Did the Feds Coordinate the Recent Occupy Crackdowns?

Posted: November 15, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: #Occupy and We are the 99 percent! | 45 Comments

This isn’t confirmed by any other sources so far, but Rick Ellis at The Examiner claims to have spoken to a Homeland Security official “on background,” and received confirmation that federal agencies coordinated the recent crackdowns on Occupy groups in multiple cities.

Over the past ten days, more than a dozen cities have moved to evict “Occupy” protesters from city parks and other public spaces. As was the case in last night’s move in New York City, each of the police actions shares a number of characteristics. And according to one Justice official, each of those actions was coordinated with help from Homeland Security, the FBI and other federal police agencies.

The official, who spoke on background to me late Monday evening, said that while local police agencies had received tactical and planning advice from national agencies, the ultimate decision on how each jurisdiction handles the Occupy protests ultimately rests with local law enforcement.

According to this official, in several recent conference calls and briefings, local police agencies were advised to seek a legal reason to evict residents of tent cities, focusing on zoning laws and existing curfew rules. Agencies were also advised to demonstrate a massive show of police force, including large numbers in riot gear. In particular, the FBI reportedly advised on press relations, with one presentation suggesting that any moves to evict protesters be coordinated for a time when the press was the least likely to be present.

This morning RalphB linked to a post at FDL about the Mayor Quan of Oakland admitting to taking part in a conference call with officials in 18 other cities.

And here’s an AP story that confirms cooperation among local officials, but not with the feds.

Don’t set a midnight deadline to evict Occupy Wall Street protesters _ it will only give a crowd of demonstrators time to form. Don’t set ultimatums because it will encourage violent protesters to break it. Fence off the parks after an eviction so protesters can’t reoccupy it.

As concerns over safety and sanitation grew at the encampments over the last month, officials from nearly 40 cities turned to each other on conference calls, sharing what worked and what hasn’t as they grappled with the leaderless movement.

In one case, the calls became group therapy sessions.

While riot police sweeping through tent cities in Portland, Ore., Oakland, Calif. and New York City over the last several days may suggest a coordinated effort, authorities and a group that organized the calls say they were a coincidence.

“It was completely spontaneous,” said Chuck Wexler, director of the Police Executive Research Forum, a national police group that organized calls on Oct. 11 and Nov. 4. Among the issues discussed: safety, traffic and the fierceness of demonstrations in each city.

“This was an attempt to get insight on what other departments were doing,” he said.

Oh sure. It was all a coincidence. These people must think we’re really stupid.

David Dayen has a post on the “disturbing silencing of the press in last night’s OWS raid.” He links to this NYT article:

As New York City police cleared the Occupy Wall Street campsite in Zuccotti Park early Tuesday morning, many journalists were blocked from observing and interviewing protesters. Some called it a “media blackout” and said in interviews that they believed that the police efforts were a deliberate attempt to tamp down coverage of the operation….

As a result, much of the early video of the police operation was from the vantage point of the protesters. Videos that were live-streamed on the Web and uploaded to YouTube were picked up by television networks and broadcast on Tuesday morning.

At a news conference after the park was cleared Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg defended the police behavior, saying that the media was kept away “to prevent a situation from getting worse and to protect members of the press.”

Yeah, right.

Some members of the media said they were shoved by the police. As the police approached the park they did not distinguish between protesters and members of the press, said Lindsey Christ, a reporter for NY1, a local cable news channel. “Those 20 minutes were some of the scariest of my life,” she said.

Ms. Christ said that police officers took a New York Post reporter standing near her and “threw him in a choke-hold.”

This is from Dayen’s post:

I’ll go one better than shoves and choke holds. Josh Harkinson of Mother Jones was forcibly dragged out of the ecampment, after sneaking in to witness the proceedings. He was one of the lucky few journalists to witness the batons and pepper spray that characterized the eviction of Zuccotti Park.

Other journalists were arrested in the exercise of doing their job. And by the way, there was violence coming from the police…

Please go read the rest at the FDL link. There also a lengthy article at the WSJ speculating on what could happen if the NYPD keeps the protesters from gathering in one place and instead they spread out over the city.

