ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Angry protesters took over an Albuquerque City Council meeting Monday night, calling for immediate change at APD, the ousting of both Albuquerque’s Police Chief and Mayor and more.
The meeting got out of control quickly about an hour after it started. Things got so chaotic and unruly that Chief Gorden Eden left and city councilors canceled the meeting.
Backgrounder: DOJ Investigation Confirms: Albuquerque Police ‘Executing’ Citizens
The scene was unlike anything many people have seen in recent memory inside the council chambers. One person even tried to serve APD Chief Gorden Eden with a warrant for his arrest.
“This is no longer your meeting, this is the people’s meeting. This is democracy in action!” said protester David Correia to the city council.
“We have no control of this meeting! So if this is your meeting, go ahead,” said Albuquerque City Council President Ken Sanchez.
The meeting started like any other, but quickly deteriorated just after 6 p.m. during public comment. That’s when protesters took complete control, pushing many councilors to abandon their seats and leaving citizens to sit in their seats.
On May 19, Justice Is In Your Hands! #Justice4Cecily.
OH SHIT! Pussy Riot just went to prison… to demand #JUSTICE4CECILY https://t.co/5j9QiVdYj1 pic.twitter.com/nvYhOS2ZUD
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallSt) May 9, 2014
Through several chants and “motions” of government, protesters made it clear they were upset with APD and city council “inaction,” demanding immediate change.
Protesters chanted phrases including “fire the damn Chief,” and “fire Mayor Berry.”
The outburst started when protester David Corriea, an assistant professor at UNM, took the podium during public comment. Corriea immediately directed his words towards Chief Gorden Eden.
“We now serve a people’s warrant for arrest on Albuquerque Police Chief Gorden! He is charged with accessory!” shouted Corriea as the group tossed arrest warrants in the air.
One woman even tried to hand Eden a warrant for his arrest. However, Eden got up and left without acknowledging the woman.
“We’re not leaving this podium, I am not leaving this podium!” Corriea continued to shout at Eden as he left the room.
Protesters kept their promise, not leaving the podium, and taking over when councilors tried to a take a break.
“We will be back in five minutes!” announced Councilor Sanchez.
Councilors took that break for about ten minutes, but protesters kept going.
“Quit sitting on your hands!” shouted one woman with a bullhorn.
Some councilors eventually returned to the chambers and Council President Ken Sanchez tried to defuse the situation.
“I would prefer to give people an opportunity to speak, we are here to listen to your concerns. Please respect the chambers,” said Sanchez.
But the plea was useless as Sanchez was nearly drowned out by protesters shouting.
“We have no control of this meeting, this meeting is official adjourned,” said Sanchez.
Councilors left, clearly upset, unable to get anything done to fix the troubled police department.
“They’ve got some serious problems that need to be addressed, but we can’t address them by not conducting city business,” said Sanchez.
It took protesters about a half-hour to clear out of city council chambers after the meeting was called off. No one was arrested. Councilors were supposed to talk about proposals to take away the mayor’s power to hire a police chief. They’re now hoping to do that in a special meeting on Thursday.
City Council Press Release – Meeting Adjournment»
Chief Gorden Eden sent out a statement Monday night:
“We understand there are those in our community who have expressed concerns about APD issues related to the Department of Justice report. We are working hard to make proactive improvements now and in conjunction with DOJ recommendations. While we welcome constructive discussions, we do not believe disruption of tonight’s city council meeting was a productive way to meet those goals.” –Chief Gorden Eden
We are calling for solidarity actions by occupiers worldwide. Demand #Justice4Cecily. Every day that Cecily is in prison. . .
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallSt) May 5, 2014
HOW TO HELP: #YouAreNeeded Fightback Fund
“The corporate state, which has proved utterly incapable of addressing the grievances and injustices endured by the underclass, is extremely nervous about the mass movements that have swept the country in recent years. And if protests erupt again—as I think they will—the state hopes it will have neutralized much of the potential leadership. Being an activist in peaceful mass protest is the only real “crime” McMillan has committed.” – Chris Hedges
Statement from the Justice4Cecily.com Team:
We are devastated by the Jury’s verdict today. It has been clear from
day one that Cecily has not received a fair and open trial. The job of
a judge during a jury trial isn’t to guide the verdict to fit his
opinion. Judge Zweibel, who consistently suppressed evidence, has
demonstrated his clear bias by consistently siding with the
prosecution. In addition to suppressing evidence, he imposed a gag
order on Cecily’s lawyers, which is a clear violation of their 1st
Amendment Rights, and placed the burden of proof on the defense, not
the prosecution. He is rightly known as ‘a prosecutor in robes’.
Beyond Judge Zweibel, it is disgusting to see vast resources from
taxpayers wasted for over two years to prosecute Cecily. Manhattan DA
Cy Vance has refused to drop this case, pursuing maximum charges
against Cecily while ignoring police violence and misconduct. This is
unfortunately not isolated to Cecily’s case but is indicative of a
system concerned not with justice but with the unrelenting harassment
of dissenters and the powerless.
In the two years awaiting trial, Cecily was never offered anything
less than a felony charge, a charge that would stay with her for the
rest of her life. While awaiting a trial, Cecily has lived in limbo
for two years, not knowing what her future would be, forced to re-live
her trauma every one of those days. Beyond the sexual assault and
physical injuries she sustained, Cecily suffered PTSD and has had
difficulty finishing her master’s degree and continuing her work as a
union organizer and activist.
Despite the chilling precedent this verdict puts forth for activists,
we will not be deterred from seeking social and economic justice, as
evidenced in the courtroom today. Though we’ve held our tongues
throughout this trial as Cecily was personally attacked and degraded,
we could not stand silent today in the face of such a gross
miscarriage of justice. The people had to speak truth to power today
by standing up and will continue to do so as long as this justice
system continues to punish the 99% and protect the 1%.
As journalist Chris Hedges said in a recent article:
“The corporate
state, which has proved utterly incapable of addressing the grievances
and injustices endured by the underclass, is extremely nervous about
the mass movements that have swept the country in recent years. And if
protests erupt again—as I think they will—the state hopes it will have
neutralized much of the potential leadership. Being an activist in
peaceful mass protest is the only real “crime” McMillan has
committed.”
We recognize that, as poorly as Cecily has been treated these past two
years, she was lucky enough to have an amazing support system
comprised of representation from the National Lawyer’s Guild and
Mutant Legal, as well as significant financial help from supporters of
Occupy Wall Street and a team of ten who tirelessly worked to bring
her case to light and support her through this trying time. It’s
harrowing to imagine how many unfortunate people encounter this system
without the resources Cecily had, though we know countless innocent
people are forced to plea to felonies and ruin their lives every day
in this building.
We will be fighting this unjust verdict in the court of appeals.
Cecily’s lawyers are optimistic, given the circumstances of the case
and the gross bias demonstrated throughout, that we can win on appeal.
Thank you all for your ongoing support throughout this trial. We know
that many share our outrage at this verdict, if you would like to get
involved in jail support, please visit justiceforcecily.com to learn
more about how to best support Cecily.
6pm rally at Liberty Square
No JUSTICE?
No PEACE!
#Justice4Cecily
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) May 5, 2014
A picture of Grantley Bovell, the #NYPD officer who sexually assaulted @CecilyMcMillan pic.twitter.com/kHC5EpF8oo #myNYPD #Justice4Cecily
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) May 5, 2014
BREAKING: Workers & retirees shutting down the street in Detroit against Emergency Financial Management #MayDay2014 pic.twitter.com/Vel28BPO7v
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) May 1, 2014
#Torino, scontri al #1maggio tra #Polizia e #Autonomi. Feriti e fermi GUARDA IL VIDEO: http://t.co/HOH5FkeQhU pic.twitter.com/RRBY6nBR12
— Il Fatto Quotidiano (@fattoquotidiano) May 1, 2014
“@SI_Torino: Studenti e precari in piazza per un primo maggio di lotta! #1M pic.twitter.com/VBnkf2zQ7s“
— AltrAgorà (@altrAgora) May 1, 2014
Hotel Bauen and workplace recuperation in #Argentina
#MayDay
#1deMayo
http://t.co/R1HRl8r30F pic.twitter.com/1bjMrJuZ7e
— 15MBcn_int (@15MBcn_int) May 1, 2014
#MayDay2014 il carro del leo con vitowar spakka col precariato meticcio in duomo pic.twitter.com/4givAdx5UB
— alex foti (@alexfoti) May 1, 2014
#mayday2014 spezzobe del mutuo soccorso, raggiungici… Facile riconoscerci 
pic.twitter.com/qbAB5lage6
— Cs Cantiere (@Cantiere) May 1, 2014
Well #myNYPD is out w/ undercover officers on a #MayDay march #IWJTour @99pickets @OccupyWallSt pic.twitter.com/yeawvNLRW7
— 99 Pickets (@99pickets) May 1, 2014
HAPPENING NOW: Hundreds of Detroiters storm Chase Bank chanting “Make The Banks Pay!” pic.twitter.com/OUZpVCRZYg
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) May 1, 2014
It’s looking like we will be taking off at 1pm for the #IWJTour @99pickets @OccupyWallStNYC #MayDay pic.twitter.com/wkU9InK9Y7
— Stan Williams (@stanisoccupying) May 1, 2014
Turkish People in their houses helping the ones on the street via baskets during police attack. #MayDay #LabourDay pic.twitter.com/EjRpBgXc0t
— ║░V☮ice ✪f Turkey░║ (@VOT99) May 1, 2014
#MayDay is trending worldwide and @twitter is lying about it: pic.twitter.com/aiDI5CUbVy via @Plussone
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) May 1, 2014
The @99pickets May Day #IWJtour2014 has begun! Here’s a press advisory: http://t.co/wM1Crqe9tj #MayDayNYC
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) May 1, 2014
What if you could receive a guaranteed basic yearly income with no strings attached? Didn’t matter how much money you made now, or in the future. Nobody would ask about your job status or how many kids you have. The check would arrive in the mailbox, no matter what.
