Slashdot Mirror
New Documents Detail FBI, Bank Crack Down On Occupy Wall Street
jvillain writes "The Guardian has up a story detailing the crack down on Occupy Wall Street (OWS). It goes on to show how the FBI, DHS, Terrorist Fusion Centers and the banks all worked together to stifle dissent. From the article: 'This production [of documents], which we believe is just the tip of the iceberg, is a window into the nationwide scope of the FBI's surveillance, monitoring, and reporting on peaceful protesters organizing with the Occupy movement These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America.' The next question is how many Americans are now listed as part of a 'terrorist group' by the government for their support of OWS?"
Really? "Stifle descent?" You couldn't have corrected that to something that makes sense?
Occupy Wallstreet was an astroturf movement, who the heck cares about an astroturf movement?
Is this the hope or the change?
As long as they don't stifle dissent, we'll be ok!
And you pay the price !! Don't Treat On Me !! Go back to commie land you hippie commies !!
Stifle dissent
Not from videos and reports I've seen. And I'm sure that those OWS folks who actually got off their sleeping bags and voted, put the current administration in office which is now cracking down on them.
There are no loopholes. It's either legal or it's not.
Our Constitution guarantees us a number of ways to work through government for change.
The problem with protests is that by working around these methods, the methods are weakened. In addition, people start believing that dramatic public attention-getting is more important than reasoned political argument.
As the only people who truly profit from this, the media love it, coming and going. One great reason to support piracy is to weaken the profits of Hollywood and the news-entertainment media.
Futurist Traditionalism
If you love freedom of speech and association, here is your chance to do something concrete about it. Make out a physical check in the amount of $1 or $5 or whatever you want. Mail the check to OWS (http://occupywallst.org/donate/) and copies to the FBI and the DHS.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
do you all read the bit about assasination?
Seriously we can't try and bullshit our way out of this one. It is merely fact.
Main Entry:
terrorist [ter-er-ist]
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: subversive
Synonyms: bomber, guerrilla, incendiary, radical, rebel, revolutionary, thug
Mark any and all posts containing hogwash as spam! For the greater justice!
that "Descent is the highest form of Patriotic"?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/unpossibles/3462246191/
So the FBI silently investigated people who reasonably could have resorted to lawlessness, and that's now stifling dissent? As someone who supported the idea of OWS, even that doesn't make any sense to me. As the saying goes, civil disobedience is still disobedience. When you walk the thin line of breaking the law, you should expect the organizations which investigate crimes to be interested.
The summary, and the article attached to it, seem nothing more than sensationalist in order to drive web traffic. More than sensationalist, outright biased. Just reading a few paragraphs of the summary pretty well shows this article was not at all interested in truth, but rather just spreading biases against the many agents and officers who were simply doing their job.
This article and summary make very little sense. Or, would that be "since", in order to keep in step with stifling descent?
the FBI occupies you.
The time for this has evidently passed. So much could have been accomplished when the movement captured the interest of many people, but they instead decided to do some pretty lame-assed stuff and not accomplish anything.
What these people were preaching was revolution. Toss out the bankers and leaders in the financial world and bring the economy down in a big crash. Rebuild it in a different model, one that works for the common people. That is going to antagonize the current powers to no end and certainly justifies a significant response.
What OWS didn't do was actually "occupy" anything. They sat on the sidewalk with signs as people passed by. The could have stormed the citadels of the finance world and brought business as usual to an end. Sure, they all would have been arrested and some possibly killed. But it would have done something. Instead they put on a big show for the media and did nothing.
Using explosives and guns to actually force an end to the economy as we know it would have resulted in most or all of them being killed, but it would have had a farther reaching effect. We would be picking up the pieces and might actually be figuring out how to make the world work with a lot fewer people - a big economic crash and restructuring would kill millions if not billions. That would have put them on the map in a big way.
There was a time when people like myself thought they might actually be able to pull something like that off. I can only imagine how worried people in power might have been - and you can therefore see the response. They wanted to make sure nothing was going to happen and look, it didn't.