Protesters have aired plans to occupy subway stations and to march on the Brooklyn Bridge on Thursday, and several people in contact with the movement say organizers expect them to be their biggest events yet.

Christopher Dunn, executive legal associate of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said a truce has been in place between police and protesters over the last few weeks, easing tensions that arose after a pepper-spraying incident in September. Also sparking outrage was a threat by city officials last month to clear the park, but they reversed course.

“Since then,” Mr. Dunn said, “the police had not really been a big issue with the Zuccotti Park protesters. But now they are the issue.”

He said Tuesday’s eviction “is going to make police officers’ jobs much more difficult…Whatever benevolent attitude the protesters had about the police is gone.”

Wow, so much is happening! Please share links to anything you read or hear about this.

Super Cat Food Commission may have reached a Deal

Posted: November 15, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Catfood Commission, Economy | Tags: , , , | 47 Comments

There are nine days left until November 23rd and automatic spending cuts that are supposed to punish deadlock.  Our economy is weak.  Exactly how much recessionary pressure will the austerity pogrom inflict on the country?  Exactly how much will the unemployment rate go up and the economic growth go down when we do the exact opposite thing that all accepted and proven economic theory would have us do?  Well, there’s hints at a deal.  Get ready for a double dipper!

The panel needs seven votes on a deal to force at least $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction over the next 10 years. Sen. Pat Toomey (R) of Pennsylvania last week broke with his party’s anti-tax pledge to propose some $300 billion in new tax revenues. Democrats are said to be on the verge of a counterproposal, as early as today, to include new cuts in entitlement spending likely to offend their party’s base.

Tax increases and entitlement spending cuts = decreases in aggregate demand = decreases in prices and wages and decrease in economic growth/GDP/Income = more unemployment.  Exactly who are they pleasing with this policy? Themselves?  Their Wall Street Overlords?  The Grinch?

There’s a lot of ignorance built in to this group.

Based on what we do know, however, both sides are playing big time budget baseline games. When they talk taxes, Republicans start by assuming the 2001/2003/2010 tax cuts will all be extended indefinitely. From there, they talk about cutting rates across the board and reducing tax preferences (perhaps with some cap on these breaks). All of this, it is reported, would boost revenue by a few hundred billion dollars over 10 years.

Sounds promising. But by starting by extending the Bush era tax cuts, the Rs would reduce revenues by $4 trillion compared to what would happen if Congress simply lets them expire as scheduled a year from now. So, Republicans would add $4 trillion to the deficit before cutting a paltry $200-$300 billion. In anyplace but Washington this would add up to another $3.7 or $3.8 trillion in red ink. Here, it counts as deficit reduction. Worse, even those dollars appear to result from presumed economic growth rather than policy changes. The wonders of dynamic scoring!

Democrats are playing their own games. While Politico reports this morning that they are proposing $400 billion in Medicare and Medicaid cuts (most of which would come out of the hides of doctors, hospitals, nursing homes, and other providers), the Dems also start by assuming a fix to the ongoing battle over Medicare reimbursements to physicians.  Straightening out this mess could cost as much as $300 billion over the next 10 years. The Ds do say they’d pay for the fix—but with money from the drawdown of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. This money is fiscal pixie dust, since the troops are already coming home and those funds were never going to be spent.

If the built-in assumption is indefinite extension of those reckless Bush tax cuts, we might as write the nation off as a banana republic right now. This is especially true when you consider what will be downsized in response to rewarding the rich for moving jobs overseas, gambling in the Wall Street Casino, and not expanding business here because the economic outlook will continue to be glum.  There are a few hints on what has to go in order to extend these indefensible tax cuts. What will the Dems trade in order to get some tax revenues placed on the table?

Democrats aren’t offering to simply take the GOP at their word. Their plan is to make any cuts to programs like Medicare and Social Security part of a trigger that would only be pulled if and when Congress passes hundreds of billions of dollars in new revenue.

Multiple Democratic aides confirm their strategy hasn’t changed: Dems will only support this sort of two-step tax reform process if there are serious revenue guarantees and the deal includes a trigger to make sure the revenue materializes.

