Archive for November, 2011
Police attack Occupy Philly… with horses
Posted by Mike E on November 30, 2011
Posted in >> analysis of news, Occupy Wall Street | Leave a Comment »
New outrage: Los Angeles police clear Occupy camp
Posted by Mike E on November 30, 2011
Posted in >> analysis of news, Occupy Wall Street | 2 Comments »
Kasama at 4 million: Time for a new leap
Posted by Mike E on November 30, 2011
We post our major milestones to give readers a sense of the audience for Kasama. Today we passed 4 million page views. So it seems like time for a brief report.
The chart above starts in February 2010, when our traffic rebooted after a domain-name change. On December 2010, it crossed the 100,000 a month line. October 2011 (last month during the outbreak of Occupy Wall Street!) our traffic crosses the 150,000 a month line for the first time.
The details are easy to quantify:
4,002,649 page views since we went live four year ago (in December 2007).
3,623 posts — which includes crossposts of interesting material and a section of original material by our own authors
31,890 comments in threads — which is a ratio of almost 9:1 (comments to posts) and suggests an engaged community of people.
Popular posts often have more than 1,000 hits in their first 24 hours. Very popular posts sometimes get 2,000 hits.
What Kasama has created is a space defined by very radical, revolutionary and communist politics — and that space has become host to a many-sided discussion of key controversies of revolutionary change, and become home to a community of people who create that discussion.
Posted in >> analysis of news | 20 Comments »
Occupy Pop! Miley Cyrus Reps #Occupy!
Posted by Nat W on November 29, 2011
Don’t live a lie, this is your one life ooh Don’t live it like you won’t get lost Just walk just walk
It’s a liberty walk, it’s a liberty walk It’s a liberty, liberty, liberty It’s a liberty walk, it’s a liberty walk It’s a liberty, liberty, liberty
Posted in >> Art and Culture, art, Media, music, Occupy Wall Street, occupywallstreet, video | 12 Comments »
India: Captured laptop used to kill Maoist leader Kishenji
Posted by Mike E on November 29, 2011
The following article appeared on the Naxal Revolution site.Panda’s laptop helped securitymen lay trap for Kishenji
Nov 25, 2011
A laptop confiscated recently from a top Maoist leader Sabyasachi Panda’s hideout in Odisha is believed to have helped the security forces carry anti-Maoist operation against Mallojula Koteshwar Rao alias Kishenji.
According to sources, the laptop was analysed by top analysts in Delhi to locate the whereabouts of the no 3 leader in the Maoist hierarchy.
According to sources, security forces including the CRPF had surrounded Kishenji and a few other top leaders in the forests of West Bengal on Wednesday itself. However, Kishenji managed to give police the slip only to land in the middle of yet another ambush. An encounter for half an hour resulted in his killing.
Panda’s laptop is believed to have provided several important clues about the whereabouts of other leaders including another politburo member Akkiraju Ramakrishna alias RK. According to soruces, RK was earlier spotted in the Andhra-Orissa border. However, a miscommunication among the security forces in cornering him allowed him to escape the police net recently. Though unconfirmed, sources said the next target would be RK since his location has almost been confirmed.
Posted in >> analysis of news, CPI(Maoist), India, Naxalite, peoples war | 15 Comments »
Losing our brother Kishenji: The state murder of India’s Maoist leader
Posted by kasama on November 25, 2011
We received the terrible news that the leading Indian Maoist Kishenji (AKA Mallojula Koteswara Rao) was murdered in by government forces in a “fake encounter.” Kishenji was a leading figure and spokesman for India’s Maoist (Naxalite) movement — and reportedly the military leader of their embryonic popular armed forces.
The following is one of the more recent accounts of outrage and exposure.
Our hearts are with the brave communist fighters of India and the hundreds of millions of oppressed people who dream of liberation.
Varvara Rao:
Maoist leader Kishenji was tortured before being killed
Telugu poet and Maoist sympathiser Varvara Rao Friday alleged that top Maoist leader Kishenji was tortured before being killed in a fake encounter and demanded a white paper from the West Bengal government.
“Kishenji was subjected to inhuman torture as his body bore marks of several injuries and he was killed in a fake encounter 24 hours after being nabbed. I demand a white paper on the killing,” Rao told reporters at the state secretariat.
Posted in >> analysis of news, CPI(Maoist), India, Naxalite, peoples war | 13 Comments »
Critical response needed: Is it wrong to fight back?
Posted by Mike E on November 24, 2011
Cairo
Jose Redfox suggested that this be posted to craft and share a critical response together.
Jose said this piece had played a role in “peace police” actions during various occupations. Let’s also share, if we can, what kinds of actions and assumptions such a piece has been used to justify (whether it was the intention of the author or not).