1. Do not carry any kind of ID on you. None. And remember, personal cell phones, esp. smart phones, are a form of ID. If you absolutely MUST have a phone with you, make sure it's not registered to you. 2. Do not talk to the cops. Not one word. 3. And, instead of "occupying wall street", you might try "occupying a job". Lastly, a question: did you vote for Obama? Remember, it's his minions who are spying on you.
I mean seriously this reeks of paranoia. There's a very valid reason for banks cracking down on OWS. In the USA there are really only two ways to legally create a bank account. One is as an individual the other is through an incorporation. Individuals can obviously have multiple co-signers such as in a family. And, incorporated entities can be businesses, non-profits, cities, etc... OWS organized itself as the antithesis of any incorporated entity. There were no official leaders, no board or leadership who was legally responsible for filing taxes, nothing. Their use of banks to collect donations, organize and pool funds, and then disperse them therefore broke pretty much all the laws that were put in place to stop groups like organized crime and terrorists from utilizing banks in the same way. The folks who work at banks can lose their jobs and face criminal prosecution if they don't report activity that looks exactly like what OWS was doing with the bank accounts they were opening. So please, use your brain and think things through before you post an article like this that simply reeks of paranoia. You may not like the system or the laws, but they exist, and the banks and FBI are simply following them.
Back in the day Janet Napolitano put out a report warning of right-wing extremist at the time of the Tea Party. Here is a bit of ranting by the progressives on how it should have been pursued: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/08/06/1117242/-Remember-the-DHS-Right-Wing-Extremist-Report
At the time that the crackdown happened to the OWS people I wrote the following:
"I’m very sorry to hear about your forceful removal from Zuccotti park where you were peacefully demonstrating against what you see as what is wrong with our country. You were exercising your free speech and free assembly rights and I hate to see this taken from you. Let me tell you that I know how you must be feeling right now. About two and a half years ago several of my friends and I joined a movement to protest the government bailing out the bankers that you are so upset with (first time I ever protested anything BTW). We had rallies around the country with the theme of promoting individualism over corporate cronyism. This movement was attacked by the press and government as being racist, gay-bashing, “Astroturf” (term for grass-roots effort sponsored by big money sources), and heartless (I’m sure there were cases where people on the fringe were causing such issues, the same can be said about the fringe in the OWS crowd, but for a majority of people I met while involved this was not the case) but now the whole movement has been marginalized. It is unfortunate that we were unable to convince you at the time of the importance of the issues we were facing and that you chose to sit on the sidelines mocking us as “Tea Baggers” and such. I do hope we can find some common ground now that you are awake and we can take our government back from the statist and big money influences we’ve ceded it to."
Gawker At Most FUCKING USELESS Startling turn the project to
The next question is how many Americans are now listed as part of a 'terrorist group' by the government for their support of OWS?
Get some historical perspective and look at the stings the FBI ran on MLK Jr and the Civil Rights Movement. This is nothing.
What videos of violence at OWS did you see?
OR are they theoretically you've seen them because people you like told you they existed?
Welcome to capitalism, where he who has the capital makes the rules.
Besides who cares what happens to a bunch of jobless hipsters anyway.
Nothing new. The FBI has always viewed anybody that questions the prevailing powers as subversive.
Cointelpro was a widespread illegal operation to quash civil rights and other movements. The documentation that proved this illegal operation existed was found by accident when some anti-war protesters broke into a selective service office that was shared with an FBI station, and found boxes of documentation which they removed, and distributed to media. Poor article, but you can google cointelpro and look around for better information.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO
The FBI also went after the head of the University of California, and eventually, under governor Ronald Reagan (who had acted as an FBI informant when he was in Hollywood), was able to have the head of the UCs fired. The UC head's only crime was not _completely_ stifling free speech rights of students-- he had made it an expulsion offense to protest any non-UC business on campus, but that didn't go far enough for the FBI. They wanted him to expel any students who protested anything on or off campus.
The FBI has a long storied history in anti-labor.
The FBI doesn't just engage in legal and illegal repression, it also is corrupt as in the connected being able to call in favors. Ronald Reagan suspecting that his daughter was living with an older married man, asked the FBI to check into this. The FBI sent multiple agents (at taxpayer expense) to stalk her, and report back to her father and mother.
