Tuesday, November 29: Time to act to support Occupy OKC

According to a press release sent by Occupy OKC Outreach Moderator Beth Isbell,:

Despite police assuring us that OKC had no intention of evicting us on 11/28 at 2 of our past three General Assemblies, Occupy OKC received a letter from OKC Police Chief Bill Citty today doing exactly that - calling for our eviction if we did not vacate park & take all equipment by 11pm tonight!  We have attorneys helping us, including the National Lawyers Guild & the ACLU.  We tried to pay permit fees first thing today as instructed, but were called to meeting with police this afternoon & provided Chief's letter.  Our attorneys asked for more time & have asked for mediation.  We have been called to a meeting with Chief Citty tomorrow morning at 8:15am.  We do not know if they still intend to carry through on their eviction threat for tonight.  We are cooperating and attempting to avoid confrontation.

As a resident of Oklahoma City, I object to my city government acting to suppress the free speech rights of ordinary citizens. I decided to express my objections in an e-mail I just sent to Mayor Mick Cornett and to Ed Shadid, who represents me in the OKC City Council. Here is what I said:

Dear Mayor Cornett and Councillor Shadid:

I am writing to express my concern about the possible eviction by the city of the Occupy OKC encampment at Kerr Park. As a resident of City Council Ward 2 in Oklahoma City, I support the right of Occupy OKC to carry out its continuing peaceful protest in Kerr Park. I oppose any efforts by my city government to evict the occupiers.

The Occupy OKC encampment is a peaceful gathering of citizens using their First Amendment rights to work for political change. The occupiers have faithfully paid for a permit to stay in the park overnight. Recently, the occupiers have been told by City of Oklahoma City representatives that they would be permitted to remain in the park so long as they continued to pay the permit. Despite these reassurances, the occupiers received a letter from Police Chief Bill Citty warning them that they needed to evacuate. This eviction notice seems to be a clear attempt by city officials to suppress the expression of ideas they don't like. This is not how a free society is supposed to work.

Citizen involvement in OKC's city government is shockingly low. City Council meetings are held at a time when most ordinary working people can't attend. Extremely few people even bother to vote in city elections, probably because they think it won't make any difference in the way things are done. This has long a city government by the Chamber of Commerce and for the Chamber of Commerce, and the needs of average citizens are most often ignored. The Occupy movement's presence in Kerr Park is a constructive first step toward ordinary people learning to take back their own city government. Such citizen involvement should be encouraged and not stifled.

Again, I urge you to do everything in your power as elected officials to make sure that Occupy OKC is permitted to remain in Kerr Park. Please let me know what action you will take on this issue.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth G. "Betsy" Brown

I encourage other supporters of Occupy OKC -- especially OKC residents -- to contact Oklahoma City's elected representatives to express your support in your own words. You can find contact information for Oklahoma City's elected officials here. If you don't know which city council ward you live in, you can find that information on this ward map. Occupiers are also calling for supporters to gather at Kerr Park to support them. For more information, you can see the Facebook page for Occupy OKC Official, or visit the Web site.

OWS library destroyed, site created

Last night we were offered the vain hope that the materials that made up Occupy Wall Street's public library had been preserved by the police. It turns out that the police actually destroyed most of the library. Thanks to Kevin Hicks for posting the link to this article in American Libraries about the destruction and re-birth of the OWS library. Christian Zabriskie writes:

Library staff were assured that they would be able to recover their materials from a city sanitation depot. Indeed, the firestorm of public hue and cry that followed the clearing of the park, the destruction of the library was the only aspect of the action to which the city directly responded. However, when library staff attempted to collect the library’s property on the morning of November 16, they found the laptops smashed, much of the collection missing, and many of the books that were recovered damaged beyond recovery. The damage to the library’s archives of zines, writings, art, and original works is devastating and irreparable.

