Tag: Occupy Wall St.

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

On November 3rd, the People, the 99 percent, will hold A People’s Hearing of Goldman Sachs in Liberty Square Park and march on Goldman Sachs! The people will bring to justice perhaps the single most egregious perpetrator of economic fraud and corruption in the United States. The Hearing will include testimonials from individuals directly affected by Goldman’s fraudulent manipulation of financial markets, including victims of housing foreclosures, pension losses, public lay-offs and untenable student debt.

The proceedings will also include expert analysis from Ralph Nader, Cornel West and Chris Hedges. Following the 99-minute hearing the people will decide on a fair and deliverable verdict via our own process of consensus-based direct democracy – and we intend to deliver it ourselves – to the headquarters of Goldman Sachs at 200 West Street, eight blocks from Liberty Square. We will ask for something our judicial and legislative systems have so far failed to deliver – the return of billions of taxpayer dollars to the 99 percent and criminal sentences for those Goldman Sachs executives who carried out the fraud. The event will be broadcast live via the Occupy Wall Street Livestream, among other public media outlets.

Read More…

Occupy marchers descend on city’s banks and close main thoroughfares and port

Watch live streaming video from occupyoakland at livestream.com

Thousands of people have attended a general strike organised by Occupy Oakland, closing streets, squares, banks and the port.

About 300 people gathered at Frank H Ogawa Plaza at 9am, the first of three rallies called by Occupy protesters during the day of action. Others soon joined, closing the main thoroughfares in central Oakland and marching on banks in the city.

Occupy Oakland protesters voted for the action on Wednesday, the day after police cleared Occupy campers from the plaza, seriously injuring former marine Scott Olsen in the process.

“Today is about saying no to the 1% and yes to the 99%,” said Cat Brooks, a long-time Oakland activist and campaigner against police violence. “This is a warning, a test, to the 1%. We don’t need them, they need us.”

A potentially powerful new element joins Occupy Wall Street as military veterans in uniform took to the streets in New York, marching from Vietnam Veterans Plaza to Zuccotti Park Wednesday, enlisting the campaign to spotlight issues of social and economic injustice.

Veterans have “a unique opportunity to continue serving here at home through our participation in this civic movement for change,” said Andrew Johnson, president of the New York City chapter of Iraq Veterans Against the War, which organized Wednesday’s march.

snip

Their grievances tend to be deep and personal as they face the challenges of coming home from war. The unemployment rate for veterans, at 12.4 percent, is due to climb as thousands of military personnel flood out of the ranks into an extremely competitive job market, with the Defense Department cutting back on manpower this year and in the years ahead.

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

On November 1st, Israel organized a general strike to fight back against global neoliberal machine.

On November 2nd, Oakland will join the month of global uprising with a city-wide general strike during which the people will converge on downtown Oakland to shut down the city and its port.

While these assemblies are calling for general strikes, they are also calling for much more. Schools, community organizations, affinity groups, workplaces and families are encouraged to self-organize to shut down their cities and rebuild their communities in whatever manner they are comfortable with and capable of.

Following Israel and Oakland’s example, we join this month of global uprising. We stand in solidarity with those who are organizing the actions that are creating the fabric of our new movement.

It is time for us to come together and build a new world through the power of the individual and the community. We are not here to make requests of a corrupt political system – we are here to take our lives back into our own hands. We are not acknowledging subservience. There is no higher power than the power of the people. We are not asking for assistance. We are declaring independence. Our demand is not to those in power, it is to those individuals still silenced. Join us.

We are the 99%. We are not afraid. We are not waiting. We are working to make a better world.

Occupy Wall Street. Occupy Everywhere

1 November 2011 – Oakland, Ca.

We represent the 645 police officers who work hard every day to protect the citizens of Oakland. We, too, are the 99% fighting for better working conditions, fair treatment and the ability to provide a living for our children and families. We are severely understaffed with many City beats remaining unprotected by police during the day and evening hours.

As your police officers, we are confused.

Read more . .

The Occupy movement has a new goal – shut down the Iowa caucuses.

The state’s protesters are inviting fellow Occupiers from across the country to “occupy” the campaign offices of the Republican presidential candidates and President Barack Obama in the first-in-the-nation presidential caucus state, The Des Moines Register reports.

