Occupy Everywhere - Sept 17th - Day of Rage Against Wall Street and what it stands for!

[Peter Lemkin]

This week in Occupy, Egypt and Greece held watershed elections, Jamie Dimon was mic-checked at a Senate hearing, thousands marched in New York against stop and frisk, some key occupations had no choice but to close up shop and the Occupy National Gathering responded to Bill Maher.

#On the eve of Jamie Dimon's testimony before the Senate Banking Committee regarding JPMorgan Chase's $2 billion trading loss, Occupy the SEC and the OWS Alternative Banking Group sent a letter to Tim Johnson and Richard C. Shelby of the Committee posing serious questions that needed answering. Unfortunately the Senators lobbed softballs at Dimon. He was, however, mic-checked by five members of Occupy Homes DC, including a disabled former paramedic who lost her home due to J.P. Morgan's unethical business practices and is now facing eviction. They chanted "Stop foreclosures now!" and were led away in handcuffs.


Photo: Think Progress

#Parties supporting a bailout saving Greece from bankruptcy won a slim parliamentary majority on June 17, beating radical leftists who rejected austerity.

#In a slow, somber procession, several thousand demonstrators conducted a silent march down Fifth Avenue to protest the NYPD's discriminatory and illegal stop-and-frisk policies, which single out minority groups and create an atmosphere of martial law for the city's black and Latino residents. The policy also leaves serious scars.

#Earlier this week, a panel of judges appointed by deposed Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak dissolved the popularly elected Parliament and allowed Ahmed Shafik, the toppled government's last prime minister, to run for president. On June 18, Shafik was defeated by the Muslim Brotherhood's candidate, Mohammed Morsi, in the country's first free presidential election.

#Occupy Wall Street, Occupy LA and Occupy NL staged casserole marches in solidarity with the Quebec student movement, which has passed the 100-day mark. New York's Infinite Strike Marches are staged every Wednesday at 8 p.m. In Vancouver, it's casseroles gone wild. Ontario students dropped a banner at the University of Western Ontario's convocation. Meanwhile, Quebec government lawyers defended Bill 78, an anti- protest law, in court, arguing that it's "in the public interest."

#The Anarchopanda has taken to the streets in open protest of Bill 78. Yes, panda.


Protesting BP at the Body Autonomy Ride on June 9. Photo: Barbara Ross.

#Last week, Bill Maher issued some advice to the Occupy Movement, believing it to be the last hope for the country. The Occupy National Gathering issued a swift response.

#Police and private security forces have raided a protest encampment of anti-fracking activists in Pennsylvania. For two weeks, neighbors and concerned citizens had been helping to stave off the eviction of more than 30 families in the Riverdale Mobile Home Park in Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania, after residents were told they had to vacate the property because the land had been sold to the giant private water corporation Aqua America.

#Daily Kos ventures that recently staged occupations by undocumented activists at Obama campaign offices in Colorado, Michigan and California are likely responsible for the timing of Obama's executive order to halt deportations of Dream-eligible youth. Sure, why not?

#NY1 froze Occupy Congressional candidate George Martinez out of a scheduled televised debate, which was eventually cancelled due to a death in his opponent's family.

#Austin Guest and Marisa Holmes, veterans of Liberty Square, have brought the principles of the park to their Crown Heights apartment, including sustainable living and codes of conduct designed to prevent one person from dominating a conversation.

#A band of Occupy Wall Street protesters who call themselves "Occu-pirates" are facing off with the Parks Department over the right to keep a sailboat-turned-protest vehicle docked in the 79th Street Boat Basin and stage drum-filled demonstrations down the Hudson River.

#Mayor Michael Bloomberg has cut funding that may result in 8,000 evictions, while homelessness is at a record high. Meanwhile, he's privatizing New York, piece by piece. Today it's parking meters.

#The Guardian thinks it knows why Bloomberg vetoed a living wage bill.

#An NYPD officer has been indicted on manslaughter charges in the shooting death of Ramarley Graham, an unarmed 18-year-old, in his Bronx home in February.

#Here's a history of the antagonism between Trinity Church and Occupy Wall Street penned by OWSJ editor Allison Burtch for Animal NY.

#More than 450 people gathered outside a JP Morgan Chase in Houston's Skyline District for a peaceful demonstration calling for the end of poverty-wage jobs in Houston. Many of them were janitors who make just $9,000 a year. One person was arrested after attempting to help a protester trampled by a police horse. Exactly 22 years earlier, the situation for Los Angeles janitors wasn't so different.

#Occupy Our Homes MN surprised dozens of Freddie Mac employees at a corporate luncheon in Bloomington by "foreclosing" on them. The group also successfully pressured Citibank to cancel a scheduled sheriff's sale and approve a loan modification for the home of Occupy Homes MN activist Nick Espinosa and his mother, Colleen McKee Espinosa.


