect of the president. And while the conversation began on the topic of acceptable political discourse, literally within the same sentence Jackson turns around and warns of the possibility that “somebody shoots an AK-47 in the White House.” Huh?
Bashir rattled off a laundry list of Republican bad behavior, from Arizona governor Jan Brewer pointing at the President to Rep. Joe Wilson shouting “you lie!” to Newt Gingrich using the term “food stamp president.”
“Why do Republicans think this is acceptable behavior in public?” Bashir asked.
“Demonizing the President is both morally wrong and dangerous,” Jackson began, citing “the continued demonization and then somebody shoots an AK-47 in the White House… to demonize him and demonize the poor is unacceptable.”
Noting that there wasn’t much of an explanation here, Bashir pressed on, asking whether Jackson was predicting “some sort of terrible outcome.”
“Ignorance and hatred and violence is in a certain pattern,” Jackson continued, citing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and noting that “George Wallace never hit anybody.”
“I’ve seen, sir, that remarkable photograph of you on the day Dr. Martin Luther King was murdered,” Bashir replied, “are you saying that Barack Obama’s very safety is being imperiled?”
“Absolutely,” replied Jackson, “ignorance and hatred leads to violence.” He went on to argue that “there is something unholy about this.”
Seems like we’re a long way off from the days Jackson was privately calling for President [then Senator] Obama’s castration [http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/item_2IKMVtS3vzxRvoAAxZ0ZGL].
The segment via MSNBC below:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Comment:
Greg: Jesse is certainly correct. Elements on the right have been conducting a passion play since Obama's first day. We are currently at station ten, "Patriots are crucified". The aim is to convince the corn fed ill bred followers to imagine themselves actors in a historic drama. Some wish to carry this fiction out as heroes, using violence to prevent a curtain torn as darkness falls.

2012-02-01 "It's Time for the Black Bloc to Go Away; Repeated violent confrontations with police are failing to move Occupy Oakland forward" by Robert Gammon from "Eastbay Express" newspaper
[http://www.eastbayexpress.com/ebx/its-time-for-the-black-bloc-to-go-away/Content?oid=3116557]
The beginning of Occupy Oakland's downfall can be traced to October 25, 2011, the day that Mayor Jean Quan green-lighted the first police raid on the City Hall encampment. That brutal — and at the time, unnecessary — crackdown launched the transformation of the local Occupy movement from a protest over economic inequality to an ongoing battle against Oakland police. OPD's overreaction that day, firing teargas and other less-than-lethal projectiles at a mostly peaceful crowd, made international headlines and sparked global condemnation. It also polarized Occupy Oakland, empowering a hard-core group of protesters who embrace vandalism, so-called Black Bloc tactics, and seem to revel in violent confrontations with police. This group has enjoyed substantial influence over Occupy Oakland ever since.
By pointing to OPD's over-the-top response on October 25, the Black Bloc group convinced Occupy Oakland to embrace a so-called "diversity of tactics," an Orwellian euphemism that effectively means: "We want to fuck shit up." Once the Occupy Oakland General Assembly had adopted this philosophy, the movement's deeply undemocratic rules (the need for 90 percent of the vote to do anything) prevented nonviolent protesters from overturning it.
The Black Bloc brethren, who appear to be mostly young white men, many of whom don't even live in Oakland, exploited this advantage to further their goals. They turned the wildly successful November 2 General Strike into a night of chaos, setting fires, breaking windows, and battling police throughout downtown. After a lull of several weeks, the Black Bloc group reignited early this year with "Fuck the Police" marches.
There is no doubt that the Oakland Police Department has a long and troubled history of violence and brutality. Few news organizations have reported on OPD's record of abuses more thoroughly than the Express. But Oakland has a lot of other problems besides its police department, and Occupy Oakland, through its "diversity of tactics," has lost sight of that fact, forcing the cash-strapped city to spend millions of dollars it doesn't have responding to the Black Bloc. Moreover, the Black Bloc's fetish for vandalism and violence has alienated a significant portion of Oakland's progressive community to the point that Occupy Oakland is now looked upon with shame by some people who once supported it.
At no time was this truer than last weekend. From the start, Occupy's actions leading up to January 28 were deeply flawed. It all began with a childish "press conference" in front of City Hall in which some Occupy leaders threatened city officials with future blockades and more violence if Oakland police stopped them from occupying an unnamed building.
Occupy leaders had purposely kept the identity of the building secret. Publicly, they maintained that they didn't want Oakland police to have the tactical advantage of knowing where they were going, but privately they surely knew that many Occupy supporters would stay home if they found out that the target was the publicly owned Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center. A planned takeover of a building owned by the city was a guaranteed confrontation with its police department.
So it was no surprise that Black Bloc members came equipped on Saturday with large shields and items to throw at cops. In fact, the planned takeover of the Kaiser was so ridiculously unattainable it seemed clear that the real goal of many protesters was another ugly battle with police, a sort of "Let's poke the bear, and watch it respond."
The Black Bloc got what it wanted. Oakland police officers, as they are prone to do, overreacted, firing teargas and less-than-lethal weaponry at the crowd, surrounding the marchers, ordering them to disperse, and then giving them nowhere to go. Even journalists got swept up in the crackdown, as downtown Oakland once again transformed into a something akin to a war zone, and the city's already poor reputation was further tarnished.
At this point, it appears that nonviolent progressives in Oakland, people dedicated to reforming the system, are effectively trapped in a toxic struggle between Black Bloc protesters who want to smash the system and a police department intent on defending it.
So what happens next? There is a possibility that after January 28, nonviolent occupiers will finally become fed up with the Black Bloc and will stop giving it legitimacy. But if they don't, the city could be in for many more days like January 28 — unless Oakland's larger progressive community steps in, retakes Occupy, sends the Black Bloc packing, and refocuses the movement on its original intent: changing a system that rewards the wealthy and large corporations while forcing everyone else to fend for themselves.