Sounds like a far-fetched idea, right? Wrong. All over the world, people are talking guaranteeing basic incomes for citizens as a viable policy. Half of all Canadians want it. The Swiss have had a referendum on it. The American media is all over it: The New York Times’ Annie Lowrey considered basic income as an answer to an economy that leaves too many people behind, while Matt Bruenig and Elizabeth Stoker of the Atlantic wrote about it as a way to reduce poverty.
The idea is not new: In his final book, Martin Luther King Jr. suggested that guaranteeing people money without requiring them to do anything in exchange was a good way for Americans to share in prosperity. In the 1960s and early 1970s, many in the U.S. gave the idea serious consideration. Even Richard Nixon supported a version of it. But by 1980, the political tide shifted to the right and politicians moved their talking points to unfettered markets and individual gain from sharing the wealth and evening the playing field.
Advocates say it’s an idea whose time has finally come. In a world of chronic job insecurity, stagnant wages, boom-and-bust cycles that wipe out ordinary people through no fault of their own, and shredded social safety nets, proponents warn that we have to come up with a way to make sure people can survive regardless of work status or economic conditions. Here are five reasons they give as to why a guaranteed basic income might just be the answer.
It would help fight poverty
America is the richest country in the world, yet widespread poverty continues to afflict us. Social Security has arguably been the most successful program for reducing poverty in American history, dramatically cutting poverty among the elderly and keeping tens of millions above the poverty threshold. Why not expand it to all?
Matt Bruenig calculated that by giving everybody a mere $3,000 a year, including children (who would receive the money through their parents), we could potentially cut poverty in half. The program would be simple: you get it no matter how much money you make, which would prevent poor people from having to worry about losing the benefit. With everybody in it together, you get a much larger base of political support (one of the reasons means-testing has always been a back-door way of killing Social Security— it reduces support).
In the 1970s, the small Canadian town of Dauphin ran an experiment through a social policy called “Mincome.” Everybody in the town was allowed to get a minimum cash benefit during the duration of the program. Poverty was eliminated, because people living below the poverty line saw their income boosted through monthly checks. But the results were about more than an official line marking the poverty threshold. Mincome positively impacted the horrible conditions associated with the cycle of poverty. When people had a basic income, they were able to better care for their families, stay healthy and improve their education — all the things that help people stay out of poverty in the future.
It could be good for the economy
A basic guaranteed income has the potential to positively impact the economy in several ways, which is why economists from John Kenneth Galbraith to Milton Friedman have advocated it.
For one thing, it could help solve the problem of demand. The great driver of the economy in a capitalist system is something economists call “aggregate demand.” The Econ 101 lesson is simple: when ordinary people have money in their pockets, they spend it on goods and services, which in turn allows businesses to thrive because they are able to invest and to hire more people. Proponents argue that a basic guaranteed income would increase demand, which would help the economy to prosper.
But wait, wouldn’t people get lazy if they had a basic income? One of the things the Mincome researchers wanted to know was whether a guaranteed basic income would cause people to stop working. Despite all the dire predictions that had circulated in academic literature before the experiment, the Mincome effect on number of hours worked was actually quite small — hours dropped 1 percent for men, 3 percent for married women and 5 percent for unmarried women.
The decrease in hours was mostly the result of people taking the time to raise newborns, care for family members, and pursue their education — people did not cut back on work just to loaf around. In addition to activities which would serve as economic investments for the future, the experiment also resulted in things like fewer hospital visits and illnesses, all of which reduce public health costs. Many argue that a guaranteed basic income is also potentially good for entrepreneurship, making it easier for people to start a small business or switch careers.
It could have many benefits to society
Clearly, we want policies that help us create a more stable society where more people can reach their potential and fewer people resort to crime and violence. Advocates say a guaranteed basic income does just that.
Researchers found that during the Mincome years, more people in Dauphin finished high school, more adults pursued education, and students achieved higher test scores. As noted, people got healthier, too: Fewer people visited the hospital, mental illness decreased, and the number of work-related injuries went down. Plus, social ills like domestic abuse dropped.
As a recession hit and the center-left politics of the 1970s shifted rightward in Canada, interest in the Mincome experiment waned. However, Canadian economic researcher Evylen Forget notes that most people who participated in Mincome wish the program had continued, citing benefits like increased opportunity to pursue an education.
Canadians are now reviving the idea, many arguing that such programs would actually encourage people to work because they would eliminate welfare provisions that penalize the poor who take very low-paying or part-time jobs. In Brazil, advocates have pointed out that a basic guaranteed income could help guard against such scourges as child labor, while Swiss activists make the case that it would help people do more meaningful work, making for happier and better workers.
Philippe Van Parijs, a Belgian philosopher, argues that a basic income is a powerful tool for social justice, allowing everyone, no matter what their circumstances, the possibility to pursue their conception of a good life. He notes that a guaranteed basic income could address some of the issues associated with sexist divisions of labor in which women are expected to do more of unpaid, care-giving work in our society.
It might be more efficient than present systems
In the current patchwork of systems confronting poverty, like welfare, food stamps and vouchers, people can fall through the cracks. A guaranteed income could help solve problems caused by rules and restrictions that leave some without subsistence income when they need it.
It’s not just liberals and progressives who like the sound of a simple basic guaranteed income. Something streamlined appeals to conservatives who like versions that could replace existing tax credits and social assistance programs — though it’s important to note that most advocates don’t propose it as a full substitute for existing programs. The American Enterprise Institute’s Charles Murray points out that a streamlined system would obviate the need for people to fill out multiple forms and visit myriad offices to receive benefits. (In his book In Our Hands: A Plan to Replace the Welfare State, Murray suggested an income of $10,000 a year to anyone who was American, over 21 and out of jail.)
Let’s not forget simple human dignity
Why is living in dignity not a right? These days, even Americans who get up in the morning every day and report to full-time jobs may not earn enough for a decent standard of living. People like fast-food workers, big-box store employees, caregivers, beauty salon workers, and farm hands often can’t earn enough to feed their families and keep a roof over their heads. Millions have seen no real increase in earnings in decades. Material security, as well as the intangible things that come along with it, like self-esteem and peace of mind, are often out of reach.
A guaranteed basic income is one way to help people to survive with dignity and free them from the humiliation of having to participate in criminal activity and accept abusive work conditions. Because everyone gets it, such a program might serve to eliminate the stigma of a hand-out. Of course, the payment has to be large enough that it helps people actually live in dignity, and some, like economist L. Randall Wray, prefer it as a supplement to something like a jobs guarantee program for this reason.
What’s clear is that our current capitalist system and social safety net have failed too many of us. It may be that in order to confront that epic fail, policy makers will need to get bolder in considering universal guarantees to all citizens.
*Lynn Parramore is an AlterNet senior editor. She is founding editor of New Deal 2.0, and author of Reading the Sphinx: Ancient Egypt in Nineteenth-Century Literary Culture. Follow her on Twitter @LynnParramore.