Protesters were allowed back into Zuccotti Park less than 24 hours after they were cleared out, following a variety of legal decisions. The library was immediately restarted with a half a dozen paperbacks. Within two hours the collection was up to over 100 volumes and the library was fully functioning—cataloging, lending, and providing reference services. “The library is still open” was repeated like a mantra. “This is why I became a librarian, this is why I went to library school,” Library Working Group member Zachary Loeb said of the rebuilding. He was also quick to point out that, while he had helped to build and maintain the collection knowing full well that the park would probably be cleared eventually, the manner in which it was done hit him hard.

Tents and tarps are strictly forbidden in Zuccotti Park now. During the reoccupation on the evening of November 15, it started to rain so library staff put a clear plastic trash bag over the collection. Within minutes a detail of about 10 police descended and demanded that the covering be removed because they deemed the garbage bag to be a tarp. There were a few tense minutes as staff tried to convince them otherwise, but ultimately it was removed—leaving the collection open to the elements. As the police withdrew, scores of people chanted “BOOKS … BOOKS … BOOKS … BOOKS.” There was still concern that the park might be cleared again that night, and one officer made it clear that “unclaimed property will be removed and disposed of” in reference to the collection. Library staff quickly set up umbrellas over the bulk of the books and began sending librarians home with bags of books to keep the collection safe in remote locations.

Nonetheless, the library remains open.

Zabriskie's article contains a link to Occupy Educated, a site created by the OWS Practical Change Working Group as an emergency response to the library's destruction. According to the creators of the Occupy Educated site:

If you are curious about why Occupy Wall Street has turned into Occupy Everywhere, if you want a basic understanding of the problems in the system that make this stand necessary, these are the books to start with, in no particular order.

Shock Doctrine – Naomi Klein
Debt: The First 5000 Years - David Graeber
End of Growth – Richard Heinberg
In Defense of Food - Michael Pollan
Griftopia – Matt Taibbi

I don't know if this is the same five books I would pick. I do know that I think I picked a good time to start library school.

Occupy OKC to march for change in OKC politics November 17

This just in from Occupy OKC:

Occupy Wall Street announced a National Day of Action for November 17th and plans for the NYC protestors to occupy the New York Stock Exchange before the bell rings and NYC subways throughout the morning, and are calling for thousands to converge on Foley Square and proceed to Occupy the Bridges to shut down NYC’s business district for a day to protest financial corruption. http://occupywallst.org/action/november-17th/.

In solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, Occupy OKC supporters will begin gathering at
2pm at Kerr Park (now renamed Poet’s Park) to march to City Hall this Thursday at 3pm
and conduct a protest rally against Maps III to highlight local corruption and protest the undue amount of big corporate money influencing local campaigns, to demand raises for police, firefighters, and teachers and show support for Oklahoma City municipal workers.

This link should provide more information about the November 17 protest: https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=266340980079556.

 

Wall Street Re-Occupied?

It's almost seven o'clock at night. I have schoolwork to do, and a novel to write. I'm taking a few minutes away from everything to write a brief blog post about Occupy Wall Street trying to reoccupy LibertyZucotti Park. A USTREAM video of events at the park right now, on the evening of November 15, can be found right here.




Rachel Signer has an excellent post at thenation.com about how the New York City movement is reacting to the a New York state supreme court justice's refusal to extend an order that would have allowed the occupier to retake the park.

A young man named Tim Weldon, who has been active in running a daily debate group in Zuccotti Park called Think Tank, said that he’d heard that Mayor Bloomberg had said, at a press conference that morning, that the protesters would now have to occupy the park only with their ideas. “What have we been doing all along?” said Weldon. “We’ve been here, discussing ideas about how to make the world a better place. Where has Mayor Bloomberg been?” He said that Think Tank would find a way to go on, even if they couldn’t hold it in the park.

“Mayor Bloomberg has been saying that we could stay here. But then he gave into his authoritarian temptations and kicked us out,” said Bill Dobbs, who has been involved with the Occupy Wall Street public relations working group, and has been at the park nearly every day over the past seven weeks.

“It’s too early to tell what will happen. This is a setback but we will regroup, continue organizing, and be stronger than ever,” Dobbs continued, as protesters swarmed around him, yelling, “Whose park? Our park?”