This essay appeared in Common Dreams.
Throwing Out the Master’s Tools and Building a Better House:
Thoughts on the Importance of Nonviolence in the Occupy Revolution
Violence is what the police use. It’s what the state uses.
If we want a revolution, it’s because we want a better world, because we think we have a bigger imagination, a more beautiful vision. So we’re not violent; we’re not like them in crucial ways. When I see a New York City policeman pepper-spray already captive young women in the face, I am disgusted; I want things to be different. And that pepperspraying incident, terrible though it was for the individuals, did not succeed in any larger way.
Posted in >> analysis of news, Occupy Wall Street | 76 Comments »
Saul Williams: List of Demands
Posted by Mike E on November 24, 2011
Posted in >> analysis of news, music, video | Leave a Comment »
Pepperspray Meme: Gotcha!
Posted by Mike E on November 23, 2011
Posted in >> analysis of news, art, Occupy Wall Street | 2 Comments »
Original Occupation: Native Blood & the Myth of Thanksgiving
Posted by Mike E on November 23, 2011
This piece is available as podcast. It is part of our larger Kasama offerings on peoples’ history.
The Puritan colonists of Massachusetts embraced a line from Psalms 2:8:
“Ask of me, and I shall give thee, the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
by Mike Ely
Intro to that first occupation
We are talking widely among ourselves about “occupying” Wall Street — taking the center of an empire back for the people of the world. We are talking about “Occupy Everything” — sharing our dreams of taking all society away from banks, police, and the heartless authority of money. We hope this moment marks a beginning of the end for them.
And yet, just such a moment cannot be understood without remembering that other occupation — the one that marked the beginning of their beginning.
Arrogant invaders occupied a land using the most naked forms of genocide. They invented new forms of slavery, slave trade and profit making. They arrived with their high-tech arms and bibles. They declared all was theirs by divine right, while they took it all with raw force.
Put another way: That first occupation was a sweeping nightmare that starts with Columbus. It has continued for 500 years. For the Native peoples of today (and therefore for us too) it remains an ongoing story of domination and removal. The nation-state who today labels millions of indigenous descendants “illegal aliens” arrived in boats with only royal decrees and their holy book as documents of legitimacy.
Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast after surviving their first bitter year in New England.
Here is the true story of that Thanksgiving — a story of murder and theft, of the first “corporations” invented on North American soil, of religious fundamentalism and relentless mania for money. It is a story of the birth of capitalism.
This piece is intended to be shared at this holiday time.
Pass it on. Serve a little truth with the usual stuffing.
* * * * * * * * *
Posted in >> analysis of news, genocide, immigration, Mike Ely, Native people, slavery | 9 Comments »
UC Davis & the high moral ground 1: The whole world is watching
Posted by kasama on November 23, 2011
This is what it looks like when the deliberate, routinized acts of authorities concede the high moral ground to us. This is how a whole generation learns about who is listening to the people, and who coldly treats the people like cockroaches needing sprays from a can. Acts of power meant to assert and enforced the norm — now expose that norm to vast audiences (including internationally). This is what awakening looks like. This is what delegitimization emerges from. This is the platform of consciousness upon which a new revolutionary movement can be built.
One million views and climbing — at youtube. The video is viral, the mood is viral.
Posted in >> analysis of news, Occupy Wall Street, video | 13 Comments »
UC Davis & the high moral ground 2: The whole world is watching
Posted by kasama on November 23, 2011
In the aftermath, the students confront UC Davis Chancellor Katehi with a stunning silence. Everywhere the camera pans shows how many faces there were in the huge crowd — silent watching and indictment. In answer to “students as threat” and “occupations are unsafe” — they displayed their unity, their discipline, their utter distance from the authorities.
Here too the world is watching, here too the video has now reached a million views on youtube (and uncounted more in other venues).
Whatever lies the mainstream media whips up for those who still watch it, there is another answer captured in real time and shared through channels that are not yet controlled.
Posted in >> analysis of news, abuse, Occupy Wall Street, video | 1 Comment »
Egypt: Revolution In The Air
Posted by onehundredflowers on November 23, 2011
This was originally on democracynow.org.
A lot of liberal groups, political parties, have made compromises with the military council in these last 10 months in fear of the Muslim Brotherhood and the rise of the Islamists and somehow taking over the country and creating an Islamist state, or taking away a civil state. And so, they made compromises with the military as well. So, you have this, kind of, this politics going on, and what’s forgotten is why people went into the street in the first place. The calls were for bread, freedom, and social justice, human dignity. People feel this has not been achieved, and so they say, “es-sawra mustamirra,” the revolution continues.