This article originally published on Alternet
THE AFTER PARTY WILL WORK FOR A GUARANTEED BASIC INCOME FOR ALL AMERICANS, REMOVAL OF CORRUPT POLITICIANS
DETROIT, MI — A grassroots alliance of community leaders and social justice activists is launching a new nationwide political party with a weekend of celebration and service in Detroit. The new party, dubbed the After Party, is a movement to inspire people of all ages to take decisive action in their communities to tackle growing inequality, the erosion of civil liberties, and rampant corruption in the political arena by promoting a platform of six principles that includes a guaranteed, inflation-adjusted basic income for all American citizens.
Priscilla Grim, founding organizer of Occupy Wall Street and co-creator of the We Are The 99% blog, said “The After Party is an opportunity for independent candidates to hack into the political system and bring deep systemic change by offering what people need most right now: a vision and a plan for a post-capitalist future that works for all of us.”
The Party will engage in a series of missions in the months leading up to the Fall election, and beyond, focused on cultivating new leadership, building local power bases and rooting out under-performing politicians.
“We’re done waiting for politicians to get a clue,” said Carl Gibson, an After Party spokesman, “We’re going to do this ourselves. Between now and November, we’re dedicated to driving out corrupt government officials who only represent those who pay them.”
The After Party plans to expand into several states in the coming months, opening up ballot access to local candidates who pledge to forgo corporate backing and further theParty Platform. After Partiers will also organize grassroots community betterment initiatives outside of the formal political system to provide alternative solutions to local problems.
“We don’t have another six to twelve months to wait for change,” said Detroit resident Demeeko Williams. “We want it now – right now. It’s time to send a jolt of electricity through the political system to let it know we are here, we’re not being represented and we’re coming for you.”
The After Party will launch on Friday, May 2nd at 7pm at historic Bert’s Marketplace in Eastern Market, 2727 Russell St, Detroit, MI 48207, with a signing of the Party Manifesto.
•••
The After Party is a political movement for a democratic revolution in the USA.
Media Contacts
Demeeko Williams, Detroit After Party
Priscilla Grim, After Party National Steering Committee
Carl Gibson, After Party National Steering Committee
Foreclose On Wells Fargo: Day 1
In a boarded-up hotel along a windy country road, a couple dozen activists are gathered for a workshop. They are mostly women, and mostly over 40. The workshop is being held by Micah White, one of the instigators of Occupy Wall Street.
After the dust settled from Occupy, White packed up his bags in the Bay Area and moved here to Nehalem, a small town in one of the poorest counties in rural Oregon. Nehalem sits on the Pacific Coast, in the shadows of popular vacation destination Manzanita. But White isn’t here for a vacation, and he came to town with a mission.
The demise of Occupy left everyone with one question: “Now what?” Almost three years later, White is helping the founders of Occupy, US Uncut, and others to launch The After Party, a new political party on “a mission to restore democracy” and occupy the ballot box in time for the 2016 elections. How? By organizing statewide ballot initiatives, ousting corrupt officials, and encouraging everyday people to run for local and county offices.
Inspired by the success of Occupy Sandy organizing efforts, The After Party also seeks to turn communities into self-sufficient hotbeds of social action. White and the After Party team want to create what they call “mutual aid flash mobs,” citizen gatherings where people can do things like start a time bank, plant urban gardens, fix local roads, organize free healthcare clinics, and build tiny houses for the homeless. Nehalem, population 267, will be a test lab.
Click here to read the full article at Grist.org
Rural Power: “Could sleepy Nehalem, OR be ground zero for the next social change revolution?” http://t.co/Ia8OucBolA via @grist #cascadia
— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallSt) April 28, 2014
Foreclose On Wells Fargo: National Days of Action April 28 & 29
Can you imagine a political party that requires no membership or dues, that crowd-sources its funding, publishes every expenditure online, invites all citizens to help amend its platform, loathes the cult of the candidate, provides a direct vote mechanism for all citizens to hold its candidates accountable if they break a campaign promise, and whose first sales pitch was to encourage voters to studiously distrust them? Neither could we until bumping into the X Party: A Citizen Network, a new political player on the Spanish electoral scene that is completely re-drawing what a political party looks like.
They are betting that their novel approach to democracy will not only re-animate the more than 18 million voters disaffected with the current Spanish party system, but will also totally reshape how representative democracy functions. This is a bold ambition that seems be picking up steam as they announced a few weeks ago their slate of candidates for May’s European Parliamentary elections, topping the list is the swiss HSBC leaker and newly converted hacktivist Hervé Falciani whose lack of Spanish citizenship seems to unfaze the self-branded anti-party. In proper situationist fashion, Falciani’s exile to Paris under the protection of French Authorities, for the numerous death threats leveled against him after leaking the names and account information of more than 130,000 tax evaders, will guarantee that lesser known candidates sourced through the network will share the limelight and play a more crucial role during the campaign.
Comparisons to Edward Snowden aside, the selection of Falciani to lead the pack of activist-candidates under the X-Party ticket, is a clear sign on how serious they are about holding those responsible for the rampant fraud that lead to the economic crisis in Spain accountable. The nominating process culminated in March, after an open primary process in which more than 2,500 network interactants participated. The six nominated candidates represent different areas of expertise constituting what they call a “federation of competences,” and whose expertise reflects upon the thematic planks of their crowd-sourced platform: public transparency, radicalizing democracy, housing rights, and economic justice. Included on the list are economist Susana Martín Belmonte, former taxation delegate Raul Burillo, and housing rights lawyer Juan Moreno Yagüe. The number two on the list of candidates is M15 activist, performance artist, political theorist, and X-Party gestator Simona Levi. Simona graciously talked to us at length about this ambitious new attempt to hack the existing political system.
“Libraries are the future.” – Occupy Wall Street
This article is by Jane Carlin (Director, Collins Memorial Library at the University of Puget Sound) and Barb Macke (Associate Librarian, University of Cincinnati) and was originally publishe…
A message from our friends in Partido X. – OSN
Today we launch a campaign to hack European Parliament for real.
As it was explained in our previous communication, Hervé Falciani, (the computer specialist who provided several Courts of Justice from different countries with information about over 130 000 big tax evaders’ bank accounts in Switzerland, obtained when he was working for HSBC bank) is the candidate of Citizens’ Network Partido X (a citizens’ device for media guerrilla that serves the purpose of participating in electoral scenarios, and hacking political systems, in order to achieve a XXI century democracy. The project was launched a year and a half ago by a group of 15M/Indignados activists and has steadily grown quite fast) for the european elections, May 2014.
We think that this candidature is a hack that gives the Spanish and European citizens, and also the International Community, the opportunity to explain how the political class is in collusion with the financial elites and to report it, to fight against this practice and to establish mechanisms to control it. The participation of Falciani in the European Parliament and the work and projects already initiated by Citizens’ Network Partido X, will contribute to put an end to the impunity of big tax evaders.
As European citizens we can not miss this opportunity to unmask who are accomplices of the tax evasion fraud of the big fortunes in the European Parliament, the European Institutions and the Spanish Government.
Once in the European parliament, we will develop our work there and implement our projects to pursue Fiscal evasion of the great fortunes using information as a tool. Citizens’ Network Partido X and Herve Falciani have already launched this method at the service of all struggles and towards a global change.
This is why we invite all international activists to get involved in the campaign for making this information reach all international civil society.
These are the ways in which you can get involved in the international campaign:
1º Be active on social media (TWITTER y FACEBOOK)
Tuesday April 22
From 11AM Madrid’s time (UTC/GMT+1)
Hashtag #FalcianiVsJuncker and using the channel #EP2014
https://twitter.com/Partido_X
https://www.facebook.com/PartidoXPartidodelFuturo
1 – Post at the indicated time the contents, your opinion, or tell how do you think your and other people’s fights are going to be benefited from having Falciani in the parliament.
2 – Share our contents:
3 – There will be some articles from international media in Spanish, Italian and English that we will share with the hashtag #FalcianiVsJuncker from our accounts in Twitter and Facebook
4 – Forward this to other international activist that may be interested in participating
5 – If you have national or international press contacts you can ask them to contact us during the days following the launch of the campaign if they are interested in reporting about this story at: [email protected]
Thanks
Further information:
• Website in English http://partidox.org/en/
• Website in Spanish http://partidox.org/
• Occupy http://occupywallst.org/article/who-is-partido-x/
• National and International Press http://partidox.org/press/
About Hervé Falciani
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herv%C3%A9_Falciani
• http://partidox.org/todo-sobre-herve-falciani/
POR FAVOR, NO USEIS EL HASTAG ANTES DE MAÑANA A LAS 11H
Mañana lanzamos una semana de campaña para explicar la oportunidad que tenemos de hacer un verdadero hack en el parlamento europeo.