The FBI has, since its inception, been an instrument of the rich and powerful to stifle dissent (and at times, even act as a personal police force to select members of the rich and powerful classes).
I'd mod you up if I had any points!
Our various governments propose ways of "petitioning for redress of grievance", and, as each becomes popular, strive to cut them off.
In British law, as applied to the 13 colonies, a signed petition could be presented to a governing body and it had a duty to respond. As the Yale law journal points out, that was so heavily used in response to slavery that it was withdrawn in the U.S. (see http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/796438?uid=3739448&uid=2&uid=3737720&uid=4&sid=21101604364957) A certain well-known president is trying to bring it back, but that's a different discussion.
With organized petitioning unavailable, personal appeals to one's representative became popular. It soon became impossible to meet your representative, and written letters turned into counts pro and con that their staffs reported.
Groups and companies then banded together and hired lobbyists, to button-hole legislators in the lobby of their building, where the public was allowed. When these became too bothersome, only selected lobbyists were invited to meetings, and the general public was excluded from the buildings.
The press is still allowed in some selected lobbies, but there is always a back corridor available for legislators to use to bypass them.
Groups then started petitioning in person, on the front lawn of the parliament buildings, and occasionally their representatives would come out and meet them. More often, the police closed off access to the building and its vicinity.
No organization, whether legislative or commercial, enjoys hearing criticism. As soon as they get too much from a given channel, that channel will be cut off. Only the occasional brave, duty-oriented legislator will ask their electors for comments.
In my own country of Canada, this last happened when the government of the day asked for broad comments on amending the copyright law, when my local city councilman needed opinions and options on a garbage-collection proposal, and most recently when the CRTC asked for suggestions to moderate the bad practices of cell-phone providers.
Redress of grievance still exists, but it's genuinely rare.
--dave
davecb@spamcop.net
Not even sure why Slashdot even allowed this story to post; it's nothing more than a liberal spin on our integrated infrastructure doing it's job, all withing the limits of the law. Calling the OWS movement 'peaceful' is a common laughable spin designed to enrage other like-minded soft-headed entitlists into continuing to vilify those who resist economic chaos at the expense of short term wealth redistribution.
Slashdot admins and mods - please use more care and do some research before allowing this sort of ill-informed drivel to embarrass your front page in the future.
http://blog.heritage.org/2011/11/08/morning-bell-occupy-wall-street-gets-more-violent/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/mattkibbe/2011/10/19/occupy-wall-street-is-certainly-no-tea-party/
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203804204577014051108901214.html
OWS was directionless, disorganized, and really had no chance of making a difference.
In my view a government, totally controlled by 'the big money' in the form of campaigning money, support money for senators and representatives, can be named corrupt. It is not interest in the country or people that drives them, it is only money.
Seriously. "Stifle descent" of these "peaceful protesters".
You must have been one of the lucky "useful idiots" who didn't get raped, robbed, or murdered at your OWS gathering. OWS were violent, repulsive losers who whine about others being successful while they sit around smoking dope in tents all day.
Ask the women who were raped how peaceful this movement was.
I for one am very glad that law enforcement was working to stem this group of socially and racially bigoted non-producers. They've destroyed public property, shown disregard for basic public safety, contempt to anyone not espousing their ideological insanity and the defecation on just about everything; to say nothing of the rapes and other wanton acts of violence.
For those that do not live on planet earth, how about some examples?
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/zuccotti_park_big_top_ilBy4VfYIwDGt2I1rM33vL
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/camper_mac_attack_IErwi9aOGMCPDdYJw2WcyI
http://cleveland.cbslocal.com/2011/10/18/occupy-cleveland-protester-alleges-she-was-raped/
http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2011/10/24/accusations-of-teen-runaway-sexual-activity-at-occupy-dallas/
http://www.unionleader.com/article/20111028/NEWS03/710289961
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/10/14/violence-breaks-out-during-occupy-wall-street-march-on-wall-street/
http://www.portlandonline.com/police/pbnotify.cfm?action=ViewContent&content_id=2534
http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/148372/violence-follows-occupy-wall-street-march
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/10/14/violence-breaks-out-during-occupy-wall-street-march-on-wall-street/
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2011/10/report-fights-erupt-between-occupy-wall-street-protesters/1
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/100688407/Oakland-Police-Department--OccupyOakland-Press-Release-Oct-25-2011
http://nation.foxnews.com/occupy-wall-street/2011/10/08/occupy-wall-street-protester-defecates-police-car
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1011/66630.html
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/occupy-protesters-defecating-our-doorsteps-nyc-residents-complain
From *personal experience* Occupy was peaceful and never physically antagonistic...