A casserole demonstration by a member of Occupy Seattle. Photo: Alex Garland

#Orlando police jailed Timothy Osmar in December for 18 days for writing revolutionary slogans on the sidewalk in chalk in front of city hall, only to drop the charges. Osmar turned around and filed suit, alleging that his First Amendment rights had been violated, and won big proving that it really is cheaper to respect a person's constitutional rights.

#The week of June 11 was Resolutions Week, during which local organizers held events to increase public awareness and put pressure on local, city and state governments to pass resolutions calling for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United.

#The remaining two members of Occupy the Farm will not be charged, meaning that there will be no charges filed against any of the Gill Tract Occupiers. So their occupation was illegal how…?

#A report found that the Oakland Police Department mishandled the October 25 Occupy Oakland protest. But there's plenty of blame to go around according to the report, the problem started at the top, with Mayor Jean Quan.

#Occupy Oakland is protesting against a recent ban on the use of shields by rallying outside the home of the council person who proposed it.

#The last of the Occupy DC tents at McPherson Square have been dismantled, effectively ending one of the oldest remaining encampments of the Occupy Movement.

#Protesters #occupied the Chicago Department of Public Health and refused to leave until they had a letter of resignation from Health Commissioner Dr. Bechara Choucair and a promise that six closed clinics would be reopened. Six were arrested.

#The Seattle Noise Brigade swarmed Capitol Hill to protest student debt.


Adam Surface

#Carmen Pittman of Occupy Atlanta is fighting to save the home that's been in her family for generations.

#Occupy Portland got a note from the city telling them that they are no longer allowed to hold meetings in the park without a permit. Apparently they haven't read the Bill of Rights. This, after a fence-mending baseball game occupiers played on June 11 against city employees.

#Twelve members of Occupy Philly were found guilty of "defiant trespassing" and conspiracy stemming from a November sit-in at a Center City Wells Fargo Bank.

#An indictment has been returned against three NATO Summit activists accused of plotting to fire bomb Mayor Rahm Emanuel's home and President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters.

#The Oakland Unified School District will close five schools that predominantly serve minority children. Parents and teachers have pleaded with the Board, and even filed lawsuits, to no effect.

#David Bronner, president of Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps, #occupied a 64-square-foot cage to draw attention to the federal prohibition on growing industrial hemp until police cut him down with a chainsaw. Yes, a chainsaw.

#Molly Gambardella, class president at North Haven High School in Connecticut, won't be addressing her class from the dais at graduation because of her involvement with Occupy North Haven, for which she briefly lived on the New Haven Green.


Waving the Occupy flag in Russia.

#Occupy Fresno has a hater website, so they must be doing something right.

#Occupy the Hamptons is kicking off the summer with some direct action in Sag Harbor.

#The Occupy Caravan reached Reno and Salt Lake.

#Palestinian footballer and hunger striker Mahmoud Al Sarsak is near death in Israeli detention. He's fasting in protest at being held for almost three years without being convicted of a crime.

#Over the weekend, members of Occupy Moscow staged an unsanctioned protest outside the offices of the Investigative Committee to support an anti-corruption blogger who was there being questioned. Ten were arrested. On June 12, 60,000 poured into the streets of Moscow chanting "Russia will be free!" Demonstrators there will soon have to face a mammoth badminton-based weapon, as Russian law enforcement is ready to test a shuttlecock machine-gun. Here's a little more about the brave Russians facing off against Putin, and here's a profile of Occupy Abai.

#Police have evicted the last Occupy London campaigners from Finsbury Square. "Thanks to all those who support Occupy, and Finsbury Square," the Occupy LSX website read. "We tried to make a difference, at least we tried."


Indigenous activists spell out "Stop Belo Monte" with their bodies.

#Three hundred indigenous Amazonians, including small farmers, fisherfolk and local residents, #occupied the massive $18 billion Belo Monte Dam project, a temporary earthen dam recently built to impede the flow of the Xingu River. Residents gathered in formation spelling out the words "Pare Belo Monte," or "Stop Belo Monte," to send a powerful message to the world prior to this week's Rio + 20 gathering.

#Activists in Bulgaria have joined up to form Occupy Eagles Bridge in response to controversial amendments to the Forestry Act that benefit their "shady" oligarch.

#As soon as the Spanish government requested a bailout plan from the European Union, Democracia Real Ya! filed a motion with the Spanish National Court against those responsible for the crisis.

#Workers at China's notorious Foxconn factory, which manufactures Apple products, were greeted with police after attempting to redress their grievances regarding work conditions. Dozens were arrested.

