Wednesday, February 27, 2013

L.A. asks U.S. Supreme Court to weigh in on Skid Row injunction

L.A. Times: L.A. Now ‏@LANow

L.A. asks U.S. Supreme Court to weigh in on skid row injunction

http://lat.ms/XDXSNK
Retweeted by Anoni


http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2013/02/la-asks-us-supreme-court-to-weigh-in-on-skid-row-injunction.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter&dlvrit=649324

Citing an immediate public health threat, the city of Los Angeles will ask the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday to overturn a lower court ruling preventing the random seizure and destruction of belongings that homeless people leave temporarily unattended on public sidewalks.

If the court takes up the matter, a ruling could have broad implications for cities across the state and nation grappling with how to keep streets clean and safe while respecting the property rights of those who live there.

The Supreme Court filing comes after two years of legal wrangling between Los Angeles officials and homeless advocates over a controversial campaign to clean up downtown’s skid row, which has the highest concentration of homeless people in the city.

“We have an obligation to the homeless, as well as to the other residents and businesses on skid row, to ensure their health through regularly cleaning skid row’s streets and sidewalks,” City Atty. Carmen Trutanich said in a statement. “The current outbreak of tuberculosis among that most vulnerable population should serve as a stern reminder to us all of just who and what is at risk in this matter.” 

More at the link.

I have reported here regarding LA's Skid Row and LA's true seat of power, ccala.org, who are desperate to remove the homeless so that they can continue gentrifying downtown as well as expanding their corporate policing force. LA has been attacking this ruling forever, constantly at work against it, which forces police to put a note on property they suspect may be abandoned, with a 24-hour window. This was fought for to stop them from simply taking whatever they want at will, because a person's medication, ID, legal papers, and personal belongings may be involved and lost, and it's obvious the city doesn't care at all. Skid Row is walking distance from City Hall. Also, this definitely affects other cities. This is horrible, it is terrible. There are true monsters involved.

What are cca's corporate police, which they seek to expand? This is LAPD during one of their many attacks upon OccupyLA marches. Note the ones in purple. They are cca corporate security, acting as police alongside LAPD.

Purple shirts and lapd occupy

Photo credited in LA Weekly article, to youtube:

Here are red shirts on Skid Row trying to create a reason to call LAPD:



I have video not yet edited of one of them saying he's an "enforcer". What is this corporation telling them?

When OccupyLA found that cca HATED water-soluble children's sidewalk chalk (or more specifically, its use for what they call "intelligence-based graffiti", which in their future plans PDF they mention intending to eliminate from downtown), some took to documenting it. Music artist Michelle Shocked made this short video which at the end features one of cca's purple shirts in true form. Remember, these shirts are hired by a business lobby, and they police the city streets:



I've seen purple shirts harassing the homeless, driving them away. I've seen the red shirts on Skid Row calling LAPD for no reason. I've seen LAPD seizing all of a person's property after arresting them for no reason, including the Catholic Worker shopping carts, which by law no one is supposed to touch. I've heard Skid Row residents say the red shirts are there every morning, looking to torment them. They are certainly ever-present, I've seen it myself.

The head of the cca has stated they have a definite plan regarding the homeless, and this brazen, monstrous attempt to use a TB outbreak to petition the courts to end laws protecting the homeless is certainly proof.

Carol Schatz of cca, 2004: "We have a very specific agenda related to homelessness." In early 2012, cca stopped their street-cleaning and garbage collection services in an area of Skid Row where Occupy Skid Row activists had set up camp. This was alongside their call for a study of the entire area to determine health risks. This study did NOT include the area of the OSR encampment. OSR activists said that the city came through several times to take photos of any resulting garbage but OSR were cleaning things on their own. When the call came down through the study to create change in certain areas of Skid Row (again, NOT including OSR's area), LAPD =first= attacked the OSR street, and forced them out, telling them not to come back. Which they promptly did, causing another police attack, and another re-encampment in the same day. LAPD chief Charlie Beck was seen in in a cruiser which then slowly went past, showing cca's reach and depth. And now cca could be hurting the homeless in other cities, through their unlimited selfishness.

Read more, mostly via Dan Bluemel's excellent articles:

Carol Schatz of the CCA and their outright war against the homeless

http://occupyobservations.blogspot.com/2012/06/carol-schatz-of-cca-and-their-outright.html

---

LA CAN's take:


Media, LAPD Misrepresent TB Outbreak in Skid Row Creating Unnecessary Fear by


"In the video below, officers justified private security guards illegally going through private property by saying it was 'for your own safety' considering 'all the stuff that has been in the news' about 'people getting sick.' LAPD sits by as BID guards cut open people’s bags – even those clearly marked with Not Abandoned signs."



Wednesday, February 20, 2013

The leaked 2006 Citigroup Plutonomy memo Part 1

My internet connection is nearly non-existent so I'm posting this incomplete document as an info dump. There are important issues present; please dig around and see. Please take this and edit it into something focused. Focus is not my speciality and this needs to get out there.


---

Massive social engineering projects revealed by Citigroup's leaked Plutonomy memo

---

The US, Canadian, and UK economies are driven by the very rich. This leaves them free to vampire the rest of us and not suffer in so doing.

The very rich prosper from the tech revolution which also provides for the suppression of their enemies (Occupy, IdleNoMore, etc.)

Equities are the main asset of the rich. Housing is the main asset of the other 80% of Americans. Foreclosure benefits the rich.

---

In 2006, Citigroup's analysis section circulated among the privileged and elite, an internal memo describing the state of the economy as may benefit and harm the continued establishment of a Plutonomic state, or Plutonomy, which is a state or economy driven and owned by said elite.

Michael Moore gloriously leaked this memo in his film “Capitalism: A Love Story”. Bravo!

The memo reveals several critical factors regarding our economy and country, the driving forces behind them, and the social engineering being undertaken on behalf of the elite's goals. Not theories, but critical facts which must become focal in which to understand and combat the trends and forces at work.

When you wonder “Who is to blame, Who is behind this, Who are 'They' and What can we Do about 'Them'”, this is it. Take their advice. It works for them extremely well. It's about all they do. In understanding them, we can beat them. In knowing their plans and reach, we may counter them.

Findings revealed in the memo:

-The economies of the US, UK, and Canada are driven by the very rich, not everyone else combined
-They enjoy specific modes of growth (Globalization and politics used to insure it [the Trans Pacific Partnership])
-Threats to their growth (historic models reveal trends and outcomes predicting the Occupy movement or similar; weaknesses of Plutonomy)
-Equities are the main asset of the rich; homes are that of the rest. The housing bubble and the illegal foreclosure engine do not harm the rich; on the contrary
-Methods of Plutonomy self-protection include direct corporate influence of the political process (Citizens United, oppression of Occupy, formation of the “tea party”, etc.)
-The very rich profit from the spy technology revolution (TSA scanners, militarization of police, etc.) which also provides for social control and the oppression of dissent (Occupy, etc.).
-As the economy is driven by the rich, the challenge is to switch that to one driven by the 99%.

