wearethe99percent:

I have been working at the same corporate job for 14 years. I spent five years in the military for love of my country. I started going to community colleges at 16 and paid my own way through school. I’m currently working on my third degree. I own a home and should be completely debt free within the next two years. I have excellent health insurance and have put away over $250,000 in retirement to date. I am not a hippy. I do not smoke pot. I do not need social programs. I am also not an asshole. I know that the reason our country was once great was because we enabled an infrastructure that allowed the American Dream to be achievable. But you cannot get a doctor to heal you by bartering with a chicken anymore. Corporate greed has made our healthcare costs three times what they should be. Our farmers live in poverty while the GMO seed industry takes their subsidies for obscene profits. The banks that once helped small businesses succeed have gambled our futures away, raking in huge profits when they win and forcing us to pay when they lose. The corporations are on a path to take every penny they can squeeze out of the population,  remove any legal way for us to fight them, and leave us no better than a third world country.

That is not the America our Founding Fathers built. People forget that the original Tea Party was against a corporation and its influence on our government.

Our Founding Fathers feared just what is happening today.

I AM THE 99% AND I WANT MY COUNTRY BACK!

wearethe99percent:

Incase the text is too small: I am an Illustration major junior in college. I have Fibromyalgia, epstien-barr virus, I get sick constantly, and i’ve had bells palsy for 4 months now (second time!). I have medication for the fibromyalgia, a nice dorm and house, a wonderful family, and I am happy. I am very scared too. I can’t find a job, my parents are supporting me. I don’t even know how much money in loans I’ll owe after I graduate, let alone how I’m going to make enough money to pay them. I’m scared that we’re going to run out of money. My step dad came out of retirement to help support the house. My mom works 3 days a week, 12 hour shifts, occasional overtime. She also runs her own business. My brother isn’t going to college anytime soon. He’s already had heart surgery and gets anxious often. He’s 17. Besides that we don’t have the money to send him to college right now. My dad works construction. I worry for him the most. He can barely afford where he lives (My mom and step dad have been close to the edge). If he doesn’t pay enough child support he’ll go to jail. He doesn’t have a car and he got his license taken away because he owes so much child support. He can’t find another job. I worry for myself, my family, my friends. But most of all, I worry for the economy, for the country, for every single one of us.

I AM THE 99%

GOD BLESS US

wearethe99percent:

I know I have friends/family who don’t get the 99% movement. I admit I’m not as knowledgeable as I should be. But let me put this in a real-life scenario for you: Congress just passed a law that allows PIZZA to be counted as a VEGETABLE in public school lunches. We are facing an epidemic of childhood obesity. Our children are the first generation to have a lower mortality rate than their parents.

AND OUR CORPORATE-RUN “DEMOCRACY” IS KILLING THEM.

I am disgusted. I am the 99%.

occupyonline:

God people, use some logic here. The one on the right is a rich, white male in a suit, cufflinks and a nice haircut so he deserves it…obviously. Fine wine and pretension are expensive, didn’t you know? It’s hard work keeping up appearances.

occupyonline:

Dan Siegel resigns as Mayor Quan’s legal advisor and gives his support to Occupy Movement!

Siegel’s resignation should not come as much of a shock. The attorney said he had come close to resigning over the city’s first raid, in which the police used tear-gas and rubber bullets to disperse the activists.

“I did think about it,” he told The Huffington Post in an interview Monday afternoon. Siegel relented when Quan reversed course amid condemnation over her handling of the Occupy protests. Quanapologized for the raids and let the activists retake their old space.

But with Quan’s latest reversal, Siegel suggests the mayor is showing weakness in the face of the city’s entrenched powers. “I do think she was overrun by the opposition,” he explained. “It was a combination of councilmembers, the chamber of commerce and some administrators in the city, including the city administrator and chief of police.”

Quan justified her latest sweep of the Occupy site on the growing allegations of violence surrounding the site.

“We came to this point because Occupy Oakland, I think, began to take a different path than the original movement. It was no longer about the pieces of the financial system or foreclosures or the unemployed,” Quan said, as reported by MSNBC. “The encampment became a place where we had repeated violence and last week a murder,” she said. “We had to bring the camp to an end before more people got hurt.”

Siegel said there is no evidence that the Occupiers are to blame for the murder, and that the victim had been a sometime participant at the Occupy camp. Siegel compared Quan to a character in a Greek tragedy. “Circumstances have put someone in a position where they wind up doing something against their own goals and values,” he said. “That’s what occurred here.”

“I didn’t agree with it,” Siegel said of Monday morning’s raid. “I really do think it’s an extremely important movement that hopefully will continue to grow and have a big impact on American society. So given the choice between expressing my solidarity with the Occupy movement and remaining a legal adviser to the mayor when we were clearly not on the same page was really a pretty easy choice for me.”  

