I’m probably one of the least anti-bankster people ’round these parts, but I don’t agree with John that Occupy Wall Street is a bad idea. New York is a city that goes 80% Democrat in national elections, but it’s also where many, maybe most, Galtian overlords live. If you scare these motherfuckers enough (and I’m as nonviolent as they come, to be clear), they’ll simmer down with the fuck-the-poor, fuck-the-middle-class Pethokoukian/Santellian/Randian fantasies. An extra 3.2% on your taxes is worth if it means you can walk easily from your office to your hired car, if you’re making seven figures.
There are those who say that Broderian “purely democratic” remedies are the answer here, I’m sure. Tell that to reproductive rights providers in the Dakotas, okay?
Scare the overlords now with benign protest or scare them later with Baader-Meinhoff or scare them even later with a real reign of terror. I’ll take the first option please, but let’s stop pretending these aren’t the only options.
Update. Point taken:
Here’s the thing: Are the Galtian overlords afraid of drumming circles when they can muster the thugs/cops to pepper spray people?
Corner Stone
DougJ, you’re starting to win me back over.
Corner Stone
Isn’t the premise for the first Fast and Furious kind of crazy?
A task force set to stop hijacks of 18-wheelers before the “truckers” take matters into their own hands?
I’m just saying. I love the series but that just never held up.
j.e.b.
Um, I think you’re missing the point. What they’re doing isn’t going to scare anyone. A real, competent protest would be worthwhile…but these people are a bunch of amateurs. Check Oliver Willis’ twitter feed for a hilarious indictment of the “protesters”.
Linda Featheringill
We are such a nation of sheep that it pleases me to see anyone demonstrating against anything. Even if I don’t agree with them. I’ll have to find out what the Wall Street demonstrators were trying to say.
MAJeff
Here’s the thing: Are the Galtian overlords afraid of drumming circles when they can muster the thugs/cops to pepper spray people?
I’m one of those folks who’d like to see a few banksters swinging from Wall Street lampposts (only half joking), but there does seem to be a lack of strategy/tactic/message to the protests.
What’s the substantive goal? What is the strategy for accomplishing it? Which tactics fit within that strategy? I honestly don’t know.
jwb
How exactly is a benign protest frightening?
jwb
@efgoldman: A working draft of the principles can be found here.
John Cole
I didn’t say it was a bad idea. I think it is a very good idea. Just the execution seems to be a bit muddled and confusing.
PurpleGirl
@efgoldman: I believe the City (Bloomberg) is claiming they don’t have permits to hold a demonstration. If they did get permits, the cops would probably try to herd them into enclosures many blocks away as they did during the Republican Convention
I’ve debated with myself joining the protest.
ETA: I’ve been preoccupied with some other matters and haven’t followed what has been happening. My bad.
goblue72
I moved to violent insurrection years ago. What this country needs is a Red Army. These douchebag hipsters are just a pointless distraction.
goblue72
@MAJeff: Doing everything we can do to support labor unions. Unlike trustafarians, union guys fight back.
Linda Featheringill
@Corner Stone:
I just read your comments on the previous thread and want to tell you I agree with you.
SOME PEOPLE who are doing nothing but sitting in front of a keyboard are not as dignified as they seem to think they are.
I think that the kids involved in occupy wall street have identified the enemy. They are doing better than most of the country.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
Organized protests good, disorganize4d protest…not so much. And this protest has been a clusterfuck. You’d think that after all of these years, the people who pulled this thing together would have learned how to do something effectively. They haven’t. It’s become protestors vs. NYPD rather than protestors vs. Wall Street- or whatever it is about Wall Street that they’re protesting.
Does anyone here know what it is that they’re protesting, exactly?
Alex S.
As Churchill said, “If you’re young and not liberal, you have no heart. If you’re old and not conservative, you have no mind.”
Well, Churchill’s idea of a conservative was pretty close to today’s technocratic democrats, like Obama or John Kerry, whereas today’s conservatives are actually radicals, either religious or economic ones.
But anyway, let these guys do what they do. Some of them will turn into more serious activists, some traders might be reminded of their own foolish younger selves. Some of them might even fear the volatile mood of the youth – just look at the London riots.
I think we are going to see more of these unorganized crowds, thanks to social media. Well, not every one will turn into the Egyptian Revolution, but it’s the entry level of activism.
Big Baby DougJ
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again):
What have you got?
PeakVT
@goblue72: Violent insurrection will turn out poorly when the government has drones, armored vehicles, night vision goggles, facial recognition technology, etc. It worked when the government didn’t have overwhelming firepower. That’s no longer the case.
Brachiator
I wonder if Americans are becoming a variation of Gibbis, the alien who has survived due to the extreme cowardice of his species, in the recent Doctor Who episode The God Complex. While people have taken to the streets in England, in Greece, and throughout the Middle East, Americans are too … sophisticated, cynical, or distracted to organize and protest, or will only consider it if they can be guaranteed a “win.”
Even with a shaky economy, there are enough people who are still in a comfort zone, so that the slow erosion of the economy and the entrenched opposition of the oligarchs to any meaningful change seems more a minor bother than a significant political or economic threat to the general welfare.
Davis X. Machina
@Alex S.:
The practical consequences of which have been what, exactly? Police over-reaction, driving the man on the Clapham omnibus to identify with the rioters? A snap general election, and the Tories tossed out of office after Labour re-embraced Clause IV? Property being proclaimed theft, and the expropriating of the expropriators?
It is, in the UK, as if they had never happened, save a few places in a few neighborhoods with hoardings gone up around where the fires were… and a general tightening up of the not-really-a-police-state-ectchually.
Snowwy
The problem here is that DougJ is exactly right:
They’re not scared yet, and there is as yet no significant faction ready to carry on to the next step of Left-wing terrorism the way the Right has. And as the Right continues to exist as a viable political expression, it will continue to ramp up in violence until it is forcibly put down. You can already see how you’re not even safe with them while in uniform. How long until a gay soldier gets killed by wingnuts, for being a gay soldier?
If there’s such a thing as valid Third Way-ism in American politics, it would be the way that looks to this dismal, violent, and divided future and tries to find a path that avoids either collapse, into either civil war or Dominionist tyranny.
For the record, that “Third Way” appears to be where most of the Democratic Party lives, so…
aisce
but what does sully think?
/punchy
MTiffany
@goblue72:
Or probably just rebelling against their Galtian overlord parents. Until mommy and daddy cut them off.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Big Baby DougJ:
Only what Susie Madrak, at C&L, copied and pasted from Bloomberg last week:
But it seems as if there’s something else going on, not just a protest in favor of campaign finance and lobbying reform- an issue that you’d think would get a lot more traction on its own.
scav
@Davis X. Machina: well, possibly, but juries sometimes take their time reporting back. Slightly different scale of event, but were the immediate in-a-month reactions to the dreaded 9/11 the most important?
Scott Supak
We need a financial transaction tax. They hide their income. I want to tax their fucking trades.
Big Baby DougJ
I can’t stop singing this to myself in a Bob Dylan voice.
Dollared
I’m in the “let’s do it, but do it right” category. Maybe because I’m a cheesehead. How on earth did we get 100,000 people every Saturday in Madison? Why can’t New York’s progressives get 10,000 sane people with a Sanders-style agenda to sit down for a day on Wall Street?
Why the fuck can’t MoveOn organize something useful like that?
And I know what I would do: Never mind Wall Street, I would start with 10,000 people in front of Fox, CBS, CNN, ABC and NBC. They will cover it because the cost of sending people is so low.
Big Baby DougJ
@aisce:
I still like it, never gets old.
PeakVT
I think the problem with this protest and a lot of protests in recent years is that the only people who are unconventional enough to protest also look … unconventional. The visual cues automatically cause a large number of people to dismiss them entirely, even if the protest makes sense given a moment of thought. John’s reaction in the previous post seems to me to be an attempt to articulate the problem.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Big Baby DougJ:
Dude, it’s this.
Linda Featheringill
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again):
How do you know the protestors have been at it for a long time? They looked pretty baby-faced to me.
Corner Stone
@Linda Featheringill: I saw them, thanks. But it’s clear that people here haven’t really taken the next step yet. It’s not about a single line march in a circle with snappy rhyming cheers. The protest doesn’t have to follow anything as we understand it. Thousands of people have spent two weeks doing this, from over educated 20-somethings to 50+ near retirees who are scared to death.
It’s being dismissed out of hand here because the MSM has told them to.
That’s all. No deeper reflection or understanding of who’s involved or why.
They don’t have to satsify your fucking bullet points for protest!
Cat Lady
Without including the New York based corporate media in the discomfort zone, the Wall Street protest just looks ineffective at best, and silly at worst. The media elites need to feel like they’re part of the problem. The messengers need to be metaphorically shot, also too.
Linnaeus
Okay, so we want more organized and coherent protests. Great.
Now ask yourself, “what am I prepared to do to bring that about?”
Corner Stone
@PeakVT:
I disagree. Cole wanted order and outcome to evaluate. He wanted people to identify with and a list of demands he could see someone negotiate for.
A Mom Anon
I heard a story once about homeless veterans living in the Pacific NW forests who were being sprayed with defoliants from planes hired by the timber companies. The companies knew the vets were there but kept spraying anyway.
People who live in that part of the country know who the bad guys are,it’s been a battle for years with all kinds of activists vs law enforcement and timber company private security. These aren’t densely populated areas,people know each other,even the homeless guys know who’s who and what’s what.
Anyhow,all it took was a few well placed anonymous phone calls to the pilots and timber company security people to let them know that the vets knew who was spraying them and how to get to them.
