I have to say, the Oakland protesters have been surprising me very much. I remain wildly impressed at how savvy & diverse they are on this side of the Bay. (I’ve only visited the SF site a couple of times, but it seemed similar. They had a stressful night yesterday, w/ cops looming then gathering, gathering then looming, and all in all threatening to close down the camp. The presence of five council members most of the evening, as well as general round-the-clock vigilance, kept the cops at bay. The failure of the crackdown in Oakland may have contributed, too.)
As many of you no doubt know by now, last night in Oakland there was a call for a general strike on Nov. 2. (More specifics on this tonight or tomorrow.) To discuss it, we broke into impromptu twenty-person groups. (There were about 1,500-2,000 of us in the Plaza, I’d say. Originally, we were dangerously hemmed in by the weakly fortified fence erected by the city to keep us off the grass, but it was dispatched quickly enough. & later was put to more aesthetic use. Tents will surely follow.) In my group alone, the diversity was striking: one woman’s English was very rudimentary; three very articulately angry Latinas, one with a child on her back whose laugh was matched by her stare; a Vietnamese nurse who schooled us on healthcare unions; an African-American guy who said he hadn’t participated in anything like this before, and only just happened to wander by at all, but was remarkably eloquent about the power of the bus strikes in Alabama; and, interestingly, more white girls than white guys. Now, while I’d admit that the process from that point was interminably democratic & boring, the conclusion — i.e., let’s fucking strike on Nov. 2 — was not. It was raucous & celebratory, and I think it may well have legs.
There is, I find, a certain allure to the unknown with all this and where it might lead. I’m not prone much to hope, but I do welcome enthusiasm.