See, here's your problem, "Captain"...you're judging a the behavior of a few and applying it to a large group. It's false equivalence...
Sort of like if I were to, say, claim that the US military is a murderous organization based on what I'd "seen and heard" of one soldier going house to house murdering civilians.
Thank you Dave Raggett
Limiting your choices: Who puts the 'candidates' there via contributions in the MULTI-MILLIONS, funding both sides, thus hedging their bets (making sure they win, either way).
You mean the FBI and police sat down with business owners to talk about a large-ish scale protest outside their premises directed at them? Screw that, if there's a mob outside your front door, why would you ever want advice and reassurances from police, it's not like it's their job or anything!
Police drawing up plans in case the OWS potentially resorted to criminal or terrorist behaviour ? How dare they! I demand a police service that doesn't prepare for any eventuality and is always taken by surprise!
It is rather shocking that the police didn't inform the leaders of an organisation that prided itself in having no leaders that they had vague threats of violence against them. Imaginary people have the right to information too!
Well, maybe not all
You've found a spelling mistake.
Have a bikkit.
Now, what do you think about the TSA FBI and bank private security conspiring to shut down protest as if it were Cold War Russia or Lybia putting down the rising of the populace?
As the "leader of the free world", how does this fit in?
Here's another such window:
http://events.ccc.de/congress/2012/Fahrplan/events/5338.en.html
http://mirror.fem-net.de/CCC/29C3/mp4-h264-LQ-iProd/29c3-5338-en-enemies_of_the_state_h264-iprod.mp4
I agree that the tone of the BBC article was a bit flamebait, however you are giving the FBI, etc more benefit of the doubt than is rational...
"Stifling dissent" is accomplished through many means...we only know what was declassified.
The FBI was warning bankers about things they heard Occupy planning, but the FBI didn't say jack shit about the assassination plot to the protesters...that's a big one.
Of course law enforcement should look in on what groups like this do...it's their job. But **what they do with the information** is the crime here. I made a few LE people who attended Occupy meetings that were open to the public...I felt that was fine.
A second point, notice how geographically FBI etc. had vastly different responses. FBI agents in, say Houston, TX are understandably more likely to view 'occupy' as a terrorist org than say, FBI agents in Seattle. America is a big place with regional cultures that vary widely along the political spectrum. It stands to reason that FBI agents who work in the South are more Fascist-minded than those who elect to work in more liberal areas.
Thank you Dave Raggett
Read all about these OWS activists here
A highly decorated Marine Corps General, and one of only a handful of men to receive the Medal of Honor twice wrote:
"It may seem odd for me, a military man to adopt such a comparison. Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty- three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle- man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.
I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested."
-- General Smedley Butler
OWS a peace movement? http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/bombmaking_in_the_village_LoRDqNzP02SDZyfC1pLVXN
... then you better toss a few dollars to the NRA also. If you think the 1st Amendment is being infringed upon by the govt now, just wait until after they neuter the 2nd Amendment, then you'll see the complete and utter elimination of what's left of the 1st, the 4th, the 5th, the 6th, the 7th, the 8th, the 9th, and the 10th as well.
I even begin to suspect that the 3rd Amendment might even get quashed as well now that the govt is broke, they might start seizing our very homes to house and office their jackbooted thugs.
...more and more of a compliment.
Meanwhile, the real global terror comes from these agencies and the corporations that control them.
but...if you follow it to the source documents and read them. You won't see anywhere near what is being described by the summary. What it seems to show is that law enforcement investigated crimes against OWS protestors and threats against them. They also answered questions by various groups inquiring about OWS and threats related to groups that were riding on the OWS movement and advocating violence.