The spraying stopped.
My point being that if you ask nicely and be polite a bully will never quit. Sometimes that sense of being nice and fair even feeds the mean and evil shit they do. The sole reason this shit keeps happening over and over again is because the people with money and power fear NOTHING. From the halls of Congress and local governments to Wall Street,there’s no fear of the People,of Us. Until there are serious consequences for being a nasty,lying,steaming,thieving sack of crap this shit will continue.
aisce
i’d be embarrassed to write something like this. you’re such a poseur, dougj. reign of terror?
Alex S.
@Davis X. Machina:
It’s probably not a good example because I consider that guy a friend, but I know someone who delayed his return to London from a family holiday for several weeks because of these riots. He’s a fairly wealthy tax attorney.
If you don’t think in weeks, but in decades, I think it’s very beneficial to have a society connected in this physical way, not necessarily through violence, but simply through proximity. Rich and powerful people hiding in gated communities are a serious indication of something being wrong, of the fabric of society falling apart. We like to complain about the isolation of the Village and presume that some of them have never seen or heard of real poverty. Well, if they want to seclude themselves you have to follow them.
However, I guess that, right now, the UK is the main battleground of economic theories, since the Tory austerity isn’t really helping. And the frontlines are especially rigid.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@efgoldman:
The difference being that the protests of the late 60’s had a pretty clear goal- getting the US out of the war in Vietnam. Adbusters has done a horrible job defining their goals. You might think it’s about derivatives trading or foreclosures. It’s not. It’s about campaign finance reform and lobbying reform.
There should be hundreds of thousands of people joining in on this protest, middle aged and old people, middle class and poor people…But there aren’t. there are a lot of students, and they’re not saying, “Get the money out of Washington!” They’re saying little more than “The handcuffs are too tight,” which is something you can hear on any episode of COPS.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
In response to the update, maybe they can figure out how to get about 100 more of those pepper spray incidents on video, and a few on the news.
Linda Featheringill
@aisce: #38
I think Doug has a point. IF a revolution ever got started in the US, I don’t think it would be peaceful. I think it would make the Cuban revolution look like a Sunday picnic.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Linda Featheringill:
Well, ya know, there have been some pretty famously successful protests over the years that they could take a look at. Gandhi, King, Mandela…There have to be a couple of books someone could read…And you’ve got to figure that NYU and Columbia students amongst them would know how to find those books.
MAJeff
How is the “occupation” linked to that goal? What does it do to accomplish that goal?
Adrian Haiwei
The last protest I went to was the last ditch (large) protest to try and dissuade the idiots in Washington from invading Iraq. There were probably 50,000 of us. If we had 10x that many, and shit-canned all the “free Mumia!” and “legalize marijuana!” signs, we might have had more impact.
Or maybe not. It did feel pretty futile.
But there are easily a million angry progressives out there, and if we were organized enough to *really* occupy Wall Street, it might make the DC/Corporate axis nervous enough to back off a little on the class warfare, and maybe let a few more crumbs trickle down from the supply side…
Davis X. Machina
A protest demanding the establishment of a commission?
Ok. Sure. Yeah.
I’m a process guy. Stone parliamentarian. Social Democrat who has a pinup picture of Nye Bevan on his cubicle.
What separates me from them? The drum circle?
A Mom Anon
@Linda Featheringill: Especially considering how many damned guns there are in this country. Not to mention other sorts of weapony goodness people have stashed away.
The thing is,I think there has to be some serious focus,and for some freaking reason no one ever directs any action at the media. A big reason we’re in this mess is a lack of honest to god journalism and a huge amount of bullshit being fed to us as”news”. The Village isn’t the least bit scared of Us either and maybe they damn well need to be.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@MAJeff:
That’s a good question, ain’t it? They should have asked themselves that.
jpe
Many more overlords live in Stamford or Westchester. Certainly larger parts of their respective populations. Most of us in NYC just don’t want to be bothered and, like me, don’t want to have to pay even more tax because trustafarians are forcing cops to get overtime comp. If they wanted to force a city to expend more, they really should’ve targeted somewhere in White Plains or something.
Culture of Truth
Then they should occupy K Street. This is why I’ve been confused about the Wall St. protest from the start. For the first week I thought it was about criminal investment banks, mortages and bailouts.
nancydarling
Fer chrissakes! Does it take striking miners being mowed down by gatling guns to get us off our collective ass? This protest is a start. I was listening to live streaming today and heard a guy who had come from Santa Fe to be a part of it. All this criticism about lack of organization, what is their goal, blah, blah, blah is just bull shit. If you can do it better and more effectively, then by all means, go ahead.
Mr. Stagger Lee
@PeakVT: Plus what leaders will we have if it were to be sucessful, either we get the Che Guevera/Pol Pots or the RW neo-nazis? Bloomberg though has expressed worry that we may not be far away from that day, especially when there are more unemployed males in this 2nd Great depression. Plus we are about to slash Defense spending, which means we about to put more people in the street. I would suggest some of the Forbes/Galtians, listen to the Buffetts, the Mark Cubans and the Bloombergs.
MAJeff
Do what exactly? What is the point of the protest?
I’m serious with that question. The organizers say it’s about establishing a commission. How does this get us to that goal?
PurpleGirl
@jpe: But they work in NYC. And they commute from Connecticut and Westchester County to their jobs. Also, not all of the jobs are in Financial District anymore: for example, J.P. Morgan Chase has a headquarters building on Park Avenue, Morgan Stanley is on Broadway in the West 50s, CitiCorp’s headquarters is on 52nd to 53rd Streets between Third Avenue and Lexington Avenue.
The really should be outside various offices spreading their message.
PeakVT
The third video down here sort of shows the pepper spray incident from another angle.
ETA: Meant for one post back.
PurpleGirl
@Mr. Stagger Lee: Ah, but Bloomberg is against raising taxes at any level. He steadfastly refuses to implement a trading tax in NYC.
nancydarling
@MAJeff: As disorganized and ephemeral as their goals may seem to you, it is better than sitting on your ass and doing nothing.
James
@nancydarling:
No no… don’t you see, it was the wrong type of people. We can’t associate with ‘those kinds’. They’re not good enough for us, as per the purity tests. Honestly, if they’re not shelling out for a PR firm nor collecting PAC donations, they’re simply there to be ridiculed. There’s only one proper way to do ‘freedom’ and this sure isn’t it.
I mean seriously, at some point during a week-long occupation they took some time out for having fun by playing the drums and dancing. That alone makes them unworthy. In closing, fuck them.
-a proud ‘progessive’ and Obama voter.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
If I’m trying to win people over to my side I ask this: Is it more effective to do so via status updates on Facebook or by getting arrested on camera and forgetting to make a peep about what I’m protesting that got me arrested?
I’ll go with Facebook on this one. Call me when you want some help actually organizing something effective.
MAJeff
@PurpleGirl:
If their goal, as is stated, is to pressure the federal government to set up a commission, how does this protest move in that direction?
That’s where it’s all muddled. Yeah, the banksters are sociopaths who’ve destroyed the country and deserve to be confronted. Confronting them, however, doesn’t have anything to do with the stated goals of pressuring the federal government to establish a commission to regulate Wall Street.
That’s why it’s all a muddle. The messaging blows, and it has no relation to the goals organizers have established.
Corner Stone
@PeakVT: Jesus Christ. These are “trustafarians” ?
Davis X. Machina
The protest will be part of the Gray Line city bus tours before long…
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
Better how? What has it accomplished other than getting a bunch of people pepper-sprayed? What has that accomplished?
Doing something for the sake of doing something is rarely useful, productive, or worthwhile. What’s the point?
Corner Stone
@James: Maybe they should have hired Lanny Davis so they could be taken seriously?
JPL
@Linda Featheringill: The revolution won’t happen. I’m not an authority on the subject but from my little neck of the woods in GA, it appears that we will be just as submissive as the Germans. Poor and without a job hoping for a savior. That’s why Bush ran on fear and why the repubs run on the scary black man.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff:
A dead guy in Tunisia has a few questions for you.
Is that what it’s going to take here in the US?
Edgar Allahu Akbar Poe
@Corner Stone:
you’re on fire.
JPL
@Corner Stone: Do you think that a Repub victory will lead to better results in the next decade? Personally, I don’t think there will be a country worth saving is the repubs take the White HOuse.
nancydarling
@MAJeff: The point IS, they might inspire others who will be more (or maybe less) effective. I wrote in Cole’s previous post about a patron saint of my household, Doris “Granny D” Haddock who walked across the country at age 90 for campaign finance reform. She didn’t get it, but she has inspired thousands. That is useful, productive, and worthwhile.
Davis X. Machina
@Corner Stone:
It’s a matter of scale. Tunisia is a very small country. If you want to move the US off dead center, you have to kill at least 3,000 people. Then we get angry, and break shit, and change the laws. One guy, not so much.
Even then, the results are unpredictable.
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
Lots of emotional flailing, but very little analysis.
How is this protest related to the stated goal of establishing a federal commission? How does it place pressure on the people who can do so?
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
And that “inspiration” has resulted in what policy changes?
PurpleGirl
@MAJeff: You have a point. I don’t know why they think protesting on Wall Street will produce results (a federal commission). Maybe they should be outside the SEC offices or the Federal Reserve Bank.
If they want to let the bankers/financial people they are unhappy with them (the bankers/financial people) then they should be more closely in view at buildings.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
Look at these dirty nasty motherfuckers returning their medals. Lot’s of people though this was just awful.