The Nation's John Nichol's has a moving editorial on how the raid on the park in the dark of the night also represented a direct attack on the First Amendment.

Meanwhile, in Oklahoma City the Occupy OKC Official Facebook Page has a link to a new Web page for the group at okcupy.com. The other Web site for the group, at http://www.occupyokc.com/, is also still up.

I've heard that city governments across the nation are simultaneously evicting Occupy movements from their camping places, but I really have to get back to my school work and don't have time to research that.

Honoring peace workers on Armistice Day

As I remind readers of my blog every November 11th, the holiday we celebrate today was originally called Armistice Day. This interesting essay explains why:

Believe it or not, November 11th was not made a holiday in order to celebrate war, support troops, or cheer the 11th year of occupying Afghanistan. This day was made a holiday in order to celebrate an armistice that ended what was up until that point, in 1918, one of the worst things our species had thus far done to itself, namely World War I.

World War I, then known simply as the world war or the great war, had been marketed as a war to end war. Celebrating its end was also understood as celebrating the end of all wars. A ten-year campaign was launched in 1918 that in 1928 created the Kellogg-Briand Pact, legally banning all wars. That treaty is still on the books, which is why war making is a criminal act and how Nazis came to be prosecuted for it.

As usual on Armistice Day, I want honor those who work for peace. This year I would like to honor the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. WILPF was founded in 1915, at the height of the Great War whose ending is celebrated by Armistice Day. Nearly 100 years later, this organization continues to work for peace, disarmament. economic justice, the environment, racial justice, and human rights. Plus, they sponsor this really cool site dedicated to ending corporate personhood.

WILPF, I salute you. In the words of Holly Near, "the bravest warriors are the ones who stand for peace."

(Hat tip to Coleen Rowley for the link to the post about Armistice Day.)

Occupy OKC protests at governor's mansion

Occupy OKC on way to governor's mansion 11-09-11

Yesterday evening on my way home from work I tried to stop by Occupy OKC's march on Governor Mary Fallin's official residence. My efforts didn't quite work the way I hoped they would. First, I didn't remember the location of the march, and when I arrived at the Oklahoma State Capitol about 6:30, no one was there.

Perplexed, I got back in my car at about 6:45 and continued driving west on Twenty Third Avenue. Soon I saw a string of protesters marching east on Twenty Third marching noisily but peacefully behind a US flag. I also saw the flashing lights of a police vehicle. I parked my car and tried to catch up on foot with the marchers. This took a few minutes, as I don't walk quite as fast as I used to.

I caught up with the demonstrators near the capitol.  There were between 25 and 30 protesters. Just as I arrived, I witnessed an interesting conversation between the marchers and the police officers (probably state police, but I'm not sure). They were discussing the specifics of the marchers' permit.

Occupy OKC marcher talking with officer

 I couldn't hear most of the conversation, but at the end of it, a member of the Occupy OKC group shook an officer's hand. Using the "human microphone," marchers told the police that they loved them, and thanked them for serving and protecting the community.

"You are part of us, just as we are part of you," the human microphone said. Although I am personally skeptical about the role the police as an institution play in our society, I was touched by this proclamation. The great potential of the Occupy movement is to bring together the vast majority of us who are ill-seved by the current corporatocracy.

Reassured that no harm was about to come to the demonstrators, I made my way back to my car and continued on to the regular weekly meeting of the Mary Daly feminist discussion group.

This USTREAM video seems to have been recorded in front of the governor's mansion.  According to the event listing on Facebook:

As a legislator, Mary Fallin voted in favor of the $700 billion Wall Street bailout that has destroyed our economy and sold our futures to the highest bidder. Her 2012 "balanced" budget includes cuts to the Departments of Education, Public Safety, Health and Human Services, and OETA--while refusing to raise taxes on the richest 1% of Oklahomans.