Tal y como os explicábamos en nuestra anterior comunicación, Hervé Falciani (el informático que ha aportado a la justicia de varios países información que extrajo mientras trabajaba en el banco HSBC sobre más de 130.000 cuentas en Suiza de grandes evasores fiscales) será el candidato a las elecciones Europeas de Mayo de este año por la Red Ciudadana Partido X (un dispositivo ciudadano de guerrilla de la comunicación para la intervención en espacios electorales y para hackear los sistemas políticos con la idea de una democracia del siglo XXI, lanzado hace un año y medio por un grupo de activistas del 15M y que ha crecido imparablemente en muy poco tiempo)
Consideramos que esta candidatura es un hack y una oportunidad única para la ciudadanía española y europea y para la sociedad civil internacional para exponer, denunciar, combatir y controlar la connivencia de la clase política con la élite financiera y que la presencia, actividad y proyectos en marcha de la Red Ciudadana Partido X con Falciani en el Parlamento Europeo planteará serios problemas a la impunidad de los grandes defraudares fiscales.
Es una oportunidad que no podemos desaprovechar como ciudadanos para poder desenmascarar a diario quién y cómo en la Eurocamara y las instituciones europeas y el gobierno español es cómplice de la estafa a la ciudadanía que supone la evasión fiscal de las grandes fortunas de las que nuestros gobernantes son cómplices.
Una vez en el parlamento europeo, nuestra intención es poner nuestro trabajo allí y los proyectos para perseguir a traves de la información la evasión Fiscal de las grandes fortunas que la Red Ciudadana Partido X y Herve Falciani tiene ya en marcha al servicio de todas las luchas por un cambio global que hay en el mundo.
Por esto invitamos a todos a participar en esta campaña de visibilización para que esta información llegue a todo la sociedad civil a nivel internacional.
Formas en las que puedes colaborar en la campaña internacional
1º PARTICIPA EN redes sociales (TWITTER y FACEBOOK)
Martes 22 de Abril
A partir de 11am Hora de Madrid (UTC/GMT+1)
Hashtag #FalcianiVsJuncker y en el canal #EP2014
https://twitter.com/Partido_X
https://www.facebook.com/PartidoXPartidodelFuturo
1 – Posteando a la hora señalada contenidos, tu opinión o contando cómo puede beneficiar a tu lucha y la de tus compañeros que Falciani entre en el Europarlamento.
2 – Compartiendo nuestros contenidos:
Contenidos:
Falciani vs. Juncker: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/
Español: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#es
Inglés: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#en
Francés: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#fr
Alemán: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#de
Portugués: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#pt
Italiano: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#it
Catalán: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#ca
Galego: http://partidox.org/falciani-vs-juncker/#gl
3 – Artículos del día en la prensa internacional en Argentina, Española, Anglosajona, Italiana que compartiremos con el Hashtag #FalcianiVsJuncker que compartiremos ese dia desde las cuentas principales en Twitter https://twitter.com/Partido_X y Facebook https://www.facebook.com/PartidoXPartidodelFuturo
4 – Pasa este una copia de este pad a otros activistas internacionales que creas que pueden estar interesados en participar.
5 – Si tenéis contactos de prensa a nivel nacional e internacional, que pueda hacerse eco de esta historia los dias de la campaña posteriores al lanzamiento pedidles que se pongan en contacto con: [email protected]
Gracias 
Más info:
Web en inglés http://partidox.org/en/
En español: http://partidox.org/
Articulo en Occupy http://occupywallst.org/article/who-is-partido-x/
Prensa nacional e Internacional http://partidox.org/prensa/
Sobre Hervé Falciani http://partidox.org/todo-sobre-herve-falciani/
http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herv%C3%A9_Falciani
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herv%C3%A9_Falciani
A new organization has been launched by some of the Occupy Wall Street founders. It is what they hope will be the future for a populist movement in the U. S. and they want you to join its first mission a Flash Mob Mutual Aid action in Detroit, May 2nd. Did the Occupation of Wall Street in 2011 and the movement that followed it fill you with hope for the future?
Have you wondered “What Now” ? Tune in to A Deeper Look,Thursday April 24th at 9:30 am on KBOO. Justin Wedes, founding member of The New York City General Assembly and Micah White, PhD—Occupy Solidarity Network board member and former editor of Adbusters—will join host, Linda Olson-Osterlund to talk about the founding of The After Party, its platform, its manifesto and its plan for action.
Written by Ritchie Savage
Ernesto Laclau, who passed away on Sunday, April 13, 2014, is known primarily as an Argentinian political theorist who wrote about populism, socialism, and political discourse. Populism is commonly referred to as a type of politics that exalts the ‘people’ and pits them against the elite. Laclau’s work on populism and political discourse has important ramifications for how we can reconceptualize the role of new social movements, such as Occupy.
Even though the formula for populism is relatively simple, a conception of people vs. power, the genesis of the concept is complex. Initially, two bodies of academic literature emerged in two different regional contexts to explain certain cases. In 1934, an Italian sociologist named Gino Germani immigrated to Argentina, fleeing from Mussolini’s fascist regime. Once in Argentina, he wrote about what he saw as a new form of politics evidenced in the leadership of Juan Perón – a type of politics he characterized as a ‘national popular’ movement that blended aspects of democratic participation and authoritarianism. This model could also be extended to characterize the leadership of other mid-twentieth century Latin American politicians, such as Vargas in Brazil and Cardenas in Mexico. In this sense, Germani provided a kind of historical model for understanding this new form of politics in relation to the experience of economic and political development specific to Latin American countries, referred to as modernization.
However, in the United States, populism has come to mean something slightly different, with reference to different historical cases. Authors such as Richard Hofstadter and John Hicks, in writing about the legacy of populism in the U.S., refer back to the People’s Party of the 1890s – a grassroots political movement that developed out of a white farmers’ alliance in the South. These farmers cultivated the idea that they were an ordinary people oppressed by an elite, such as ‘big business,’ expressing the hardships they experienced as a result of the crop lien system. The interesting move that Hofstadter made in his essay, “The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” was to try to link up rhetoric propagated in the era of McCarthyism with this historical legacy traced back to the People’s Party. This led to a watershed both in the U.S. academic literature and even in the media, where it is now common to refer to examples of ‘populist rhetoric’ found in a tradition of U.S. politicians that spans from William Jennings Bryan to Barack Obama, but also in contemporary U.S. social movements, such as the Tea Party and Occupy.
It gets more complicated. Just as the term ‘populism’ has been used to refer to cases of politics in the U.S. from the 1890s to the present, it has been applied to two subsequent waves of politicians in Latin America, spanning from the aforementioned mid-twentieth century cases to figures like Venezuela’s Chávez (and now Maduro), Bolivia’s Morales, and Ecuador’s Correa in the present. Still yet, the term also found its application in Europe as theorists like Margaret Canovan and Paul Taggart have attempted to explain the emergence of European political parties in the late 1980s and early 1990s, such as Jörg Haider’s Austrian Freedom Party and Jean-Marie Le Pen’s National Front. Following this line of thought, there is much concern in the present about parties in Europe such as Golden Dawn in Greece and Jobbik in Hungary, as these parties are not only populist, but also display neofascist characteristics.
And now people talk about cases of populism present all over the world.
So, right wing or left wing, politician or movement, rhetoric or action, here or there, past or present – to what sort of thing does populism refer?
Laclau gave us the first iteration of his theory of populism in his 1977 classic, Politics and Ideology in Marxist Theory. He entered into the debate on populism, following the trail of Germani and other Latin American political theorists, in the discussion about Peronism. Laclau’s initial innovation in conceptualizing populism was to break with Germani’s model for understanding the specific form of Latin American populism as an outcome of processes of modernization. Instead, Laclau inaugurated a paradigm shift in conceiving of populism in broader terms as a form of political discourse. The utility of this new definition of populism was that it allowed for more comparisons to cases of political movements outside of Latin America, insofar as this definition was no longer bound up with historical processes of economic and political development specific to Latin America.
One of the most important characteristics of the new discursive definition that Laclau developed in this book was that populism as a discourse creates a separation and antagonism between the people and the power bloc. Not unlike previous political theories, such as that of Carl Schmitt, Laclau asserted that populist discourse constructs an ‘enemy.’ Populists point to those politicians with power in the sphere of institutionalized politics and blame them for not representing the interests of the people. Populists then claim to embody the interests of the people as a way to maneuver themselves into positions of power. With all of the cases Laclau considers, he shows how this populist discourse is one that can be employed, in ideological terms, across the political spectrum from Left to Right.