Fluffy
@jpe:
The Galtian overlords also live and work in Greenwich, perhaps to a greater degree than White Plains. However, the only place where protestors can get photogenically close to banksters is downtown. Standing on a grassy verge 3000 yards from the entrance to a hedge fund office in a bucolic business park doesn’t make any news at all.
If they make downtown too uncomfortable, the Lords of Finance will shift more of their operations to other areas. Part of the reason why the NYC powers that be are unified against tattooed artistes in drum circles is — they don’t want to chase more of the finance business tax base out to Connecticut.
nancydarling
@MAJeff: The fat lady isn’t singing yet.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: Who exactly is calling for a commission to be formed? The “leaders” of a leaderless and disorganized occupation? I’m very sceptical of this request.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
And ewww, look at this dirty fucking hippy, what did he accomplish?
Corner Stone
@Davis X. Machina: I expected a French saying thrown in there somewhere. I’m a little sad now.
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
So, your plan is:
1) Protest and provoke a violent response
2) ???????
3) DEMOCRACY NOW!
Corner Stone
@JPL:
I honestly don’t even know what this means.
PurpleGirl
@Fluffy: Actually UBS is planning on coming back to NYC. Their Stamford offices have proven to be out-of-the-way for meetings with other banks and financial companies.
ETA: While Goldman, Sachs is still downtown, there has been so much consolidation in the sector since the 1990s and so many companies moving to NJ or mid-town that there are fewer companies downtown.
MAJeff
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
What did the Yippies accomplish?
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: protests some times take on a life of their own. Did you anticipate Egypt?
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: I feel kind of sad for you.
James
@Corner Stone:
He found one opinion in the throngs of a very divergent group then ran wild with it.
He’s amazed that a group sans corporate branding and focus groups does not have a message spun tighter than his asshole.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@MAJeff: @MAJeff: Fun.
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
I’m sorry, but Egypt is not the United States. As much difficulty as Americans are facing, it isn’t the same as the food shortages combined with repressive police state that existed in Egypt. Part of engaging in serious analysis isn’t just saying “protest worked!” but “protest worked under certain conditions. What are those conditions and why did they work.” The attitude you seem to be taking is, “Do something, no matter what and no matter what relationship it has to your goals. Just do SOMETHING.” It’s not reasonable or efficacious.
What are the similar conditions in the US and Egypt that make the protest in Egypt likely to occur here?
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@MAJeff: Look you can hand this out to your students and “evaluate” them!
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
No need to. I actually study social movements, what they do, and the effect they have. My primary focus is on queer movement, but there are other issues I focus on. I’ve been in the streets, the sheets, and the classroom.
Again…what’s your goal? How are you going to get there? Got a plan? An idea? Just gonna flail forever?
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
Uhm…Isn’t Jerry Rubin one of the Wall Street guys now?
LunarMovements
Well, it seems I was wrong. Not only are peaceful protesters being “kettled” here in the good ole US of A (which I had hoped would be something I would never see), but they are being assaulted by officers as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moD2JnGTToA&NR=1
This shows peaceful young women being corralled by an outrageous number of cops holding up orange netting, and then sprayed with mace by one cop directly in the face.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CiujCQI2vEE&feature=related
This one is a slowed down version. You can see the mace being delivered at approximately 1:23 by a somewhat older police officer wearing a white shirt.
So much for the constitutional right of peaceful assembly.
MAJeff
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
How did the Yippies accomplish those goals? What kind of pressure were they able to put on the state? Was it actually the Yippies (no) or other factors (yes). Romanticization is worthless.
jpe
They’re not close to banksters; they are, however, in a photogenic area. It’s like any other disaster movie: people like ruining NYC because it looks cool. At least the filmmakers have the honesty to admit the pretense, though.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: Food shortages? Repressive police state?
Where you been dog, in the sheets?
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): He’s been dead for 17 years but, yes, he did that.
“Near the end of his life, Rubin was heavily involved in multi-level marketing of health foods and nutritional supplements.”
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Corner Stone:
Bullshit. You don’t feel sorry for anyone. You’ve made that clear over time. If you could feel sorry for anyone you’d see how hurtful you are.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@MAJeff: Whooop-teee-fucking-dooo.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): I actually liked John Sinclair and the WPP better.
Linda Featheringill
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
Aaaahhhh. Stuck. You’re here. :-)
JPL
@Corner Stone: I think that some protests could help the republican party win. In a sane society, the Wall Street protests would be bipartisan.
The Tunesian suicide started a revolution that altered the landscape in the Middle East. I think the same could happen here but it would be to our detriment. The repubs have used fear to corral us and the media.
Edit.. I hope I’m wrong though…
MAJeff
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
Translation: efficacy? Who needs it? Let’s party!
Fun for the protestors, politically useless. OK, I know where you’re coming from.
@Corner Stone:
AT the same levels? Really? Democrats getting disappeared and tortured under Bush? Democratic socialists arrested and tortured under Obama?
At least try a little analysis. We aren’t dealing with anywhere near the same levels of deprivation and repression. Once (if) we are, those variables might matter. Now? Not so much.
This is the point. Analysis. You’re dealing with widely disparate situations. Deal with those differences. Yes, there are problems. But, the situations are not comparable.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@MAJeff: You have some academic analysis of the VVAW too?
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
Was it the rock and roll, the dope or the fucking in the streets that hooked ya?
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Is this multiple choice too?
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
Sorry, I forgot “all of the above”. I was watching something else.
OzarkHillbilly
best left unsaid.
Linda Featheringill
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
Completely not germane: The only time I have heard that phrase I was in Birmingham, Alabama.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): “We were egg snatchers, flashin sunshine children”!
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Linda Featheringill: Well, since we’re doing Dead lyrics
Halfstep, Mississippi uptown toodeloo Hello, baby, I’m gone, goodbye
Half a cup of Rock and Rye.
Farewell to you old Southern skies
I’m on my way, on my way.
Linda Featheringill
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
#110
Oh, my. I’ve been serenaded! :-)
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
We are 13-time NFL Champions.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): @Linda Featheringill: The full deal.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): I’m amazed that the link the dude provided earlier worked and I got to watch it online.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
Incredibly stupid play costs the Falcons a chance.
JPL
@Raven (formerly stuckinred): well my teams sucked today.
Odie Hugh Manatee
I’m in the “at least someone is doing something!” camp, though the establishing a commission and protesting at Wall Street seems kind of at odds to me. IMO, a “re-regulate Wall Street” sit-in would make a bit more sense to me. They are asking for is something from D.C., where the ones are who could make it happen, and not Wall Street. The banksters aren’t going to ask Obama to establish any commission, that’s for sure.
I would like to see an “if we can’t afford a home then we will live here for now” sit-in set up around re-regulating Wall Street and raising taxes on capital gains, or something along those lines.
One thing about protests is that the front lines are attractive for attention seekers, especially the weird ones. I don’t know if they can but the organizers would be smart to man the lines with people who can get the message out, especially photogenically. Mosh pit-style protesting with competing messages just muddles everything perfectly for our M$M.
They need it spelled out for them in an image that can say more than any words. IMO, putting the right people/signage at the front of a protest can help get that message out.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
You in the Falcon’s exclusivity zone? Too far away from a sports bar with a dish?
Answer me on the football thread. I’m shutting down and heading home.
Allan
Wall Street isn’t afraid of those silly protests. Wall Street is afraid of Elizabeth Warren.
Martin
I’m the guy at work that y’all hate. I see a group of people there in Wall Street and want to walk up to them and shout: “What message are you trying to communicate? I don’t care what you’re saying, I care what you’re doing.”
I can appreciate the guys that camp out in trees for years. Say what you will about whether dedicating your life to save a single tree is a good use of anyone’s time, at least their actions are effective – the tree won’t get cut down. That’s a fuckload more productive than the people standing around the bottom of the tree proselytizing about this and that, and a bunch of people camping out in lower manhattan banging drums doesn’t tell me shit. And I don’t fucking care what they’re saying – I lived in NYC – you get VERY good at tuning out all the shit that gets yelled at you.
You want to make a point about what? Mortgage foreclosures? Bailouts? Rich people? What are you outraged about, because I can’t tell. And if you’re trying to make a point about mortgages, go find a few thousand people living in their cars and move them down there. Set up a soup kitchen. Give them their very own JP Morganville, and get it on CNBC every day.
Martin
Oh, and give everyone a ‘Jump, you fuckers!’ sign.
OzoneR
I agree with the point. The problem is the way they protest is rather pathetic. Banging drums and singing songs isn’t going to scare those in power. Egyptians didn’t take out Mubarak by singing kumbaya in the Tahir Square.
Not that I think any other type of protest will necessarily work. I always got the feeling Americans are the type who will whine about these things, but never do anything about it, accepting it last their “lot in life”
Corner Stone
@Martin: Exactly.
Kola Noscopy
@Allan:
Fuck you, you establishment milquetoast.
Much as I would like to believe different, if Elizabeth Warren is elected, she will be marginalized or assimilated once in power. That’s what your man Barry is all about: Keeping the powers that be in power.
Oh, and fuck you again.
MariedeGournay
It’s not hip nor cool to actually care about things enough to make a bit of fool of yourself in their defense.
magma
God bless those dirty friggin’ hippies-at least they’re not a members of the Left-Liberal Chairborne Division of Inconsequential Blog Wank.
Corner Stone
@Allan: Nobody is afraid of E Warren. If she’s elected she’ll have C Schumer on one hand and R Shelby on the other.
OzoneR
@Kola Noscopy: Serious question, how do you not end up killing yourself…jeez.