So please don't spread an interpretation that doesn't match the source documents.
Is this the constitution written by slave owners who didn't allow the poor or female to vote?
The constitution was NOT written to give freedom to all, it was written to give freedom to rich white males. NEVER FORGET THIS. NEVER forget the famous Greek democracy was build on slaves.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
My god, your grasp of history is fucking flawed.
READ up on the suffragette movement you fucking insane moronic piece of shit before you try spouting your lies.
On November 15th, 1917, Alice Paul and Lucy Burns, founders of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) were arrested along with 216 other women who had picketed the White House under the Woodrow Wilson administration, bearing signs for the right to vote. By morning, some of the incarcerated women were barely alive. Lucy Burns had been beaten. Her hands had been chained to the cell bars over her head, bleeding and gasping for air. When Alice Paul engaged in a hunger strike, guards tried to force-feed her, tying her to a chair and using a tube to pour liquids down her throat. Thirty-three women endured ongoing torture until word was finally smuggled out to the press.
No violence by the government against the movement my ass.
You are scum.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Isn't the Tea Party the radically violent, racist, venom-spewing group that should be the headline here?
Oh wait. There's rarely (if ever) been any violence, racism or otherwise from the Tea Party... although the press would like you to believe otherwise.
This sounds about right for the FBI, etc... Violence, hatred, and murder.
Step 0: Control media outlets and discredit all that are not under your power, Propaganda!!!
Why is this step 0? Because with the media intact and doing what it is required by society, none of the other crap would have happened, however the buck stops with the people, if the people aren't going to do anything about it then they get what they get.
Step 1: Create a crisis or allow one to happen.
"You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it's an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before."
-Rahm Emanuel
Create an enemy that will never go away (terrorist) and wage a war that will never end (terrorism) and define the enemy as "those without any rights" and can be held indefinitely (National Defense Authorization Act)
Step 2: Promise to protect the populace from said crisis/enemy by any means necessary, begin by restricting rights in the name of security.
Step 3: Implement a massive trillion dollar (data from The Economist) surveillance network HLS, TSA, NSA, DIA OMG, WTF, BBQ ), record all calls, maintain facial recognition database (thank you Facebook) fill the air with drones and the ground with cameras.
Monitor for dissent. (see: fbi-coordinated-crackdown-occupy below)
Step 4: Dis arm populace (http://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/assault-weapons)
Step 5: Tighten grip further via martial law or other "required security protocols", rename political protest groups as "terrorist" deregulate corporations, dismantle workers rights, remove environmental protections, and finally ammo up. (Department Of Homeland Security Is Buying 450 Million New Bullets)
Anyone not complying or protesting is a terrorist. (see step 1)
http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2011/09/costs-homeland-security
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_Act_for_Fiscal_Year_2012
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/national/2012/12/fbi-treated-occupy-terrorist-group/60289/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/29/fbi-coordinated-crackdown-occupy
http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-03-28/news/31247765_1_atk-rounds-bullet
http://www.sacbee.com/2012/12/27/5079151/california-gun-sales-increase.html
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
They have persuaded uneducated fundamentalist Christians and the same poor people who would suffer from their policies to vote for them in the belief that they are somehow aligned to "conservative values". Vote for me and I'll stop abortion. But hey, it won't matter because the rape victim will die for lack of medical treatment.
The Libertarians are the spiritual heirs of Al Capone, and use the same schtick to energise the base.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
look who the big contributors to OWS are, it's bullshit. it has another purpose than what it says on the tin. It did, however, let the government and those with government in their pockets know who troublemakers are....
The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of
he's mentally ill. OWS was just the thing he latched onto. There would have been something else. Also, the FBI wasn't watching guys like him, it was watching the leaders of the movement in an obvious effort to shut it down.
OWS had one unforgivable sin: it offered a working and likable alternative narrative. Right now the only narrative in American society is that if you work hard and play by the rules you'll succeed, and if you didn't it's your own damn fault and you're a bad person. It's prosperity gospel by any other name. OWS and the 'We are the 99%' was catchy, simple and made sense. It was a movement that had a real chance, which is why we're even talking about it, and also why it was crushed relentlessly.
