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from Anthony De Rosa:
A 2011 timeline of protest, revolution and uprising.
View the story "2011 Timeline of Protest, Revolution and Uprising" on Storify]
from Unstructured Finance:
At the intersection of Wall and Main
By Jennifer Ablan and Matthew Goldstein
Whether you agree with it or not, the Occupy Wall Street protests that began two months ago in New York have ignited a debate over income inequality and the political clout of the nation’s banks.
Before the protesters began camping out in Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan, much of the conversation had focused on the federal government’s debt and not the equally big debt run-up by U.S. consumers in the years before the financial crisis. Now it seems you can’t go a day without reading a story about the vast gulf between rich and poor and the shrinking middle class, or how the housing crisis won’t get fixed until something is done to alleviate the burden for millions of homeowners who are underwater on their mortgages.
Last month a group of graduate journalism students from Columbia University spent some time at the Occupy Wall Street encampment in Zuccotti where they did in-depth interviews with over 200 protesters. (This was before New York City moved to forbid people from sleeping out in the concrete plaza). And the students findings were surprising in that the OWS protesters weren’t just a bunch of unemployed hippies, who all vote Democratic. Rather, they found that the majority of protesters didn’t identify with either political party, 56 percent didn’t have private health insurance and just under 40 percent gave President Obame a grade of C for managing the economy.
We talked to two of the students, Lili Holzer-Glier and Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato, and this video discusses some of their research.
The findings of the Columbia students are something that many who work on Wall Street might want to pay more attention to. In our story “The Wall Street Disconnect,” we found that many of the 1 percent of the finance world just don’t get why so many people in the U.S. and around the world are upset with their profession.
The disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street is a bit startling, given that three years after the worst of the financial crisis unemployment remains at 9 percent, 15 percent of the country is on food stamps and at least 20 million people live in extreme poverty in this country. And in many states, entire neighborhoods are ravaged by foreclosures.
from Tales from the Trail:
House Democrat wants GOP apology for threats and violence
House Democrat Barney Frank says Republican leaders should apologize for threats and vandalism against Democrats who've had the temerity to back President Barack Obama's legislative agenda.
Why? The Massachusetts Democrat says Republicans have actually been cheering on the bad behavior. And, he adds, recent Republican condemnations have not gone far enough.
"I'm glad that my Republican leadership colleagues now have decided to denounce it. But they've been very late to do that. Over the weekend, they were much more egging on this kind of behavior than denouncing it," he told ABC's Good Morning America. "I think there ought to be some apologies."
First, there was House Republican leader John Boehner's castigating remark last week about the "punk staffers" who are working on Democratic financial reform legislation. Frank believes that comment was the starting gun for increasingly aggressive rhetoric by Republicans and their supporters.
Then there were the folks in the House balcony on Sunday who disrupted the healthcare proceedings with shouts that prompted security officers to act.
"Republicans were standing on their feet, cheering them on, urging them physically to resist the officials," Frank told ABC. "To undo that, I think they should apologize."
Follow the link to the video. The congressman is spit upon at 00:13 seconds. Only a partisan lying hack would see this and say nothing happened.
from Financial Regulatory Forum:
U.S. bankers gather in Chicago, face protests
CHICAGO, Oct 26 (Reuters) - A top banking industry group on Monday defended the practices of traditional banks while facing protesters who railed against Wall Street abuses.
The American Bankers Association, which has gathered for its annual convention, said the protests were misplaced because it is largely community bankers that are attending.
"You did not make any abusive subprime loans; you did not take big bonuses for products that later blew up," ABA President Edward Yingling said during his opening remarks.
The Service Employees International Union, a major labor group, estimates that up to 5,000 people will join the protests over the next couple of days.
Protesters gathered outside the hotel hosting the convention on Sunday night, holding signs that said, "Hold Banks Accountable," and chanting for changes to the banking industry.
"The big banks heard loud and clear tonight that taxpayers are fed up with them taking our money and using it to pay themselves outrageous profits and lobby against financial reform," the SEIU posted on its website.
from Tales from the Trail:
New president cheered, old one jeered
WASHINGTON - They came to cheer a new president. Some came to jeer the old one as well.
As a helicopter carried George W. Bush away from the U.S. capital where he has served as president for the past eight years, those in the crowd sang the taunting sports anthem, "Na na na na, hey hey, goodbye."
The 43rd president certainly didn't hear them. But he might have seen the "Arrest Bush" signs waved by some spectators as he rode in the presidential limousine toward the Capitol with his successor Barack Obama.
He also might have heard the chants of "No more Bush" shortly before the swearing-in ceremony began.
The sentiment was apparently widespread.
"People have been coming up to me all day saying, 'Nice sign, let me take a picture,'" said Washington prison guard Jewell Lee, 44, referring to her styrofoam sign that said simply: "GET OUT."
Some in the crowd taunted Bush with his own words and slogans.
from Tales from the Trail:
Activists “shoe” Bush out the White House door
Critics of outgoing President George W. Bush turned a stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue outside the White House into a rowdy street theater on the eve of his handover of power to Barack Obama.