Occupying the super committee

When I turned on the radio this morning, I heard news that Occupy Wall Street is marching on Washington D.C. to support the end of Bush era tax cuts for the wealthiest US citizens. When I checked out their Web site, I saw this this is so.

According to OWS, "On November 23rd, the Congressional Deficit Reduction Super-Committee will meet to decide on whether or not to keep Obama's extension to the Bush tax-cuts - which only benefit the richest 1% of Americans in any kind of significant way." This is actually the deadline for the committee to complete its work--so this is the day on which it would be voting on its entire plan for deficit reduction.

The OWS march will leave today, November 9, and march 20 miles every day:

A major draw for this march is to encourage more people in rural communities to get involved as well as bring spreading the word along the highway. We are hoping people will join the march along the way; whether for an hour, a day, or the full two weeks, we feel its imperative for OWS to be involved in the historical significance of long distance marches to support, promote, and encourage economic and social equality. We will be walking from 9am to to 5pm (banker hours) and will hold nightly GA's and/or discussions at 7pm in each town where we camp. We will be spending two days off at Occupy Philly and Occupy Baltimore. We are hoping a few people from these occupations will join us in the march to the White House and Occupy DC!.

This raises the question, what is the super committee and what is it doing? The committee was created by the August congressional compromise that ended the standoff over raising the national debt. The Economist has a good summary of that standoff and what the super committee does.

The deal, hammered out just days before that deadline, promises $917 billion in spending cuts over the next decade in return for a two-stage increase in the debt ceiling of $900 billion. After that, a 12-member congressional committee, equally composed of Republicans and Democrats, is to find $1.5 trillion in further deficit reductions that Congress must approve by December 23rd, in return for a similar-sized increase in the debt ceiling. If the committee fails to reach agreement or its proposal is rejected, $1.2 trillion in spending cuts will be triggered, drawn equally from domestic spending and defence.

The House and the Senate will both vote on the super committee agreement, if one is reached, but it will be a straight up-or-down vote with no amendments allowed.

In my opinion, the federal deficit and federal debt are much less of a problem than you might believe, based on mainstream news accounts. (Simply explained, the if the government spends more than it takes in any year, this creates a deficit. Deficits accumulating for a number of years create the national debt.) See this analysis, which I posted in May.

Trying to reduce the deficit at this point--that is, reducing the amount of government spending--could prove devastating to our economy as we struggle with chronic high unemployment and increasing poverty.

Over the past 30 years, taxes have been slashed for the wealthiest US citizens and we have wasted money on numerous unnecessary military adventures, such as the ones in Iraq and Afghanistan. During this period of time, when we were mostly governed by right-wing Republicans, the national debt has increased.

Now, conservatives argue for slashing much-needed social programs in order to reduce the deficit and debt. They even insist on attacking Social Security, which has not contributed to the deficit in any way. Conservatives insist on keeping the Bush era tax increases and even want to cut tax rates further--although they express willingness to raise revenue by closing tax loopholes.

Meanwhile, Democrats on the committee seem determined to sell out ordinary people in an attempt to reach a compromise with the Republicans, according to The Nation.

Representative Maxine Waters of California has introduced a bill to repeal the supercommittee, and the $1.2 trillion in cuts it’s mandated to make. She believes the committee is “illegitimate” and “borders on unconstitutional.”

At a breakfast meeting with progressive reporters and bloggers today (October 27), Waters said she knows her bill probably doesn’t have the support to pass right now, but she wants it on the table if the supercommittee deadlocks. “Of course its’s a long shot. But right now people are getting more and more agitated, frustrated and concerned about this supercommittee and not happy that there are those who are saying, including the president, they want even bigger cuts,” Waters said. “So it may fall apart. If it falls apart my bill is there to say ‘kill it.’ ” She added that she’s spoken to several Republicans who are equally unhappy with the supercommittee’s power.

Waters’s frustration is shared by many Democrats in the House, who feel not only shut out from the process by colleagues in the Senate—Baucus is reportedly acting with guidance from Senate majority leader Harry Reid, leaving House minority leader Nancy Pelosi on the sidelines—but are also shocked at the level of cuts to Medicare and Social Security being proposed.