In short, you didn't think speech was really free, did you?
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
http://wh.gov/UCL9 sign on folks! I can hardly wait to see the mealy mouthed BS answer to this... Oh, and expect to be on some FBI troublemaker list, if you're not yet. Consider it a badge of honor. ;)
"Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem." -- Jefferson
There was Government violence against the Suffragettes, and shows of force intended to intimidate them.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
when we're told from day one as children that America is the greatest country on Earth? It was mostly young people that aren't as jaded as you and I, and You're taught to believe that we're all basically Americans and in the end we'd come together, work together and prosper together. I seriously doubt they were expecting to have counter terrorism groups hand them their asses. That's the sort of thing that happens in Syria, not America...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
http://www.lawfulrebellion.org/2012/01/29/lawful-rebellion-in-2012-the-clock-is-ticking/
This sums up pretty much everything going on in the US as well. This is the problem that needs to be fixed, and we can do it, and they know we can, and they are scared that we will.
http://www.lawfulrebellion.org/2012/01/29/lawful-rebellion-in-2012-the-clock-is-ticking/
This talks a lot, but doesn't give any defining details. Of course police organizations are going to talk to each other, (the US has like 50 just as the national level, nevermind individual states and cities). Of course they are going to talk to the object of the protest, (the banks). And peaceful protests can turn violent VERY quickly, so of course police are going to have their terrorism / riot units get involved.
Did they purposefully illegally arrest peaceful organizers?, were those "peaceful" organizers stopping lawful business, (which no protest, no matter how "peaceful" is allowed to do, hence making the arrests perfectly legal)?
Did any protestors actually get shot?
Was anything the police did purposefully planned illegality?, or did they just react with a bit of a heavy hand?
Did the protestor who got hit see a line of riot police banging their shields, after they have say, crossed the legal bounds for protests?
Did the collusion with the private interest involve the FBI telling the private interests what the protestors are legally allowed to do?, when the police will have to step in?, contingincy plans if the shit hits the fan, you know, stuff you EXPECT the police to talk about with people who are about to receive what might be the largest protest in human history?
Of course. We (those of us in the US and Western Europe, anyway) have a stable system of government. What this means is that there are negative feedbacks in the system which counter any attempt to change it. Furthermore, the systems learn: When a tactic manages to overwhelm the existing feedback mechanisms and cause an actual change, new feedback mechanisms are set up to render that tactic ineffective in the future. Thus the more the system changes, the more stable it becomes.
It follows that any technique for change actually sanctioned by the system (such as voting) will not work, as those techniques have long since been countered. They still serve a purpose, however -- they waste the energy of those seeking change, and they present an excuse for barring other techniques.
And Senators demanding the assasination of a foreign civilian under military law.
Does this mean that teabaggers and the Senate House are all full of violent psychopaths?
Actually, it pretty nearly does.
DId you really think anything would change ? Really ? You basically have in the US two corporatist party. One is more conservative, the other slightly more liberal, but basically doing both blow job to corporation for election money and power. You the folk don't even enter the equation. Back in 2008 I was laughing hard at people stating it was a new deal, things would change and so forth. I am still laughing hard now. And the next president in 2016 ? It will be all the same. And so forth for any subsequent election until the folk got enough and destroy the corporate/politic/plutocraty bloodily. Then a few decades of destabilisation and a new regime will come by. Which will generate loser and winner, winner which will get to be the new aristocraty over decades, the new 1%. And so forth. It is all bsut and expansion following each other not economically, but politically. After a revolution some of the old 1% are clever enough to get in the new 1% , but basically the "bottoms" stay there no matter what. And certainly no matter what soothing slogan they get told.
Just read though all the documents provided. There's the possibility that there's other activity in the "redacted" documents, but what's reported isn't that interesting.
There's some material on the attempt to shut down the Port of Oakland, but it's mostly after the fact. That was mostly handled by the Oakland PD. The FBI was interested, but doesn't seem to have done much. There are some monthly reports of meetings with banks along the lines of "well, that's what Occupy is up to, now back to that check fraud problem you've been having". The Richmond Fed was apparently worried, but the FBI didn't see any real threat to them.
