Now I Know Why OccupyLA Is Being Shut Down... Remember When It Started Snowing In NYC, And...

[WillyT]

many here advocated for moving the #OWS headquarters to warmer climes in LA ???

:shrug:

Help Stop the Eviction of Occupy Los Angeles on Monday!
Submitted by clayclai - WLCentral
Sat, 11/26/2011 - 04:38

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Mayor Villaraigosa & Police Chief Charlie Beck announced today at a afternoon press conference that the LAPD would forcefully throw Occupy Los Angeles off of the park areas surrounding Los Angeles City Hall Monday, November 28th at 12:01am. This move is being made although there have been no major incidents to marred the record of 56 consecutive days of peaceful protests at City Hall since the encampment first started on October 1st.

It is being done in spite of the vote by City Council in October to:

ADOPT the accompanying RESOLUTION to SUPPORT the continuation of the peaceful and vibrant exercise in First Amendment Rights carried out by "Occupy Los Angeles"

At the time City Council President Eric Garcetti told the campers on the city hall front lawn "Stay as long as you need, we're here to support you," Now it would seem that the city's tune has changed.

To it's credit both the City of LA and the LAPD have taken a decidedly different approach to the occupy movement compared with other major cities, including New York, Chicago, Oakland and Portland where the movement was faced with eviction and police violence almost from the beginning of those encampments. Until now, the City of Los Angeles has allowed the encampment at city hall to establish itself and to grow with a minimum of police and city interference.

This approach had undoubtedly worked well for all involved. This negotiated peace between the City and Occupy Los Angeles has no doubt resulted in much lower policing costs than those seen by other cities. Police violence is very expensive, keeping people out of parks is very expensive. Whereas the LAPD has had to task very few extra officers to Occupy LA except for when we have held marches, rallies or other special activities. I am afraid that this will now change.

For our part, it has allowed Occupy LA to grow to be the largest occupy encampment in the United States with over 400 tents pitched on the green spaces around city hall. The stability of the occupation has allowed it to develop organization in depth, a strong committee and affinity group structure that is the result of more that 50 consecutive General Assemblies at the same location, as well as physical institutions on site like the Library, Media tent, bike repair shop, print shop and People's University.

In this winter of our discontent., I believe the survival of the Occupy Los Angeles encampment at City Hall is vital for the whole occupation movement nationwide While many of the encampments are being shutdown by police, many others will see their survival threaten by winter in coming months. So far, Occupy LA has avoided both of these frustrations. Already many occupiers from Wall St. are talking about flying west for the winter, some have already arrived. We get activist visitors from all over the world at Occupy LA and under the current, peaceful conditions, Occupy LA is the ideal base camp for many of the institutions that glue the occupy movement together. The role of Occupy LA in helping the entire occupy movement survive the winter and turn the next season into an American Spring can not be underestimated.

But now there is a nationwide reactionary movement among big city mayors to shut down the occupy encampments. Oakland's Mayor Quan spoken of a conference call of eighteen big city majors on this very subject. This indicates some level of national co-ordination. Now it would appear that Los Angeles is being pressured to join this reactionary movement. We need you to supply the counter pressure.

Please contact the Los Angeles City elected representatives and tell them not to shut down the Occupy Los Angeles encampment at city hall.

Tell them to continue their support and cooperation with Occupy Los Angeles.

Tell them we will not go quietly into that good night.

Tell them them, if they think they have budget deficients now, tell them that if they evict Occupy Los Angeles, they will have hell to pay.

In Solidarity,

Clay Claiborne

Emails of the Mayor & Council Members:

[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]

Here is some more contact info you can use:

Mayor's Office: [phone] or [phone] fax- [phone] @villaraigosa on twitter
City Hall: [phone] email [e-mail]
LAPD: 1-877-275-5273 email [e-mail]

[Fire Walk With Me]

1. (bows in thanks). I sent all of them this article's headline, a few paragraphs, and the link:

Expert calls Occupy demos most important in generations; urges they be left alone

By: Colin Perkel, The Canadian Press

Posted: 11/16/2011 4:33 PM

TORONTO - The Occupy protest is the most important democratic social movement of the last two generations and demonstrators who have taken over parks and other public spaces should be left alone, an expert in social movements said Wednesday.

As civic authorities across Canada and the U.S. move to end the various occupations, Vincent Mosco, professor emeritus of sociology at Queen's University, said the "extraordinary" movement had created a rarely seen coalition.

"When you see trade unionists, students, minority groups and others coming together, locking arms across sites in North America, what we have here is something unprecedented — at least in recent memory," Mosco said from Ottawa.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/canada/breakingnews/expert-calls-occupy-demos-most-important-in-generations-urges-they-be-left-alone-133995048.html

[WillyT]

2. Right On !!!

:yourock:

:hi:

:kick:

[Fire Walk With Me]

4. There are rumors about the reason for the eviction, if true it would be the classic money

versus freedom dynamic. We shall see.