In, *Hegemony and Socialist Strategy, Laclau and Mouffe develop this conception of political discourse further, showing how a particular form of populist discourse can be utilized by the Left in order to foster political identities and fight for socialist causes. The idea of a discourse that pits the people against groups in power remains central to this theory. Following the theory of structural linguistics pioneered by Ferdinand de Saussure, Laclau and Mouffe add to this conception of political discourse that there are certain signifiers, such as ‘people,’ ‘nation,’ and ‘revolution,’ which can be utilized in order to foster political identities. The special quality of these signifiers is that they are capable of becoming saturated with many meanings. In this way, signifiers, such as the ‘people,’ when introduced in a political discourse can create stable political identities by linking together a vast plethora of democratic demands. For Laclau, creating forms of political discourse that revolve around these signifiers, which link demands and create identities, is the key to ushering in new forms of socialist and radical democratic change – for instance, to create more just forms of governance, to include marginalized groups in decision-making, and to enact policies geared toward the redistribution of wealth.
At this point, I think we can take Laclau’s fully formulated conception of populist discourse in his last book, On Populist Reason, and show how his theory is applicable to a movement such as Occupy. First you have what Laclau refers to as an ‘empty signifier,’ like ‘Occupy,’ which is devoid of specific content and can function as an umbrella concept for linking together democratic demands. The signifier ‘Occupy’ is also linked to an ‘antagonistic rift’ between the people and the enemy. In the discourse of Occupy, this would be the separation between the ‘99%’ and the ‘1%.’ Just as Laclau’s definition of populist discourse stipulates, the idea that “We are the 99%” provides for a political identity that embodies a notion the ‘people’ against the ‘1%,’ a conception of the enemy as an economic and political elite that is oppressing and exploiting us. It follows that ‘Occupy’ as an empty signifier was capable of taking, what were previously, a series of isolated democratic demands and now linking them together into a set of unified popular demands. Thus Occupy brought together workers demanding rights, students mired in debt, people discriminated against along lines of race and sex, immigrants demanding reform, and more
Perhaps one of the most important and controversial points that Laclau makes in On Populist Reason is that “populism is the royal road to understanding something about the ontological constitution of the political as such”. What he means is that populism reveals something that is at the heart of all forms of politics. Following thinkers such as Sigmund Freud, Claude Levi-Strauss, and Jacques Lacan, Laclau alludes to the fact that the unconscious is structured like a language, and populism itself is like a manifestation of the unconscious symbolic structure of the political. This idea has been interpreted as a threat to already existing normative democratic theories in a couple of different ways.
Among political theorists, one of the main concerns with contemporary cases of populism is that they constitute threats to institutionalized democratic politics, where in Latin America, cases of populism such as Chavismo are sometimes suggested as having authoritarian tendencies, and in Europe, new cases of populism invite comparisons to cases of both authoritarianism and fascism. Thus, if populism is tied to the very notion of the political itself, there would be no way to single out cases of politics as “populist” in order to signify that they pose a threat to democracy. In other words, if the very foundation of politics is based in a symbolic structure similar to what Laclau describes as populism, then one loses the ability to solely categorize certain right-wing or authoritarian political movements or regimes as populist.
But if Laclau is right, then populism might truly represent a much more complicated phenomenon. For Laclau, typically the event that sets off these symbolic processes of political identity formation is what he refers to as a ‘dislocation,’ which is a kind of real social crisis that presents an obstacle to being represented within language. For instance, it could be an economic crisis, like that of 2008, and our inability to completely wrap our minds around the center of the problem and what caused it. Political identity formations then emerge on the symbolic level to sort of fill in the gap – to be able to describe the cause of the crisis and the solution to it.
In this sense, we can see how populist movements of both the Left and the Right have emerged in the United States in the wake of the 2008 crisis, first the Tea Party and then Occupy. Both movements employ empty signifiers and link democratic demands around political identities in order to propose solutions to the problem. As the repercussions of the economic crisis have stretched to Europe, we might similarly look at the rise of Golden Dawn and Syriza in Greece.
Yet even though movements on both sides of the political spectrum might share some kernel of the same unconscious symbolic structure, this is not necessarily bad news. To view this as bad news would be to stress that from this perspective there is, in reality, simply a void in the center of all politics, which is constitutively lacking in any content and structured by unwieldy unconscious and linguistic forces. This view could lead to an extreme nihilism implying the idea of the death of politics or that authentic political action is impossible.
But for Laclau, this is good news. From his Marxist roots in Gramscian theory, he believed we could use and manipulate the symbolic structure of populist discourse in order to fight for progressive causes. And he led by example, becoming an important figure in Argentinian politics, sometimes even wielding a populist discourse to thwart his enemies. This is how I will like to remember him, as a kind of populist superhero.
Sometimes I think it is the lack of content, which the empty signifier implies, that constitutes a threat. There is the idea that with all this emptiness, and availability to absorb possible meanings, the empty signifier can really take up a lot of space. It can stand in for the people, after all. Sometimes the empty signifier can also be extremely destructive, in a paradoxically productive political sense. Laclau was aware of this – that empty signifiers are capable of taking up an important symbolic space, which allows for political action to take place.
Take the empty signifier, ‘Occupy,’ again. This is a potentially dangerous signifier, and that is why it was perceived as a threat by the Right. What does ‘Occupy’ mean, essentially? To take up space. Here we have a signifier that takes up significant symbolic space in our imagination, prompting us to take up more symbolic and even physical space. O-c-c-u-p-y. It almost exists, as Žižek would claim, as pure negation. Like Bartleby’s ‘I would prefer not to,’ there is no content to the negation. Even before Occupying ‘Something,’ there is the idea of ‘Occupy’ itself – to simply exist and take up space – symbolically, politically, physically.
This is not really a eulogy for Laclau, nor is it for Occupy, because these ideas are not dead.
Ritchie Savage recently earned his Ph.D. in Sociology from The New School for Social Research. He is currently working on the book, “Populism in the Americas,” and he teaches sociology courses as a Visiting Instructor at Pratt Institute and as an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Baruch College.
You are invited to attend:
The After Party
Friday, May 2, 2014 3:00 PM until Sunday, May 4, 2014 9:00 AM
Your party is over, Wall Street.
The People are awakening and we are aren’t asking your permission to clean up the mess you left behind…
The New IRS lets your choose where your tax money is spent. What would your chart look like? http://t.co/6OsqBuHMaF pic.twitter.com/zUe9BAVGKE— The New IRS (@TheNewIRS) April 14, 2014
Dear Occupy Wall Street,
I’m writing you because…
JUST IN: 15 Jurors have been selected so far, with OPENING ARGUMENTS HAPPENING TODAY (April 11) at 2:30PM EST. It’s most important that we pack the courts, and show that we stand in Solidarity with Cecily.
Please share! #Justice4Cecily at 100…
“A message from some of our friends in Occupy.” – OSN
Today, a group of occupiers, seasoned activists and future leaders are announcing the launch of a new political movement for a democratic revolution in the U.S.A.
Introducing: The After Party.
Two and a half years ago, we took to the streets in hundreds of cities to protest the financial elite and their cronies in government. We created protest communities in public spaces, abolished debt, wrote the Volcker Rule for financial reform, and helped hurricane survivors rebuild. Now, we’re challenging our corrupt government directly by building political power, starting at the local level.
The After Party isn’t a traditional political party in any sense. We organize by identifying and meeting a community’s needs from beyond the political system, and getting rid of corrupt politicians by getting our own community leaders into local office. We will feed the hungry, educate those who wish to learn, care for the sick, and house those whose homes have been taken. We will break the stranglehold of the broken two-party system by innovating and changing the rules of the game.
Read The After Party Manifesto.
We’re counting on you to tell your friends about the After Party, and help us get the word out about the new political party that will finally speak for, and with, young people, the poor, people of color, the homeless, the hungry, and the uninsured — the same people who have been left out of the conversation for too long.
‘Like’ and ‘Follow’ us on Facebook and Twitter to stay up-to-date on Party news!
In solidarity with the global 99%,
the After Party team
Join Occupy Wall Street at the University of Puget Sound on April 9 at 5pm for a surprise announcement.
Driving directions:
Monday Update
Manhattan, NY- Cecily McMillan, accompanied by approximately 50 supporters, was back in court today for pre-trial motions. Judge Zweibel upheld his previous decision on motion 50-4(a), denying access again to Officer Grantley Bovell’s personnel files, on the grounds that this previous history of excessive force and corruption are not relevant to the case at hand. The DA argued that none of these cases were substantiated due to the recommendation from the internal affairs bureau, an arm of the NYPD.