“You go inside, or if they won’t let you in, you shut ’em down. You sit in front of their doors,” Frank Cordaro of Des Moines, the man credited for the idea of the “First in the Nation Caucus Occupation,” told the Register. “Who knows? It could be a very big deal.”

The plan, Cordaro told CNN, is “people coming to Iowa, occupying every presidential [candidate’s] office, shutting them down until they start talking real turkey about what’s going on in this country, where the 99 percent of the people who are not benefiting, at the expense of the 1 percent who are getting away with murder.”

   The Chapter of St Paul’s Cathedral has unanimously agreed to suspend its current legal action against the protest camp outside the church, following meetings with Dr Richard Chartres, the Bishop of London, late last night and early this morning.

   The resignation of the Dean, the Rt Rev Graeme Knowles, has given the opportunity to reassess the situation, involving fresh input from the bishop. Members of Chapter this morning have met with representatives from the protest camp to demonstrate that St Paul’s intends to engage directly and constructively with both the protesters and the moral and ethical issues they wish to address, without the threat of forcible eviction hanging over both the camp and the church.

   It is being widely reported that the Corporation of London plans to ask protesters to leave imminently. The Chapter of course recognises the Corporation’s right to take such action on Corporation land.

   The bishop has invited investment banker Ken Costa formerly chair of UBS Europe and chairman of Lazard International, to spearhead an initiative reconnecting the financial with the ethical. Mr Costa will be supported by a number of City, Church and public figures, including Giles Fraser, who although no longer a member of Chapter, will help ensure that the diverse voices of the protest are involved in this.

   The Bishop of London, Dr Richard Chartres, said: “The alarm bells are ringing all over the world. St Paul’s has now heard that call. Today’s decision means that the doors are most emphatically open to engage with matters concerning not only those encamped around the cathedral but millions of others in this country and around the globe. I am delighted that Ken Costa has agreed to spearhead this new initiative which has the opportunity to make a profound difference.”

   The Rt Rev Michael Colclough, Canon Pastor of St Paul’s Cathedral and a member of Chapter, added: “This has been an enormously difficult time for the Cathedral but the Chapter is unanimous in its desire to engage constructively with the protest and the serious issues that have been raised, without the threat of legal action hanging over us. Legal concerns have been at the forefront in recent weeks but now is the time for the moral, the spiritual and the theological to come to the fore.”

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

   Having lost their gas-powered generators, the protestors at Occupy Wall Street are turning to a more eco-friendly alternative: pedal power.

   Keegan Stephan, a bike mechanic and environmentalist at the Zuccotti Park site of the protest in New York, has been pedaling a stationary bronze Schwinn bicycle to provide energy for the protesters’ encampment….

   How does the contraption work? The bike is connected to a flywheel, which in turn connects to a dynamo, the Times explains. That dynamo creates energy, which flows through a motor and a one-way diode to charge a black battery.

   When fully charged–after about 6 hours of pedaling–the battery might provide power for around 100 hours, Stephan estimated. It’ll be used to power laptops, cellphones, and other devices being used by the protesters. ….

   Then Friday, police confiscated the gas-powered generators that the protesters–some of whom have slept in the park for more than a month–had been using. The Fire Department has said that storing large amounts of fuel in the park violates fire codes [and, pragmatically, they’re not wrong].

   That’s when Stephan’s contraption–joined since Saturday by three other bikes attached to motors that Occupy Boston protestors had shipped down to New York–suddenly came in handy.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

A fast, easy, free, and non-violent way to drive the big banks out of their greedy little minds is sitting in your mailbox right now. You just don’t know it yet.

One of the comments suggested that this is a way of supporting the US Postal Service which might keep thousands of postal workers off the unemployment line.

joanneleon, a friend, proved the needed transcript

New York protesters hunker down in snow-covered tents

NEW YORK, Oct 29 (Reuters) – A rare snowstorm tested the resolve of anti-Wall Street protesters camped out in a New York City park on Saturday as police in Nashville detained dozens of demonstrators during an eviction from a city plaza.

A day after New York authorities confiscated generators from the Occupy Wall Street movement against economic inequality, hundreds of protesters struggled to stay warm and dry after more than an inch of snow fell in the city with temperatures forecast to drop to freezing overnight.