Three-Dot Roundup -
Federal Judge Thelton Henderson stripped power from Mayor Quan, Oakland City Administrator Deanna Santana, and Interim Police Chief Howard Jordan, ordering them to first consult with Independent Monitor Robert Warshaw, a former police chief in Rochester, New York, before making any changes to police department policies. Henderson is deeply frustrated with the department's lack of progress in achieving court-mandated reforms. The judge also said that if Quan, Santana, and Jordan decide to ignore Warshaw's recommendations, they must come to court and explain why. ... Bay Area transportation officials also are moving forward with plans to extend BART to Livermore, even though such rail extensions — along with additional toll lanes planned for the region — could spur more sprawl by making it easier for suburban commuters to get to work. The Contra Costa Times reported that the Alameda County Transportation Commission, which is dominated by elected officials from suburban areas, voted overwhelmingly to include the $400 million BART to Livermore proposal in a sales tax measure that would go before East Bay voters. Commissioner Keith Carson, who represents Oakland and Berkeley, was the lone vote against the plan, saying more money should be spent on urban bus systems. ... California regulators adopted strict clean-air standards for cars, requiring 15 percent of new vehicles sold in the state to have zero emissions by 2025. The new rules take effect in 2018, and industry analysts expect electric and plug-in vehicles to become common by the end of the decade. ... And Assemblyman Sandré Swanson of Alameda has dropped his bid to challenge state Senator Loni Hancock of Berkeley in this year's senate race, the Oakland Tribune reported. Swanson endorsed Hancock, and she, in turn, endorsed him for 2016.

2012-02-01 "How I Got Arrested at Occupy Oakland; Our own John C. Osborn offers a first-person account of being taken into custody by police during the latest Occupy Oakland protest" by John C. Osborn
[http://www.eastbayexpress.com/ebx/how-i-got-arrested-at-occupy-oakland/Content?oid=3113852]
As I sat on a wooden chair in the lobby of the Oakland YMCA on Broadway, my wrists wrapped with tight zip-ties behind my back, I couldn't help but play through the events of the day. Watching as Oakland Police Department officers processed the dozen or so people inside the lobby, I wondered whether the higher-ups would okay me as a "journalist" and let me go, or whether I would be taking the 45-minute ride to Santa Rita Jail in Dublin with the others.
January 28 was a rough day on the streets of Oakland. A vandalized City Hall. A street confrontation that likely made riot porn addicts drool. And the arrest of about four hundred people over the course of the day, most through mass arrests in which marchers and journalists had no ability to escape. To put the arrests in context, more people were arrested last Saturday than in all the arrests made of Occupy Oakland participants since it first started on October 10.
In the days after #J28, a blame game quickly ensued, a public relations war with incendiary language like "improved explosive devices" (seriously?), "tantrums" (maybe), and "institutional violence" (debatable). But this is what January 28 really showed: Tensions between OPD and Occupy Oakland have escalated to a perpetual feedback loop in which police wait for the slightest provocation to justify force in order to put down the protests of the whole, while Occupy Oakland organizers continue a protesting framework built on confrontations that end up with injuries and arrests in hopes to once again prove "the police are violent."
January 28 was supposed to be the culmination of a month's worth of planning to take over an undisclosed vacant building and convert it into a social center, to reactivate a dead building in order to create something useful to the community. The march, attended by close to 1,000 at its peak, was jubilant, largely peaceful, and included a diverse group, young and old.
But it shouldn't have surprised anyone that after some Occupy Oakland participants threatened the city last week with future blockades if they were met with violence that Oakland would once again become a scene of gas bombs, rubber bullets, and broken glass.
There's so much that went wrong that day. The fifteen minutes or so of heated confrontation between police and protesters on 10th and Oak streets after OPD created a perimeter around the vacant Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center (the target building for occupation) is a prime example. Police fired dozens of rounds of projectiles and lobbed at least a dozen teargas grenades toward the advancing line of shield-bearing marchers, while an undetermined number of protesters threw rocks, bottles, smoke bombs, and even furniture back at police. By the time police pushed the crowd back to Frank Ogawa Plaza, disoriented protesters were choking on tear gas. It was still just the afternoon.
But it was after about five hundred protesters went for their Plan B target that OPD decided to employ mass arrest tactics in violation of their own crowd control policies. The first so-called kettle happened at Henry J. Kaiser Memorial Park. Police blocked all the exits and started issuing dispersal orders, only they didn't offer a safe exit route as mandated by their crowd control policy. The policy specifically states that "the crowd should be given an opportunity to disperse rather than face arrest" and should be afforded with "at least two" exit points, if possible. Also, police are to allow protesters the chance to leave before kettling them. Near panic broke out after officers lobbed teargas grenades at protesters who marched on them with a barricade in hand. Eventually, the protesters tore down two fences to get back onto Telegraph Avenue, at which point police offered an "exit" route.
It was outside the YMCA where the second kettle happened, trapping hundreds of protesters. A bunch of marchers ran up to the Y's entrance. They pounded on the door and desperately pleaded with staff inside to let them in so that they could escape arrest and teargas. Eventually, someone inside the Y opened the door, and like a dam breaking, protesters poured in jubilantly, with some running deeper inside, and others, like me, lingering in the lobby.
It took all but a minute before police had pushed a group of people inside as they advanced up to the Y, then blocked the entrance, declaring everyone arrested. There was no opportunity to leave, no dispersal orders given, and no breaking and entering as claimed by OPD. Protesters, who were peacefully marching at this point, were not allowed to leave the area as afforded by the law.
The mass arrest tactic of OPD netted six journalists, all of whom had to negotiate their ways out of custody: Gavin Aronsen with Mother Jones, Vivian Ho with the San Francisco Chronicle, Kristin Hanes with KGO radio, Yael Chanoff with the Bay Guardian, graphic journalist Susie Cagle, and me. Chanoff was forced to spend the night in jail.
It took me about an hour to get out of custody. I was told that because I did not have an official OPD press pass that I was "not a journalist." After pressing a number of officers to check with the public information officers that I was, indeed, a journalist, I was finally allowed to leave after being admonished over how my safety is at risk without having a press pass. In the past, declaring that you were a member of the media or flashing a business card was more than adequate to get by, and was in alignment with the department's policies.
The mass arrest of protesters and journalists was also a surprising escalation for a department that just lost more autonomy after a federal judge found it is seriously lacking in the required reforms mandated by the courts. The treatment of journalists covering Occupy Wall Street, in particular, is a growing issue nationwide and one of the main reasons that the country fell 27 spots to 47th in terms of press freedom this year, according to Reporters Without Borders.
But what is also troubling is the degree to which Occupy Oakland organizers are both alienating potential "comrades" from their cause with their not-well-thought-out confrontational tactics and by putting their supporters at risk knowing how police will likely respond to their agitations. There are many people in the local movement who have good intentions, but those intentions are being lost amid acts of vandalism and "Fuck the Police" marches that appear designed to provoke a violent police response.

