On money and billy clubs

[Henry M]

Rather poor provocateurs, IMO.  The occupier don't do anything but talk,
mic-check, and occupy.  If I were a provocateur...

AsB4,
٩(●̮̮̃•̃)۶
Henry Mu
http://astore.amazon.com/tdcoccamsaxe-20


On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 3:37 PM, Ian Livingston <igrlivingston at gmail.com>wrote:

> One must account for the probability of the presence of agents
> provocateurs among the protesters. That is one of the favorite methods
> establishment policing agencies use to discredit anti-establishment trends
> and movements.
>
>
> On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 8:31 AM, Henry M <scuffling at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> The first amendment does not grant everyone to live wherever they please
>> for as long as they want.  When peoples emotions make them lie and say
>> incorrect things, it's bad for their movement unless that movement has
>> actual political power, which OWS does not have.  It may feel good to shout
>> things, even when they're wrong and counterproductive, but it sets real
>> progress back.  Rather disgusting, actually.
>>
>> AsB4,
>> ٩(●̮̮̃•̃)۶
>> Henry Mu
>> http://astore.amazon.com/tdcoccamsaxe-20
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Nov 24, 2011 at 11:21 PM, Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
>>
>>>  Published on Thursday, November 24, 2011 by Robert Reich<http://robertreich.org/>
>>> The First Amendment Upside Down. Why We Must Occupy Democracy
>>> by Robert Reich <http://www.commondreams.org/robert-reich>
>>>
>>> You’ve been seeing this across the country … Americans assaulted,
>>> clubbed, dragged, pepper-sprayed … Why? For exercising their right to free
>>> speech and assembly — protesting the increasing concentration of income,
>>> wealth, and political power at the top.
>>>
>>> And what’s Washington’s response? Nothing. In fact, Congress’s so-called
>>> “supercommittee” just disbanded because Republicans refuse to raise a penny
>>> of taxes on the rich.
>>>
>>> Meanwhile, the Supreme Court says money is speech and corporations are
>>> people. The Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision last year ended all
>>> limits on political spending. Millions of dollars are being funneled to
>>> politicians without a trace.
>>>
>>> And a revolving door has developed between official Washington and Wall
>>> Street – with bank executives becoming public officials who make rules that
>>> benefit the banks before heading back to the Street to make money off the
>>> rules they created.
>>>
>>> Other top officials, including an increasing proportion of former
>>> members of congress, are cashing in by joining lobbying power houses and
>>> pressuring their former colleagues to do whatever their clients want.
>>>
>>> Millionaires and billionaires on Wall Street and in executive suites
>>> aren’t contributing all this money out of sheer love of country. Their
>>> political spending is analogous to their other investments. Mostly they
>>> want low tax rates and friendly regulations.
>>>
>>> Why else do you suppose tax rates on the super rich are now lower than
>>> they’ve been in three decades, and why – even though the long-term budget
>>> deficit is horrendous – those rates aren’t rising? Why else do the 400
>>> richest Americans (whose wealth is larger than the combined wealth of the
>>> bottom 150 million Americans) now pay an average tax rate of only 17
>>> percent?
>>>
>>> Why do you think Wall Street got bailed without a single string attached
>>> – not even being required to help homeowners to whom they sold mortgages,
>>> who are now so far under water they’re drowning? And why does the financial
>>> reform legislation have loopholes big enough for bankers to drive their
>>> Ferrari’s through?
>>>
>>> And why else are oil companies, big agribusinesses, military
>>> contractors, and the pharmaceutical industry reaping billions of dollars of
>>> government subsidies and special tax breaks?
>>>
>>> Experts say the 2012 presidential race is likely to be the priciest
>>> ever, costing an estimated $6 billion. “It is far worse than it has ever
>>> been,” says Republican Senator John McCain.
>>>
>>> If there’s a single core message to the Occupier movement it’s that the
>>> increasing concentration of income and wealth at the top endangers our
>>> democracy. With money comes political power.
>>>
>>> Yet when real people without money assemble to express their
>>> dissatisfaction with all this, they’re told the First Amendment doesn’t
>>> apply. Instead, they’re treated as public nuisances – clubbed,
>>> pepper-sprayed, thrown out of public parks and evicted from public spaces.
>>>
>>> Across America, public officials are saying Occupiers have to go. Even
>>> in universities – where free speech is supposed to be sacrosanct – peaceful
>>> assembly is being met with clubs and pepper spray.
>>>
>>> The First Amendment is being stood on its head. Money speaks, and an
>>> unlimited amount of it can now be spent bribing and cajoling politicians.
>>> Yet peaceful assembly is viewed as a public nuisance and removed by force.
>>>
>>> This is especially worrisome now that so many Americans are in economic
>>> trouble. The jobs recession grinds on, seemingly without end. Homes are
>>> being foreclosed upon. Qualified students cannot afford college. Or they’re
>>> forced to take on huge debt loads they can’t repay in a jobless economy.
>>> Schools are firing teachers. Vital social services are being axed.
>>>
>>> How are Americans to be heard about what should be done about any of
>>> this if they are not allowed to mobilize and organize? When the freedom of
>>> speech goes to the highest bidder, moneyed interests have a
>>> disproportionate say.
>>>
>>> Now more than ever, the First Amendment needs to be put right side up.
>>> Nothing less than the future of our democracy is at stake.
>>> © 2011 Robert Reich
>>>  [image: Robert Reich] <http://www.commondreams.org/robert-reich>
>>>
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> "Less than any man have I  excuse for prejudice; and I feel for all creeds
> the warm sympathy of one who has come to learn that even the trust in
> reason is a precarious faith, and that we are all fragments of darkness
> groping for the sun. I know no more about the ultimates than the simplest
> urchin in the streets." -- Will Durant
>
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