Many supporters showed up to court this morning, wearing a pink hand over their right breast, signifying solidarity with Cecily, who was sexually assaulted in this exact manner by Officer Bovell the night of M17. Judge Zweibel ordered that these signs of solidarity would be forbidden in the court room, as the claim of sexual assault is unsubstantiated since Cecily never reported this incident to the IAB directly.
Jury selection was postponed due to a supposed lack of potential jurists in the building. It will begin tomorrow morning,Tuesday April 8th at 9:30am at 100 Centre St Room 116 Part 41.
Press Contacts:
Stan Williams 256-323-1109
Lauren Wilfong 413-207-4207
Marty Stolar 917-225-4596
Backgrounder
Our dear friends, Cecily McMillan is going to trial and we need all y’all occupiers to show up and support!
You are needed to come out full force and show the court system that we stand with our friends and that we will bring #Justice4Cecily.
In an unbelievable turn of events, Ms. McMillan faces 2nd degree assault charges stemming from a 2012 encounter with the NYPD that left her beaten and unconscious.
Join us at 9:15 am at 100 Centre Street, Room 1116 Part 41, New York, NY 10013 In the best interests of her trial, everyone who comes needs to wear proper business casual clothing and remain calm and respectful in the courtroom.
There will be breakfast and hot tea in the morning on Monday outside the courthouse for supporters!
Oh, and did you know?
“Officer Grantley Bovell has been accused of running a motorcyclist off the road to make an arrest, kicking a suspect in the face while he was on the ground, and slamming an arrestee’s face into the stairs on an MTA bus. Bovell was also one of the 500 officers ensnared in the vast ticket-fixing scandal in the Bronx, and was again internally disciplined for his role.” – Cop’s Record Of Excessive Force Allegations Will Be Sealed For OWS Trial, Gothamist
Do this: “Tell everyone you know about Officer Bovell’s history of abuse.” Tweet it. Sing it. Facebook it. Bring it on a sign. Let’s get the truth out there.
Done. Now, you are needed—RSVP here:
Directions
The best thing that you can do is come to the courthouse to bear witness to the egregious treatment of Cecily by the “justice” system, and to let them know that we won’t stand for it. The trial starts tomorrow and will likely continue for the next week or two. Court starts at 9:30 am each day, except for Thursday, when our judge will be unavailable, at 100 Centre St, Part 41 (room 1116). Please wear business casual as our appearance can affect the jury!
We aren’t entirely sure how quickly or slowly things will move, but here’s a tentative schedule of events – we’ll update as we can:
April 7th – Jury Selection
April 8th – Opening Arguments
April 9th – Prosecution Case
April 11th – Defence Case
April 14th – Closing Arguments
April 15th – Jury Deliberation
Members of the Justice For Cecily Support Team will be around to answer any questions. Stay tuned into http://justiceforcecily.com/
#Justice4Cecily #Justice4Cecily #Justice4Cecily
This piece was written for our contemporary myriad movements, but it is particularly poignant in regards to the Wave Of Action, which is attempting to tap into the incredible creativity around the globe. As events, actions, and images are being crafted, remember to look for opportunities to strategically collaborate with one another. We can increase our strength by working together not only in name, but in coordinated actions. This essay was inspired by a group of women during a Women Weaving the World discussion. Many thanks to all of them for the deep reflections, but particularly to Kathe Schaaf who spoke of the movement of movements in an eye-opening way. Learn more about Women Weaving the World here. ~ Rivera Sun
This article originally appeared on WaveOfAction.org
I feel like shaking everyone and saying, don’t you get it? We are a movement of movements.
My friends, we have been trapped in old dominant paradigm thinking. We have been steeped in warmongering, hierarchical, competitive, control-based mindsets since birth. We think we are lacking something, or that we’re ineffectual at organizing, or we’re failing. We call for a Movement of Movements, like the War to End All Wars, a rallying cry that will amass the allies on the edge of the battlefield so we can massacre our enemies.
It makes me want to laugh – and cry.
We want to name, label, categorize, and control the emergent phenomenon of this revolutionary resistance. We want to take the wild flurry of activity that is erupting on a thousand fronts and turn it into an army for change. We want to call it something because then we can control it. This is what our lineage of science and religion has taught us: if we give it a name, it is ours. If we trademark the Movement, we can capitalize on it. If we organize it all in one place, we can make it work to what we consider its highest potential.
We need to let go.
We need to surrender to this very large phenomenon and join with it. We need to trust each other, the causes, and the organic, emergent nature of what is happening . . . this is revolutionary.
This is a way of participation that is radical in our society. The long history of invasion, conquest, genocide, wars of aggression, and abuse of people and the planet has indoctrinated us in false beliefs that we must organize everything in order to survive. But these old patterns of competition and control are a worldview perpetuated by the wealthy elite, who profit from such mentalities at our expense. To this end, they have abused the theories and philosophies of the Judeo-Christian God and Darwin, alike. They school us in fear-based, violent mindsets to ensure that we will never pose a serious threat to their dominance. If we do not emancipate our minds from their worldview, we will remain blind to the greatest strengths of our movements.
Building a Movement of Movements seems to be the logical, strongest, and wisest approach to breaking our opponents’ power, but our real strength may lie in our myriad movements. The empowered elite are fighting us on all fronts. We have them surrounded on all sides. Our plethora of issues distracts them, divides them, and weakens their centralized position. They sit in the fortress of wealth and power, staring wild-eyed into the living, breathing, diverse jungle of opposition. There is nothing they would like more than to see us assemble all of our strength in one place and march down the road to their fortress. Then they could destroy us in one swoop. So, from the balustrades of their socio-political system, they taunt us and mock us, calling us disorganized and inefficient.
We are not disorganized. We are organized differently.
“We are the ivy crawling up the buildings, the moss breaking down the bricks, and the dandelions shooting up in the sidewalks. We’re as vast as the planet and as microscopic as infectious disease. The Dandelion Insurrection isn’t a handful of radicals. It’s all of Life itself!” – from The Dandelion Insurrection
We must learn to look at the interconnections of our myriad causes and wage struggle through collaboration, not control. Our causes are not at odds with each other, nor do they need unification under one name or coordination from a central command. Instead, we need to collaborate strategically, using our diversity of issues as our strength. If we look at the overlapping issues of health, economy, jobs, peace, surveillance, education, energy, housing, environment, democracy, and so on, we will see that every movement is working to replace destructive, corrupt systems with constructive, life-supporting, sustainable alternatives. Our strength lies in our inherent unity, not in the label attached to it. Our only weakness is in our uncertainty . . . and the fact that we remain unaware of the power of our situation.
We can tap into the collective and coordinated strength of our many movements by learning to strategically collaborate with one another. A few key elements of such an approach are:
- Celebrate other’s achievements; the success of one cause is the success of the whole.
- Support each other’s efforts through solidarity, encouragement, resources, media campaigns, etc.
- Take time to analyze the interconnections of the movements. Search for untapped strengths and sources of support. Identify pivot points of change and opportunities for other movements to help sway a critical element of your own movement.
- Talk with each other. Find out how your efforts overlap and look for opportunities for strategic collaboration.
- Our movements are revolutionary; their manner of collaborative, horizontal organization is the most natural, organic system on Earth. We terrify the empowered elite because we reflect, in our very structure, the most powerful force on the planet: Life. In what they call our disorganization, we embody the natural systems that the patriarchal, Puritanical European colonizers have been trying to repress and control for thousands of years. Our movements are as frightening to them as a liberated woman, or the pagan religions of old Europe that succumbed to the first invasion of the mentality that now engulfs the empowered elite around the globe. We are organic and uncontrollable…and we are, ultimately, unstoppable.
Instead of codifying our movements under one name, we must learn to recognize who and what we are. We are a movement of movements, a great multiplicity of motion.
Author/Actress Rivera Sun is a co-founder of the Love-In-Action Network, a co-host on Occupy Radio, and, in addition to her new novel, The Dandelion Insurrection, she is also the author of nine plays, a book of poetry, and her debut novel, Steam Drills, Treadmills, and Shooting Stars, which celebrates everyday heroes who meet the challenges of climate change with compassion, spirit, and strength.
HOW TO HELP: FOOD FUND
“You are needed for a wave of action.” – Occupy Wall Street
We need you to join the #WaveOfAction that is rising everywhere on Friday. If you cannot make it to an action in your city, please consider supporting the food fund for on the ground participants.
In NYC we will be directly confronting the power of the 1%. Marching on multinational airport corporations who pay poverty wages in the morning, and on Wall Street for the closing bell in the afternoon, and back to our park in the evening where we will begin a three month fight back against the oligarchy that gets stronger everyday.