John C. Osborn
About 1,000 Occupy protesters marched toward the vacant Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center.

2012-01-29 "JR Valrey Presents The Black Experience Study Guide: My Top 7 Books, Movies, and Albums for Black History Month"
[http://www.amoeba.com/blog/2012/01/jamoeblog/guest-amoblogger-jr-valrey-presents-the-black-experience-study-guide-my-top-7-books-movies-and-albums-for-black-history-month-.html]
For this special Black History Month Amoeblog we've invited author/journalist/broadcaster/activist JR Valrey (a.k.a. the People's Minister of Information) to be a guest contributor and to write the following insightful piece, accurately titled The Black Experience Study Guide: My Top 7 Books, Movies, and Albums for Black History Month. The Oakland-based Valrey, who was interviewed & profiled on the Amoeblog last month [http://www.amoeba.com/blog/2011/12/jamoeblog/raw-uncut-grassroots-ghetto-and-anti-corporate-jr-valrey-s-block-reportin-.html], is known for his work on KPFA radio, his contributions to the San Francisco Bay View Newspaper, and his recently published book Block Reportin'. The book, which will soon be available for sale in Amoeba Hollywood's ever-expanding book section, features interviews with such important black cultural figures as political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal, hip-hop emcee/poet/actor Mos Def, former US Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, comedian/social satirist Paul Mooney, and the late, great, highly influential Gil Scott Heron. In the spring of this year Valrey plans to publish his second book, Unfinished Business: Block Reportin' 2. For more info and insights on JR Valrey, visit the blockreportradio website [http://www.blockreportradio.com]. Thanks for your contribution to the Amoeblog JR Valrey!
---

Black History Month was born out of Black History Week, which was created by Carter G. Woodson, author of The Miseducation of the Negro, in the early half of the 20th Century.

Since then, many people celebrate it by learning about the great pyramids of Egypt or by memorizing Malcolm's "The Ballot or the Bullet," which is cool, but I want to modernize and diversify the list a little bit. These are some books, movies, and albums that I would add to the list of the Black Experience Study Guide, because they had a profound effect on how I look at the world in a spiritual, social, political, and cultural sense.
 This list is my humble contribution to uplifting people's consciousness about what is happening to Black people internationally, as well as how we feel about life after having our backs against the wall for centuries, with few exceptions. As the late legendary jazz saxophonist John Coltrane would say, "Here are a few of my favorite things."

 1) The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
 
The New Jim Crow is one of the best books that I've ever read in my life. It gives a chronological history of how the U.S. has become the biggest mass incarcerating nation in the world, way beyond Russia and even apartheid South Africa.
 This book talks about the role that political architects like Richard Nixon, Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and more played in bringing us to the scenario, where two million people are currently behind bars. Michelle Alexander also makes the poignant point that there are more Black people in this country tied to the criminal justice system today than there were in 1850, a decade before the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. The New Jim Crow is an essential read for anybody doing serious study on the on-going war being waged against Black people in the U.S. by the government.