The memo does not even include mention of the corporate alliance ALEC who are writing laws which are being passed in various states, such as “stand your ground” and “right to work”. Corporations writing laws. The TPP are a global version of this and we do not get to vote.

This is WWIII. It is economic, it has long since begun, and it is the 1% against all the rest of us.

The memo, "The Plutonomy Symposium: Rising Tides Lifting Yachts":




Sections following, not assembled:

-What the Plutonomists are doing to the US and world
-How they increasingly criminalize dissent and profit from oppression
-The real economy and its factors
-Related social engineering in Europe, banksters installed in government
-What to do

One person, one vote. Goes under self-protection

The memo reveals their fear of social and thus political demands for more even distributions of wealth. This may both be deflected through elite influence or outright control of the political process, as well as providing the elite direct control over regulation and legislation effecting their direct interests.

Dkos story:



2009 Daily Kos

“Even though the Plutonomy (the top 1%) control over 50% of the net worth in America -- they don't control the Votes!”

“What was it they fear most, again?
The principle of "one person -- one vote"?
Say, NOW that's NICE!  ... that could one day be the People taking our Country back.”

Hence the installation of the 2010 “Citizens United” ruling which provides for corporate donations/lobbying to become "votes".

The "Citizens United" organization was significantly funded by Plutocrats the Koch brothers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_%28organization%29 



Quashing the information. Goes under Self-protection

In 2009, an internet forum member linked the group to the Citigroup Plutonomy Memo.


Linking today reveals corporate influence in action:


"This content was removed at the request of Citigroup, Inc."



2009 Daily Kos

Conditions favorable to Plutonomy:

“overseas conquests invigorating wealth creation”

which is Globalisation. The Trans-Pacific Partnership.






Page 12: Equities are the main asset of the rich.



FORECLOSURE:
Foreclosure is part of it, destroying the middle class and turning us into a nation of renters...from them, the property owners. Owning property increasingly becoming a thing of the past.
Page 10 of the Memo states that 80% of Americans own little equity, with housing being their biggest asset. Page 12 states that equities are the main asset of the rich. Not odd then that they've attacked the housing market. Hit 80% of your target in a single blow, in their main asset...think like a warrior, attacking vulnerabilities. Would this harm the economy, which would in turn harm the very rich? No, the memo says that the American economy, like the UK and Canadian economies, are driven by the rich. That there is no “the consumer”. If they wished to directly attack the housing market to create a disaster upon which they could profit, rake in monies bet upon such disaster, as well as becoming a new breed of robber land barons, they could do so without suffering economic harm or even worry in the process.
page 8 of the memo:
“...in the US, the top 20% of consumers might account for nearly 60% of income and spending. The bottom 20% account, on our data, for about 3% of income and spending.”
Was the “housing bubble” created on purpose, to not only create a reason to gain bailouts but to turn the people of this nation into renters, not owners? Who has information that they caused on purpose, the housing bubble? The predatory loans were purposeful as were the insurances taken out in hopes (knowledge) they would fail, but was the collapse greedy negligence or social engineering as in Greece, etc.?






Research Plutonomy in the roaring 20s, where the Memo says it exists. Conditions? What brought it about? Post WWI recovery, and what percentage went to the 1%?

The Memo says technical revolution is behind the previous waves of Plutonomy including the Roaring Twenties. Today, we have the $1 trillion spy tech economy, the permanent war budget, computing, pharma, weapons manufacture, the 0.01%. That is the third of three drivers of this market.
Memo says on page 9 that the top 10%'s wealth/income inequality began in 1989, beginning in earnest in 1995.






Plutonomy's plan for America resembles Greece, Italy, Spain, Ireland, Portugal...
Goldman Sachs timeline, conquests:

2010:

Voila! Greek Gov't Appoints Ex-Goldman Exec As New Debt Chief

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/02/19/838682/-Voila-Greek-Gov-t-Appoints-Ex-Goldman-Exec-As-New-Debt-Chief#


2011:

Arrest the Criminals at Goldman Sachs and in the Greek Government (video: Greg Palast)

http://www.v2load.com/videos/aQp22WN0cpg/


Also Italy's Prime Minister; the former attorney general of Ireland during the bailout; the head of the European Central Bank; and more:

http://acampadabcninternacional.wordpress.com/2011/12/09/what-price-the-new-democracy-goldman-sachs-conquers-europe-acampadabcn-takethesquare-acampadasol-15m-occupy/

The 2008 economic collapse was planned, a smash-and-grab to destablize the country. Disaster Capitalism. The Shock Doctrine. What has been done to Greece, Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Spain, is being done to America.


And why not America?

Citi Offered Jack Lew A Big Bonus To Secure A 'High-Level' Government Position


"It's not uncommon for a U.S. Treasury Secretary to have served on Wall Street, but what's interesting about this next one is that his bank gave him a pretty significant financial incentive make the leap."





(Analyze the similarities between what was done in those countries versus what has happened here.)
Plutonomists say in the memo that they prosper from right-wing, anti-immigration politics so why not work to install such when it does not hurt the Plutonomists in the process? In countries whose economy is not already dominated by them, why not drive the population to rebel against government (through brazen “austerity” measures) and even overthrow it, providing opportunity for the Plutonomists to install the right-wing, anti-immigration model they prefer?
Remember when Bush family friends OPEC embargo'd Democratic President Jimmy Carter, personally inconveniencing most Americans to the point of beginning to attack each other over places in gas lines? Then Saint Ronald Reagan was then installed, beginning their long process of destroying America's middle class and unions.
Oddly enough, Enron pulled the same stunt in California and got Republican Arnold Schwarzenneger installed, who immediately attacked infrastructure (nurses, firefighters, health and mental health care, etc.)

Chicago mayor Rahm Emmanuel wants to run for US president. Mind you, =former Goldman Sachs employee= Rahm Emmanuel wants to run for US president. Ahem.



They have been systematically attacking obstacles to their rule. Note statements about these obstacles in the memo as well as what they want, go back a step, and see what they are doing/attacking to get it. It will well pay to find direct connection, and to deflect them.




The real economy and its factors.


Bailout for the low-income does not help the economy, page 8 of the memo:
“...in the US, the top 20% of consumers might account for nearly 60% of income and spending. The bottom 20% account, on our data, for about 3% of income and spending.”
So don't expect the very rich to do anything for the bottom 20% of the nation.
“Plutomony would likely drive...companies selling to or servicing the rich.” (Porche stock was at $777 a share.)