On the first day of Occupy Wall Street no one thought it could happen either.
The Plan on Friday (April 4) in NYC
3:00 pm: Summer Disobedience School Reunion (People’s Gong!)
Federal Hall, 26 Wall St., NYC
Perform the People’s Gong with the #OWS Direct Action Summer Disobedience School! This is a great entry point into the global wave of action on Wall Street.
Find out the specifics at nycga.net.
7:00 pm: 99% City-Wide Wave Of Action (People’s Assembly!)
Liberty Square (Formerly Zuccotti Park)
7:05pm Vigil for Dr. King / 7:15pm Assembly
The People’s Assembly will happen after the vigil of Dr. King to reconvene the spirit of the Occupy Wall Street Movement as well as many of the movements that preceded it.
All the details are at nycga.net
HOW TO HELP: FOOD FUND
Follow #WaveOfAction and #YouAreNeeded.
WaveOfAction.org | OccupyWallSt.org | World | NYC | London | Chicago | Boston | Reno, Nevada | Fort Wayne, Indiana | Orange County, CA | Windhoek, Namibia | Philadelphia | Mississippi | Brisbane, Queensland, Australia | Amsterdam | Seville, Spain | Lansing, Michigan | 5 cities in Tennessee | Ontario, Canada | Various cities, Germany | Johannesburg, Za | Various cities, South Africa | Sydney, Australia |
Tweets about “(#waveofaction OR #youareneeded)”
Wave of Action in Los Angeles: https://www.facebook.com/events/1413346825582931/
Full Schedule for NYC:
Friday, April 4
9:30 am: The Dream Marches On: Sanitation Workers 1968–Airport Workers 2014
Meet just south of the intersection of Belt Parkway and Lefferts Blvd
Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated in 1968 as he stood with striking Memphis sanitation workers, who were struggling to make the American dream accessible to all. 48 years later, New York area airport workers are organizing renew that road to the American dream. Workers, elected and clergy leaders and community supporters will gather at the Lefferts Blvd JFK AirTrain Station at 9:30 a.m. They will march along Lefferts to 83rd Avenue to Queens Blvd to Junction Blvd, with the march ending at 3:30 p.m. on the 94th Street Bridge by Ditmars Blvd, which leads into LaGuardia Airport.
RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/432929090175142
11:00 am: Vigil at Congressman Charlie Rangel’s Office
163 W 125th Street, New York, NY
Join the vigils at congressional district offices across the United States to demand that congress pass the Robin Hood Tax on Wall Street – the only real cure to the illness of rampant economic inequality.
RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/752900214729898/756392451047341
3:00 pm: Summer Disobedience School Reunion People’s Gong
Federal Hall
Join the #OWS Direct Action Summer Disobedience School Class of 2012 as they come together as a part of the global wave of action on Wall Street to perform the People’s Gong.
Find out more at nycga.net.
4:20 pm: Medicine for the Movement
Liberty Square (Zuccotti Park)
Occupy Reefer Madness is a coalition of seasoned lawyers, policy experts, Occupy Wall Street Activists, artists, marijuana users and non-users who are new to activism.
We demand the passage of The New York State Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act. We will be giving a public teach-in on the details of this bill how you can help make recreational marijuana a reality in New York and beyond as part of our contribution to the #waveofaction beginning on April 4th. If we can make our medicine legal in the marijuana arrest capital of the world then we can do it everywhere.
RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/744843895539992/
5:30 pm: 99% Wave of Action – Say No To the Regressive Agenda of Cuomo!
Federal Hall
Demand a New York that works for #AllOfUs, not only the 1%.
RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/475983245864460/
6:00 pm: Political Prisoner & Movement Martyr Night Vigil
New York City Veterans Memorial
Join local peace activists as they join the World Wide Wave of Action with a candle light vigil & silent night march from Foley Square to the NY Veterans Memorial to raise awareness about those killed & imprisoned during the on going non-violent struggle for justice for all.
More Information: Wave Of Action
6:00 pm: Know Your Rights – NYC #WaveOfAction Mask Edition
Did you know you can be arrested for wearing a mask during #WaveOfAction?
Police in New York City sometimes enforce a very old city law that bans masks and facial coverings at gatherings of two or more people unless it is “a masquerade party or like entertainment.”
If there is more than one masked individual at an event, everyone wearing a mask could get arrested. The law permits the police to use discretion in enforcement, so there may be some situations, and some types of face coverings, that police will ignore.
Find out more at nycga.net
6:30 pm: Operation Safe Winter Community Potluck
60 Wall Street, New York, NY
Join members of the NYC Activist community to provide healthy hot meals to those in need in & around the Financial District of New York City. This project is a grassroots volunteer effort inspired by Operation Safe Winter.
Find out more on nycga.net
7:00 pm: Book as Tactic: NYC Launch for Debt Resisters’ Operations Manual
Join us on Friday April 4th for the New York City launch of the fully revised and updated edition of the Debt Resisters’ Operations Manual. We will discuss the original conception of the manual as a form of collaborative research to emerge from Occupy Wall Street, and reflect on the possibilities of using the format of the book as an organizing tool in the task of building a debt-resistance movement. Along with a brief introduction to this revised edition, the event will also be an opportunity to celebrate the role played by books in emancipatory movements more generally—including book blocs of course! Refreshments will be served, red squares will be distributed, and plans will be hatched for moving from analysis to action in the years to come.
RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/1375597829385171/
7:00 pm: 99% City-Wide Wave Of Action- People’s Assembly
Liberty Square (Formerly Zuccotti Park)
7:05pm Vigil for Dr. King / 7:15pm Assembly
The People’s Assembly will happen after the vigil of Dr. King to reconvene the spirit of the Occupy Wall Street Movement as well as many of the movements that preceded it.
Read more at nycga.net
8:30 pm: People’s Grassroots Conference on Monetary Affairs
Federal Reserve Bank 33 Liberty Street New York 8:30pm
We will be giving presentations and answering questions on the history of the Federal Reserve, The NEED Act, the Livable Wage Movement and the New York City Bitcoin Center in front of the NYC Federal Reserve from 8pm – 11pm as our contribution to the #waveofaction kick off party.
RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/517755408329988/
9:45 pm: Occupy Veterans Memorial Civil Disobedience
New York City Veterans Memorial 55 Water Street New York 9:45pm
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a POP space intended to be open to the public 24 hours a day to honor those who served in South East Asia yet at 10 PM it is closed by management. Take a stand with Occupy as we honor those who have died in wars both past & present on April 4th with a reading of names at the space starting at 9:45 PM. At 10 PM we will engage in a non-violent sit in to protest this 1st amendment infringement & to raise awareness about the need to end all wars. This action is to also show solidarity with Veterans for Peace who have supported Occupy & it’s community.
Find out more on nycga.net
For more information go to nycga.net
Occupy Jail Support
NYPD Central Booking 100 Centre Street 10:00pm
Civil Disobedience often means having to take an arrest to carry the message of economic injustice to the wider world & those facing arrest need your solidarity in the form of jail support.
Please join the Occupy Wall Street Jail Support community as they volunteer to track, wait for & then greet those arrested as they are released. For more information please follow the hashtag #JailSupport on April 4th online via Twitter & Facebook and visit nycga.net.
11:00 pm: Wildcat March
From Federal Hall Steps to Union Square
Wear Black. Bring Pots, Pans & Noise Makers.
Find out more on Facebook
If only bank regulations were enforced with the same vigor. #WaveOfAction pic.twitter.com/567rc6AXPA— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallSt) March 29, 2014
Break the system by creating something new. pic.twitter.com/pnlLQuTpC1— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallSt) March 29, 2014
This article was written by @TysonKelsall and originally published at Over The Edge. We’re reposting because Cascadia is the future. Stay in the loop. – OSN
There is a separatist movement building slowly in the Pacific Northwest. Its speed reflects the pace of the people outside of its metropolitan centers.
It is not your typical movement based on the right and left spectrum, nor is it necessarily about protecting a certain culture. More so, it is about creating one, building off the foundation of what already goes on in the westernmost bioregion. It is about decentralizing two governments that seem to disregard what the population wants on the West Coast. The movement calls for a new sovereign state: Cascadia.