Thank you for your post!

[lunatica]

3. You can send an email to all of them at one time

Here are email addresses with commas so you can send them all the message in one email. Triple click so you can select the entire list and copy and paste the following in the To: box.

[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail],[e-mail] ,[e-mail]

[ret5hd]

7. god, fix that post with some linebreaks or spaces, please.

[lunatica]

9. that would defeat the purpose of the post

Sorry if you don't get it.

[roseBudd]

5. At some point the tactic of occupying has to evolve...

http://beyondthechoir.org/diary/117/the-tactic-of-occupation-the-movement-of-the-99

"It behooves us to examine why this particular tactic of physical occupation struck such a nerve with so many Americans and became a powerful catalyzing symbol.

On some level we have to separate the reasons for this broad resonance from some things the physical occupation has meant to the dedicated people occupying on the ground. ..

But it is also a tactic. A tactic is basically an action taken with the intention of achieving a particular goal, or at least moving toward it. In long-term struggle, a tactic is better understood as one move among many in an epic game of chess (with the caveat that the powerful and the challengers are in no sense evenly matched). A successful tactic is one that sets us up to eventually achieve gains that we are presently not positioned to win. As Brazilian educator Paulo Freire asked, "What can we do today so that tomorrow we can do what we are unable to do today?"

By this definition, the tactic of physical occupation in the case of Occupy Wall Street has been enormously successful already. We have, at least for a moment, subverted the hegemonic conservative narrative about our economy and our democracy with a different moral narrative about social justice and real democratic participation. We are significantly better positioned than before to make bold demands, as we can now credibly claim that our values are popular—even that they are common sense—and connected to a social base...

I want to suggest that the primary reason the tactic of occupation has resonated so far and wide is because it has served as a symbol about standing up to powerful elites on their own doorstep. To most people, the "occupy" in "Occupy Wall Street" essentially stands in for the F word! Millions of Americans were waiting for someone or something to stand up to Wall Street, the big banks, the mega-corporations, and the political elite. Then one day, a relatively small crew of audacious and persistent New Yorkers became that someone or something — became the catalyzing symbol of defiance we'd been waiting for.

Thus, Occupy Wall Street has served as something of a floating signifier — amorphous enough for many different kinds of people to connect with and to see their values within the symbol. Such ambiguous symbols are characteristic of new populist alignments. Many objects can serve as the catalyzing symbol, including actions (e.g. the occupation of Tahrir Square or of the Wisconsin State Capitol this spring), individual politicians (quintessentially Perón in Argentina), or even constructed brands (e.g. the "Tea Party"). As the above examples suggest, this phenomenon can be seen in all kinds of broad political alignments, across the ideological spectrum. In all cases though, a degree of ambiguity is necessary if the symbol is to catalyze a broad alignment. If the symbol's meaning becomes too particular—too associated with any one current or group within the alignment—it risks losing its powerfully broad appeal.

It's important to note that although the signifier is floating (i.e. not peg-able), it is not empty of content."

[Zorra]

6. I remember. That was a good call at the time, WillyT.

Good deductive and extrapolative thinking.
:thumbsup:

[WillyT]

8. Every Now And Then... I Have A Moment...

:D

:bounce:

:hi:

[Zorra]

11. lol

Well, then, have some more.;-)

Imagination and numbers is how we're going to remove the 1% from power.

[Fire Walk With Me]

10. Nov. 16: "#Occupy Los Angeles will likely be the next #Occupation to be attacked."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=439&topic_id=2323229

X[

[WillyT]

12. Great Call !!!

Amazing how predictable some of this stuff is.

:shrug:

:hi:

[Fire Walk With Me]

13. Just trend-watching is all. TPTB cannot allow #Occupy to prosper.

Their resistance is like clockwork. Predictable, as you said and know. DU historians know more about this than I, but even a pinch of cynicism will reveal that TPTB MUST attack, they must. It's what they are, it's what they do. Can't have people making decisions for themselves, can we? Then where would TPTB, be?

[lonestarnot]

14. They have until Wed. to come over and give it to A.L.E.C.!

[AnnaLee]

15. It appears to be a war

I ran into this link yesterday. It appears that tea party types are desperate to discredit OWS.
http://savingtherepublic.com/blog/2011/10/occupy-violence-and-sexual-assaults-on-the-rise-fringe-media-remains-silent-on-the-issues-while-praising-occupiers/

[veness]

16. Stay Informed! Occupy LA Developing Stories and News on KPFK:

Developing Stories and News

http://kpfk.org/kpfknews/1-latest-news/5414-occupy.html

http://kpfk.org/listen-live.html

Yayyyyyy for KPFK!

[robinlynne]

17. thank-you Willyt. I did not know this significance of OccupyLA.