Where is Plutonomy occurring? Page 8 of the memo:
“Figure 1 shows...the top 1% of the population of income has grown substantially in countries such as the US, UK, and Canada. The countries, which apparently tolerate income inequality, are what we call Plutonomy countries: economies powered by a relatively small number of rich people.”
So our economy is driven by rich people. No wonder Wall Street is unregulated, and there is zero intent to bail out the poor. (Page 11: “We should worry less about the average consumer...”)


What has driven this? Pages nine and ten:
“The bull market in financial assets/equities (they want disinflation); the rise of managerial capitalism (managers/bosses making all the gains); an ongoing technological revolution (lists previous periods of growth; analyze for what happened to/stopped this growth).




Page 17, “The Risks to Plutonomy”. 
 
-Inflation
-Financial collapse
-Ending technological revolution
-Political pressure to end the increase in income and wealth inequality
-Destroy globalisation
-Destroy right-wing, anti-immigration political parties which support the rise in profit share/fall in wage share
Page 18
-Call for relaxing immigration controls/deportation
-”The political process is the greatest threat to Plutonomy.”
-Page 21 lists equity strategies. “Equities are the main asset of the rich.” -Page 12 of the memo. So, attack equities.
Of course, it says that the rich actually drive the economy, and the economy mainly serves the rich. So live outside the economy and destroy the economy.

"The risks to Plutonomy: Finally, political pressure to end the increase in income and wealth inequality."

"Perhaps the most immediate challenge to Plutonomy comes from the political process. Ultimately, the rise in income and wealth inequality to some extent is an economic disenfrachisement of the masses to the benefit of the few. However in democracies this is rarely tolerated forever."

“We see the biggest threat to Plutonomy as coming from a rise in political demands to reduce income inequality, spread the wealth more evenly, and challenge forces such as globalization which have benefited profit and wealth growth.”

Page 18:

"So is Plutonomy under threat politically? We are keeping an eye on this one. At the moment it is too early to make this call. ...does not resonate as a population determined to destroy wealth inequality."

"While there are challenges to this, not least through populations/the political process demanding a more 'equitable' share of the wealth, in the short term we think the trend of the rich getting richer is likely to persist." 


How to change the US economy into one driven by the 99%?





DESTROYING DISSENT for fun and personal profit.

Page one and seven of the memo:
“What could go wrong?
…we think the most potent and short-term threat would be societies demanding a more 'equitable' share of the wealth.”

“Societies”, plural. World-wide. Their plans are world-wide, mentioning “globalisation” several times.
Page 16 of the memo:

“We see the biggest threat to Plutonomy as coming from a rise in political demands to reduce income inequality, spread the wealth more evenly, and challenge forces such as globalization which have benefited profit and wealth growth.”


They saw Occupy coming. Kos 2009

“At some point it is likely that labor will fight back against the rising profit share of the rich and there will be a political backlash against the rising wealth of the rich. This could be felt through higher taxation on the rich (or indirectly though higher corporate taxes/regulation) or through trying to protect indigenous [home-grown] laborers, in a push-back on globalization -- either anti-mmigration, or protectionism. We don’t see this happening yet, though there are signs of rising political tensions.”

Kos 2009:

“And as long as any worker push-back, can be held in check -- well No Worries, then.”


ALEC pushing “Right to Work” laws which destroy unions and worker's bargaining rights


The rise of the “Americans are terrorists” meme is purposeful and is designed to provide for control of any who would contest the Plutonomy.


FBI & DHS Under Obama Declared Occupy Wall Street Protesters TERRORIST To Protect Big Business



Corporate control of media. Six corporations control the majority of US mainstream media, have killed stories they do not like. (Bain Capital / Mitt Romney connection / Clear Channel)


NDAA, NDRP, HR347, FISA, Patriot Act, CISPA...


Anonymous: Night Raid Equipment-Maker Lobbied for NDAA, Singles Out Sen. Rob Portman.


http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/12/19/1046972/-Anonymous-Night-Raid-Equipment-Maker-Lobbied-for-NDAA-Singles-Out-Sen-Rob-Portman#

Anonymous singles out Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) for receiving a particularly large sum from companies and PACs lobbying for the NDAA. From the RT report:

Robert J. Portman...we are truly disturbed by the ludicrous $272,853 he received from special interest groups supporting the NDAA bill that authorizes the indefinite detention of U.S. citizens on U.S. soil.

Even in Washington terms, over a quarter million is a ridiculous amount of money from special interest groups supporting an issue to any single legislator. Congressmen have been bought for far less, with around $50,000 considered a serious ante at anyone's table, and much less merely keeping you in the game.

snip

“Among the supporters of NDAA are California-based manufacturer Surefire, L.L.C., who won a $23 million contract from the Department of Defense three months ago.




"You can see where the real center of power is in this country."

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2012/01/occupy_congress.php

"You can see where the real center of power is in this country," he said. "There are several thousand people here right outside the Capitol, and only like 50 cops. But when we get a few people down on Wall Street, the police response is crazy."



OWS
Chase-Police-State
Occupy-takes-over-bank-in-San-Francisco_UPI_Terry
Schmitt


Camps and actions were met with overwhelming response from militarized police:
Occupy Phoenix:
occupy-phoenix


Occupy Denver, by Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post:


Occupy Denver, Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post


OccupyLA:
riot police
guard BofA during occupy la march

occupy portland Steve Dipaola Reuters:

occupy
portland Steve Dipaola Reuters


Occupy Denver AP Photo Leah Millis:
Occupy Denver
AP Photo Leah Millis


NYC?
OWS-Police-Brutality


Philly, photo by Spiritualution:
Police
brutality at Occupy Philly

LA:
Occupy_Protests_Anniversary_0c8f5


The republican national convention:
RNC
Wearechange Riot Police line

The Democratic National Convention:

Democratic National Convention

Media were targeted and arrested. No evidence = no claim to brutality! Who believes "dirty, stinky hippies!"


“Police in the dark of night descended on the park with cleaning crews and removed the press and pro bono legal observers. They then proceeded to raze the park’s temporary structures and forcibly eject OWS supporters. Local churches took up those expelled from the area in some cases.”


“Progressive Democrat” mayor Jean Quan of Oakland let slip that 18 mayors had a conference call to discuss what to do about Occupy encampments. A systematic, orchestrated campaign began against these sites, with DHS and “terrorism” and “tactical” police units present.
What Jean Quan and the city of Oakland did to Occupy Oakland deserves an in-depth analysis:

Oakland officials caught in lies about attacking Occupy



City Cuts Power To Occupy Baltimore Site



Media in the United States are owned by six or so corporations.
(Cartoon of mass protest with clear signs, bimbo newscaster on scene being told by elite “They don't know what they're protesting!”)
Screenshot of Fox news Zuccotti clearing with text “Good riddance”. (Get flickr Pro.)
Corporate-influenced media either mis-reported the Movement from the beginning or were eventually directed to do so. This is not theory; this is direct elite influence of the country's information flow and reporting systems for the benefit of said elite.