Buffeted by strong winds, protesters hunkered down in snow-covered tents in Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan, where the movement first set up camp six weeks ago, sparking dozens of similar occupations in city parks across the United States.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

Yesterday, at Liberty Park, NYC Fire department swept in and confiscated 5 diesel and biodeisel fueled generators that are used to provide lighting for safety at night and power for computer and camera equipment. It was done on the pretext of “safety concerns” as stated by Mayor Michael Bloomberg just as a nasty winter storm is hitting the NYC area with a mix of icy rain and snow. However, it has been reported that the generators were quickly replaced since #OWS/NYC is flush with funds. Tents also pooped up again in the park but were left undisturbed by police, the mayor’s office stating that the owners of the park had not complained. Elsewhere, OWS encampments are preparing for winter conditions. Keep trying, Mike. We aren’t leaving and you can’t silence us or continue to protect your friends.

In Oakland, Scott Olsen’s condition continues to improve and he is being evaluated by speech and physical therapists. The picture of Scott being carried to safety has gone viral around the world. Protestors and tents have also returned to the square where the incident took place.

There was a festive mood as 6,000 letters from the 99% were delivered to the CEO’s of the country’s largest banks.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

Late yesterday word began trickling out the the Iraq Marine vet, Scott Olsen who sustained a skull fracture after being stuck with a non-lethal object, possibly a tear gas canister, was off the ventilator and awake. The fracture caused a brain contusion that has affected the speech center of his brain. Doctors are optimistic that it is not permanent and will resolve itself. No surgery was necessary. Scott’s parents are with him. He knows where he is and recognizes his parents which are all excellent signs. According to the hospital, shortly after Scott arrived, he began to have seizures and was placed in an induced coma.

The other good news is that Oakland Mayor Jean Quan has done a complete reversal, allowing the Occupy Wall Street protesters to return to the park and pitch tents. Candle light vigils were held around the country in support of Scott.

#OccupyCleveland reaches court assisted resolution in federal court against city; will begin 24/7 occupation immediately.

There were arrests in NYC as over a thousand protesters participated in a march with bag piped and drums for Scott. At one point the protesters pushed back the police taking the orange mesh barrier that is used to pen them in and turned it on police.

This weekend OCW will be taking over state capitols around the country.

Occupy Wall Street invaded the halls of Congress when a protester stopped the Super Committee’s hearing.

Cold weather is here and OWS is preparing with stock piles of warm clothing, cod weather sleeping bags, tarps and tents. OccupyTogether has put together a wiki cold weather manual that has good information.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

The lack of integrity in the banking industry and Wall St. is as much of a problem for the left as it is for the right. The Obama administration is as much of the problem as were both Bush presidents, Clinton And Reagan.

Author David Degraw and Prof. William Black talk about politicians supporting the OWS movement for their own political gain as opposed to those who truly believe in the protests.

If you aren’t familiar with Professor Black, he is currently an Associate Professor of Economics and Law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City in the Department of Economics and the School of Law. He was a central figure in exposing Congressional corruption during the Savings and Loan Crisis. He is brought the Keating Five to national attention when he published the congressional notes he took during those hearings. Black authored the book The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One: How Corporate Executives and Politicians Looted the S&L Industry which explains concept of “control fraud”, in which a business or national executive uses the entity he or she controls as a “weapon” to commit fraud.

David Degraw is an independent investigative journalist and author who writes for the web site Ampedstatus. He has been participating in the Occupy Wall Street protests in Liberty Park since day one and is part of the working group that helps coordinate the activity.

Besides prosecuting the banks for fraud, Robert Kuttner of the American Prospect makes a good argument for bringing back the Glass-Stiegel Act which was repealed under Clinton. Kuttner says that it would simplify banking regulation and counter the argument that there is too much regulation:

[]. It would have been far better policy to return to the simple bright line of the Glass-Steagall Act.

If you want to be a commercial bank, with federal deposit insurance, access to Federal Reserve advances, and a Good Housekeeping seal from regulators, great. You will have to follow closely policed rules. Alternatively, if you want to trade and speculate with your own money, go to it. But don’t grow so big that you can bring down the whole system, stay out of the commercial lending business, and don’t expect the government to bail out your bad bets.

That system worked very nicely. It was almost impossible to evade, and it didn’t require 298-page regulations, with legions of regulators to police the creative evasions and gray areas.