An activist coalition calling itself ShoeBush.org piled a motley collection of dozens of old shoes, including tan combat boots said to have been worn by U.S. troops in Iraq and children's bright yellow flip-flops, at what amounted to Bush's doorstep.
"We wanted to shoo and boo Bush on his last day in office," said Ann Wilcox of Washington D.C., who marched with the group of about 500 peace activists.
The footwear was tossed between Inaugural parade reviewing stands under watchful eyes of uniformed Secret Service officers. It was a reminder of an Iraqi journalist, Muntazer al-Zaidi, who hurled his two shoes at Bush during a news conference marking the outgoing president's farewell visit to Iraq.
A hooded, black-clad man posing as the Grim Reaper stood nearby with a sign saying "Death thanks Bush and Cheney." The reaper, in an interview, added: "They've been very good for business." A giant Bush bobblehead in prisoner's stripes paraded nearby, his hands in chains as if being led away under arrest.
Others handed out black and white postcard-sized signs urging "Arrest Bush" to the hundreds of onlookers, many who had come from afar to celebrate Obama's swearing-in at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue at noon on Tuesday.
"You voted for change now use your voice to demand justice," the group's handout urged. "Tell the new U.S. attorney general to appoint an independent special prosecutor to investigate the crimes of the Bush administration."
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from Tales from the Trail:
Biden smells “victory” in the air for Obama
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Just two days before the U.S. presidential election, Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden smells victory for Barack Obama.
Speaking at Florida State University in Tallahassee, his first in a three-stop swing through the battleground state of Florida on Sunday, Biden pointed to a dramatic bronze statue entitled "Unconquered" outside the university's stadium.
"This is a great place to have this rally in front of the 'Seminole Unconquered'. I tell you, I don't think you ever approach this stadium without smelling victory in the air," Biden said.
The statue depicts a spear-brandishing Seminole Indian astride a rearing horse and was designed to "capture the indomitable spirit" of the Seminole people, says the university's website.
With polls showing Obama ahead of Republican John McCain, Florida Sen. Bill Nelson was also in an upbeat mood when he introduced Biden.
"Do you smell victory in the air?," Nelson said. "I suspect on Tuesday night we are going to be singing 'happy days are here again'," he told about 2,000 enthusiastic supporters.
A small group of protesters shouted anti-Obama slogans on the outskirts of the rally and Biden had a message for them and other McCain supporters who were criticizing Obama.
from Tales from the Trail:
102 arrested in Minneapolis after rock show
A standoff between rock fans and police led to 102 arrests Wednesday night when fired-up concertgoers took to the streets after a Rage Against the Machine show.
Several hundred fans of the band, whose songs include "Take the Power Back," and "Bullet in the Head," marched through downtown Minneapolis after the band finished its set at the Target Center arena.
The show ended at roughly the same time as the third night of the Republican convention across the Mississippi River in St. Paul. Fans of the politically radical band mixed with exuberant Republicans headed to exclusive parties where they toasted vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's speech.
As police in riot gear faced shirtless rock fans in the streets, Republicans looked on from the rooftop deck of the exclusive R. Norman's steakhouse, where bigwigs like Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman pressed the flesh.
Many of those at the party were not impressed with the spectacle.
"They'll claim police brutality, then sue and win and make enough money to come to the next convention," one partygoer said.
"They can sit there all night because they don't have jobs," said another.
from Tales from the Trail:
Pepper spray again perfumes St. Paul streets
The invigorating scent of pepper spray perfumed downtown St. Paul again on Tuesday.
Police used percussion grenades, tear gas and pepper spray to push protesters out of downtown at the end of an otherwise peaceful march for poor people that drew more than 1,000 participants.
The event largely avoided the chaos that engulfed the area on Monday, when bands of black-clad anarchists smashed store windows and threw rocks and bottles at police.
Police said they had made 10 arrests over the course of the day, far short of the 284 arrested on Monday.
Earlier Tuesday, anarchists vowed further disruptions througout the week. The Secret Service warned that some might target journalists.
Tuesday's march, organized by the Poor People's Human Economic Human Rights Campaign, picked up steam after it passed the State Capitol, where the police had canceled a performance by the rock band Rage Against the Machine.
Protesters headed downtown, and organizers tried to deliver a message to the Republicans through the security fence surrounding the Xcel Center, where Republicans were holding their convention. Many protesters went home after that.
from Tales from the Trail:
Police, protesters clash near convention
ST. PAUL - Police in riot gear used pepper spray and smoke bombs against a few hundred violent protesters on Monday, and at least a dozen were arrested outside the arena where the Republican party opened its presidential convention.
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In the video above, a police officer lobs a smoke bomb in the direction of the camera.
Officers on horseback, motorcycles and bicycles chased down a group of rock- and bottle-throwing protesters that had broken off from a larger, largely peaceful, march by as many as 10,000 people. The smaller group smashed police car windows and a Macy's storefront, and a few threw glass bottles at police.
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In the video above, police march down Kellogg Avenue in St Paul.
A Reuters reporter saw police handcuffing some of the protesters in a parking lot not far from the convention.