OWS NYTimes
Lie



Did you hear about these marches throughout the world on US mainstream media?
Global
Revolution 2012

On September 29, the Spanish people surrounded their congress and demanded it step down. The country is 90% in debt (TO WHO!?) and unemployment is 25% or higher (50% for those under 30). Citizens in several European countries joined in. Time Magazine hid a single sentence on this at the end of an article:

October 8 2012, "The Mormon Identity", page 14, "World":

"Meanwhile, anti-austerity protests rocked the Spanish capital yet again, as demonstrators marched on the country's parliament building and confronted police, leading to at least 64 people being arrested."

Thousands upon thousands of citizens surrounding their governments, demanding positive change. Can't have that in the media. Monkey see, monkey do! Not good for Plutonomists!

More on "Surround Parliament" :

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021446183


It has been pointed out on Twitter that when riot police attack peaceful protesters, the stock headline is “Police clash with protesters”, as though protesters were doing some of the violence. (Video of cops beating peaceful protesters?)


After Occupy encampments were cleared, and even during the encampments, cities were moving to create new rules to directly prevent Occupy presence (and thus influence). Charleton Heston is upset:
Planet of the
city park


Forces which oppose Occupy are easily detected within the Federal Government:


Peter King on
Occupy




“Losers” video stating “Homeland Security”.

Congressman Peter King Calls Occupy Protesters "Angry Losers! Living In Their own feces and urine."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ux0YhnyX0c8


Notice how Peter King is part of "Homeland Security".


How the Los Angeles Police Department are made into tentacles of Homeland Security.
http://occupyobservations.blogspot.com/2013/01/how-lapd-are-made-into-tentacle-of-dhs.html

Can we conclude that PDs are taking orders directly from DHS?
DHS Emails Question Federal Law Enforcement's Role in Violence at #OccupyWallStreet and #Oakland Rallies
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/15389-newly-released-dhs-emails-questions-federal-law-enforcements-role-in-violence-at-ows-rallies-in-oakland-and-new-york 


In Los Angeles, a business lobby called ccala.org have their own security teams which patrol downtown LA, driving out the homeless, harassing the poor, and daily helping cca's drive to criminalize the homeless on Skid Row. These are one of four area divisions, seen in purple, helping LAPD attack an OccupyLA march downtown. Mind you, these are not police. These are people hired by a business lobby. There they are acting as police:
Purple shirts
and lapd occupy
Corporations with street patrols throughout the downtown area. Is it fascism yet? When were we asked to vote on this?


Add SWAT raid on Occupy Miami safehouse pics/video.

DHS and the technological revolutionaries who are driving the rich ever richer have opened a new market within the US: the militarization of police and sheriff departements. When families marched in Anaheim, California to protest police murders of unarmed community members, they were met thusly:
Photo by Mike Bobio, cops on the APD roof:
Anaheim SWAT
cops on roof mikebobio on twitter.jpg%20large

Screenshot from timcast or OccupyFreedomLA's livestream, not sure which, of what blocked the march: one of many militarized police, this one bearing an M-32 grenade launcher or its nearest predecessor. Police line is visible behind him. Also note the M-32 hooked to the center of the belt of the above officer on the right. What's the big deal? A Marine tells me that these weapons are still in use in the Corps. What are city PD doing with armed forces weaponry, even if it's for use with tear gas grenades?
Anaheim
Timcast sleeve insignia
AytMoKgCQAAd1C3.jpg
large.jpg%20large

Nothing says “to protect and serve the community” like militarized police preventing grieving families from gathering, the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Since when do police and sheriffs require tanks?

RNC Tampa
police tank

Meet the Contractors Turning America's Police Into a Paramilitary Force


January 30, 2013  |  


The national security state has an annual budget of around $1 trillion. Of that huge pile of money, large amounts go to private companies the federal government awards contracts to. Some, like Lockheed Martin or Boeing, are household names, but many of the contractors fly just under the public's radar. What follows are three companies you should know about (because some of them can learn a lot about you with their spy technologies).

http://www.alternet.org/meet-contractors-turning-americas-police-paramilitary-force?paging=off

Meet the Private Companies Helping Cops Spy on Protesters

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/meet-the-private-companies-helping-cops-spy-on-protesters-20131024#ixzz2inCzJDfU


Which is also profitable to them under their condition for Plutonomy: technological revolution. Unsurprising that they are lobbying for legislation benefiting their own conditions for personal gain.


Police Departments, who are now agents of DHS, attacking Occupy, is terrorism.

Oddly, this is an FBI definition of “terrorism”. See how it fits what the Plutonomists have had done to Occupy:

The FBI further describes terrorism as either domestic or international, depending on the origin, base, and objectives of the terrorists:
• Domestic terrorism is the unlawful use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group or individual based and operating entirely within the United States or its territories without foreign direction committed against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.
http://www.terrorismfiles.org/encyclopaedia/terrorism.html


How DHS, “iWatch”, and “terrorists” allow the elite to use the political system to both demonize and control dissent against the elite, as well as profit through the technological revolution mentioned in their Benefit to Plutonomy analysis.




UK: New police powers 'will curb Press freedom': Officers will be allowed to confiscate material from journalists

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2278923/New-police-powers-curb-Press-freedom-Officers-allowed-confiscate-material-journalists.html


Amber Lyon
CNN








Terrorists” are about establishing laws for controlling America and Americans.





Medals for drone murder. Review this for vectors:



http://www.activistpost.com/2013/02/medals-for-murder.html






“The state doesn't just want you to obey; it wants to make you want to obey.” ~H.L. Mencken



“Corporations don't die in war. They thrive.”



https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=485700188162858&set=a.211428545590025.56617.210504329015780&type=1&theater






“Who are the real parasites? People who dismiss the unemployed and dependent as 'parasites' fail to understand economics and parasitism. A successful parasite is one that is not recognized by its host, one that can make its host work for it without appearing as a burden. Such is the ruling class in a capitalist society.” ~Philosophy professor Jason Read

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=383833188319524&set=a.172696862766492.33038.109496509086528&type=1&ref=nf






Selling national parks and resources to China in the US and other countries, such as the sale of gold-laden land. Who is pocketing this money? It doesn't go into government coffers, does it?

The most-storied warrior tribe in Ecuador prepares to fight as the government sells gold-laden land to China

http://www.salon.com/2013/02/10/to_get_the_gold_they_will_have_to_kill_every_one_of_us/ 






Image showing a 3,000% increase in Forbes rich:

http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/1361/networth.gif



Via Gooserock at the Dkos 2009 link.