@freightliner Free #FreeCascadia! bumperstickers for all Freightliner #Cascadia drivers pic.twitter.com/QFMk5w9FoG
— CascadiaNow (@cascadianow) March 13, 2014
The map is not perfect yet. To some it stretches from Northern California to the Alaskan Panhandle. For Cathasaigh Ó Corcráin, co-editor of underground journal Autonomy Cascadia: A Journal of Bioregional Decolonization, since Cascadia is based largely on ecological designs its borders would reflect that, more so than current political ones. Corcráin, following Dr. David McCloskey’s influence, says that watersheds should dictate Cascadia’s region. For example, he uses the Alsek River in the Alaska and Yukon as the northernmost border, and the Klamath River as the southernmost. He also points to the importance of sharing the Salish Sea. Others include Idaho or use current political borders.
Flowing from that, Corcráin also sees the focus of bioregionalism as challenging the current way we associate ourselves with the land. Bioregionalism, as defined by Brandon Letsinger, founder of the Cascadian Independence Project and manager of Cascadia Now’s web presence, is “a way to reframe and rethink a lot of the boundaries and borders on this region to better represent economic, political, social and environmental realities.” Corcráin, who traveled around theoretical Cascadia when filming Occupied Cascadia, says that he also noticed many similarities to communities around the region who shared similar relationships with natural resources and surroundings. For example, a logging community in rural Washington likely shares many cultural characteristics as a logging community in rural northern British Columbia. Furthermore, Corcráin points to that fact that Cascadia is a very wild place, and the wilderness is rugged and “in your face, hard to ignore.” Letsinger said that Cascadia is the birthplace of the idea of bioregionalism. Further, Cascadia has much of its ecological systems still intact relative to the rest of North America.
What is #Cascadia? #Culture Editor @TysonKelsall looks into what the movement means: http://t.co/ZPTp0UJES8 @cascadianow #freecascadia
— Over the Edge (@OVERtheEDGEunbc) March 20, 2014
In 2004, there was the creation of the Cascadian Cup; an intense soccer competition between the Seattle Sounders, Portland Timbers and the Vancouver Whitecaps. Perhaps, if Cascadia ever were to form, the Vancouver Canucks would change their name to the Vancouver Cascadians and have an entire nation behind them. Maybe then, they could finally win a cup. Letsinger says that Washington state residents are the only state to tune in and cheer for the Canucks. He says the same can be said for British Columbians and the Seahawks. In 2011, the “Republic of Cascadia” made it onto a Times Magazine list as number 8 of the Top 10 Aspiring Nations, which, despite the journalist’s throw-in that Cascadia “little chance of ever becoming a reality,” maybe it is just the beginning.
Many British Columbians have probably inadvertently seen Cascadia’s flag, amicably nicknamed the “Doug Flag,” as it has made its way onto the packaging of one of Victoria’s most popular brews, Blue Buck. The Doug Flag depicts a Douglas Fir over a typical horizontal tri-colour flag. The three colours, blue, white, and green, represent the bioregion of Cascadia. The blue is for our ocean, lakes, rivers and other bodies of water; the white for our snow-capped mountain ranges and glaciers; and the green for our lush forests.
The environment is a key factor in any movement towards Cascadia. Letsinger points’ to the 1970s novel Ecotopia, where a country formed by Washington, Oregon, and northern California is a different sort of place, with a sustainable and socially just foundation. Emmanuel Brunet-Jailly, PhD, associate professor of Public Administration and Jean Monnet Chair at the University of Victoria, sees similar outlooks and values on the environment throughout what some call Cascadia. British Columbia and Washington have similar ecosystems; as both Letsinger and Corcráin point out, an oil spill in the Salish Sea, or, Puget Sound is going to transcend a man-made border. Brunet-Jailly adds that Cascadia, or, the Pacific Northwest consists of a culture very engaged with the sea.
Letsinger sees growing support for Cascadia. He points to lack of other alternatives and general unhappiness when it comes to the Canadian and American federal governments. He sees this largely due to the fact that Cascadia focuses on positives and a new, untainted prospect. According to Letsinger, Cascadia Now is in direct communication with 10-15,000 people and also acknowledges the many social media groups with 1000s of followers surrounding the idea of Cascadia. Corcráin agrees, saying that he himself has seen the idea of Cascadia grow since he was first involved. He agrees that Cascadia comes without “ideological baggage,” and says that the WTO protests of 1999 were a re-awakening of the bioregional movement in Cascadia, previously being popular in the 80s. He also points to the bankruptcy of some Oregon counties, stating that economic collapse can be tragic, but it can also lead to opportunity for something new; and that through this, change is on people’s mind in a very basic and practical way.
Going further down the road of politics, of course colonialism and unceded lands in Cascadia would still exist if the moment of independence were right now. So, what could be done about this? What does decolonization look like in an independence movement? As a comparison, the Mohawk population in Quebec says they will hold their own referendum for independence if Quebec wins theirs. Alternatively, Corcráin views a tenant of decolonization as looking at how a colonial power dominated local governance, and sees the potential separation of Cascadia as being Indigenous-led, settler supported. To him, it would be interesting to see how traditional laws can be applied to a modern region with a settler majority. Part of this may be the ability to move throughout the Cascadia bioregion unimpeded by borders. Is there potential in seeing how Cascadia could play to fair land title and rights compared with British Columbia, Canada, and America, all of whom have failed to do so?
Some say Cascadia is a chance to break the old, traditional left-versus-right spectrum. Letsinger argues that it is not a red-versus-blue issue, but one of empowering communities. He says that there has been some energy in Cascadia behind a “progressive libertarian” movement. Is localizing the economy really a right or left argument? Are many people in Cascadia really chasing corporatism as a political ideology? Of course, mix in the Cascadian respect for the environment, and the political landscape starts to unfold. Letsinger points out transparency and real democracy as important tenants to Cascadia; he says the question then becomes “why are we not doing this?” when we consider the “dirty corruption” and limited democracy currently in Canada and America. He says Cascadians are further united by a love of place. He claims that none of these things are attainable within the current system.
So, is a sovereign, but undefined Cascadia possible? Letsinger says surely, and that the foundation is already being built. Brunet-Jailly says the idea of a country is too far-fetched and not something he considers, but does see much cooperation across the British Columbia and Washington border. For example, when BC-based officials were concerned that Americans would not attend the Vancouver Olympic Games, the two sides came up with an enhanced driver’s license so that border crossing would be easier, which Brunet-Jailly states is an incredibly complex process. Letsinger uses the renaming of the Salish Sea as an example, breaking down cross-border division that had an arbitrary meaning at best. Only time will give clear definition to Cascadia.
What is a #FreeCascadia? A new article featuring @CascadiaNow, @CorcranIsAinmDm and more. http://t.co/UCp6A8f0rb #Cascadia @LeaderlesRevolt
— Tyson C. Kelsall (@TysonKelsall) March 20, 2014
This week’s Theory Thursday is by Micah White, PhD. – OSN
Although our individual human life is finite, each of us is born into a human story that stretches back to the dawn of inegalitarian society—a story of the struggle for equality, autonomy and mutual aid among the people… We call this the story of democracy.
The people’s spiritual uprising toward democracy is like the Pacific Ocean seen from Neahkahnie Mountain. The surface of the ocean is in a state of flux—constant dynamic change—and the individual human mind is incapable of anticipating the movement of the sea. Even when the waves are calm, they are truly in a state of motion and unpredictability near the shore or around sea stacks.
Humanity has learned to never turn their back on the ocean. One never knows when a tsunami might hit. The ocean receives our respect because at anytime the waves may turn from placid to furious and wash away the structures that once looked permanent.
The fury of the ocean is influenced by natural forces: the distance of the earth to the moon, the wind, earthquakes, and more.
The waves of the social organism are equally influenced by natural forces. Revolutions follow patterns. An increase in food prices, for example, historically precedes a revolutionary moment. Witness the 2011 Tahrir Uprising in Egypt. Each era has a unified theory of social movement creation that remains to be defined by those striving toward its discovery. The great revolutionaries behind the uprisings of the 18th century (French Revolution, American Revolution, Haitian Revolution), 19th century (Europe’s Insurrection of 1848 and the Paris Commune of 1871) and 20th century (Russian Revolution, Chinese Revolution) were modern theorists of understanding, stimulating, and channeling the insurgent waves of the social organism toward liberatory political goals.
The social organism is under pressure from the trifecta of ecological, economic and spiritual catastrophe. The ongoing crisis of the 21st century is a symptom of these three catastrophic pressures that guarantee a continued increase in uprisings.
Our objective as social movement creators is to develop a predictive understanding of the complex forces of dynamic social change in order to use the momentum of coming global waves to achieve our populist vision of a better world for the 99%.
Micah M. White, PhD is on the board of the Occupy Solidarity Network.
“@OccupyWallSt: #truth pic.twitter.com/fa1fh5VRr0” #trewth
— Russell Brand (@rustyrockets) March 19, 2014