 2) The First Minute of a New Day by The Midnight Band

Gil Scott Heron and Brian Jackson of The Midnight Band were two of the most influential musicians of their era, musically and lyrically. Many have heard of some of their contemporaries like Curtis Mayfield and The Last Poets, but somehow this band seems to get lost in the sauce when it comes to official recognition. This album is like a time capsule, detailing spiritually the wants and desires of African people that have been oppressed in the Americas for centuries. Songs like "Winter in America," "Ain't No Such Thing As Superman," and "Pardon Our Analysis," are timeless masterpieces...not only scathing critiques of the system that has its boot on our necks, but empowering messages for oppressed people to keep their heads up, fist in the air, and eyes peeled on the path to self-determination. Songs like "The Offering," "Must Be Something," and "Alluswe," are revolutionary prayers, extensions of the spirituals enslaved Africans were singing on plantations, in the south to organize and politically educate themselves.
 The late Gil Scott Heron was one of the most passionate writers of any genre, in my opinion, ever produced in the United States. Brian Jackson is the perfect musical compliment. This dynamic duo has been sampled in rap music by 2Pac, The Coup, Freeway, Common, and Kanye, just to name a few.

 3) Kongo: 50 Years of Independence of Congo

 This is a documentary that employs animation to tell the history of the mineral rich, under-developed, war-torn African country known today as the The Democratic Republic of the Congo. Everyone, who listens to the international media from the Unites States, Europe, or the Arab world has heard the stereotypes of African governments being backwards and corrupt and squandering resources, but very few have heard of the European powers who manufactured these situations, helping to put these puppets in power for the benefit of European economies. This documentary, which is broken into three parts, tells the stories of King Leopold of Belgium, the architect of colonialism in the Congo, who genocidally cut the country's population in half, because of his ambitions to enrich himself, and later Belgium.
Kongo: 50 Years of Independence of Congo also paints a bold portrait of the late great first Prime Minister Patrice Lamumba, who strived to fight off secessionists who wanted to split the most mineral rich areas from the country for the benefit of a few and the western powers. It was my first time hearing the names of Congolese anti-colonialist like Simon Kimbangu, who was a liberation theologist and died a political prisoner because of that fact, and Paul Panda, who was a Black man of Congolese descent from Belgium, who spoke up and organized for African independence on an international level.
 This film discusses the life of the dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, who was in power for decades, and who was in part responsible for the assassination of Patrice Lamumba. It also talks about the rise, with the assistance of the Rwandan government, of Laurent Kabila, who was later assassinated and his "son," the current front man "running" the Congo, Joseph Kabila.
 In most electronic devices, there is a mineral called Coltan and 80% of the world's supply of this essential mineral is in the Congo. So for all of us that use laptops, iPhones, iPads, and PS3's, it is our responsibility to know the human costs and environmental costs of these products, and to do what we can to eliminate the carnage. The Congolese people deserve to have their sovereignty and right to self-determination respected, and if people want to make and buy things that require minerals from the Congo, than they should pay the Congolese who are the care-takers of that land a fair price. To properly respect other cultures, we need to educate ourselves, and learn something about them. This documentary is a great start to educating oneself on Congolese political history.  The 156 minute film screens February 15th at 7pm during the African Film Festival at UC Berkeley's BAM/Pacific Film Archive.

 4) The Wiz

The Wiz is a brilliantly crafted cinematic masterpiece that was shot in New York City , with an all-star cast featuring Michael Jackson, Richard Pryor, Lena Horne, Nippsey Russel, Diana Ross, and more. Although it is an adaptation of the widely known Wizard of Oz, it is the Black version that is spiced up with beautifully written and performed music, as well as soulful choreography.
The climax of the film is when Dorothy, played by Diana Ross, and her crew of misfits make it into the Emerald City, a.k.a. Oz. There Richard Pryor, who plays the Wiz, scares the hell out of the motley crew using big speakers hoisted on the top of tall buildings, and with a huge metal face that breathes fire and gives people the impression that the Wiz is indestructible. At one point the Wiz yells through his microphone that the color is red and all of the people follow the trend even making up songs and dances to celebrate the color. A few minutes later, the Wiz changes the the trendy color to green and the people follow suit, making up a new song and dance. This reflects the brain-washing power of the corporate media.
 Shot during the political and cultural dishevel of the 70's, this tale of mass media manipulation of the human race is even more important today, looking at the fact that more people know of Jay Z and Beyonce's new baby than know about the war in the Congo, which has already claimed 6 million African lives. Most people in the U.S. could name more sports figures, than they can politicians who make decisions everyday that dictate the quality of our very lives. This is a testament to the power of the media.

 5) The 7 Day Theory by Tupac Shakur aka Makavelli

 This was the last album that Tupac Shakur worked on and oversaw before he was assassinated with the help of various police agencies in Las Vegas, in September of 1996. Different from All Eyez on Me, The 7 Day Theory was, in my opinion, one of his most contemplative albums right alongside the classic Me Against the World. These were the two albums where we got to see the genius come out of Pac without any obstacles or filters. Tupac recorded All Eyes on Me after he was shot, set up, and convicted on trumped up rape charges. The rage and party nature that makes up All  Eyes On Me reflects a young Black spokesman for his generation that was still maturing, and was trying to psychologically bounce back from being almost killed and unjustly accused, imprisoned, and crucified in the media. The 7 Day Theory is the album he started after he was able to shed those feelings, expel those demons, and revolve back to what it is he set out to do. Pac was very verbose about his political leanings, on songs like "Blasphemy," "Whiteman's World," and "Hold Ya Head." He lyrically sprayed venom on "Bomb First," and "Hail Mary," where he starts out with "I'm not a killer but don't push me/ revenge is like the sweetest joy next to gettin' pussy/ picture paragraphs unloaded/ wise words being quoted/peeped a weakness in the rap game and sowed it/ bow down. "
 A lot of people had a problem with Pac calling out other rappers on this album. But isn't that the roots of rap? When KRS 1 and MC Shan battled it was Hip Hop, when Common attacked Ice Cube it was Hip Hop, but when Pac spoke up in his rhymes, people couldn't take it. They thought that he went to far. His words, his writing, and his passion were so in tune with each other that people thought that it was dangerous. Isn't that the sign of a great writer, poet, rapper, and musician? His commentary on other musicians was only a secondary reason why I appreciated this album. The number one reason is that Pac, his emotions, and the things that would happen to him in the world gave the planet a bird's eye view to the worldly intellect, the gentleness of spirit, the confidence, and the arrogant rough attitude of young Black men that is created once we realize that in every country, in every kind of society, it is us against the world. White on top, and Black on the bottom. Rich on top and poor on the bottom. This album elegantly weaved all of these feelings into a cohesive product, that the oppressed all over the world and those who identify with them, related to, because they knew that Pac meant every thing he said, with everything in his being. I aspire, as a writer to be able to connect my brain, heart, and pen like Pac did on this album.