Egyptian Revolution Enters New Phase As Thousands Brave Violence to Protest Military Rule
Activists in Egypt are holding their fourth day of massive demonstrations to demand an end to military rule and a transition to a civilian government. The protests continue amidst a massive crackdown and an offer to resign from Egypt’s interim cabinet. Reports from Cairo’s main morgue said at least 33 people have been killed and more than 1,500 wounded in the military government’s crackdown. The turmoil comes as Egypt is scheduled to begin holding parliamentary elections on Monday. “I can’t see how a legitimate election can take place when you have such state-sponsored brutality happening in the heart of the capital city of the country,” says Democracy Now! correspondent Sharif Abdel Kouddous, who joins us for an update from Cairo. “What many Egyptians have been seeing over these past 10 months has been that the revolution has been abused and stolen and deformed, and that the military council in Egypt has really not lived up to any of its promises in this transitional period, from human rights abuses to just their complete grip on power.”
Posted in >> analysis of news, Egypt, politics, women, working class, youth | Tagged: Arab Spring, Tahrir Square | 1 Comment »
Occupy Everything: Make the ripples, build for waves
Posted by Mike E on November 21, 2011
“When words are spoken that (suddenly! finally!) invoke that idea of negating a whole system or structure (i.e. “Occupy Everywhere!” “All power to the General Assembly!” “Long live the Oakland Commune!”) — every nerve should go on alert. We should tune in intently to the reception.
“Who is speaking? Who is listening? Who is answering back?…
“We should take note as the stone hits the pond, and read the ripples. Because we are wanting to generate waves.”
This emerges from a discussion of “When do we discuss power? Long live the Oakland Commune?“
by Mike Ely
Any complex human task, (any!) that you speak the words quite a bit in advance of the actual moment, in order to be able to act when the actual alignment of stars is “just right.” And you often have to speak them with poetry that won’t hold up to lawyerly textualism (“We want the world and we want it now!” or one of my favorite Pantherisms “Blood to the horse’s brow, and woe to those who cannot swim.”)
If you think about it: Any revolutionary cause needs contagious agitational slogans the preconfigure in the mind the visions and goals that will (eventually, hopefully) give rise to action slogans.
That is how ideas change matter: When revolutionary ideas become grasped (understood, taken up and creatively morphed) by large numbers of people, matter itself is changed (meaning that social relations are overthrown and their defenders are challenged and defeated).
Posted in >> analysis of news, Mike Ely, Occupy Wall Street | 19 Comments »
From Mexico >>>>> to Oakland Commune
Posted by kasama on November 20, 2011
Here’s a statement from Mexico, addressed to the Oakland Commune. November 13, 2011. Spanish version
To the Peoples of the World
To the Occupy Movement
To the Oakland Commune
To Our Sisters and Brothers in Struggle on the Other Side of the Border
We don’t need to remind you of the deep connections between Wall Street, Gringo Capitalism and our Mexican misery. From Imperialist wars to the initial experiments in agrobiotechnology, Mexico has been the principal landscape for offensives by northern capital. We have participated and continue to, in the uprising of the Zapatistas against the neoliberal attack of NAFTA. The uprising which set the spark for the movement against neoliberalism. We met each other at the summits of Seattle, Prague, Genoa, Miami and Cancun. We met each other through a great global conversation.
It’s been a long time since we fought together in the movement against neoliberalism and the world has changed since those times. Today the narco war is devastating our society. As two sides of the same coin, on one side we have the narco and on the other the militarization of the country. These two faces are crushing us from both sides. Although it seems like they fight, they are both at the service of capital and in the modern world local capital is connected in a strong fashion to global capital. In the last few months we have learned these connections between Wall Street and narco money. According to one analysis, narco money was the liquid capital necessary to rescue the banking sector from the initial hits of the financial crisis in 2008 [1].
Posted in >> analysis of news, Occupy Wall Street | 6 Comments »
New Flier: Kasama Online Literature Table
Posted by kasama on November 19, 2011
Connect people with Kasama’s rich offering of pamphlets. This two-sided handout describes key Kasama publications. And describes the two ways that people can get them: by ordering a printed version, or by downloading and printing a PDF. Print this and share it.
Click for the PDF
Posted in >> analysis of news, Kasama, Kasama pamphlets | Leave a Comment »
Holy Occupy, Batman! It’s the 99%!
Posted by onehundredflowers on November 19, 2011
This interview was originally in boingboing.