Corner Stone
@magma: Fuck yeah! 100x this this this!
James
@OzoneR:
Actually, the first week in Tahrir consisted of mostly younger adults, numbering less than three hundred, who held out in the face of Mubarak’s Interior Ministry forces. They sang songs and danced as well cuz… wait for it… wait for it… it’s fun.
Their courage inspired the tens of thousands who turned out a week later. The ousting of Mubarak was only one of several hundred complaints those kids had.
Corner Stone
@OzoneR: Well, if anyone can answer that…
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Martin:
This! A thousand times THIS!
But then again, the official line is that it’s about the undue influence that Wall Street has on D.C., though it’s hard to tell.
OzoneR
@James:
Well maybe it’s an American thing then because these guys courage is imspiring basically nobody.
I had a friend of mine ask me if I can go downtown and see how many people are there and “Is it worth it to go?” As if he wasn’t going to bother if there were only 30 people there.
Bill Arnold
Rude Pundit‘s take on this is worth skimming.
(Warning: Rude Pundit is often offensive to those easily offended.)
Corner Stone
@OzoneR:
Sigh.
Genine
This is a response I had to Linda Feathergill in the previous thread:
Genine
Blockquote fail!
Sorry.
Corner Stone
@Bill Arnold: I like that take, thanks.
It kind of knocks the shit out of the useless cynicism by some here.
No “Free Mumia” signs, indeed.
James
@OzoneR:
I give no fucks about your apathy.
I do give a fuck about you being factually correct when speaking about your betters.
WaterGirl
@nancydarling: I completely agree. This feels to me like the start of “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not gonna take it anymore”. And that’s a good thing, even if it’s not well organized.
OzoneR
@James:
Well if we’re being factually correct, we should probably point out that the Egypt situation began in Tunisia when a man set himself on fire, so maybe the analogy doesn’t work.
Maybe if someone set themselves aflame in Liberty Plaza…
El Cid
There’s never any lack of insight about how some protesters or organizers are doing it all wrong, and how desperately someone needs to do something or other a lot better and more effectively.
WaterGirl
@MAJeff:
I’ll tell you what it’s accomplished. it’s got my blood boiling, and i’ll bet a lot of others feel the same way. Maybe it’s enough to get a lot of us off our asses and DOING SOMETHING more than typing on a blog, donating, and working for a candidate.
OzoneR
@El Cid:
Well it’s still early, but this doesn’t seem to be very effective, does it?
delphi_ote
@WaterGirl:
Liiiiiike?
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
As long as they’re white, yeah.
FollowtheDough
I want to hear MORE excuses why we should just write off all the movements you disagree with,Progressives. It’s because they are…EMOPROGS! That’s right, emoprogs and you hover above them in your own exhalted sense of worth. That elite pragmatic armchair that we mere mortals can only dream of touching. What we need is a list why it isnt coherent and why the movement isn’t up to snuff. Oh thank you, for bringing us your insightful sixth sense to political matters! How could we live without your brilliant analysis on why our society isn’t running on all cylinders properly? Amaz-ing
This is why people walk away. None of these self ordained political scholars are better than any of the protesters they are judging. These scholars probably suffer as many personal flaws in their own political philosophy as these college students. But for so many entrenched in these blog comment sections,message boards and hammering away on twitter, that is a bit too painful to come to terms with.
The Spy Who Loved Me
The biggest problems I see with this protest are: 1. The number of protesters. Not enough to make any kind of impact, and 2. What they look like. Does anyone really think the vast majority to the country looks at these kids (a combination of hippies, hipsters and anarchist looking people) and identify with them in any way?
You want an effective protest against Wall Street? Have a bunch of middle-class people take to the streets. Until then, Wall Street is laughing at these yahoos.
MAJeff
@The Spy Who Loved Me:
This seems to me the key question, and the key word is “effective.”
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Well, he’s dead now, but he did kind of change his stripes before that. Sad.
FollowtheDough
@El Cid:
It’s all just yammering armchair bullshit. You know what it reminds me of? Comic book store guy on the Simpsons. “Ohhhh surely you know how to organize” 80 percent of these pragmatic scholars have never engaged in any protest because they are scared and terrified of failure and the judgement of their ideas. “What you should be doing” “Where is your strategy” Vague Question interrogating is easy After a while it’s just painfully obvious that a lot of political critics are bonded to that armchair for their entire life. Somehow we are lost without their guidance and logic compass.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: So you been tween the sheets and the streets. What would you suggest for an effective protest?
nancydarling
@WaterGirl: Thank you Water Girl. You mentioned something to Raven a couple of day ago about a rough two weeks. Have you been sick?
James
@The Spy Who Loved Me:
“Anarchist looking types”… those are what homeless young adults look like. Street-involved youth were a large contingent of the Occupation.
“Let’s have a proper protest about the inherent inequality in our economic system, but could we please have the poors just fuck right off first? The optics won’t work.”
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@WaterGirl: I’ve been thinking about you in your time of grief. It’s never easy – they leave such big paw prints on our hearts.
El Cid
@OzoneR: And what would “effective” be, anyway? And if a protest weren’t “effective,” then what?
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@FollowtheDough:
Which is fine if you believe in protesting for the sake of protesting. Here’s the front page of the Emoprogs’ blog. As I type this, there are eight blogposts on there. Two are about the message behind the protest, two are about the inner workings (one about the food fund becoming the general fund, the other dealing with guidelines for the march), one’s about the side-trip to Sotheby’s in support of the treatment of the art handlers, and three are about the cops and arrests.
And of those two blogposts that are on-message, one is video only, and it meanders all over the fucking place. I think that if I listen to that rant long enough I’ll be convinced that it was Wall Street that killed the Lindbergh Baby.
Hey,
TroofersOccupiers: Keep It Simple, Stupid!FlipYrWhig
Unlike John, I guess, I really like the power of crowds. But the thing I always get hung up on is how to take the crowd from being just a bunch of people to being big enough to create that implicit intimidation that makes collective action crackle: that sense that we are not just a random bunch of people, we are legion, and if you disrupt us, more of us will come, so don’t dare it, and if you do dare it, _you_ will be the one who comes away looking worse. When it works, there is nothing like it in politics. But there aren’t many examples of it working in the USA, are there? What is it that _makes_ it work? Serious question.
FollowtheDough
@The Spy Who Loved Me:
These are how movements sprout. Do you think the protests in India started instantly w/ Gandhi? Suddenly he appeared and everything was a revolution. It took YEARS before miniscule results were seen. It’s always confusion and lack of planning in the beginning. The hardest thing to do in politics is to put yourself out there for the world to see. It’s pretty easy to be “Mr/Mrs. What U Should Do” in the age of the internet. I think that is what is suffering most in our politics. I don’t have the answers. I believe we are now at the point of the spaghetti theory. Throw anything to the wall and hope to god it sticks for our future. Sorry but we can’t wait for “The Right Protesters”
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
What’s the goal?
I know you hate that question, but seriously, what’s are you trying to accomplish?
That shouldn’t be a question that’s off limits. The bus boycotts, for example, weren’t just a symbolic statement that “we won’t take this anymore,” they were an attempt to exert economic pressure on the system.
Queer Nation worked to put pressure on the feds by shutting down the FDA. I’m not going to make a blanket statement about what kind of protest to engage in. I’m stuck in North Dakota. I’m not going to have any impact on the practices of Wall Street. But, if one wants to impact Wall Street, what are ways to do it? Even beyond that, though, what impacts does one want to have? This isn’t about denigrating all protest, but instead asking what the goals of protest are? If it’s to mobilize more people, fine. But then, the messaging needs to be central, and it should engage with the society in which we live. How can people produce a message that can be heard by wider publics? What’s wrong with asking that question?
There are a couple of conflicting themes here. A starting point involves the efficacy of action. Some folks are arguing that any action should be taken, regardless of its impact, goal or efficacy. Others (including me) are saying, if you’re going to take action, why are you doing so? What’s the intended impact of that action? What’s the analysis that indicates this action will be effective? Those are basic strategic questions.
Another involves the conditions under which protest is taking place. Sorry, we aren’t suffering the same kind of police state or massive resource shortages as Egypt. Those conditions provided a mobilizing potential that simply doesn’t exist in the United States. How do we deal with those differences in conditions? The middle class in Egypt was impacted by those conditions in a way that the middle classes in the US isn’t? How do those factors influence what’s possible? That question appears to be out of bounds.
I’ll ask again, some of the organizers of these protests have said the goal is a commission. How do the protests get to that point? If that’s not the pont of other folks, what are they attempting to accomplish? Are they attempting to influence the actions of traders? How are they doing so? Are they doing so in a way the traders will laugh off, or are they doing so in a language traders can hear?
I’ve heard nothing that addresses any of this other than, “Shit sucks! Stand up!” And then……?
nancydarling
@MAJeff: Shorter Jeff: Blah, blah, blah, blah…
El Cid
I believe in protesting for the sake of protest. Of expressing, publicly, one’s outrage.
Even if it doesn’t seem to really advance an issue, and there’s a failure to take any energy present to lead to further work. I wish all such protest efforts would be maximally “effective,” but unfortunately they’re often run by humans rather than silhouettes of extremely effective protests done at other historical times and places.
Surely no one is crazy enough to think that the presence of several dozen people at protests somewhere vacuums out all the energy that otherwise would be put to completely effective organizing.
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
So, what are you attempting to accomplish, and how are you doing so? What’s your message? How is that related to the people you are trying to reach?
In other words, you’d rather rail than think strategically.