 6) Block Reportin' by JR Valrey

This is the book of interviews that I wrote. I think that Block Reportin' is an essential read because I interviewed people who made major contributions nationally or were involved in major earthshaking events: controversial people, talented musicians who stand for a cause, legendary political figures who speak on behalf of Black people from all walks of life, and more.
 Interviews range from the late poet/jazz/blues man Gil Scott Heron, to the fire spitting lyricist M-1(half of one of rap's dopest revolutionary groups, dead prez), to the courageous Peace activist Cynthia McKinney who talks about her experience being kidnapped and made a political prisoner in Israel, to Hajj Malcolm Shabazz, the grandson of the international human rights leader Malcolm X (Hajj Malik El Shabazz), to CIA financier Freeway Rick Ross (the real dude not the rapper), to Black Panther political prisoner and the prolific writer Mumia Abu Jamal, plus more. I don't believe in polite journalism, though I do believe in truthful journalism so I ask questions that may seem invasive at times, but it is in the spirt of true political education. In the book I don't speak the "Queen's English." I speak the dialect of masses, the people in the streets who live around us, the reason why I do this is to communicate information, not to pass some kind of English exam.  Unlike most school textbooks that talk about the people who are no longer breathing, Block Reportin' deals with the people who are still breathing, kicking, fighting, and speaking out. This is important because their stories are not over, in some cases you can join their movement and help to affect the outcome, like in the case of political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal, or in the case of the War in the Congo that is still on, claimed over 6 million lives, and caused catastrophic environmental damage.
 The chapters in Block Reportin' are only a few pages long, and there are more than 30 personalities for the reader to analyze who talk about subjects as eclectic and abstract as Malcolm X's connection to jazz music, which I talked about with Umar Bin Hasan of the Last Poets, and as concrete as the curriculum of the Black Panther Party's Liberation School, which was headed by Ericka Huggins, who shared her knowledge with me in a KPFA recording studio.
Block Reportin' is my attempt at hooking real living history and history makers up with people who live within these neighborhood and cell blocks, because ultimately I believe that our history and the history of resistance in this country in all its forms should be documented and distributed by us. If we fail to do so, our enemies will bury it and change it.

 7) Dark Alliance by Gary Webb

Sometimes it is said in the Black community, that the truth is only the truth when it comes out of the mouth of a white man. So to that extent, I had to include this book on my list of top 7 choices of books, movies, and music that I would recommend for Black History Month.
Dark Alliance, written by San Jose Mercury News reporter Gary Webb (who was later murdered), details the US government plans that were executed in the '80s to sell cocaine in Black neighborhoods in the Bay and in LA. The mission was to fund counter-revolutions, off the books and out of the gaze of U.S. taxpayers, in El Salvador and in Nicaragua. This book exposes explosive information linking the elite in the highest echelons of the United States government to international drug trafficking.
 This is another book that exposes the true nature of the government that we currently live under. Many of the people, excuse me -- criminals, named in this book are still alive and still impacting influential circles in the government, military, and in the intelligence agencies of this county. So even after you've read the last page, the story is on-going and still unfolding. We've had shortages on water in California recently, but never on cocaine, which is grown in South America.
Dark Alliance is a classic piece of journalism, that I believe should be a mandatory read for every high school and college student in this country.