Representative Henry Waxman told Politico today that he has “no stake” in the committee and called it an “outrageous process” that is “not open and transparent.” He said the “things put forward by Democrats…I would never vote for.”

Democrats would like to portray themselves as the party of the 99 percent. There are indeed strong progressive Democrats who are fighting to protect the interests of ordinary working people and the poor.

The Democratic leadership, including President Obama, often seems more interested in making nice with the one percent than in protecting the rest of us. Let's hope that the march of the 99 percent on the nation's capital will encourage them to re-evaluate their position.

Update 11-10-11:  This morning's Progressive Breakfast reports that super committee Democrats continue to lessen their support for maintaining crucial social programs in hopes of reaching a compromise with Republicans.

Occupying my library studies school work

This weekend I stayed away from political and social activities and completed three assignments for my Libraries and Popular Culture class. It's a great class, and I'm learning a lot, and it's definitely worth the work. One of my assignments was to write a review of a documentary dealing with popular culture. I picked the movie Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Mass Media.

I watched the movie and wrote the review, I was struck by exactly how applicable Chomsky's ideas were to the current Occupy movement. So I'm posting my review here in the hopes that it will contribute to discussions of ideas and strategy in our quest to rein in the corporatocracy our nation has become. (If you would like to watch the film, you can do so here. If you can't devote three hours in one sitting to this, you could check out the film from the Oklahoma County Metropolitan Library System.)

My review follows below:

Introduction

            On November 4 I watched the 1992 documentary Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media by Mark Achbar and Peter Wintonick. I’ve read some of Chomsky’s political analyses, and I’ve wanted to watch this movie for years. Recently I checked it out from the public library because it seemed very relevant to our class discussions on corporate hegemony in creating mass culture. Manufacturing Consent also seemed an appropriate choice for our class documentary project.

Summary

            This 168-minute film is partly an analysis of Chomsky’s political ideas, partly a biography of Chomsky, and partly an examination of some of his opponents and detractors. Chomsky, a self-described anarcho-syndicalist, says that coercion in human society should take place only for clearly justified reasons. He argues that concentrated private control of economic resources allows the owners of these resources unjustified control over society. In a totalitarian society, elites retain power by using obvious overwhelming force. In a democracy, such as the United States, elites maintain power by “manufacturing consent.”

            Chomsky says that the elites who own and control mass media believe that ordinary people must be diverted and controlled for their own good. This is not done by direct censorship. Major newspapers and major television stations control the political agenda through such strategies as selecting topics, framing issues, filtering information, and setting the boundaries of acceptable debate. 

As an example of this process, Chomsky compares US media coverage of genocide in Cambodia in the 1970s with coverage of atrocities committed by US-backed Indonesian forces against the people of East Timor in the same time period. He argues that abuses committed by US enemies were exaggerated while abuses committed by US allies were ignored.

Additional Sources

            Making a balanced selection of additional sources related to this movie was challenging because Chomsky’s opponents often use such extreme language in attacking him that they undermine the credibility of their own case. My own sympathy with Chomsky’s views undoubtedly made it more difficult for me to be neutral. Nevertheless, I hope this resource list would be useful to library patrons who had a variety of responses to the film.

1. The IMDB Web page on Manufacturing Consent (Internet Movie Database n.d.) contains reviews from both viewers and critics. While most of these reviews are positive, there are cogent dissenting points of view, as well as links to message boards for further discussion. There is also a link that allows a viewer to watch the movie for free.
2. Z Magazine was one of the sources of information that Chomsky suggested in the film. This website by the publishers of the magazine (Z Communications n.d.) contains links to much news and analysis from a libertarian socialist point of view, as well as a link to an online version of the magazine. Viewers who found the movie convincing would particularly like this site, and Chomsky himself has a blog here.
3. This page (Wvong 2001) by Canadian computer programmer Russil Wvong offers a critical assessment of Chomsky’s work. While agreeing with Chomsky in part, Wvong also presents evidence that Chomsky advances his claims in intellectually dishonest ways. Wvong also argues that Chomsky is willing to accept human rights abuses when perpetrated by regimes he supports.
4. The book Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (Herman and Chomsky 1988) offer a clearer and more comprehensive explanation of Chomsky’s “propaganda model” than the movie does.