Conditions which benefit Plutocracy: Right-wing, anti-immigration political parties which support the rise in profit share/fall in wage share

In other words, when CEOs make ever more money and workers, ever less. Like this:

Corporate Profits Have Grown By 171 Percent Under Obama -- Highest Rate Since 1900

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/corporate-profits-have-grown-171-percent-under-obama-highest-rate-1900 

"Average annual corporate profit growth under Obama is the  highest since 1900, whereas profit growth declined during both Bush presidencies. As a share of the economy, corporate profits have never been higher.
Unfortunately, this profit deluge has not been shared by workers, whose wages as a percentage of the economy have  fallen to all-time lows. Workers also got dinged by the recent increase in the payroll tax, which was large enough to  wipe out a minimum wage increase in some states."


8 Huge Corporate Handouts in the Fiscal Cliff Bill

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/8-huge-corporate-handouts-fiscal-cliff-bill

"Throughout the months of November and December, a steady stream of corporate CEOs flowed in and out of the White House to discuss the impending fiscal cliff. Many of them, such as Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, would then publicly come out and talk about how modest increases of tax rates on the wealthy were reasonable in order to deal with the deficit problem. What wasn’t mentioned is what these leaders wanted, which is what’s known as  “tax extenders”, or roughly $205B of tax breaks for corporations. With such a banal name, and boring and difficult to read line items in the bill, few political operatives have bothered to pay attention to this part of the bill. But it is critical to understanding what is going on.

5) Subsidies for Goldman Sachs Headquarters – Sec. 328 extends 'tax exempt financing for  York Liberty Zone,' which was a program to provide post-9/11 recovery funds. Rather than going to small businesses affected, however, this was,  according to Bloomberg, 'little more than a subsidy for fancy Manhattan apartments and office towers for Goldman Sachs and Bank of America Corp.' Michael Bloomberg himself actually thought the program was excessive, so that’s saying something. According to David Cay Johnston’s The Fine Print, Goldman got $1.6 billion in tax free financing for its new massive headquarters through Liberty Bonds."



The Untouchables: How the Obama administration protected Wall Street from prosecutions




Yes, Virginia, the Rich Continue to Get Richer: the Top 1% Got 121% of Income Gains Since 2009

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/02/yes-virginia-the-rich-continue-to-get-richer-the-1-got-121-of-income-gains-since-2009.html

 

U.S. banks in 2012 post highest profits since '06

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/26/us-usa-fdic-earnings-idUSBRE91P0N820130226?utm_source=Daily+Digest&utm_campaign=de8376aab3-DD_2_27_132_27_2013&utm_medium=email#.US5jjkXSlU8.twitter



Wealth Gap in US Between Blacks and Whites Tripled Since Reagan

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/02/27-8


Of Sequester, Squander, and How Congress Sold Out the People

http://www.occupy.com/article/sequester-squander-and-how-congress-sold-out-people


Wealth Inequality in America, Visualized:



MIT Economist Destroys the Idea That We Need the Megabanks to Survive



http://www.switchyourbank.org/simon_johnson_bank_size















How Banksters Think (FORECLOSURE, DIVIDE AND CONQUER/DISTRACT)


via Herbalicious


Unconfirmed


“We must go forward cautiously and consolidate each acquired position, because already the inferior social stratum of society is giving unceasing signs of agitation.
“Therefore, prudence dictates to us a line of conduct that seems to give in to the will of the people, until the execution of our plans be well-enough established for us to be able to declare our intentions without having to fear any organized resistance.
“Our confidence men shall have to closely watch the Farmers Alliance and the Knights of Work, and take steps immediately, either to control both associations in accordance with our interests, or to break them.
“Our men will have to attend the Convention that will be held in Omaha on the 4th of July, and be in charge of all activities. Otherwise, this Convention could muster such an antagonism to our plans that we would have to resort to force to overcome it.
Now, at the present time, using violence would be premature. We are not yet ready to confront such an assault. Money must first of all seek maximum protection in schemes and in legislation.
“Let us make use of the courts. Let us go forward as fast as possible at perceiving debts, at foreclosing (depriving of recourse to justice when a certain time limit has been transgressed) on debentures and mortgages.
“When, through the law's intervention, the common people shall have lost their homes, they will be more easy to control and more easy to govern, and they shall not be able to resist the strong hand of the Government acting in accordance with the orders of the central power of imperial wealth, under the control of the leaders of finance.
“Our top leaders are perfectly aware of the truth. They are presently working at establishing an imperialism of the capital to rule the world. But while they are implementing this plan, they must keep the people busy with political antagonisms.
“We'll therefore speed up the question of reform in the custom rates by the political organization called the Democratic Party; and we'll put the spotlight on the question of protection and of the reciprocity by the Republican Party.
“By dividing the electorate this way, we'll be able to have them spend their energies at struggling amongst themselves on questions that, for us, have no importance whatsoever, and on which we only touch upon as instructors of the common flock.
“It is thus that, through discreet acts, we can maintain what was so generously projected and executed with such a remarkable success.”

-United States Bankers' Magazine 1892



Allegations of the Business Plot

Major General Smedley Butler describes an alleged political conspiracy to overthrow President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933
In November 1934, Butler alleged the existence of a political conspiracy of Wall Street interests to overthrow President Roosevelt, a series of allegations that came to be known in the media as the Business Plot.[56][57] A special committee of the House of Representatives headed by Representatives John W. McCormack of Massachusetts and Samuel Dickstein of New York, who was later alleged to have been a paid agent of the NKVD,[58] heard his testimony in secret.[59] The McCormack-Dickstein committee was a precursor to the House Committee on Un-American Activities.
In November 1934, Butler told the committee that one Gerald P. MacGuire told him that a group of businessmen, supposedly backed by a private army of 500,000 ex-soldiers and others, intended to establish a fascist dictatorship. Butler had been asked to lead it, he said, by MacGuire, who was a bond salesman with Grayson M–P Murphy & Co. The New York Times reported that Butler had told friends that General Hugh S. Johnson, a former official with the National Recovery Administration, was to be installed as dictator. Butler said MacGuire had told him the attempted coup was backed by three million dollars, and that the 500,000 men were probably to be assembled in Washington, D.C. the following year. All the parties alleged to be involved, including Johnson, publicly said there was no truth in the story, calling it a joke and a fantasy.[59]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler#Allegations_of_the_Business_Plot




















NEOCONS


Karl Rove to Suskind:

"Guys like you are in--what we call--'the reality-based community'. You believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." "That's not the way the world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."


November 2001—shortly after the 9/11 attacks—Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld met with General Tommy Franks to review plans for the "decapitation" of the Iraqi government. The two men reviewed how a war against Saddam could be triggered; that list included a "dispute over WMD inspections." It's evidence that the administration was seeking a pretense for war.

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/02/hubris-rachel-maddow-documentary-iraq-war-david-corn

Also goes to “Fahrenheit 9/11” war opportunists, which is one of the above “conditions favorable to Plutonomy”.