Statement from the J28 Tactical Team
[http://occupyoaklandmoveinday.org/content/statement-j28-tactical-team]
This is a statement from the group charged with tactical planning for the Move-in Day building occupation. There have been many questions about our role in events, the choices we made, and the rationale for these choices. Because we cannot answer such questions publicly without substantial legal risk, there has been a great deal of speculation and even mudslinging. Many have questioned our good intentions, suggesting that we had no intention of actually occupying a building and only wanted to start a fight with the police or “create a spectacle.” Given the energy we have put into this effort, both at the clandestine and open level, we find such suggestions hurtful. Each of us worked intensively in the Building Assembly committees and in the closed group charged with planning, effectively devoting an entire month of our lives to this effort. Like everyone else in the building assemblies, we wanted a social center for Occupy Oakland  and we remain truly disappointed that we were not successful on the 28th. Still, we think the day was a success in many ways. We think the organizing for the 28th was especially powerful, and the work done in the building assemblies, the conversations had, the ideas shared, will continue to produce results. For some of us, such organizing is an important part of how we judge victory or success and we are proud that we attempted a  model of organizing different than those typically used for actions like this. We strengthened new relationships and encouraged people to take on unfamiliar roles.  Regardless of the result, we put the idea of claiming a building for social needs front and center in ways that it had not been before, drawing international attention to the reclamation of vacant properties for human needs rather than profits. Even if the reestablishment of the Oakland Commune was blocked, this was still a manifestation of its clear and ferocious anticapitalist spirit. The solidarity actions it inspired – nationally and internationally – attest to this. People are inspired by what we do, inspired by our explicitly anticapitalist politics, our ambition, our willingness to say and do what we really want. We suspect that these internal debates seem much less pressing to those watching from afar.
Getting 1000 or 2000 rebels out in the streets to illegally claim a building seems a huge success to us,  something that would not have been possible months ago. We do not see this as low turnout but as proof of the outreach work that the committees did. Throughout the day, friends, comrades and total strangers acted in incredibly powerful and brave ways, displaying a ferocity and resolve that we have rarely seen before. This was, indeed, a manifestation of the power, compassion, and dedication of the Oakland Commune, our willingness not only to fight our enemies but to take care of each other. Despite the failures of the day, this will continue to produce important effects. In particular, we notice that there was almost no internal strife during the streetfighting that occurred. No one tried to keep people from throwing things at the cops or advancing on the police line with shields. This fact on its own indicates a step forward for Occupy Oakland. We can act with unity and respect each other on the streets. We hope to see more of that in the future.
Nonetheless, we did not succeed in our stated goal and the day featured many questionable decisions, organizational breakdowns and outright tactical mistakes. We want to account for these and take responsibility where possible. It must be said that we are a relatively large group, that many of us had never worked together before, and that we have varying perspectives on the events of the day. We are not in full consensus about what went wrong and what went right.
We will first offer a narrative of the day's events, with as little editorializing or commentary as possible. We provide this neutral account first, followed by our criticism of the the tactical and strategic mistakes of the day.

Narrative

Once the Move-in Day endeavor got underway, a group of us began meeting to
take care of the aspects of the occupation that were not going to be
organized publicly, as stated in the proposal. This group included people
from most of the different committees of Occupy Oakland. Most of us had
never worked together before. Some members of the committee came into this
process having already begun scouting for suitable locations while
crafting the proposal that went to the GA. Once this group formed, other
teams continued looking for locations that fit our criteria. We felt very
strongly that the building needed to meet the following conditions: 1) it
needed to be owned by a corporation or governmental entity rather than an
individual; 2) it needed to be large enough to fit our assemblies and
committees; 3) it needed to have water and power; 4) be relatively close
to Oscar Grant Plaza; 5) be a building that was relatively easy to get
into, both for purposes of research and the occupation on the 28th'; 6) be
in a neighborhood where its impact on neighbors would be relatively low.
Finding buildings that fit all of these criteria was more challenging than
we expected. We ended up with a shortlist of three buildings, including
the Kaiser center. The other two buildings did not meet all of the
criteria perfectly, but we agreed to use them as alternates.

Given these options, and given the fact that the other two options had
some significant flaws, we felt that the Kaiser center should be plan A,
provided we had sufficient numbers of people. We estimated that we needed
around 1000 people to successfully take and defend the Kaiser building.
Though it was an open secret that the Kaiser center was a possible target,
and the building had been openly discussed as a possibility since November
(even discussed as a possible place the Mayor might offer us in exchange
for vacating the camp), we felt that it was worth trying to see if we
could get to the doors of the Kaiser center before the police did.  We
thought the story of the Kaiser center – sold by the city of Oakland to
its own redevelopment agency, virtually ensuring that it would remain
unused for the foreseeable future – would help build support for our
occupation and illuminate the shady dealings of the Oakland Redevelopment
Agency. The fact that it was city property made it seem more likely that
we would be able to stay, in contrast to corporate property where, it
seems, the police would be obliged to respond if the owners requested.
Therefore, we decided that we would head in that direction if numbers were
good during the rally and there was no police activity at the building.
Our original plan was to get to 10th St. in front of the Kaiser Center,
take down the fence on that side of the building, and fill the
alley/parking area between the Kaiser Center and the Oakland Museum, at
which point our entry team would get us into the building. If that didn't
work, we were prepared to enter from the lake-side of the building and
take down the two sets of fences there. If we were blocked from the
building on both sides, our plan was to head to Plan B. (Plan C was too
far from the Kaiser center, and was intended to be an alternate if our
numbers at the plaza were under 1000). We had a couple different blocs of
people in front who knew the locations, the plans and were equipped to
help out.

By the end of the rally, numbers swelled toward 1000 and as we left the
plaza our scouts reported that there was still no police activity at the
Kaiser. It was a beautiful day. Police had been distracted by a diversion
at a decoy building 30th and Telegaph, which they had surrounded and
filled with cops, and seemed mostly distributed throughout the city in
small staging areas. We started heading in the direction of the lake. As
we turned off 12th St. onto Madison St. our scouts told us that police
vans had parked at the intersection of 10th and Oak and also at 12th and
Oak. By the time we got to 10th and  Madison we could see the skirmish
line forming one block down, on Oak, and we knew that we were also blocked
on 12th. (11th was impossible because of the tunnel, an effective kettle).
 At that point we decided to see if we could get around by cutting through
Laney and spilling into the streets on 10th. We almost succeeded but the
police blocked the front of the march from going down the first set of
stairs.