Source

Smart man realizing he does not want to touch this legal shit storm with a ten foot pole. Why? Because all his legal education and life experience tells him something that should be known to everyone - what is going on right now IS NOT OKAY - legally or ethically.

occupyonline:

Indeed, the Wall Street Journal found:

The vast majority of demonstrators are actually employed, and the proportion of protesters unemployed (15%) is within single digits of the national unemployment rate (9.1%).

(And see this.)

Professor Hector R. Cordero-Guzman and business analyst Harrison Schultz from the Baruch College School of Public Affair puts the unemployment rate of the Occupy protesters at 13.1%. In other words, approximately 85% employment rate.

doangivadam:

One of the mindless attacks on Occupy protesters is that they are lazy and should “go get a job”.

In fact, most Occupy protesters have jobs.

For example, Scott Olsen – the Marine veteran peacefully protesting in Oakland who was shot in the head with a projectile by riot police – had a very good day job, but was so dedicated that he went to the protests after work

occupyonline:

Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan said police will allow protesters to re-enter Frank Ogawa Plaza late this afternoon but will remove anyone who tries to camp out there.

He said the police sweep at the plaza early this morning went more smoothly than the raid three weeks ago, in part because he said no one threw rocks at officers this time.

Thirty-two people were arrested in the raid this morning, and another person was arrested around noon for spitting at an officer at 14th Street and Broadway.

Police spokeswoman Johnna Watson said that in addition to spitting at officers, that man threw a gallon of water onto them and knocked down barriers at the plaza.

Jordan said that once the city finishes cleaning up the plaza, people can’t be kept away because it is a public space. But he said police will monitor the plaza all night to make sure tents aren’t set up again.

He also said that if anarchists show up tonight trying to cause trouble, “We intend to have sufficient officers to arrest people who break the law.”

Jordan said officers from other agencies will be available again tonight if necessary.

This morning, Oakland police were assisted by officers from the San Leandro, San Francisco, Hayward and Fremont police departments, and sheriff’s deputies from Alameda, Santa Clara and San Mateo counties.

Jordan said nearly 100 Oakland police officers and 300 officers and deputies from other agencies participated in this morning’s enforcement. No injuries were reported to officers or protesters, he said.

City Administrator Deanna Santana said Oakland is paying between $300,000 and $500,000 for today’s mutual aid.

Oakland is paying in full for the assistance, since the raid was a planned event, Jordan said. However, if protests get out of hand tonight, that would constitute an emergency and a mutual aid agreement would be activated, meaning Oakland wouldn’t have to foot the whole bill for the response.

Occupy Oakland protesters plan to hold a rally at 4 p.m. today.

“We expect a large, peaceful rally,” Jordan said.

He said police will “facilitate” the rally by escorting protesters as they march from the Oakland Public Library to Frank Ogawa Plaza.

Jordan said there are about 25 tents at a second encampment at Snow Park, near Lake Merritt, which is about half a mile away from Frank Ogawa Plaza.

He said police plan to remove people in the tents from the park eventually but that it’s not a high priority now because “Snow Park has never been a problem for us since there has been no violence or drug dealing.”

Crews were still cleaning up Frank Ogawa Plaza early this afternoon.

All of the protesters were gone from the plaza, except for Zachary Running Wolf, a tree-sitter who is perched atop a small wooden platform in a tree there.

Jordan said police are leaving him alone for now as they look into what his legal rights are to be there.

This morning, he could be heard shouting from the tree, “This is native land. I’m not coming down.”

Copyright Bay City News

occupyonline:

A group of Occupy Wall Street protesters left New York to march down the highway to Washington. Post reporter Elizabeth Flock is following the group, which hopes to arrive in the nation’s capital by Nov. 23, the day Congress is set to vote on extending Bush-era tax cuts.

Nov. 13, 2011

March co-organizer Kelly Brannon tells marchers that if they make a decision that will affect everyone, they need to inform the group. “If you want to eat grass, eat grass, I don’t care,” Brannon said on the march, which at that point had made it to in Philadelphia

The owner of the Savage Automobile Technologies car lot threatened to have demonstrators arrested for standing on his property as they held a meeting in Philadelphia. Demonstrators decided to move from the location.

Nov. 12, 2011

The numbers at the Occupy the Highway march just got a lot bigger, as marchers crossed state lines into Pennsylvania.

Garth, one of the marchers, chronicles his travels on his website here: www.pursuingnothing.com

Follow the march online

occupyonline:

• This Thursday, November 17, the two-month anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement, protesters will join forces with labor unions and MoveOn.org to hold a “day of action,” aimed at encouraging federal funding of infrastructure projects. [The Hill, Occupy Wall Street]

• Jay-Z’s…