There are a few incidents that were investigated. Someone threw something burning over the White House fence, and it turned out to be a road flare. Some white powder was dumped in some protest, and it turned out to be uninteresting. One protester came in to the FBI to report that the leaders were holding secret meetings and she was worried about what they were up to. There was a concern that a right-wing group was going to attack an Occupy group.
There was apparently at least one one terrorism investigation. The FBI was concerned that a known suspected terrorist might use an Occupy group as cover to get close to a target.
It would be more interesting to see what Homeland Security was up to. The FBI has a real job, catching crooks, and measures success by convictions. So they don't want to devote too much effort to time-wasting activities. That doesn't up your stats, which is how you get promoted in the FBI. Homeland Security's anti-terrorism operation, on the other hand, has few terrorists to chase and too many people chasing them. So they're looking for work to keep themselves busy. Most of the troubles with law-enforcement come from the parts that generate their own work, not the parts that are complaint-driven.
The FBI, and military police, and the CIA, did it back then. It was a large enough scandal that Congress passed laws against it.
Too many years of pro-crime (white collar, please), pro-totalitarian (corporate, please) Republicans, and they did it again. I'm *so* surprised.
"Support, protect, uphold the Constitution", if it doesn't bother the people that own you.
mark
So why have none of the bankers / bank workers been sent to jail for behaviors which led to the current economic catastrophe? Outright theft goes unpunished, but they strictly enforce policy when it comes to preventing protesters from protesting their theft...?
No fucking chance in hell of that. From an economic standpoint the Libertarians are worse than the Republicans; if possible. Remember the Libertarian Poster Boy, Ron Paul had the most conservative post war voting record on anybody in congress between WWII and 2002, and is a Republican. So hell no they aren't going to vote Republitarian.
And giving their choice between pissing away their vote on the Greens and helping the Republitarians win, they vote Democrat, which is what those who were old enough to vote last time voted.
Union reaction to occupy. Question the motives all you want; but the association is right out there, and even involves an SEIU local. OK, have a ball guys. AFK for a while. Happy New Year. Lucky '13.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Thank you FBI and all for keeping track of these want-to-be's who can't contribute to the welfare of mankind, only to destroy what they can't have.
How many people are being watched? Probably not enough of you dirtbags!
"These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America"
The word they were looking for is fascism.
The problem "global", is that you're making the same mistake by extrapolating from your "personal experience" to the whole movement.
The tighter the grip, the faster everything slips through.
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
I came here to see some bank crack.
I smell a homophone conspiracy! :))
r
An American Nazi Empire is inevitable. The Banksters screwed up Germany in the 1920s and at some point it was rational for everyday people to vote for Adolf Hitler. He was the only man who had a credible plan and resolve to help the common man.
You know the rest.
So, I hope for America that Occupy Wall Street will succeed.
Home of the readers who think they know everything, and the editors that clearly know nothing.
Americans aid "Terrorism" in Northern Ireland through various means. The IRA and its factions kill real people with or without uniform.
America sponsors Terrorism in Iran. At least that is the view of Iran, when American-sponsored killers kill people on Iranian soil. (And, yeah, I know about the Zionist excuses why that is "OK")
America sponsors the terrorist actions of the Israeli Army to ethnically cleanse Arabs from the land they owned for hundreds of years. America aids Israel in torture and illegal,indefinite detention of Arabs (Muslim, Christian and others).
America condones Israeli terror commandos suffocating people in Dubai with their own pillow. As a reward for terrorism, America sends billions every year to Israel.
Does anyone have the actual documents? The story that is supposed to have the documents attached is missing the attachments.
I have been politically active in the past, as an individual. Mostly on the internet in discussion forums like these. Often with true name.
From that, I got personal visits from government shit, advising me "to leave the country for a while, then we won't bother your". The country of my birth, Germany. I got dummy attacks with dogs.
So yeah, fuck your claim of being an "office worker". I know 100% what the government sometimes does. Doing a little bit of disinformation is just the "basic measure".