If that sounds a little Rube Goldbergish to you, it is. But both parties have basically agreed that the Super Committee wouldn’t have enough time between its launch and its deadline to write a full overhaul of the tax code. So Dems are privately insisting that any future promised revenue come with more than a promise. If the GOP can’t deliver the votes for it, then the safety net cuts they want disappear. That’s not to predict that they’ll stick with this demand until the bitter end — for liberal groups, vigilance is key.

Ever heard of out of sight, out of mind?  If the Repubs delay the tax details and the Dems still try to eek something out, how will this work?  Follow that link to a bunch of other links with this short intro.

As the panel’s Nov. 23 deadline approaches and doubts about its ability for success persist, a new approach is emerging in which the panel may opt to postpone politically difficult decisions by deciding the amount of new revenue their deficit-reduction plan would require, but leaving specifics to Congress’ tax-writing committees to fill in next year.

So is this a deal or a punt?

It seems that K Street isn’t giving up on keeping all the lights lit on the tree for their special interests.  This doesn’t bode well.  The meat may get thrown out while the fat and grizzle are still on the plate.

And 125 companies and groups made another pitch to the super committee on the importance of setting aside additional unlicensed spectrum for new technologies like ultra-fast Wi-Fi.

Google, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and others said they worry that if the panel gives the Federal Communications Commission authority to conduct incentive auctions, that the FCC’s move last year to open up the spaces between television channels for unlicensed use could be derailed.

“We urge Congress to give the FCC the flexibility to preserve TV band spectrum for unlicensed super Wi-Fi devices and deliver innovation to American consumers and economic growth to our nation,” they wrote in the letter to the co-chairs of the super committee, Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.

Yup.  That’s so much more important than feeding hungry children, creating jobs, and fulfilling our obligations to seniors.  It seems that most people will have to search out the bags of dry food while a whole lot of businesses that don’t seem to be able to function without subsidies will still be dining on fancy feast.

Hillary in Hawaii Open Thread

Posted: November 15, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: just because, U.S. Politics | Tags: , , | 7 Comments

I thought we could use another pick-me-up, so here’s a great anecdote about Hillary from The New York Daily News.

Hillary Clinton’s trip to Hawaii took a hilarious turn when a half-naked man interrupted her photo op and streaked in the background with nothing but a flaming torch and loin cloth.

Video of the incident, which surfaced Tuesday, shows the Secretary of State busting out a hearty laugh and clapping her hands when she spots the man zooming by.

“Th[at] was great!” Clinton exclaimed to the media. “I hope you all captured that.”

Clinton had been posing for photos with Donald Tsang, Hong Kong’s chief executive on Saturday as the man appeared in the shot.

Barely containing herself, she then patted Tsang on the shoulder and joked “People will wonder what the chief executive is doing.”

Here’s the video:

Poverty in These United States

Posted: November 15, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Austerity, children, Economy, hunger, income inequality, poverty, seniors, unemployment | Tags: , , , | 10 Comments

We are not Afghanistan.  We are not Haiti or the Democratic Republic of the Congo.  We are not any of the 3rd world nations that are sometimes callously referred to as the ‘black holes’ of the world, where national incomes range between $700-900 annually, where human assets in nutrition, education, health and adult literacy are the lowest of the low.  Nor do national fluctuations in agriculture production, instability of import/export services or economic smallness define us.

We are decidedly not one of the least developed nations on the planet.  Quite the contrary.  We are the richest, most powerful and technologically advanced nation the world has ever known.

Yet poverty exists and is rising.  American poverty is a fact, a condition defined not by 3rd world standards but by the standards of who and what we are as a premier Nation among all nations.

No sooner had the Census Bureau come out with its findings on poverty–the first report in September, followed by a supplemental report in early November—the naysayers lined up reminding us that the findings were misleading, that many of the so-called poor had cars and TVs, that children of the poor sported Xboxes. And my God, a goodly number actually have air conditioning!  I suspect many have heating, too.

The arguments are that unless a family or individual meets a 3rd-world definition of poverty then even the mention of rising American poverty levels falls into the category of gross exaggeration.  This in a time when unemployment is the top concern of the American electorate, when unemployment sits ‘officially’ at 9% but, in fact, has reached nearly 20%, when from 2001-2009 42,400 American factories closed their doors to traditional middle-class jobs.  This is also in a time of historical corporate profits and obscene CEO salaries in the financial services industry that through casino betting, accounting fraud and governmental bailouts brought this country and the world to its knees. And continues to do so, eg., MF Global headed by former NJ Governor Jon Corzine. 