Supreme Court installs George W. Bush. Halliburton installs Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney rings up no-bid contracts for Halliburton. Dick Cheney's Halliburton stock skyrockets. Halliburton criticized for charging $100.00 per 15 pound bag of soldier's laundry (they outsourced LAUNDRY!?).

Halliburton bills taxpayers $45 per case of soda, $100 per bag of laundry


http://www.halliburtonwatch.org/news/whistleblower_hearings_denied.html

Cheney's Halliburton Made $39.5 Billion on Iraq War

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/308-12/16561-focus-cheneys-halliburton-made-395-billion-on-iraq-war


Use of extended/permanent war to over-stretch military capacity/budgets, strain the economy to ripen it for a later blow. Privatization of military assets/procedures/vendors. Setting the stage for banksters.

Fiscal Cliff and Sequester


















Koch Brothers Driving Keystone XL Pipeline from Canada to Cut Out Venezuelan Oil








Koch brothers pour more cash into think tanks, ALEC




1% behind destruction of the US post office? Brentspeak on DU posts:

On Jan. 27, 2013, Obama instituted the largest tariff on U.S. small businesses in American history [View all]


On Jan. 27, an agreement by Obama's Postal Regulatory Commission Chairman, Ruth Y. Goldway to have USPS First Class International package service reclassified from a relatively fixed-rate "market dominant product" to a "competitive product" (i.e., comparable to FedEx and UPS prices) raised the price of internationally mailing lightweight packages (1 oz - 4 lb) upwards to between 60%-110% more than previously.

For example, prior to the rate increase, the cost of mailing a 1.25 lb package to the UK was $13.17; now it will be $18.60. Previously, the cost of mailing a 1 oz-2 oz. package to, say, Canada, was $3. The new rates double that to $6.03 - $6.55. A 5 oz. package package, previously $6.95 to ship internationally, will now cost $12.75

An obvious question arises: what connections do Ruth Goldway, the USPS Board of Governors, Republicans (especially Darrell Issa and Dennis Ross), and both the Obama and previous Bush administrations have with UPS/FedEx and the assorted hedge funds and private equity groups who are waiting to buy up USPS assets for pennies on the dollar when USPS will finally be forced to fully privatize its 200 years accumulation of property, worth countless billions of dollars?




Manipulation of entire currencies to promote disaster capitalism?

Black Swan •@NewsVortex
RT @zerohedge Norway Enters The Currency Wars http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-02-17/norway-enters-currency- …



LAND GRABS:

Purchasing viable farmland (likely in anticipation of climate change as we're already in a food crisis which can only worsen with drought and temperature fluctuation).


Modern Colonialism: Foreign Investors Buy Up Vast Amounts of Developing World Farmland.



April 2012:

WORLD BANK AND WALL STREET SUPPORT LAND GRABBING IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

http://www.globalresearch.ca/world-bank-and-wall-street-support-land-grabbing-in-developing-countries/30423

"Farmers demand the World Bank and Wall Street stop grabbing their lands, at opening of the Bank’s annual conference in Washington, DC.

The World Bank is playing a leading role in a global land grab, say farmers’ movements and international allies. The World Bank’s policies for land privatization and concentration, have paved the way for corporations from Wall Street to Singapore to take upwards of 80 million hectares of land from rural communities across the world in the past few years, they say in a collective statement that they will release at the opening of the World Bank’s Conference on Land and Poverty in Washington DC, on April 23, 2012.

The global land grab was denounced at over 250 worldwide protest actions on April 17th, the International Day of Peasant’s Struggle.

On April 24th, another major farmland investor conference in New York City, involving the World Bank and large money managers like the Canadian Pension Fund, TIAA-CREF and PensionDanmark, will be targeted for protests by Occupy Wall Street and others."

(Paul Wolfowitz, a neocon, was made head of the World Bank for a while.)




Regarding banks and bailouts and regulation (and no regulation) :



Don’t Blink, or You’ll Miss Another Bailout

http://www.cnbc.com/id/100466032

In an interview, Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio, who serves on the Banking Committee, said the New York Fed's behavior in this case "underscores that the more we learn about these bailouts, gifts and advantages that Wall Street gets, the clearer it becomes that one set of rules applies to the largest megabanks and another set of rules to the smaller financial institutions and the rest of the country."








Manufactured debt and financial crises:

America faces more than a dozen deadlines, all caused by billionaires and wealth transfer


I’ve had an article in draft for some time — “The 16 Deadlines Facing America” — that details each deadline, describes the dangers, and states why each faces an end-point rather than just a periodic fluctuation... I’ve identified 16 of these game-over situations facing America today, situations from which there is the possibility of no recovery — not the certainty, but the possibility. As I was working on that article though, looking especially what it would take to reverse each trend, I realized it’s really only one story writ 16 times on 16 separate canvasses.

That story? The song of the predator class, the rich and the rest — “All your money are belong to us.”
Here they are, numbered in no particular order, but grouped:

1. Accelerating transfer of wealth to the .001% (“the billionaires”)
2. Accelerating transfer of manufacturing out of the country
3. Marginalization or destruction of effective labor unions
4. Destruction of the middle class (i.e., the consumer class)
5. Capture of government by billionaires of both parties
6. Capture of the Republican Party by anti-Constitutional billionaires via Tea Party-financed candidates
7. Constitutional changes, including changes in practice to rule of law and an ever-widening circle of elites with immunity from prosecution
8. Creation via trade agreements of a transnational state that enshrines corporate sovereignty
9. Permanent war and a permanently expanding military
10. Permanently expanding national security state, including militarization of police, widespread spying and punishment for political crimes
11. The ticking time bomb of increasing numbers of returning untreated war-damaged battle-trained veterans
12. Oil dependence without recognition of oil as a soon-to-be-depleted energy source
13. Deterioration of the environment, largely due to oil and carbon dependence, among other causes
14. Destruction of the integrity of our food supply
15. Destruction of public education
16. Climate catastrophe and the collapse of human populations and level of civilization


My bottom line, and the surprise discovery, is that every single one is driven by one common cause — internationalist billionaires.

http://americablog.com/2013/02/america-faces-more-than-a-dozen-deadlines-all-caused-by-billionaires-and-wealth-transfer.html





Privatization of the world's water supply!