What’s your goal, and how are you going to get there? Answer that! How does this protest get you there? Do you have ANYTHING?!?!?!
MAJeff
Shorter nancydarling: “AAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!! Where’s my political change now?!?!?!?”
nancydarling
@MAJeff: You are totally missing the point. This may be the start of something bigger. Instead of criticizing from our key boards, we should be organizing our own actions or helping those who have already begun one.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
It may be the beginning of a backlash, instead.
nancydarling
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): So. Let’s do nothing because we might make things worse.
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
And you’re missing a bigger point: Who are you attempting to reach and how?
I live in North Dakota. People here, despite a pretty good economy (for the state), are also seeing their retirement accounts decline because of Wall Street’s practices. How is your messaging reaching them? I understand the idea of tipping points and all that, but the messaging also needs to be useful. If I, a lefty halfway across the country, have no idea what these folks are trying to accomplish, what chance do centrists in this state have to get that message? The entirety of the approach seems to be, “If we protest, they will come.” No, they won’t. They need a message that breaks through. The point isn’t to reach lefties, but to reach broader publics. What’s the message? How does it appeal to those publics? How does it foster mobilizing them?
This isn’t critique for the sake of critique. Seriously, what’s the message? If it’s simply a vague protest of Wall Street for the sake of protesting Wall Street then….what?
OzoneR
@El Cid:
If I knew, I’d be doing it.
nancydarling
@MAJeff: @Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGNd6SdwMpg
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
No, get your ducks in a row before you start the protest.
Come in with a strategy. Game out what could possibly happen when the protest begins, and make contingency plans in order to deal with problems before they derail the protest.
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
So, basically, all you’ve got is “inspiration.” Efficacy is worthless so long as there’s some kind of inspiration.
Strategy, tactic, goal…meaningless, so long as there is inspiration.
Analysis? Who need it! We’ve got inspiration…even from movement that had no political impact; they had inspiration!
Where’s your analysis? What are you attempting to accomplish, and how do you hope to do so…beyond INSPIRATION!
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
Nice try.
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
Where are you trying to go? What do you want to see happen? How do you propose we get there?
You’ve answered none of these. Instead, your approach seems to be, “People gonna get pissed an mobilized” as if by magic, or music video.
What are these protests supposed to accomplish and how?
nancydarling
@MAJeff: @Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): You both refuse to get it. What I am hoping is that this protest is the vanguard of bigger, better and more focused, if you will, movements and protests. What’s so hard about that?
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
Hoping? You’re hoping? That’s it, just hoping?
doofus
@MAJeff: Some people view protest as a useful end in itself. I am not one of those people.
Janus Daniels
Nothing ever grows from hope?
nancydarling
@OzoneR: No, actually I go to Little Rock for actions and demonstrations. I organized and led an ongoing peace rally in the lead up to Iraq, 2003. I’ve been and will continue to be in the trenches. We’ve got to start somewhere besides our keyboards. Denigrate these demonstrators all you want. I applaud them
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
Toward what goal? How are you going to mobilize people if there’s no message? Is it just going to be the emotive “Oooooh! people be pissed at Wall STreet! I must join!”?
What movement and protest? There isn’t even a message. There isn’t a movement. There’s just a nondescript message with no audience, no goals, and no message. How are you going to reach people? What message are you going to give them? What are they organizing around? You’ve given nothing more than LET’S JUST PROTEST!
What movement are you trying to build? Do you have any kind of analysis as to the constituencies you are trying to mobilize and the messages they will be most receptive to? Or, is it all about PROTEST!!!!!!!
If you’re trying to build a Vanguard, perhaps you should read Lenin. A vanguard for whom? How will you reach them? You’ve answered none of that other than to say, PROTEST!
Seriously, the Yippies?!?!?! They had NO effect on policy. In public discourse they remained a joke, and for most of the country they have always been irrelevant pranksters.
If you’re attempting to form a vanguard, who are you mobilizing and how are you doing so? You’ve addressed none of that other than to say, “If we protest they will come!” That’s bullshit and it’s worthless for movement building. Who’s you’r audience? What’s your message for them? How are you going to get them involved?
Dr. Morpheus
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again):
Oh, I think there’s been something written about this subject.
OzoneR
@Janus Daniels:
Not hope alone, no.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
And you don’t get it: Maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s just the opposite. Maybe it leaves such a bad taste in the mouth of the general public that no one can snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.
If you want traction on this, you need flyover country, you need the middle class- you need the people who this has been effecting the most, not college students with sideways haircuts who are going to NYU and Columbia, working on their doctoral theses on pet grooming in post-feminist New England (ETA: Which, I think, was Cole’s doctoral thesis).
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
Yet you have no plan to move these rallies further forward except HOPE it catches on, and what if it doesn’t? Then what? You blame Obama? Democrats? Me?
I’m supposed to applaud that you’re rallying with no plan on how it take it to the level other than keeping your fingers crossed?
Dr. Morpheus
@nancydarling: Shorter Nancydarling, “I got nothing!”
MAJeff
@OzoneR:
What, you expect there to be a relationship goals, strategy, and tactics?
Dr. Morpheus
@nancydarling:
He is helping by pointing out that you need to organize and plan. If you don’t understand that then you’re part of the problem, not the solution.
El Cid
It’s a big country. If some people protest, and if some people pay some degree of attention, then barring certain protest actions and outcomes, said activity wouldn’t prevent you or others from doing something you think more effective in terms of basic organizing.
Of course, protests can also devolve into in-group stagnation, navel-gazing, and social clique reproduction.
Partly because there aren’t other, better alternatives available for the more or less ‘ordinary’ person who’d like to publicly express some position with some intensity.
It matters, though, what larger organizations with better funding do — it’s not every day that you get a crossover between spontaneous mass outrage and deeply rooted organization such as the Madison protests. If only.
gwangung
@MAJeff: It occurs to me that if no one in the group has an overall strategy, the group is susceptible to being taken over by someone who does—and that strategy may not be what the group itself wants.
Dr. Morpheus
@Janus Daniels:
Hope is not a plan, nor is it a action.
So no, nothing ever grows from mere hope.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@MAJeff:
Well, there’s always…this.
boss bitch
Come on, those Wall Street guys are not afraid of those protesters. Hit them in their damn pockets if you want to frighten them.
nancydarling
I’ve been involved in a fight with an electrical co-op over herbicide spraying and board member nominations and other issues of transparency. We’ve been at it for 4 years and started with a bunch of DFH’s and hope. Well, guess what? We just hired a big gun law firm that took on the Pedernales Electrical Co-op in Texas and won.
There is no change without hoping for it and someone to lead the way.
El Cid
You do not need to form a vanguard. I am the vanguard. You might need a power forward, though.
OzoneR
@MAJeff: Do we really think the tea party formed and a few people marched and then hoped it would catch on, and Callooh Callay, it did?
No, they had a tangible plan to sell to the masses; utilize the media, exploit cultural wedge issues like race, sex and religion (black welfare moms, Ground Zero mosques), channel public anger into that (you can’t trust liberals, even if they say what you want, cause they want to build mosques in Ground Zero) and ride it to victory.
The left doesn’t have this, maybe it doesn’t exist, I dunno, but “hoping this is the beginning of something big” is not a plan, we’ve been hoping since before I was born.
You expect Democrats to back your movement on the off chance that it may catch on and they won’t all go under if it doesn’t?
MAJeff
@Dr. Morpheus:
So no, nothing ever grows from mere hope.
“Mere” being the key term. Hope may be necessary, but it is far from sufficient. Hope along is worthless; it’s fantasy. Instead, it needs to be connected to analysis: We can produce change if we…..” That later point is tied to analyzing where there are vulnerabilities in the system, where challenge can interrupt the operation of oppression.
What’s been missing, though, is that analysis. Instead, the basic approach has been, “If we shop up and protest, we have to hope masses will agree with and join us.”
Crossing fingers ain’t a strategy
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
So you and the DFH’s protested by walking down the middle of Main Street , holding up traffic, all the while talking about the Pedernales Electrical Co-op’s involvement on a power grid that includes TVA dams that murder innocent snail darters, right? And the lawyers just showed up?
MAJeff
@OzoneR:
They also had an organizational infrastructure.
The left is at a severe disadvantage in that way. We don’t have, for example, the organizational infrastructure or resources of the Southern Baptist Convention.
nancydarling
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Basically that’s how we started. Little protests here and there. The law firm came late in the game. And no they didn’t just show up.
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
So, while you’re basic “argument” here is, “If we protest, they will come,” you acknowledge that’s not what happened in the case you’re describing.
nancydarling
@MAJeff: Little protests here and there, that’s how it all begins.
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
Yes, we all agree with this, and then what…
MAJeff
@OzoneR:
MAGIC!
The lawyers were so inspired by the tiny protests, that they just gravitated to a movement. The Vanguard’s impact is simply its presence.
gwangung
@nancydarling: If you have a plan to turn little protests into something more…and contingency plans if some things don’t turn out right.
MAJeff
@gwangung:
No plans are necessary. If you protest, they will come. It’s the magic of the vanguard. No strategy is necessary. Just protest. It has a magical influence.
nancydarling
@OzoneR: I’ve already told you that. Some one comes along with a more organized action. I’m not involved in the NY action. I’m busy with my own issues locally although I am certainly willing to join in with some one who is involved with what we are seeing in NY.
Corner Stone
This is fucking hilarious. If you ain’t got a bulletproof Powerpoint with bullet points then don’t bother leaving your house to protest.
WTF is wrong with you people?