The discussion of prosecuting fraud, making the banks responsible for it, not the victims and finding easier solutions to regulating the industry is what the Occupy Wall Street movement should be sparking for the politicians, all of them.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

Late last night, Scott Olsen, a former Marine, two-time Iraq war veteran, and member of Iraq Veterans Against the War, sustained a skull fracture after being shot in the head with a police projectile while peacefully participating in an Occupy Oakland march.  The march began at a downtown library and headed towards City Hall in an effort to reclaim a site-recently cleared by police-that had previously served as an encampment for members of the 99% movement.

Scott joined the Marines in 2006, served two-tours in Iraq, and was discharged in 2010.  Scott moved to California from Wisconsin and currently works as a systems network administrator in Daly, California.  

Scott is one of an increasing number of war veterans who are participating in America’s growing Occupy movement. Said Keith Shannon, who deployed with Scott to Iraq, “Scott was marching with the 99% because he felt corporations and banks had too much control over our government, and that they weren’t being held accountable for their role in the economic downturn, which caused so many people to lose their jobs and their homes.”

Scott is currently sedated at a local hospital awaiting examination by a neurosurgeon.  Iraq Veterans Against the Wars sends their deepest condolences to Scott, his family, and his friends.  IVAW also sends their thanks to the brave folks who risked bodily harm to provide care to Scott immediately following the incident.

Keith Shannon, the roommate of injured Occupy Oakland protester Scott Olsen and a fellow Iraq War veteran, shares what happened Tuesday night when the Oakland Police Department fired upon the crowd with rubber bullets, bean bags and tear-gas canisters, one of which gave Olsen a skull fracture and trip to the emergency room. Shannon, himself a vocal protester, provides an update on Olsen’s condition – saying Olsen is “stable, but critical” – and says the incident has only bolstered his resolve to continue working for the movement.

In tonight’s Special Comment, Keith calls out Jean Quan, mayor of Oakland, for her use of 500 police officers in a pre-dawn raid Tuesday morning, followed by more tear-gas bombs, rubber bullets and bean-bag rounds on Tuesday night. Quan, herself once a victim of the Oakland police’s bullying, now “is the bully,” Keith says. He calls on Quan to dismiss acting Police Chief Howard Jordan and allow protesters to return to their location, “or, having betrayed everything she’d supported and all those who have supported her, she must resign.”

Hundreds of protesters in New York City marched on Wednesday night to show solidarity with protesters in Oakland, Calif., where the police used tear gas to disperse crowds a night earlier. About a dozen demonstrators were arrested in New York, the police said.

Just after 9 p.m., about 500 people left the Occupy Wall Street base in Zuccotti Park and went on a winding march around the financial district and City Hall, accompanied by drummers and a man playing the bagpipes as a helicopter followed overhead.

Less than an hour later, a smaller group of protesters poured into the streets, ignoring orders from police officers to stay on the sidewalk, and began a frantic cat-and-mouse game. More than 250 protesters walked quickly and sometimes ran through the streets of SoHo and the West Village, at one point storming through a movie set on Macdougal Street as groups of police vehicles with lights and sirens pursued them closely. People emerged from bars along the way asking what was going on and offering encouragement.

Yesterday afternoon Occupy Wall Street group Healthcare for the 99% marched to the headquarters of Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield, WellCare and St Vincent’s Community Hospital, a casualty of profit-driven insurers and a healthcare system that leaves 50 million Americans uninsured. Last night Keith’s guest, Dr. Steve Auerbach of Physicians for a National Healthcare Program, spoke about the need for affordable, accessible national healthcare.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

2.24pm: I’ve just spoken to Keith Shannon, roommate of Scott Olsen, the Iraq veteran who is in hospital after apparently having been hit in the head by a police projectile.

Shannon said doctors told him Olsen has a “skull fracture and swelling of the brain”. A neurosurgeon will assess Olsen later today to determine whether he needs surgery, Shannon said.

Olsen, 24, was in 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines, before leaving the military last year. He had been opposed to the Iraq war even before his first tour to the country, Shannon said. Shannon and Olsen met in November or December 2005, and share an apartment in Daly City, south of San Francisco.

Rubber bullets and shotgun propelled bean bags can maim and kill, if the person is hit in the head, chest or abdomen. This is over-reaction by the Oakland Police on the orders of Oaklands Chinese-American mayor Jean Quan

While President Obama was telling the small crowd at a $7500-a-plate fundraiser in San Francisco that “Change is possible,” Pooda Miller was across the bay trying to get her plate back from the Oakland Police Department. “They came, pulled out rifles, shot us up with tear gas and took all our stuff,” said Miller, at an afternoon rally condemning the violent evacuation of more than 170 peaceful, unarmed Occupy Oaklanders by 500 heavily-armed members of the Oakland Police Department and other local departments yesterday morning.