We were thus forced to wind our way through Laney, during which time many
of us got separated. It was hard getting the group through the narrow
paths of the college. Exiting Laney, we lost the front of the march while
trying to regroup, and some people went ahead, turning back toward the
lake-side of the Kaiser Center instead of heading toward Plan B per our
plan. When we caught up with them, there was a standoff with the police.
We attempted to encourage the crowd to storm the lines and started taking
down some fences, but this was unsuccessful. Because it seemed like people
were interested in continuing to try for Kaiser, and riled up by their
encounter with the police, we led the march around the corner to try to
find a tactically better position from which to  get past the police
lines. On Oak St. we advocated for people to try and break through the
police line. People seemed willing to give it a shot. The fighting that
ensued was immensely inspiring, even if, according to our original plan,
we should have been well on our way to Plan B.  People displayed
impressive bravery but the encounter was exhausting and Plan B seemed too
far at that point, and too difficult to get to, seeing as we would have to
get around the police and head into East Oakland. We decided to return to
the plaza.

–

Once back at the plaza we needed to make some decisions about whether to
continue on to plan C, call it quits or do something else. Plan C was a
bit of a walk, given what we had just gone through. It was also clear to
us that the police were capable of guessing our destination, and would
probably block us if we tried to make it to C. At the same time, it was
clear that people were very inspired by the Battle of Oak St. and wanted
to try for a building. We felt some sense of urgency based on that energy
level, but were pretty sure that many people would go home if we didn't
try something quickly. It occurred to us that we might try the Traveler's
Aid building. We sent a scout to look at it. There were people working on
the building who had the door padlocked. We suspected that we could cut
the lock, the workers would leave and we would have our occupation. Though
this did not fit our criteria – it was owned by a wealthy individual
rather than a corporation, and was smaller than our needs – we felt that
it was our best chance for success, given the aggressive police response.
We assembled at the corner of 14th and Broadway and marched over to the
Traveler's Aid building. However, when we got there, the group tasked with
cutting the padlock was unable to do so, given the equipment they had.
While standing in front of the Traveler's Aid, trying to figure out what
do, the march took off around the corner, up San Pablo. At that point our
decision making structure effectively collapsed, and we scrambled to try
and find a place to take the march. Most of us in the tactical group had
different ideas about what we should be doing and no time to figure them
out. While trying to discuss our options, we were kettled at 19th and
Telegraph, escaped miraculously, and continued up Telegraph toward the
building used as a decoy that morning . The police, however, blocked us at
28th and, once on Broadway, the march, which was no longer entirely in our
hands, started heading back to the plaza, which seemed wise. Most of us
were arrested in the final kettle on Broadway, though some of us escaped
and went to the other side of the kettle to support our arrested comrades.
At that point, autonomous groups, enraged by the events of the day,
responded to the police violence in the manner which they saw fit –
entering City Hall and trashing it, for instance,or marching to the jail
to try and block the sheriff's buses.

Analysis, Self-Criticism and Recommendations for the Future

We made several tactical mistakes and some questionable decisions during
the first march. As stated before, we do not have consensus on what went
right and what wrong, and can only offer the following perspectives.

The First March:

1) Cutting through Laney is certainly questionable. We do feel that it
might have worked, and could have been seen as a brilliant gambit. The
only other choices would have been to   charge the lines or immediately go
to Plan B. Some of us think storming the lines would have been the best
option. In hindsight, if we had split the march, with half of the people
pressuring the police lines on Oak and the other half going through
Laney, we might have effectively surrounded the police.

2)Letting the march escape from us in Laney was a clear failure of
conrol. As a result, the crowd turned back toward the Kaiser center when
many of us feel that it would have been much better to go to Plan B
immediately,  since it was clear that the police had already surrounded
the building and put it on lockdown. Others feel that we still had a
chance and might have effectively charged the police line on the
lake-side of the building and that  the crowd therefore made the correct
choice. Some people in the decision-making team had reservations about
plan B, particularly with regards to its residential location. They were
hesitant to bring such an intense fight to that location.

3)As for what happened afterward, it was clear that there was a real will
in the crowd to fight   the police. Although there was probably only a
very small chance of successfully reaching the  doors of the building,
and we probably should have been well on our way to Plan B, the Battle
of Oak St., as it has been called, was immensely moving for all of us,
and we very much value  this material testimony to our hatred of the
police and our desire for a home for the Oakland Commune. We do not
think people would have fought as hard as they did if they were not
committed to the project of taking a new home for Occupy Oakland.

The Second March:

1) Our decision making structure effectively broke down, and we were
seduced by a sense of urgency into making hasty decisions, rather than
following the planning and thinking we had come up with. Our unwillingness
to call it a day and risk the feelings of anticlimax and defeat was a real
weakness. We need to be willing to make strategic retreats.

2) We made a hasty decision to occupy the Traveler's Aid building, and we
did not adequately prepare to make sure it happened correctly. In
particular our entry team only had one tool, which did not work for the
job.  They were supposed to have another tool which would have worked in
that situation.  Ultimately, we are not in consensus about whether we
should have done something else in place of the TA building, whether we
should have gone to another building on our long list, tried for plan C,
or called it a day.

3) After the failure of Traveler's Aid, things completely broke down. We
should have jumped in front of the march and taken it back to the plaza in
light of the fact that we didn't have a really great destination. While we
were trying to figure out what to do we got kettled and after the breakout
the march headed up Telegraph on its own. It was a runaway train, but we
should have found a way to stop it.

4) After we were kettled once, we should acted to prevent a second kettle.
We should have taken the march out of situations where we might get caught
by the police. Broadway, in particular, is a bad street. We should have
put the march back on Telegraph as quickly as possible.