Your recipe is the “bodies at rest” part of the theorem. What a bunch of fucking choads.
Corner Stone
Everybody! Stop what you’re doing! Someone with a better plan and more organization is coming soon!
Soon now!….Any minute!….Any…any…
Just whatever you do, stop what you’re doing!
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
Bullshit. You can babble on and on, but the point remains: what are you trying to accomplish and how are you doing so?
Keep railing on the “we have to do something but not think about what or how” theme.
But let me ask: what are you trying to accomplish? How are you trying to get there?
Corner Stone
People here are denigrating actual action being taken. While they watch the Steelers tied against a 3rd string QB on the Colts.
And they are giving admonishment for those taking action.
Makes sense to me.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: I’m not sure. Let’s stop and put together a 13 point action plan to figure that out.
MAJeff
SCREEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMMM!
Has capitalism been overthrown?
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
So, you don’t know what you want, but by protesting without a message or a goal you’ll get it.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
So did you or didn’t you:
1). Stay on-point regarding Pedernales Electrical Co-op’s herbicide spraying, or did you stray off into other territory, like the wages and bennies packages of Pedernales’ employees and/or issues over the effects of their plants’ coal-burning polluting the environment/windmills killing raptors/dams killing fish?
2).Get proper permits for use of the town park or for that march down Main Street?
3).Lead your protest into McDonald’s during the Friday lunch rush and protest the wages they pay their workers?
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
So we’re all just waiting around for someone to come up with a plan?
Great.
TTT
As Churchill said, “If you’re young and not liberal, you have no heart. If you’re old and not conservative, you have no mind.”
Churchill was SO conservative he didn’t want to waste any bombs on the train tracks into Auschwitz. Speaking of which, he considered Hitler and Gandhi to be equally evil threats to the British.
I know it’s kinda offtopic, I just like to bring it up when people hero-worship the guy too much (which they do).
MAJeff
@OzoneR:
Yup, she’s got the emotion. Someone else can do the thinking.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: If you want to plot it out on a chart then I suggest we all just kick up the footboards on our LaZBoys.
Your posturing is ridiculous. You claim to have studied political movements.
Tell us, what comes first?
nancydarling
@Corner Stone: Fuck this! I’m turning it over to you. It’s past my bedtime—us old folks have to get our rest to be ready for the next days little protest.
MAJeff
What’s the intended effect of the protests? How will the protests help reach that goal?
Seriously, I have yet to see a single person answer those questions. If the goal of the protests is to send a message, what’s the message? If the protests are supposed to affect some kind of structural change, what change? If the protests are supposed to influence policy, which policy?
And, how?
No one has answered these. The only thing I’ve seen, with regard to goals, is setting up a commission. How do the protests help reach that goal?
If it’s not about the commission, what’s the point of the protests? What message? What goal? What’s the point of the protest beyond the protest?
If it’s protest for the sake of protest…what next?
No one supporting these things has offered anything other than “hope….then mass movement.” That’s insufficient. Indeed, it’s worthless.
What’s the point? (and by that I mean, what’s the message and/or goal? I still have no clue, and no one has tried to tell me….Sorry, “hope” isn’t a goal.)
OzoneR
God you people are fucking pathetic. “But we’re actually starting a movement, this is how you start, now someone else has to figure out what’s next”
God lord, no, you don’t get credit for laying a foundation if you can’t put a house on it.
Corner Stone
@OzoneR: You and your ilk are the biggest reason why we will slip into fascism in this nation.
“Nothing can be done!”
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
What are you trying to do? You still haven’t identified that.
Protest then…….?
I still have no idea what you’re protesting. You haven’t specified a single thing. Your position seems to be to shout at Wall Street and pray for structural change.
What the fuck are you hoping the protests will accomplish? I still don’t even know what the message of the protests is. No one can specify it.
What in the hell are you, Corner Stone, trying to accomplish? Do you even know?
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
little protest of….
hoping to accomplish….
Or, is it just about standing on a street corner for the sake of standing on a street corner.
WHAT THE FUCK IS IT, EXACTLY, YOU ARE ATTEMPTING TO DO? YOU STILL HAVEN’T SPECIFIED THAT.
OzoneR
@Corner Stone: Well we can always HOPE something can be done, can’t we. It would be better than actually exploring ways to do something. That’s someone else’s job.
Corner Stone
You know what? I live in a deep wingnut CD. And those motherfuckers aren’t calling meetings to strategize. They aren’t asking endless questions about “how” they are going to get their goal accomplished.
They show the fuck up. At every meeting, at every opportunity. They show up and they make themselves heard.
Hate them or not. Disparage them or not.
Those fucking assholes don’t waste time talking about “Wah, what’s your goal? Waah, what’s your endpoint? Waaaah, what’s your backup plan?”
They show the fuck up.
And we’ve got pseudo backer assholes like OzoneR and MAJeff telling us if we don’t already know the finish line then we shouldn’t start the fucking race.
Good God.
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
why don’t you skip the sleep and figure out how to turn those little protests into movements.
Better 40 years late than never.
OzoneR
@Corner Stone:
Are you idiot?
OF COURSE THEY ARE. That’s what happens in churches, community centers, Republican clubs, Focus on the Family meetings, NRA meetings, in Fox News boardrooms, in New York Post editorial meetings, etc.
This is stupid, even for you.
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
So, what are y’all doing? Talking to each other?
I mean this seriously. What are you doing in that CD? Are you just meeting for the sake of meeting? Are you talking about electing people? Are you talking about challenging policy? Those are the things we’re talking about.
Or, are you meeting for the sake of meeting? Talking then dropping it.
Basically, from what I can see, you meet and protest, and you protest without any kind of message or idea as to what you want. You just protest for the hell of it without saying what you’re protesting or providing any kind of message?
Meeting is a start. Meetings determine, “What next.” Why are we standing in front of the post office? That’s something, but you seem to be saying, “Just protest for the sake of protesting, no matter the message, no matter why, just do it.”
You’ve offered nothing other than rage at people asking, “what are you doing and why?”
Corner Stone
@OzoneR: Fuck you Nick.
“Nothing can be done!”
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: I personally spent 6 months volunteering for the Bill White campaign in TX. I ran crews in 3 CD’s his org had written off. Door to door and GOTV. And that’s all I’m going to say about that.
Otherwise, you will not find a more corrupt Old Boys Club than the TX Democratic Party. The 70 year olds in charge would rather burn the state down than let anyone else have a go at it.
And that’s why they’ve been losing for so long even though TX should have a fighting chance at being Purple.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
@MAJeff:
Jeff, I can answer that definitively, but it involves mentioning the act of a.s. and DougJ would censor me (he is not a truthseeker). Sorry.
.
.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: And the reason I’m angry at your viewpoint is because I’ve seen it used as an excuse for my entire political life.
It’s bullshit.
OzoneR
@Corner Stone: That’s right, retreat to your Nick bullshit.
Pathetic. No wonder the party ignores you people.
OzoneR
@Corner Stone:
so why not challenge them? Why can’t you people try running for committee positions, state legislature, county legislature where there is one, city-level positions? What, are you all afraid you’re going to lose?
And don’t give me the “wah, they’re not going to let us in” bullshit, whatever happened to crashing the gates? Seriously. if I was standing on the other side of the gates you were threatening to crash, I’d be standing there laughing.
Corner Stone
@OzoneR: Dude, you already gave it up. You admitted it here. You told everyone you are Nick. I can find that if you really want me to.
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
The basic point you’ve made in this thread is, “act without thinking.” It’s the Nike, “Just do it” without reflecting on what “it” is or why it should be done.
I’m going to ask again, what’s the message the Wall Street protesters are sending?
here in North Dakota, I only know they’re protesting; I have no idea what message they’re attempting to communicate or what they’re trying to accomplish. I mean that. It hasn’t made it through the coverage here.
Are they trying to shut Wall Street down? Are they trying to put pressure for a commission? I have no idea? If I’m supposed to act in solidarity, solidarity with what?
You haven’t offered ANYTHING other than rage. If I’m supposed to talk about movement building, what the hell movement am I supposed to talk about building? You haven’t even bothered to talk about that. Instead, there’s this nebulous mass that will magically be mobilized because some folks are protesting for the sake of protesting on Wall Street.
Corner Stone
@OzoneR: You’re an idiot. I live in a +22 R CD. The ONLY D’s who get elected are 70 year olds who have been in office for 40 years.
You don’t know shit about shinola you fucking punk.
Corner Stone
@MAJeff: I’ll get back to you in a couple weeks with an ABC PPT.
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
So, you don’t even know what you’re trying to do. You’re just protesting something for the sake of protesting something in the hopes that it will mobilize a movement to protest something.
Gotcha.
Roy G
Just wanted to say it here too: Back in 2002, I was part of hundreds of thousands of non-hippies marching in NYC with a totally coherent message: No War in Iraq.
Of course it didn’t change anything, but that doesn’t mean it was wasted. The Wall Street Kids are doing right, even if some keyboard jockeys here can’t comprehend it.
OzoneR
@MAJeff:
you know, I went to the first meeting of some progressive club called United We Stand in Brooklyn. It was a disaster. It was just ten people sitting around drinking Starbucks complaining about the rich and about jobs and about civil rights and the environment and identifying every problem we have to fix and whining about Citizens United, then they formed committees to deal with each issue, the committees met and complained a bit more and we’re adjourned.
I went to two more meetings where the same shit happened and then stopped going because it wasn’t leading to anything, and finally when I had suggested we link up with other like minded groups citywide/statewide/nationwide, I got told that it’ll be considered, but probably wouldn’t happen because “other groups have other ideas”
WTF?