Miller and others are calling for the recall of Jean Quan, who made history as Oakland’s first Asian-American mayor (full disclosure: Quan’s daughter is my Facebook friend); and they are complaining about the use of excessive police violence authorized by Interim Chief Howard Jordan, an African American. Such conflicts between former minorities are becoming the norm in what more conservative commentators call the “post-racial” era ushered in by the election of Obama.

Quan and Jordan are in the throes of dealing with a police department plagued by officer-involved shootings and killings, corruption and other crimes-crimes that have forced a federal consent decree to reform the department, after officers were convicted of planting evidence and beating suspects in West Oakland. Taking her cue from the Obama campaign of 2008, Quan announced Jordan’s appointment at a public safety forum titled “Creating Hope in the Community.”

Many like Miller and other Occupy Oaklanders are having second thoughts about what feels like the affirmative actioning of policing and state violence. Others, like Ofelia Cuevas of the University of California’s Center for New Racial Studies, see the workings of a not-so-21st-century pattern of policing and power.

From Slate, Why Isn’t Tear Gas Illegal?

Yes, but only in war. The 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention doesn’t apply to domestic law enforcement. (The United States was a major proponent of the exemption, fearing that the convention might be interpreted to prohibit lethal injection.)

[]

In enclosed spaces, however, the chemical agent can have much more serious effects. When police plan to use tear gas grenades to flush suspects out of a house, they start by comparing the dose of CS with the volume of the building and calculating a “lethal concentration time.” That’s the number of minutes it will take before most people inside would die from exposure. If the lethal concentration time is nearing, and the suspects haven’t yet emerged, the police start breaking windows for ventilation.

It’s not entirely clear how many people have been killed by CS. Amnesty International said 50 Palestinians died from inhalation in the late 1980s-prompting a brief suspension of tear gas sales to Israel-but those conclusions are disputed. The FBI used CS in its raid on the Branch Davidian compound (PDF) in Waco, but the ensuing fire left it unclear how, exactly, the cult members were killed. Such incidents have prompted a search for less toxic crowd-dispersing chemicals such as malodorants, but none has proven as effective as tear gas. Russia appears to be moving in the other direction, using the powerful opiate fentanyl to incapacitate rebels during a 2002 hostage crisis. That approach ended up killing more than 100 innocent people.

The United States is so enthusiastic about riot-control agents that it has a standing Executive Order reserving the right to use them on the battlefield, in spite of the Chemical Weapons Convention’s prohibition, to protect convoys or prevent the use of civilian shields. While the U.S. hasn’t invoked the order since ratifying the Convention in 1997, Donald Rumsfeld made news in 2003 when he raised the possibility.

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

Occupy Wall Street NYC now has a web site for its General Assembly  with up dates and information. Very informative and user friendly. It has information about events, a bulletin board, groups and minutes of the GA meetings.

Date/Time

Date(s) – 26 Oct 2011

3:00 PM – 7:00 PM

Location

Liberty Plaza

Under the Big Red Thing

   March

Time:

3:00pm Sign Making in Liberty Plaza

4:00pm Open Speakout – come share your personal struggles with our healthcare system

4:30pm March Against the Health Insurance Industry

March Details:

4:30pm – Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield / One Liberty Plaza: located across the street from Zuccotti park, Empire is a subsidiary of WellPoint, the largest publicly-traded health insurance company. CEO Angela Braley’s overall compensation is $13.1 million dollars, enough to cover 1455 New Yorkers.

5:30pm – WellCare / 110 5th Ave: the for-profit company that administers Medicaid and Medicare Advantage programs in New York and other states. Currently being investigated for fraud with estimates that WellCare illegally siphoned $400 million to $600 million from state health insurance programs for the poor. (1)

6pm – St Vincent’s Community Hospital / 12th St & 7th Ave: closed earlier this year due to bankruptcy, St Vincent’s is a casualty of profit-driven insurers and a healthcare system that leaves 50 million Americans uninsured. There are now no hospitals on the westside below 57th st.