Barack Obama, the most fascist president ever. The people can't demonstrate against Wall Street or heck anywhere near him he changed the rules so the SS could arrest or shoo away protesters that were too near him. He certainly doesn't want dissent showing up in any of his video / sound bites.
And you Slashdorks praise Obama and his policies like he is some kind of God. Sheesh.
..you are.
I tell you something: These people are doing you, the banksters, your nation and the whole western world a major service. They are calling for the reform of a rotten system, so that it can again function somewhat.
The alternative includes Guillotines, terror by guys like Feliks Tsershinsky (who ordered 17000 killed in three years), mass shootings and also Zyklon-B.
So, make up your mind what you really want ? Reform or Revolution ?
in the land of the free.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
It is 'can happily accommodate a lack of dissent.'
..Goldman Sachs ?
Trying to spread your Collective Ad-Hominems (so to speak) here ? We know you Banksters are so fucking enormous, excellently smart. We can imagine you try to spread disinformation, lies and half-truths. You can afford the best propaganda specialists from all the money you have stolen from the common many in a way that cannot be punished by law.
The only thing I do not understand is why you are so tremendously short-sighted. If you continue down this path of destructive egotism, you will one day be pulled out of your little castles and raised to the next street lamp with a rope. By the people whom you have destroyed their jobs and their little lives.
Hi Mr Seargeant. Can I have an overflight by Guardrail, please ? I am an aircraft fan when I don't piss you and your corrupt buddies.
Thomas Jefferson? Not so much.
which is the narrative. Their Narrative was that unless you are part of the 1%, they aren't going to take your money, because you don't have any (the 1% has all the money). Whether you agree with the narrative or not, it was an effective one.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I think the best way to protest is http://www.lietaer.com/2010/03/the-worgl-experiment/
Casteism
The OWSers were anything but peaceful. They also appeared to know little about what they were protesting and even less about remedies. Their encampments were cesspools of filth and crime, contrary to the observations of a few. They did more harm to creating a climate for change than good and in general displayed a lack of knowledge about the issues or decision making. They were the epitome of those not suited for college.
I see that picture with the local GOONS all suited up with billy clubs and it pisses me off. Maybe groups like OWS should invest in gas masks and riot shields along with other NON-WEAPONS purchases to become a more resistant and stubborn force. As they are now... any wanna be reserve cop can push them around. TOTALLY INEFFECTIVE TIME WASTERS!
Actually, the talking point that the Clear Channel talkshow entertainers have long been hammering is that the Federal government, i.e., Barack Obama hisself, covertly created and supports the OWS movemen, which promotes Socialist government policies, in order to counter the threat posed by the brilliant minds of the Tea Party. What, now you're saying no?? Next thing they'll be trying to tell us that the President isn't even a Muslim.
Marxist AGW scientists? #include "irony.h"
error: conflicting declaration or overloaded equality operator /usr/include/logic/irony.h
Big apple, new Yorik, undig it, something's unrotting in Edenmark.
Too many people lost too much money for there to be any effective intelligence on Wall St. ... or perhaps it is an ethical failing.
Mods: Your disagreement with facts is not a reason to mod down.
If you think his "facts" are only "opinions", then so are yours. And these sources, unlike the ones provided in another post higher, include non-conservative ones.
So Wall Street selling America's technology and manufacturing infrastructure/defensive arsenal/war reserve to the communists in the PRC directly (for example, Bain Capital is a leader in the field) is "OK", but Americans exercising their right to free speech and assembly is a "no-no"?
Hey, NCIS/FBI? Think about it: Why bother? There isn't any America left to protect when the only thing that defines treason is whether or not you're making money at it.
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
A Greenwich Village couple, affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street movement, was arrested yesterday for allegedly having a cache of weapons and bomb making materials in their apartment. A detective discovered a plastic container with seven grams of a white chemical powder called HMTD, which is so powerful, cops evacuated several nearby buildings. http://newmediajournal.us/indx.php/item/7929
So 7grams of a substance too unstable to be particularly useful in a bomb in now a cache? If a redneck did this it's hardly make the local news, much less national news.