Discussion Topic

            Noam Chomsky, a linguist by training, is most emphatically not part of the culture-and-civilization tradition. His work on universal grammar—which he believes is hard-wired into the human brain—has convinced him that ordinary people are creative geniuses. He doesn’t believe that ordinary people are dupes, but simply that they lack resources to gain complete information.

            In the 1992 movie, Chomsky advanced a specific model for how corporate elites create and maintain what Antonio Gramsci calls “hegemony” over popular culture. Chomsky argued that most news media outlets are owned by giant corporations that share the interests of the rest of the ruling elite. This allows them to control the terms of popular debate and crowd out dissenting ideas.

            Do you think Chomsky’s argument was accurate in 1992? This movie was released before widespread public use of the Internet. How has the existence of the Internet affected the accuracy of Chomsky’s position? Does greater availability of the means to publish mean that corporate control is much less of a problem than it was?

References

Achbar, Mark and Peter Wintonick (directors). 1992. Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media. Necessary Illusions/National Film Board of Canada. Zeitgeist Films, 2002, DVD. Includes Chomsky’s 2002 reflections on the film, extended excerpts of 1969 Firing     Line debate with William F. Buckley, Jr., and a 1971 discussion with Michel Foucault.

Herman, Edward S. and Noam Chomsky. 1988. Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of  the Mass Media. New York: Pantheon Books.

Internet Movie Database. n.d. “Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media.”             http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104810/. Accessed November 5, 2011.

Wvong, Russil. 2001. “Noam Chomsky: A Critical Review.” http://www.russilwvong.com/future/chomsky.html.  Accessed November 5, 2011.

Z Communications. n.d. “Z Net: A Community of People Committed to Social Change.”           http://www.zcommunications.org/znet. Accessed November 5, 2011.

Kansas health board pursues Tiller colleague

Kansas abortion provider Dr. George Tiller was murdered by a pro-life zealot in 2009. Tiller was often demonized because he was one of  the very few late-term abortion providers in the US. These abortions were not provided for frivolous reasons, however. A typical client might have discovered that the fetus suffered such a serious abnormality that it could not survive outside the mother's body.

Now, as Kate Sheppard reports for Mother Jones, the Kansas State Board of Healing Arts is considering whether to yank the medical license of Dr. Ann Kristin Neuhaus, who certified the medical need for abortions performed at Tiller's clinic. This board has been stacked with anti-choice activists appointed by Republican Governor Sam Brownback. Sheppard writes:

One time, Neuhaus evaluated a 10-year-old girl who had been raped by her uncle, which is one of the files the medical board is investigating. This girl was tiny, maybe 4'8", Neuhaus recalls. There had already been a police investigation, and the uncle was in jail, but it took until the third trimester for the girl to make it to the clinic. "For them to belittle it, to say that its okay for a 10-year-old have a kid by her uncle, and no harm is going to come from it, that's just beyond the realm of decency," she says.

Not all of those details were in the paperwork, however, because Neuhaus says she knew that records weren't truly confidential given the anti-abortion leanings of Kansas law enforcement officials. "I chose to sacrifice details," Neuhaus says. "I risked nothing but my license. I didn't compromise their health care."

At the clinic, Neuhaus' decisions were made in a place that was constantly under threat. Tiller was shot in both arms outside the facility in 1993. To enter, patients had to go through a metal detector. For a while, Neuhaus says, she wore a bulletproof vest to work. She even carried a .40 caliber pistol in her scrubs for a short period and took up target practice. "I was a reasonably decent shot," she says. "I would not have had too much trouble shooting one of those people if I had to." There were also bomb threats. But as time went by, she got more comfortable with the situation: "I think at some point, you get used to it, and you don't have anxiety."