#A leaked draft agreement revealed that the Obama administration is pushing a secretive trade agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact, which could vastly expand corporate power, allowing foreign corporations operating in the U.S. to appeal key regulations to an international tribunal which would have the power to override U.S. law. "Go local" campaigns could be threatened by the agreement. The TPP is being called "NAFTA on steroids."


A 100-year-old woman arrested at the California Capitol building for standing up to save home care.

#The House of Representatives has overwhelmingly passed a resolution urging the president to oppose any policy toward Iran "that would rely on containment as an option in response to the Iranian nuclear threat." In other words., the drumbeat for war has been sounded.

#The Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against Gov. Rick Scott over his contentious push to remove thousands of potentially ineligible voters from Florida's voting rolls.

#Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders released Government Accountability Office records revealing that more than $4 trillion in near zero-interest Federal Reserve loans went to the banks and businesses of at least 18 current and former Federal Reserve regional bank directors in the aftermath of the 2008 financial collapse.

#The Supreme Court will not revisit the Julian Assange case.

#Thanks to Canada, Occupy is not dead, wrote the Los Angeles Times. We're just in a transitional period. Here's another article questioning whether or not Occupy is actually going somewhere, but this one has quotes from an actual Occupier.

#The average American family's net worth dropped almost 40 percent between 2007 and 2010, according to a study by the Federal Reserve.

#Seven in 10 teens will be jobless this summer.


Photo: Primavera Mexicana

#Executive compensation continued to rise last year.

#Rhode Island has passed the country's first ever homeless bill of rights.

#The New York Attorney General's office recently won an important decision in Albany County State Supreme Court when a lawsuit by a Koch Brothers'-backed political organization, which attempted to stop New York's involvement in a multi-state campaign to cut climate changing emissions, was dismissed.

#Gay rights organizations and civil rights organizations, which once viewed each other warily, are making surprising alliances.

#Shareholders, once reticent, are now revolting for some of the same reasons we are.

#Insurance giant Aetna inadvertently disclosed more than $7 million in donations to conservative political groups in a regulatory filing made earlier this year.

#Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Representative Darrell Issa (R-CA) called for a "digital bill of rights" to protect Internet users from intrusive legislation.

#In a speech at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said, with a straight face, that "government-compelled disclosure of contributions…is nothing less than an effort by the government itself to expose its critics to harassment and intimidation."

#Newt Gingrich, also with a straight face, said that elections are rigged in favor of the wealthy. And he should know.

#President Obama comes down hard on whistleblowers yet he himself leaks.

#Some of those who've been arrested for shoplifting at Wal-mart over the last several years have died while in custody of the megastore's Asset Protection staff.

#A major biotech company known as Syngenta has been criminally charged for denying knowledge that its genetically modified Bt corn actually kills livestock.


Occupier Ben P. arrested at the Cruz home in South Minneapolis while disguised as a bush.

#With virtually no debate, the North Carolina state Senate nixed global warming restrictions on the state's coast.

#Here are six government surveillance programs designed to monitor what you do online.

#The Nation reveals how the FBI is using informants to stir up fake terror plots, destroying lives in the process.

#The Atlantic explains how the Maple Spring fits in with the Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street sort of.

#The Village Voice ran a series of articles that accurately presented U.S. immigration policy as "apartheid."

#Dan Rather explained to Bill Maher how corporations own the media.

#Workers at the Davis Wire Co. in Kent, Washington, have been on strike for four weeks over forced 12-hour days and inadequate breaks.

#A USA Today investigation found that dozens of men have gone to prison for violating federal gun possession laws, even though courts have since determined that it was not a federal crime for them to have a gun and many of them don't even know they're innocent.


DREAMers line an on-ramp to the 101 Freeway near the Los Angeles Federal Building. Photo: Pocho-one Fotography

#Swoon: Robert Pattinson discussed Occupy.

#Citizen journalists are the future of news. Duh.

#Oregon's expansion of Medicaid not only provided healthcare to 10,000 who previously did not have it but also provided scientist definitive proof that Medicaid helps people, NPR reported.

#The Guardian asked whether the Republicans deliberately crashed the U.S. economy.

#Journalist Josh Stearns has been keeping track of the journalists arrested during Occupy actions. Here is a detailed list.

#God love The Onion.

#On June 21 there will be a national action against PNC Bank.

#The Paul Robeson Freedom School, an innovative 8-week educational program for Brooklyn youth most affected by the destructive policies enacted in the public school system, needs funding.


Occupy London

#Occupy the CITI Long Island City, that is.

#March to the California State Capitol on June 25 and demand a statewide moratorium on foreclosures.

#The Student Power Convergence 2012 will take place August 10 to 14 in Columbus, Ohio.

#According to The People's Record, the month of June has so far proved the busiest month for global protest-movement news.

Want to report news about your occupation or meetup? Email me at JenSacks77@gmail.com.

This week's roundup was brought to you in conjunction with Occupy ALL the Updates,