Nestle are the 27th largest corporation in the world and the largest "foodstuff" interest. Here is video, beginning at about 2:00, of Nestle's then (2005) CEO clearly stating that water is not a human right, that it should be owned and sold.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPY64EJcsG4

Profiting from Your Thirst as Global Elite Rush to Control Water Worldwide




MENTIONS CITIGROUP ACTION IN 2007:

Citigroup is aggressively raising funds for its war chest to participate in the coming tidal wave of infrastructure privatization: in 2007 it established a new unit called Citi Infrastructure Investors through its Citi Alternative Investments unit. According to Reuters, Citigroup “assembled some of the biggest names in the infrastructure business at the same time it is building a $3 billion fund, including $500 million of its own capital. The fund, according to a person familiar with the situation, will have only a handful of outside investors and will be focused on assets in developed markets” (May 16, 2007). Citigroup initially sought only U.S.$3 billion for its first infrastructure fund but was seeking U.S.$5 billion in April 2008 (Bloomberg, April 7, 2008).
Citigroup partnered with HSBC Bank, Prudential, and other minor partners to acquire U.K.’s water utility Kelda (Yorkshire Water) in November 2007. This week, Citigroup signed a 99-year lease with the City of Chicago for Chicago’s Midway Airport (it partnered with John Hancock Life Insurance Company and a Canadian private airport operator). Insiders said that Citigroup is among those bidding for the state-owned company Letiste Praha which operates the Prague Airport in the Czech Republic (Bloomberg, February 7, 2008).

The elite multinational and Wall Street banks and investment banks have been preparing and waiting for this golden moment for years. Over the past few years, they have amassed war chests of infrastructure funds to privatize water, municipal services, and utilities all over the world. It will be extremely difficult to reverse this privatization trend in water.

In my 2008 article, I overlooked the astonishingly large land purchases (298,840 acres, to be exact) by the Bush family in 2005 and 2006. In 2006, while on a trip to Paraguay for the United Nation’s children’s group UNICEF, Jenna Bush (daughter of former President George W. Bush and granddaughter of former President George H.W. Bush) reportedly bought 98,840 acres of land in Chaco, Paraguay, near the Triple Frontier (Bolivia, Brazil, and Paraguay). This land is said to be near the 200,000 acres purchased by her grandfather, George H.W. Bush, in 2005.

The lands purchased by the Bush family sit over not only South America’s largest aquifer — but the world’s as well — Acuifero GuaranĂ­, which runs beneath Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay. This aquifer is larger than Texas and California combined. 

Bill C-45 removes 99% of Canada's lakes and rivers from the protected list




Greeks Stand Up to Protect Their Water From Privatization:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022168806

Nestle Group -"Access to Water Is Not Your Right"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022179129

Control of the water supply is control of who may farm, and what they may farm. Monsanto encroachment? Most definitely would result in world domination in the increasing drought/climate change/coming food crisis. They don't care about billions dying. They will determine who lives and who dies through control of water.

Enron, an enormous supporter and contributor to George W. Bush, were early adopters of the hydraulic empire (via KamaAina on DU) :

Azurix Corp. is a water services company, headquartered in Houston, Texas. The company owned and operated facilities in North America (mainly Canada), Europe, and South America. In 2007, Azurix was awarded a $165 million claim against the government of Argentina by an international arbitrator, the company is currently involved in a dispute over Argentina's refusal to pay the claim.

Azurix was formed when Enron Corporation purchased Wessex Water in 1998. In June 1999 it was part-floated on the NYSE stock exchange, with Enron retaining 34% ownership. The company was formed with an IPO of $800 million and an opening stock price of $22.00, which fell to $2.00 within two years. The business was a disaster for Enron, and in April 2001 Enron announced it would break up Azurix and sell its assets. Enron eventually sold Azurix North America and Azurix Industrial Operations to American Water Works for $141.5 million.

(Enron also met with Arnold Schwarzenegger before they cause the rolling power blackouts in California which inconvenienced Californians to the point of demanding a run-off election to replace the Governor...and Arnold “won”. Note that the same energy embargo tactic was used on Jimmy Carter by OPEC, who are Bush family friends. The same Bush who was head of the CIA and now is buying up water.)


8 Ways Privatization Has Brought Pain and Misery to American Life

http://www.alternet.org/hard-times-usa/8-ways-privatization-has-brought-pain-and-misery-american-life

"A Citigroup economist gushed, 'Water as an asset class will, in my view, become eventually the single most important physical-commodity based asset class, dwarfing oil, copper, agricultural commodities and precious metals.'"


Food Security in the Age of “Water Grabbing”

http://foodtank.org/news/2013/02/food-security-in-the-age-of-water-grabbing#.UTQaRuGLZsM.twitter 





BANKING: Debt and creating money out of thin air. 



FORMER GOLDMAN BANKER: You Should Know The Ugly Math Behind Your Credit Card Debt

http://www.businessinsider.com/compound-interest-and-credit-card-debt-2013-2

Goes with this report about money being created out of thin air, "Paying interest on a loan that never existed":

Signs Of The Awakening: Occupy Breaks Into The Mainstream

http://occupysavvy.com/2013/02/16/signs-of-the-awakening-occupy-breaks-into-the-mainstream/

This has been a very, very long time coming: the facts and figures behind Occupy’s economic ideology are finally being broadcast in the mainstream.

This clip is from TVNZ – New Zealand’s “partially-privatised” corporate-backed bank-sponsored mainstream television news service. It validates what Occupiers have been saying all along.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0McsspLZYQE




Goldman Sachs bankers get rich betting on food prices as millions starve

Revolution News ‏@NewsRevo

Goldman bankers get rich betting on food prices as millions starve
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/goldman-bankers-get-rich-betting-on-food-prices-as-millions-starve-8459207.html
… via @Independent
Retweeted by .


Goldman Sachs made more than a quarter of a billion pounds last year by speculating on food staples, reigniting the controversy over banks profiting from the global food crisis.

War only happens when the money'd class believes they can profit from it.
Orwell war is
money


Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan’s stock bonus jumps


Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan’s stock bonus nearly doubled this year, to $11 million, reflecting a steep share price rise and the board’s apparent confidence in Moynihan’s progress on the bank’s legal issues and capital position.
And going forward, he’s getting a base salary increase as well: to $1.5 million from $950,000, according to a person familiar with the matter.
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2013/02/19/3864990/bank-of-america-ceo-brian-moynihans.html

Child poverty map of the UK, 2012



U.S. considers ‘Native Canadian groups’ as possible terror threats: embassy cables
http://aptn.ca/pages/news/2011/04/30/u-s-considers-native-canadian-groups-as-possible-terror-threats-embassy-cables/

How Corporations Make Money from Prison Labor: They’re Happy to Have More Inmates






Biggest Myths About The Right-To-Work Laws


Union Busting 2.0: Wisconsin Republicans Target Private Sector Unions They Previously Praised http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/02/20/1614021/wisconsin-private-sector-union-busting/



Walker drops bomb #2, this time on Wisconsin's private sector unions  http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/02/19/1188366/-Walker-drops-bomb-2-this-time-on-private-sector-unions



BofA Foreclosure Reviews: Whistleblowers Reveal Extensive Borrower Harm and Orchestrated Coverup (1)





