the Occupy movement, through its steadfast refusal to respond to police provocation, resonated across the country. Losing this moral authority, this ability to show through nonviolent protest the corruption and decadence of the corporate state, would be crippling to the movement. It would reduce us to the moral degradation of our oppressors. And that is what our oppressors want. — Continue Reading
Where is the church now? Where are the clergy? Why do so many church doors remain shut? Why do so many churches refuse to carry out the central mandate of the Christian Gospel and lift up the cross? Some day they are going to have to answer the question: “Where were you when they crucified my Lord?†—Chris Hedges, from Continue Reading
This is really disappointing to see and hear. I saw tweets to this effect last night, that Maher had bad mouthed #OWS, and now I heard it on this video (and read the transcript) ….Just as Bill tends to get a bit cyncial and testy about religion, he’s going to say what he thinks at just about any moment. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/02/04/bill_maher_tells_occupy_protesters_to_get_a_job.html Wes Continue Reading
From the Opinion column of The Tennessean by Bill Howell of Nashville. Occupation makes a powerful statement about the depth of one’s commitment to obtaining a redress of grievances that cannot be made in another manner. http://www.tennessean.com/article/20120131/OPINION03/301310012/Fight-bill-will-quash-assembly-rights My agreement with this goes as follows: The country, the state, and the people in it deserve to know, and must know, what Continue Reading
Environmental activist and Sojourners contributor Bill McKibben on OWS Because they didn’t quickly say “we want this bill passed,†commentators have had to grapple with the actual message of many Occupiers: Our economy is unfair. It gives too much power to corporations, who abuse that power for their own ends. They’ve not just cheated us financially; they’ve cheated us out Continue Reading
Ughh. This article is so typical. Bank CEO “talks some sense” into a strawman OWS person. Most #OWS peopel would see this as just the kind of impasse at which we presently find ourselves. http://www.northbaybusinessjournal.com/47776/what-if-a-bank-ceo-and-occupy-wall-street-sat-down-over-coffee/ Now doesn’t that make sense when you “settle down” and realize that we do this for EVERYONE? Yeah. Right.
Just watched this impressive conversation between Lawrence Lessig and Chris Hedges on the situation in the United States re: the “Winner Take All Politics” (to borrow a title from a book whose authors Bill MOyers had on his opening week of his new show recently). I had downloaded a sample chapter of Lessig’s latest book Republic Lost, and now I Continue Reading
It just occurred to me that the SOTU tends to be GNOSTIC in it’s nationalism. It’s the fashion to feature “highlighted” individual stories in the State of the Union. But when it comes to movements, FIRE! BAD! No mention of what the obvious popular movement that has brought the very issues and themes upon which that Obama executed his oratory. Continue Reading
What a dandy swipe at the elite of the elite: If you’re Europe, and your struggling people are called “Greeksâ€, and your rich people are called “Germansâ€, then the World Economic Forum will spend pretty much limitless amounts of time and effort on attempts to understand the dynamics between the two and (doomed) plans to try to prevent it from Continue Reading
If Matt Taibi sees a possibility of some real hope here, then that itself is a reason for hope. Taibbi lays it out, and concludes with this: Obama’s decision to tap Schneiderman publicly, and dump Geithner, and whisper about a millionaire’s tax, signals a shift in its public attitude toward the Wall Street corruption issue. The administration is clearly listening to Continue Reading
Another clueless critique , this time from Chrsi Christie , suggestingthat the Civil Rights movement would have gotten the gains by putting it to a vote. Similarly, there have been people who criticize Occupy saying that there is no need for “the silly protests” because they have the mechanism of voting to speak for them. But that IS why there Continue Reading
From Jesse Jackson op-ed for CNN: Dr. King was an occupier, our country occupied by the vicious and divisive legal segregation. His last great campaign was the Poor People’s Campaign, aimed at occupying the Mall in the nation’s Capitol to address abounding poverty, the demands for a job or an income for all, health care for all. When Dr. King Continue Reading
Once again, I want to repeat how glad I am to have the voice of Bill Moyers back on television. A friend of mine has often lamented that Moyers should be on the news shows ALL THE TIME. I agree. He should be persistently pursued for the treasures of knowledge he aggregates in his wonderf ully informative interviews. He brings Continue Reading
One of the things for which the Net has been invaluable in my journey of late is to keep me “in the loop” with what is happening amongst the Occupy movement. I hear various people talking about how they aren’t noticing Occupy much of late. Well one, if you depend on the mainstream media, that will be the impression. But Continue Reading
Salon has two sections on their website related to #Occupy. One is an “Occupy Wall Street” section, and one is an “American Spring” section. I am looking into both of these to see what the differences are. I am putting this in my #OccupyTheology section/post-type, beause I draw a close relation between “theological thought”, and the aspirations of the passionately Continue Reading