MAJeff
@Corner Stone:
Here’s your strategy: Stand on the street corner with signs that say:
“We’re opposed to __________________.”
That should help realize your concrete goals and get people motivated to join whatever the fuck movement you’re hoping to build.
OzoneR
@Roy G: These protests in no way compare to the Iraq war protests of 2003, at least not yet.
OzoneR
@Corner Stone: .
The douche who likes to complain others say “nothing can be done” is now saying “nothing can be done”
How dainty.
I tell you what, I’ll come to Texas and run in your fucking district if ya’ll too cowardly to do it yourself.
Big Baby DougJ
@Corner Stone:
Righties aren’t very good about showing up for protests, liberals are much better about it, truth be told.
OzoneR
@Corner Stone:
Really? I mean are you for real with this? You should start a race even if you don’t know where you’re finishing? You always know where you’re finishing when you start a race! Whos shows up to run a race without knowing where the finish line is? How stupid.
I mean REALLY?!?!?!
Corner Stone
@Big Baby DougJ: I’m not talking about protests in that comment DougJ, which should be obvious even to you.
Corner Stone
@OzoneR: C’mon Nick! Please do son!
Corner Stone
@OzoneR: What should be obvious to anyone reading comments is that I step out of the structure and work my ass of for D causes. I held house parties for Nick Lampson and then Obama.
I don’t sit around holding my dick telling every one it’s not worth trying, like your sorry ass.
If I show up at a meeting with 10 people I start calling other people.
What do you do you fucking punk? Make fun of them and go home to your basement apt under momma’s townhouse?
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Corner Stone:
This tone again? Christ, you are the internet bully, aren’t you?
But, really, who doesn’t know what about what? You’re talking about working a partisan political campaign, where the choices come down, in the end, to one of two or three candidates. And you’re candidate can actually speak for himself.
Here we’re talking about an issue- or we should be anyway- that has to be sold to Senate and House majorities and their voters…Or more like, because what the protestors here are talking about taking on is something the SCOTUS concerns a free speech issue, 2/3 of both the House and the Senate, then ratified by 3/4 of the states…So, ya know, it takes a lot more finesse to sell it than just knocking on doors and working GOTV efforts.
Corner Stone
Shit. You haven’t seen hatred til you go to southern Brazoria county, or Chambers or Matagorda and tell them you’re canvassing for the Democrat.
You ain’t got the sand for that.
Corner Stone
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Mau mau.
Roy G
@ozoner “no wonder the party ignores you people.”
Seriously? You f*n apparatchik, I hope Rahm at least gives you a reach around for all your ‘service’ to ‘the Party.’
And MAjeff, take it from someone who was from where you’re at now, there’s a reason why they keep talking about turning the Dakotas into ‘Buffalo Commons’ and it’s the same reason why it’s so conservative there and the big cities are more liberal: because they chase out anybody who doesn’t conform to their narrow and usually ignorant worldview. Good for you to try to change that, but you’re not gaining anything by whinging about the Wall Street protesters. Go read some Matt Taibbi if you need help constructing you own coherent message.
OzoneR
@Corner Stone: Decatur County, Indiana asshole, I got egged in high school for wearing a Clinton/Gore button and someone once wrote “Baby Killer” in pigs blood on my 1983 Chevy S-10, so you if you want to play “liberal victim in the country” with me, I’ll go toe to toe with you for longer than it takes to go from Westport to Angleton.
OzoneR
@Roy G:
That’s sad for you, but if you expect that these people are going to follow you while you sit in your little bubble in Lower Manhattan, you’re delusional.
But we should hope, right?
Roy G
@OzoneR: These protests in no way compare to the Iraq war protests of 2003, at least not yet.
Sure they do. The Democratic Party was against us then too. Check the votes for AUMF, the Patriot Act, etc.
James
@Roy G:
No… no… not Matt Taibbi. He says naughty things sometimes.
THINK OF THE OPTICS! THINK OF THE OPTICS!
The party is mother. The party is father. There is only the party.
Janus Daniels
@OzoneR: what grows with no hope?
FlipYrWhig
Well, I was kind of hoping that someone would talk about ways to make the random group of angry people _into_ a mass that scares the Powers That Be. Because, you know, sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t, and I’d like to know how that happens. But I see we’ve gotten to the “you’re a fucking punk-ass,” “no, _you’re_ a fucking punk-ass” portion of the evening.
OzoneR
@Roy G:
You might want to recheck that, most Democrats in Congress voted against AUMF.
OzoneR
@Janus Daniels:
I see I need to repeat myself
No, not HOPE ALONE
Robert Waldmann
On point taken. Don’t fall for the false dichotomy fallacy. The first emendment isn’t obeyed, but it isn’t chopped liver.
Banksters are often jerks, but they don’t like having to have people pepper sprayed.
The cops hate banksters.
I’d say harassing them is good strategy. Especially if Obama denounces the occupiers.
A side benefit is he can be the reasonable moderate rejecting extremists on both sides: Wall Street occupiers and Republican Congressmen. Hippy punching works. But it doesn’t work so well if they are no hippies to punch.
Come on Obama, betray the revolution and punch me. Please.
kestral
Arriving late to the thread (at a time when I should be asleep, no less) to ask one simple thing.
If you’re only supposed to go in with a concrete plan and battle strategy, then what’s one single person supposed to do? Should I just shut up and sit quietly in the corner?
boss bitch
@kestral:
yes. shut up. just. shut. up.
Every damn time someone suggests to the left that they need a better game plan, there is always a group that only hears, “shut up and sit quietly in the corner”. So if that’s all you hear then please, shut up.
boss bitch
Maybe some of the protesters can attend this workshop:
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefield/4636/announcing-nyc-workshop-organizing-journalism-civil-resistance
Great reading on that site by the way. I can never understand why he isn’t talked about more in the liberal blogosphere….hmmmm
nogo postal
If we are really serious?
National days of surround and occupy.
One weekday where every unemployed person surround and/occupy their House Rep and Senator or do the same in D.C.
One weekday where every person without health coverage surround and occupy their House Rep Rep. and Senator…or do the same in D.C.
One weekday were every person having to pay interest on a student loan surround/occupy their local House folks and Senate folks or in D.C.
National days of “Notice This!” …..
Just as Americans had to relearn rock and roll from the British in the 60’s …perhaps we need to relearn “This is what democracy looks like” from the young folks of “The Arab Spring”.
BrianM
@MAJeff: Jesus fucking Christ, nancydarling actually accomplished something, starting from a place you say can’t be started from, and all you have is endless repeated snark about how what she said she did can’t be done? How about shutting up and listening?
OzoneR
@Robert Waldmann:
They hate hippies more.
OzoneR
@BrianM:
no, this is completely wrong. No one is saying it can’t be started from where she’s starting, what we’re saying is they have no plan to move it forward.
That’s not accomplishing something. Any idiot can make a sign and stand on the corner.
nancydarling
Well, I feel better after a good nights sleep! No little protests are on my schedule today.
What I heard from Jeff, Ozone, Andy and others over and over and over again was not ” Sit down and shut up” but “You’re doing a shitty job, so why bother.”
Having never run anything except at a local level, I honestly don’t know what should or will be done next. I do know that better minds than mine (and very likely better minds than their’s) are probably at work on the second phase. Criticism is easy. Actually doing something is hard and involves failure as well as success.
I still applaud those in NYC. What they are doing is hopefully (that word again!) just a beginning.
Meanwhile, I will stay involved in my local issues where my allies and I have shown competence and results. I will participate in nation wide actions, but some one else will have to plan the strategy. I continue to HOPE that some one else will.
I want to thank Corner Stone for a lovely new word. It begins with “ch”, ends in “d” and has an “oa” in the middle. It and a variant spelling are not in my very large dead tree dictionary, but are in my on-line dictionary. For some reason FYWP deleted my post using that word, not even sending it to moderation. It’s always nice to have another arcane insult to hurl. Thank you, Corner Stone. Are you possibly a cyclist, since you were familiar with the term?
arguingwithsignposts
@Corner Stone:
Interestingly, Chambers Co. used to be a yellow-dog democratic county. They didn’t even have a GOP office or people on the ballot back in the 90s. All the county officials were nominally democratic, and the state rep. was a democrat. Although, most of them were what you’d classify as “blue dogs” today.
As to the point of the conversation, I thought the tone of that NYT piece was incredibly snotty and derisive. I also remember reading about some “occupations” of BofA offices a while back by union members.
A little more organization would probably help. It couldn’t hurt. I don’t have an easy solution for that. And no, I don’t think the banksters give a shit about protests. Heck, I don’t think Congress gives a shit about most protests. Unless it starts hitting any of them in the pocketbook.
MAJeff
@nancydarling:
Then you aren’t listening.
BrianM
@OzoneR:
And you know this how? Are you going by anything more than a picture of a kid drumming? Articles in the NY Times?
Yes, these protesters have a touchy-feely left-anarchist vibe that wears on me fairly quickly, but I attended a technical conference in Berlin recently, organized by such people. They started out with an offhand notion, refined it by lots of talking (via Skype, I believe), and pulled it off. It was a well-run conference. Unusually, it spawned a bunch of planned follow-on activities (not just the usual “we’ll do the same thing next year” that you get from a successful first conference). Some of those will work. Some won’t. Maybe the whole thing will fizzle. Pretty much everything does, eventually. But they’ve clearly generated something starting from almost nothing and a decision to talk.
Even from the little I’ve been following the Wall Street people (mostly through the Guardian), it’s clear they’re in the get-together-and-talk phase. There’s that whole “General Assembly” thing.