General Self-Criticism and Other Remarks

1) In retrospect, the parameters of the proposal, particularly the
parameters around ownership (or our interpretation of them) seem very
problematic. There were not as many viable commercial spaces owned by
banks and corporations as one might have thought. There were, however,
many viable spaces owned by wealthy individuals for investment purposes.
This is a place where the anticorporate (rather than anticapitalist)
ideology of the Occupy movement has become a limit. We should have
initiated a discussion with the assembly about these parameters and tested
out people's feelings about them.

2) Many of us feel that we were not good enough at communicating with the
march. We failed to stay in front of it at a crucial moment. Though we
prompted most of the major decisions the march made, our team was not
sufficiently visible as leaders or decision-makers. Many of us are, of
course, uncomfortable with such authority but we recognize that visible,
identifiable march leaders are important. Many of us feel that our
decision-making team could not effectively consult with each other,
receive info from the scouts and lead the march quickly. We have discussed
the possibility that we might need more people for march leadership, or a
single person who can make decisions autonomously if necessary, consulting
with the others where possible. Speed is important.

In general, we feel that a “leaderless” movement like Occupy Oakland – one
whose basic principles we support –  produces too few people who are
willing to stand up and lead a march with a megaphone. [We also want to
note, here, that patriarchy plays a big part in who gets  noticed or
respected as a march leader]. This opens up very complex issues of power
and authority in such situations, the need for strategic “leadership” or
direction and the contradictions this raises for people who are opposed to
leaders and authority in general. Throughout the day we struggled to
balance our own responsibility to lead the march toward success, making
choices for the group, and yet at the same time preserve the autonomy of
individuals and groups, in the spirit of Occupy Oakland. This is a
difficult balancing act in such a situation. There are times where
autonomous action made it difficult to succeed and times where autonomous
action was exactly what was necessary. (For instance, if an autonomous
group had flanked the police as they were facing off with the shields at
10th and Oak, going up Madison and down 10th, we might gotten past the
police lines there.) We hope that we can discuss such issues and think
about the new organizational forms they demand.

3) We should have gamed out more scenarios beforehand. Though many of us
feel it's impossible to play out, in advance, all of the contingencies and
possibilities one will encounter, we should have thought about the
possibility of splitting the march in half for tactical power. We have
indicated two places where the capacity to split the march might have led
to success.

4) Many have suggested that we should have gone about the occupation in an
entirely different manner  – clandestinely occupying a building and
attempting to regularize our tenancy there. Though we think the project of
occupying buildings in this manner – squatting, in other words – is
important, and some among us are squatters, it is not possible to occupy
commercial space this way. Or rather, it's not possible to occupy the kind
of space that would meet the needs of the proposal in this manner. You
can't quietly occupy these kinds of buildings, and even if you could, the
point of the proposal was to create a space for the Oakland Commune, which
is anything but quiet. Others have suggested that we should have gone in
the night before and then brought people over. Ultimately, we do not see
how this would have made a difference. The mass of people coming to
support the occupation would have encountered the same resistance, as long
as the day was announced as a day of occupation. We think that the main
tactical problem is that an occupation needs hundreds if not thousands of
people to support it. Getting those people to the building before the
police block you or evict those already inside is a difficult problem,
especially if one wants to openly inform people about what is happening
and what they might expect. We hope there can be more discussion about how
this project can be successful at a tactical level.


A Final, Slightly Philosophical Note

We have pointed out the many ways in which we thought the day was a
success and the many ways in which we thought it was a failure. But we
also want to remark on how relative and ultimately ambiguous these terms
are. For some of us, everything short of the total destruction of
capitalism is a failure. History is full of strange twists and turns and
reversals. None of us know, ultimately, what all of this will have meant
one month from now, one year from now, in a decade. We also note that, in
many regards, some of Occupy Oakland's greatest “successes” were born from
“failures.” The effect of failure is not always clear. Some failures lead
to successes. Some successes lead to failures. The eviction of the camp on
the morning of Oct. 25th was a clear failure. We had no capacity to defend
ourselves against the military operation of OPD. The attempt to storm the
police lines and retake the plaza on the night of the 25th was
unsuccessful. The night was a series of brave and remarkable failures to
take down the police line at Broadway and 14th.  And even though there
were five thousand people in the streets, the police deployed tear gas and
drove us back, again and again. Why, then, did it feel like a victory? One
of the reasons we were able to retake the plaza the next night is that the
police grievously wounded some people  – one of them a veteran  – and were
forced to retreat under public condemnation. The point, therefore, is that
we do not know what will happen. This does not mean that all choices are
equal. Questions of strategy and tactics are of the utmost important but
they have to be situated in this terrain, where the effects of tactical
success or failure are difficult to predict. We are up against an enemy
with overwhelming force and, as a result, sometimes we win indirectly, by
creating the condition for the next thing to happen, as the eviction of
the camp created the conditions for the General Strike. This is why it is
worth trying things, even knowingt that they might not work. Think, for
instance, about how the day might have gone otherwise J28. We do not know
what would have happened if we had reached plan B, or chosen to head
toward Plan C instead. We do not know, ultimately, whether or not we could
have reached these places without being blocked or kettled. The police
seemed determined to use whatever force they had at their disposal in
order to preserve the sanctity of private property. Under such
circumstances, holding a building might be impossible. There are no magic
tactics here, no secret weapons. Nonetheless, we still think the project
of taking a home for Occupy Oakland is of utmost importance. We hope that
our experience, our failed success and our successful failure, will
eventually lead us onto the road home. Long live the Oakland Commune!