From our friend nyceve at Daily Kos

OAKLAND — Police fired tear gas at least five times Tuesday night into a crowd of several hundred protesters backing the Occupy movement who unsuccessfully tried to retake an encampment outside Oakland City Hall that officers had cleared away more than 12 hours earlier.

Police gave repeated warnings to protesters to disperse from the entrance to Frank Ogawa Plaza at 14th Street and Broadway before firing several tear gas canisters into the crowd at about 7:45 p.m. Police had announced over a loudspeaker that those who refused to leave could be targeted by “chemical agents.”

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

New York Governor, Andrew Cuomo, got told “No, we won’t do that” by Albany’s police and New York State troopers when ordered to clear Occupy Wall Street protesters from a park across the street from the state Capitol and Albany ‘s City Hall:

ALBANY — In a tense battle of wills, state troopers and Albany police held off making arrests of dozens of protesters near the Capitol over the weekend even as Albany’s mayor, under pressure from Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration, had urged his police chief to enforce a city curfew.

The situation intensified late Friday evening when Jennings, who has cultivated a strong relationship with Cuomo, directed his department to arrest protesters who refused to leave the city-owned portion of a large park that’s across Washington Avenue from the Capitol and City Hall.

At the Capitol, in anticipation of possibly dozens of arrests, a State Police civil disturbance unit was quietly activated, according to officials briefed on the matter but not authorized to comment publicly. But as the curfew neared, the group of protesters estimated at several hundred moved across an invisible line in the park from state land onto city property.

“We were ready to make arrests if needed, but these people complied with our orders,” a State Police official said. However, he added that State Police supported the defiant posture of Albany police leaders to hold off making arrests for the low-level offense of trespassing, in part because of concern it could incite a riot or draw thousands of protesters in a backlash that could endanger police and the public.

“We don’t have those resources, and these people were not causing trouble,” the official said. “The bottom line is the police know policing, not the governor and not the mayor.”

And to add to the ego deflation for Gov. Cuomo, Albany County District Attorney David Soares has stated:

“Our official policy with peaceful protesters is that unless there is property damage or injuries to law enforcement, we don’t prosecute people protesting,” Soares said. “If law enforcement engaged in a pre-emptive strike and started arresting people I believe it would lead to calamitous results, and the people protesting so far are peaceful.”

The camp has been named “Cuomoville”

Some protesters Monday were angry with the governor.

“Gov. Cuomo’s new name is Gov. 1 Percent because that’s who he chooses to represent – the more wealthy residents of New York state, those on Wall Street, his backers and supporters,” said Victorio Reyes, 37, a community organizer with the Social Justice Center of Albany who was making video reports from the park. “We’re not going to stand for it.”

Cuomo insists the temporary surcharge on incomes over $200,000 should expire Dec. 31, as planned when it was created under Gov. David Paterson to address a fiscal crisis. Cuomo and other opponents of the tax say it and a new proposal to tax earnings over $1 million would drive tax revenue and jobs out of state.

As anyone knows who has ever had to set up a military encampment or build a village from the ground up, occupations pose staggering logistical problems. Large numbers of people must be fed and kept reasonably warm and dry. Trash has to be removed; medical care and rudimentary security provided — to which ends a dozen or more committees may toil night and day. But for the individual occupier, one problem often overshadows everything else, including job loss, the destruction of the middle class, and the reign of the 1%. And that is the single question: Where am I going to pee?

Some of the Occupy Wall Street encampments now spreading across the U.S. have access to Port-o-Potties (Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C.) or, better yet, restrooms with sinks and running water (Fort Wayne, Indiana). Others require their residents to forage on their own. At Zuccotti Park, just blocks from Wall Street, this means long waits for the restroom at a nearby Burger King or somewhat shorter ones at a Starbucks a block away. At McPherson Square in D.C., a twenty-something occupier showed me the pizza parlor where she can cop a pee during the hours it’s open, as well as the alley where she crouches late at night. Anyone with restroom-related issues — arising from age, pregnancy, prostate problems, or irritable bowel syndrome — should prepare to join the revolution in diapers.

Of course, political protesters do not face the challenges of urban camping alone. Homeless people confront the same issues every day: how to scrape together meals, keep warm at night by covering themselves with cardboard or tarp, and relieve themselves without committing a crime. Public restrooms are sparse in American cities — “as if the need to go to the bathroom does not exist,” travel expert Arthur Frommer once observed.  And yet to yield to bladder pressure is to risk arrest.