I don’t see how it’s helpful to point and mock.
nancydarling
@MAJeff: Let me rephrase that. What you are saying is “You are doing a shitty job, and unless you can hit the ground running with a full blown game plan, why bother. Also, it is important to convey that full blown game plan to me and my minions so we can evaluate it for efficacy so you don’t make asses of yourselves.”
Corner Stone
@BrianM: As I just said in the other thread:
“This isn’t hard to figure out. The media has a virtual blackout on this protest and 99% of what little coverage they do deign to write about is carefully constructed to make the protestors sound and look like kooks. And the protest to be “disorganized” with “no goals” or leadership.
I find it amusing the amount of people here who have spent thread after thread dissing the media, talking non stop about how they suck and the way they destroy discourse.
Yet those same people have swallowed the media’s line on this protest, hook and line.
How many times did we scream about 100 TP’ers getting days of press when 100K in Wiscy didn’t get squat or doodly? And Wiscy had some powerful organization once the unions put their weight into it.
These guys aren’t running the same protest. They don’t have the money or sustainability.”
Corner Stone
@nancydarling: Always happy to help.
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig: I look forward to hearing from you when you have the strength to rise from your fainting couch.
Corner Stone
@arguingwithsignposts:
In broad strokes, we went to the White campaign and they said, “We aren’t spending a dollar for GOTV here, here or here. If that’s where you can work for us, please feel free.”
And I don’t mean entire counties, but swaths of areas across them. There’s been some serious reversal of fortunes over the last 10 years the closer you get to the water counties, and they aren’t too happy.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: I asked a question. You could answer it. Or you could concentrate on swinging your virtual dick as usual.
nancydarling
@FlipYrWhig: Sometimes, swinging one’s virtual dick is the only sane response that is possible; otherwise one just keeps repeating ones self.
FlipYrWhig
@nancydarling: Most of the thread was a sustained, if acrimonious, discussion about protests, street theater, and direct action, and how to make them work. That’s salvageable. Then there’s never-ending bullshit flowing like magma from thread to thread to thread. We can do without that.
Corner Stone
@nancydarling: You’ve got to understand. FlipYrNick is a very delicate soul.
FlipYrWhig
@nancydarling: You’ve got to understand. The single thing most important to Corner Stone’s life is displaying how much he’s Not A Pu55y.
nancydarling
@FlipYrWhig: I guess it’s all in the eye of the reader. You read a “sustained” discussion. I read “What’s your plan? What’s your plan? Ya gotta have a plan. Ya gotta get organized. Ya gotta have relationships. Ya gotta have strategy, tactics. Ad infinitum.”
No one put forth a plan of their own and made only vague suggestions of what to do and just criticized the shitty plans of those that are trying and demanded better without putting their ideas out there or sticking their neck out. Lots of hand-wringing over lack of a better plan!
@Corner Stone: I know. I often send jaws to the floor at my local Dem women’s club with fairly mild statements. I behave well at meetings and don’t use bad language since, except for me, it is a churchy group (I am home-churched). I did once say that we are getting our asses kicked in Arkansas—that is a naughty as I have ever been. It is an old gray headed group and I am the oldest regular.
It’s such a relief to come here to BJ and be able to use scatological language.
Samara Morgan
@j.e.b.: Oh they got scared wednesday night when the troy davis march hooked up with #opOccupyWallstreet protests. The NYPD “escorted” the Davis protestors back to Liberty Square.
Remind you of anything? Like Tehran? Where the Iranian secret police and the Basij broke up protests that were getting too big?
If Julian is right America is going to turn into a police state on its way to NLS collapse.
:)
this is actually a really good post, Trollmaster.
/bows low
eemom
@FlipYrWhig:
well, in fairness to CS, ya gotta swing the dick you have, not the one you wish you had.
FlipYrWhig
@nancydarling: It’s true that the discussion kept circling around and breaking down, but it was at least on the subject: do protests work, and how can protests be made to work better? There’s the “at least protests are doing something, and something is better than idle kvetching” camp, and the “protests that don’t have clear objectives are unproductive and look stupid” camp. Within those parameters, I think it’d be interesting to try to figure out how the gaggle-of-funny-looking-people-in-the-street _becomes_ The People, the Hardt/Negri leaderless “multitude” that strikes back at institutional power by setting a counterexample. I think you and MAJeff and others could hash that out in interesting ways. I’d like to see that. I don’t think meta-arguing about who’s a bigger punk-ass bitch is going to help.
It’s not about scatology, it’s about the difference between being an asshole in the service of making a point, vs. being an asshole because you’ve cultivated an online persona as being the biggest swaggering asshole around and you need to maintain it, in between doing football play-by-play because you’re bored and lonely.
OzoneR
@BrianM:
If they have one, it hasn’t been implemented.
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
then you’re hearing wrong and I can’t help that, sorry.
OzoneR
@nancydarling:
LMFAO, how pathetic.
“I’ll get involved when someone else leads the way, otherwise I’ll stick to my own local issues in my super red state”
mclaren
DougJ:
When I proposed mass non-violent protests at the White House several years back to encourage Obama to pursue progressive policies, mass hysteria erupted on this forum and people threatened to report me to the Department of Homeland Security.
When I said last month that Vice President Biden needed to be tried for treason for introducing the unconstitutional Patriot Act, people on this forum became frantic and came unglued, predicting that I would be interviewed and arrested and charged with a crime by the Secret Service. (I’m still waiting to be interviewd by the Secret Service, by the way.)
Now DougJ suggests violent terrorism and nary a peep of protest.
My oh my oh my oh my oh my. How times have changed…
nancydarling
@OzoneR: Sorry I’m not able to save the world. Read my continued response at #285. One does what one can. For me that has been on local and state wide issues. I lack the expertise to mount anything on a national scale. I know. It’s an unforgivable failing. I’ll go do 10 Hail Marys and 5 Ave Marias and hope (that word!) God forgives me because you surely won’t.
nancydarling
@OzoneR: Sorry, I meant 275. FYWP won’t allow me to edit.
eemom
@FlipYrWhig:
You, sir, ROCK.
I am in complete accord with the substance of your position, as well as your other….observations.
mclaren
@Corner Stone:
A hit. A palpable hit!
LOL.
xian
@nancydarling: well what kind of protests lead to bigger protests? is this that kind?
it’s really not hard to think in terms of goals and tactics…
shano
I have joined my local ‘occupy’ group. this movement is spreading- 64 cities so far have organized protests ongoing.
To find your city protest visit @OccupyTogether on fb or twitter.
The revolution will not be televised, it will be live blogged on social networks.
Really, I do not understand why people are having such a hard time understanding what this protest is about.
Where the hell have you been for the past 30 or 40 years? I remember when corporations did not completely own our government, lock stock and barrel, but I suppose that is quaint .
shano
Remember when Obama told the Bankers that he was “the only one standing between them and the pitchforks and torches”?
Well, it seems that standing has been obliterated. Nothing changed from 2008, nothing but some watered down Dodd Frank attempt at normalizing the equations.
The massive problems are still there, the government is complicit in propping up these corrupt institutions, and the economy is getting worse.
nancydarling
@shano: Bless you, child, and all your compatriots. This blog may not be the most fertile ground for your recruiting efforts. Some of the kewl kids at BJ might rather spend their evenings beating up on a helpless old lady like me than actually, you know, doing something. It seems I have committed a grave faux pas by supporting the Occupy efforts in my comments. According to some of them you all are likely just a rag tag band who don’t know your asses from a hole in the ground.
I am also held to account for not laying out a plan for a national movement. Never mind that I am just computer literate enough to research stuff on the web, compose and send out newsletters and print flyers if need be. That is sufficient for my “little” activities but hardly worthy of anything on a bigger scale. Hell, I can even cut and paste without scissors and a glue stick—oh, that would be copy and past these days, wouldn’t it? My techno-phobia is the bane of my children, especially my daughter; my son is a little more patient.
I have yet to master the movie function on my digital camera or cell phone—I’ve only had them 5 years. I drove my Ford Ranger extended cab pick-up for a year before I realized there was a rear door on the passenger side as well as the driver side. I have only had it 2 1/2 years and haven’t got around to reading the direction book yet.
In spite of all of the above, I can make a killer Passion Fruit Custard Tart and a Three Citrus Cranberry Sauce to die for. I know how to grow a pretty decent garden, can or freeze my bounty, bottle feed an orphan calf, and lots of other rustic things. I only add these modest talents to my resume here so I won’t be thought a total nincompoop.
Any way, good luck and Godspeed to all of you, my spiritual babies. If there is anything going down in Little Rock, Fayetteville, or Springfield, Missouri, I will be there to dance in the streets with you. I promise not to bring any big puppets or in any other way be an embarrassment to you.
I’m even going to move finding out about this twitter stuff to the top of my list—ahead of figuring out where my truck’s spare tire is located.
@xian: I hope all of the above answers your questions. I really shouldn’t be running anything bigger than what I am already involved in. Dr. Laurence J. Peter was a patient of mine back in my working days and I understand his principle very well.
Corner Stone
@nancydarling: Yeah, well what’s your plan for those tarts, or that sauce? Huh!? What’s your goal??
nancydarling
@Corner Stone: Touche, Corner Stone. My keyboard doesn’t seem to have a key for the tilde or whatever that diacritical symbol is called that belongs above the “e”. And to be honest, I would ‘t know how to put if there if I had one.
Corner Stone
@nancydarling: Oh, it has a key. It has a key, alright.