Criminalizing Dissent and Punishing Occupy Protesters: Intro to Henry Giroux’s "Youth in Revolt"

via Occupy News Service on FB
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/14224-criminalizing-dissent-and-punishing-the-occupy-movement-protesters-introduction-to-henry-girouxs-youth-in-revolt Young people are demonstrating all over the world against a variety of issues ranging from economic injustice and massive inequality to drastic cuts in education and public services.1 In the fall of 2011, on the tenth anniversary of September 11, as the United States revisited the tragic loss and celebrated the courage displayed on that torturous day, another kind of commemoration took place. The Occupy movement shone out like flame in the darkness—a beacon of the irrepressible spirit of democracy and a humane desire for justice. Unfortunately, the peacefully organized protests across America have often been met with derogatory commentaries in the mainstream media and, increasingly, state-sanctioned violence. The war against society has become a war against youthful protesters and in­creasingly bears a striking resemblance to the violence waged against Occupy movement protesters and the violence associ­ated with the contemporary war zone.2 Missing from both the dominant media and state and national politics is an attempt to critically engage the issues the protesters are raising, not to mention any attempt to dialogue with them over their strate­gies, tactics, and political concerns. That many young people have become "a new class of stateless individuals ... cast into a threatening and faceless mass whose identities collapse into the language of debt, survival, and disposability" appears to have escaped the attention of the mainstream media.3 Matters of justice, human dignity, and social responsibility have given way to a double gesture that seeks to undercut democratic public spheres through the criminalization of dissent while also resorting to crude and violent forms of punishment as the only mediating tools to use with young people who are at­tempting to open a new conversation about politics, inequality, and social justice.

In the United States, the state monopoly on the use of violence has intensified since the 1980s and in the process has been di­rected disproportionately against young people, poor minorities, immigrants, women, and the elderly. Guided by the notion that unregulated, market-driven values and relations should shape every domain of human life, a business model of governance has eviscerated any viable notion of social responsibility and conscience, thereby furthering the dismissal of social problems and expanding cutbacks in basic social services.4 The examples are endless, but one in particular stands out. In March 2012, Texas governor Rick Perry7 joined eight other states in passing legislation to ban funding for clinics, including Planned Parent­hood facilities, affiliated with abortion services for women.5 As a result, the federal government has stopped funding the Texas Women's Health Program. Unfortunately, this attempt by Perry to punish all women because of his antiabortion stance means that more than 130,000 women in Texas will not have access to vital services ranging from mammograms to health care for their children. There is more at work here than a resurgent war on women and their children or "an insane bout of mass misogyny."8 There is also a deep-seated religious and political authoritarianism that has become one of the fundamental pil­lars of what I call a neoliberal culture of cruelty. As the welfare state is hollowed out. a culture of compassion is replaced by a culture of violence, cruelty, waste, and disposability.7 Banks, hedge funds, and finance capital as the contemporary registers of class power have a new visibility, and their spokespersons are unabashedly blunt in supporting a corporate culture in which "ruthlessness is prized and money is the ultimate measure."8 Collective insurance policies and social protections have given way to the forces of economic deregulation, the transformation of the welfare state into punitive workfare programs, the privatiza­tion of public goods, and an appeal to individual culpability as a substitute for civic responsibility. At the same time, violence—or what Anne-Marie Cusac calls "American punishment"—travels from our prisons and schools to various aspects of our daily lives, "becoming omnipresent ... the shows we watch on television, the way many of us treat children some influential religious practices."9

David Harvey has argued that neoliberalism is "a political proj­ect to re-establish the conditions for capital accumulation and to restore the power of economic elites" through the implementation of "an institutional framework characterized by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade."10 Neoliberalism is also a pedagogical project designed to create particular subjects, desires, and values defined largely by market considerations. National destiny becomes linked to a market-driven logic in which freedom is stripped down to freedom from government regulation, freedom to consume, and freedom to say anything one wants, regardless of how racist or toxic the consequences might be. This neoliberal notion of freedom is abstracted from any sense of civic responsibility or social cost. In fact, "neoliberalism is grounded in the idea of the 'free, possessive individual,'" with the state cast "as tyrannical and oppressive."11 The welfare state, in particular, becomes the archenemy of freedom. As Stuart Hall points out, according to apostles of free-market fundamentalism, 'The state must never govern society, dictate to free individuals how to dispose of their private property, regulate a free-market economy or interfere with the God-given right to make profits and amass personal wealth."12

Paradoxically, neoliberalism severely proscribes any vestige of social and civic agency through the figure of the isolated automaton for whom choice is reduced to the practice of end­less shopping, fleeing from any sense of civic obligation, and safeguarding a radically individualized existence. Neoliberal governance translates into a state that attempts to substitute individual security for social welfare but in doing so offers only the protection of gated communities for the privileged and incarceration tor those considered flawed consumers or threats to the mythic ideal of a white Christian nation. Neoliberalism refuses to recognize how private troubles are connected to broader systemic issues, legitimating instead an ode to self-reliance in which the experience of personal misfortune becomes merely the just desserts delivered by the righteous hand of the free market—not a pernicious outcome of the social order being hijacked by an antisocial ruling elite and forced to serve a narrow set of interests. Critical thought and human agency are rendered impotent as neoliberal rationality "substitutes emotional and personal vocabularies for political ones in formulating solutions to political problems."13 Within such a depoliticized discourse, youths are told that there is no dream of the collective, no viable social bonds, only the ac­tions of autonomous individuals who must rely on their own resources and who bear sole responsibility for the effects of larger systemic political and economic problems.


CEOs killed Hostess

THIS is “them”, “they”, the “NWO” spoken of by Bush (see the water privatization article).

“When we are successful, and we will be....”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rc7i0wCFf8g












What to do? MLK, Jr.'s non-violent direct action program:

“Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word 'tension.' I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth....

The purpose of our direct action program is to create a situation so crisis packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.

First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to 'order' than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: 'I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action'; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a 'more convenient season.' Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.”

http://mondoweiss.net/2012/01/mlk-and-the-peace-process.html




Attack globalisation.
Strengthen the housing market, which is the main asset of the lower income.


DOPAMINE: Part of the rich's path to success! Bottom of page 13:
2. “The hypormanic edge: The link between (a little) craziness and (a lot of) success in America.” -John Gartner
Extremely dangerous but should revolutionaries play with adding dopamine to their intake? Potential for disaster/discursion/demonizing the movement.


Attack Plutonomy stocks/companies.


Asprey and Mariella Fashion Group are listed as “the ultimate Plutonomy company, having served the ultra-rich for over 200 years.” -Page 15 of the memo.


Artworks are unique and appeal to the grandiose / selfish who wish to have something no one else can have. Please do not destroy original, unique works to spite the rich. Bring them into public museums for all the people.


OccupyForum: Strategies and Tactics of The Environmental Movement



~The small steps are key, if we let ourselves become numb or immobilized by the task before us, nothing will change and it will soon be to late..but every journey begins with a single step, and each step we take brings a new horizon into view ♥
~American Indian Prophecies~


Occupy bears fruit:
Occupy Bears
Fruit