A lot of you have pointed out the change.org thing was messing up the screen, so I removed it. Are there any other minor problems that need to be addressed?
But they have cell phones
Nothing wrong with this that deregulation and tax cuts can’t fix:
When the Census Bureau this month released a new measure of poverty, meant to better count disposable income, it began altering the portrait of national need. Perhaps the most startling differences between the old measure and the new involves data the government has not yet published, showing 51 million people with incomes less than 50 percent above the poverty line. That number of Americans is 76 percent higher than the official account, published in September. All told, that places 100 million people — one in three Americans — either in poverty or in the fretful zone just above it.
After a lost decade of flat wages and the worst downturn since the Great Depression, the findings can be thought of as putting numbers to the bleak national mood — quantifying the expressions of unease erupting in protests and political swings. They convey levels of economic stress sharply felt but until now hard to measure.
Cue Andrew Sullivan blockquoting Megan McArdle agreeing with Tyler Cowen that these statistics are flawed.
Thirty or forty years of muddying the waters and what do you expect? It’s probably not as bad in the midwest, though, where people stick together.
In Your Base, In Fact Destroying The Credibility Of Your Doodz
Here’s the Up With Chris Hayes story that Anne Laurie was talking about earlier today:
A well-known Washington lobbying firm with links to the financial industry has proposed an $850,000 plan to take on Occupy Wall Street and politicians who might express sympathy for the protests, according to a memo obtained by the MSNBC program “Up w/ Chris Hayes.”
The proposal was written on the letterhead of the lobbying firm Clark Lytle Geduldig & Cranford and addressed to one of CLGC’s clients, the American Bankers Association.
CLGC’s memo proposes that the ABA pay CLGC $850,000 to conduct “opposition research” on Occupy Wall Street in order to construct “negative narratives” about the protests and allied politicians. The memo also asserts that Democratic victories in 2012 would be detrimental for Wall Street and targets specific races in which it says Wall Street would benefit by electing Republicans instead.
According to the memo, if Democrats embrace OWS, “This would mean more than just short-term political discomfort for Wall Street. … It has the potential to have very long-lasting political, policy and financial impacts on the companies in the center of the bullseye.”
The memo also suggests that Democratic victories in 2012 should not be the ABA’s biggest concern. “… (T)he bigger concern,” the memo says, “should be that Republicans will no longer defend Wall Street companies.”
It was pretty obvious that this was the plan and has been Wall Street’s response for some time now: demonize the Occupy movement among independents/swing voters to divide them from supporters (“They’re Dirty Effing Hippies and criminals!”) and further divide and demoralize the remaining supporters by trying to split them from the Democrats (“The Dems are just as much Wall Street lackeys as the GOP, there’s no difference!”)…all to avoid losing the “populist” mantle the Tea Party currently has, giving them license to happily loot the treasury and make the rest of us suffer.
It’s a pretty good plan from an Evil Overlord perspective, and it has made headway into reducing support for the movement. Well, that was before the whole park evicting and pepper-spraying of grandmothers and college kids sitting peacefully on the sidewalk started happening.
I’m thinking that might change as a result.
In Your Base, In Fact Destroying The Credibility Of Your DoodzPost + Comments (68)
Occupy’s Friends in High Places
UC Davis Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi is the latest member of the list of stupid responders to Occupy provocation. Since Katehi is a university administrator, she cloaks her iron fist in a flabby glove of bullshit comity rhetoric:
While we have appreciated the peaceful and respectful tone of the demonstrations to date, the current encampment raises serious health, safety and legal concerns, and the resources we require to supervise this encampment cannot be sustained, especially in these very tight economic times. Our resources must support our core mission to educate all of our students.
We appreciate the substantive dialogue you have begun here, and we want to offer you appropriate opportunities to express opinions, advance the discussion and offer solutions as part of the time-honored university tradition. We invite you to consider the topics you would like to present and we will work with you to sponsor a series of forums throughout our campus.
I must now ask that all tents be peacefully removed by 3:00 p.m. today in the interest of safety, respect for our campus environment and in accordance with our Principles of Community.
I love that last bit — the time-honored UC Davis “Principles of Community” are apparently printed on a can of pepper spray. Here’s part of her response to to a dozen students getting maced in the face:
We deeply regret that many of the protestors today chose not to work with our campus staff and police to remove the encampment as requested. We are even more saddened by the events that subsequently transpired to facilitate their removal.
A moron who thinks the passive voice is the politically smart response to what went down yesterday is probably too thick to realize there’s a simple alternative that’s worked elsewhere. For example, after clearing the Occupy encampment in Rochester once, and realizing that it would cost far more and bring Occupy more attention to do it again, the Mayor here cut a simple deal. Occupy gets half the park, and cleans up after themselves.
If you look at the pictures of the UC Davis encampment in the campus newspaper, it was occupying a tiny bit of space. Linda P.B. Katehi figured clearing out that peaceful little encampment was important enough to send in armed riot police instead of cutting a deal. For that, she should be fired.
Saturday Morning Open Thread
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Anybody here watch Chris Hayes’ morning show? From Greg Sargent, at his WaPo Plum Line blog:
You should definitely check out Chris Hayes’ show on MSNBC [Saturday] morning — he has a scoop coming that will shed some new light on the meaning of the constant efforts to discredit Occupy Wall Street. Here’s the teaser:
‘Up’ will reveal details of a memo the program has obtained from a prominent lobbying firm pitching a Wall Street client on how to hit back at Occupy Wall Street and target specific Democrats in 2012 races around the country.
Don’t get MSNBC in our household, but I’m curious about this.
Police Pepper Spray #OWS Student Protestors Directly in their Faces at Occupy Davis
This is horrifying and brilliant all at once.
Today at Occupy Davis, a police officer approached a group of students sitting in a line peacefully on the ground, walked up and down the line and pepper-sprayed them directly in the face — as one would spray pesticide on weeds. What you’ll see in this video is such a callous display of police brutality, I don’t know how this police officer is going to go home and look at himself in the mirror.
As the students cry “Shame on you!” the police arrest a few students; but as the crowd circles them — non-threateningly, but insistent — the police begin to retreat. Then, amazingly, the students (via People’s mic) offer the retreating police a moment of peace: “We are willing to give you a brief moment of peace so that you may take your weapons and your friends and go. Please do not return.”
And the police do.
It’s frightening and amazing to watch:
Here’s contact information (via Twitter, of course):
Late Night Open Thread
It’s one of those nights. I have all the faculty members from the college in the town I live here at the house, and it’s worse than your usual frat party.
I’m going to start cooking to hopefully sober some of these people up.