The old canards are being taken for a rerun as well: poverty is a symptom of lazy minds and an entitlement generation or an unwillingness to work hard and save money.  Many will recall the Welfare Queen stories of the past, imagined always as a black woman with a dozen children, driving idly around town in her brand new Caddie.  Living life high on the hog, the hysterical claims insisted, bilking government largesse [ otherwise known as taxpayer money].  But as Ralph B. noted in an earlier thread, there’s nary a word about corporate/millionaire welfare, where companies and even individuals skate on Federal taxes through loopholes and accounting maneuvers and government handouts

Let’s get real.  The fallout of 2007-2008 hit many average families between the eyes, this after wages had been stagnating for three decades with a beginning upswing in the 90s, wage advancements quickly lost since 2000. Prices, however, have continued to rise, commodity prices in particular, those base products— gas, foodstuffs—that we all rely on to survive.  Medical costs/premiums have gone through the roof.  Is it any wonder seniors, who face a disproportionate share of medical problems and costs, have gotten caught in the old trap of choosing food or drugs?  Children are caught up in the economic whirlwind, too, as parents lose jobs and homes, scramble for low-paying, part-time positions, work that frequently is not enough to ensure adequate food and/or nutrition on a consistent basis.  Should we be surprised then at the increase of American children now classified as ‘food insecure?’ 

Here’s what we know:

49.1 million Americans have fallen into poverty, 16% of the population or 1 in 7 Americans.

Nearly 20% of that number are children; nearly 16% of the indigent are 65 years and older.

21.5% of American children have been classified as ‘food insecure.’

1 in 15 Americans are classified as the ‘poorest of the poor, which in 2010 translated to $5570 or less for an individual, $11,157 for a family of four.

The Census Bureau’s Supplemental report issued earlier this month takes into account governmental assistance—food stamps, the earned income tax credit, school lunch programs etc—without which the statistics above would be even worse.

From a Center on Budget and Policy Priorities report:

Six temporary federal initiatives enacted in 2009 and 2010 to bolster the economy by lifting consumers’ incomes and purchases kept nearly 7 million Americans out of poverty in 2010, under an alternative measure of poverty that takes into account the impact of government benefit programs and taxes. These initiatives — three new or expanded tax credits, two enhancements of unemployment insurance, and an expansion of benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly called food stamps) — were part of the 2009 Recovery Act. Congress subsequently extended or expanded some of them.

Hence the total number of persons in poverty would have been even higher last year if not for the six government initiatives.

Btw, the link above gives a rather shocking comparison between the poverty rates in the US and Brazil.  Not pretty.

Yet, Michelle Bachmann’s prescription as well as many of her Republican colleagues is based on the old saw: self-reliance, an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay.  This in a time of record unemployment and rising poverty in the general population.

How many statistics, comparisons, articles and images are necessary to convince the disbelieving that American poverty is on the rise, that it is not the result of coddling, laziness or lack of self-reliance?  Or perhaps we must admit that there is also a poverty of spirit and reason running rampant through country, blinding those who would blame fellow citizens for the dearth of employment and opportunity without offering any workable solutions to an ever growing, bleak reality.

Let’s Hear It For the Girl

Posted: November 15, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Banksters, Democratic Politics, Economy, Elizabeth Warren Campaign, Feminists, income inequality, investment banking, Media | Tags: , , , | 10 Comments

Elizabeth Warren, the Woman Who Would Throw Stones, The Matriarch of Mayhem, the Socialist Whore [according to an irate party crasher] dedicated to turn your first born into a Marxist revolutionary and the woman who dares to run for the late Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat in Massachussets has produced her first political ad.  Ooooo, scary!

Now think about the ads Karl Rove’s outfit, Crossroads GPS, has run against Elizabeth Warren–the attacks, the baseless accusations.  This straightforward introduction is a breath of fresh air.  And that is why Elizabeth Warren is so very dangerous.

Let’s hear it for the girl!

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