Interview with creator of Occupy Wall Street “bat-signal” projections during Brooklyn Bridge #N17 march
By Xeni Jardin
Earlier this evening, tens of thousands of Occupy Wall Street protesters marched throughout New York City, many making their way on to the Brooklyn Bridge, carrying LED candles and chanting. As Occupiers took the bridge in a seemingly endless sea of people, words in light appeared projected on the iconic Verizon Building nearby:
“99% / MIC CHECK! / LOOK AROUND / YOU ARE A PART / OF A GLOBAL UPRISING / WE ARE A CRY / FROM THE HEART / OF THE WORLD / WE ARE UNSTOPPABLE / ANOTHER WORLD IS POSSIBLE / HAPPY BIRTHDAY / #OCCUPY MOVEMENT / OCCUPY WALL STREET / list of cities, states and countries / OCCUPY EARTH / WE ARE WINNING / IT IS THE BEGINNING OF THE BEGINNING / DO NOT BE AFRAID / LOVE.”
A few hours later I spoke with Mark Read, who organized the “bat-signal” project. He tells Boing Boing why and how he did this, and what technology he used.
Posted in >> analysis of news, art, Occupy Wall Street, occupywallstreet, organizing, politics, Protest, students, video, women, working class, youth | Tagged: 99%, bat-signal, Brooklyn Bridge, N17, projection, Verizon | 4 Comments »
From Seattle General Assembly: Solidary, diversity, clarity, debate
Posted by kasama on November 18, 2011
Unite the many, oppose the few: Attack in Seattle
This proposal was passed by the Seattle General Assembly GA:“Occupy Seattle has many different politics and visions within it. This is our strength.
We will not allow any in our movement to be singled out and attacked for their politics whether they be anarchist, progressive, communist, liberal, socialist, radical, etc.
We welcome healthy debate among and between each of these groups, but debate is very different from irrational attacks and fear-mongering. We will defend each other and our movement.
If people are partaking in actions which are damaging to the movement or risk the safety of its members unnecessarily, this should be dealt with as a separate matter, outside the purview of this statement of principle.
Posted in >> analysis of news, anarchism, communism, Occupy Wall Street | 1 Comment »
When do we discuss power? Long live the Oakland Commune?
Posted by Mike E on November 18, 2011
The communards' barricade in Oakland -- denounced on pro-police website
In their new poster for Saturday, the Occupy Oakland graphics crew (and who else? Oakland’s General Assembly?) raised the beautiful and visionary slogan
“Long live the Oakland Commune!”
What does that mean to them? And to us?
Reactionary columnists have attacked the Occupations for “playing at the Paris Commune, with barricades and visions of power.” How do we answer that? How do we build on it?
There has also been agitation discussion of “All power to General Assemblies” — raising the idea that society should be occupied generally, and that a new order could start with the formation of General Assemblies everywhere.
The following essay was submitted by Abbas to Kasama — and (obviously) raises precisely this.
By posting this essay here, Kasama is not endorsing this, nor even raising the slogan… but pointing to the various early glimmers of counter-power being felt and discussed.
This confronts revolutionaries everywhere with practical and theoretical question:
- Are we speaking to (or even seeing!) the ways our new generation is thinking about new power?
- What is the role for visionary manifestos of dreams? How do they relate to immediate plans?
- What would it mean to inject something into the air, before it can be realized on the ground?
- When and how do we raise the destruction of old power and the creation of new power?
- How do we envision and present our end goals and the transition to new society? Is it just in whispered discussions of one’s and two’s, or does it deserve space in slogans, posters and banners?
- How to we speak to the glimmers of new power in this moment? How we speak to those bold ones who are asking: Why don’t the 99% just occupy everything? What do we say to those aging heads who just think such things are merely naive, or divisive, or impossible?
- How do we speak to the forms, transitions, prerequisites and demands of discussing power?
- How and when does the visionary clash with the practical? When does it invent a new practical?
- How and when does the visionary clash with necessary alliances? And when does it transform those alliances?
Posted in >> analysis of news, Occupy Wall Street | 62 Comments »
Five Things in New York City that are dirtier than Zuccotti Park
Posted by Mike E on November 18, 2011
These guys look like they could use a bath, I guess. But is that really the point? By Edwina Hay
Thanks to Impose Magazine.
By Ari Spool
Mayor Bloomberg stated today that he believed health and safety conditions were intolerable at Zuccotti Park. But instead of putting together a community based task force or something, he unleashed hundreds of police officers in the middle of the night to roust everyone. Predictably, these really dirty and unhealthy people didn’t go easy, and they were prepared: Barricades for blocks, the subway and Brooklyn Bridge shut down so the crowd couldn’t rush to help, an LRAD acoustic sound weapon stationed near the park to deafen protestors, and what must have been hundreds upon hundreds of NYPD, including their SWAT surveillance unit, Technical Assistance Resource Unit, which has gotten in trouble before for filming peaceful protests unconstitutionally.
The crackdown caused more health and safety problems than it solved, although they certainly got that park squeaky fucking clean. For instance, they caused a major health issue for City Councilman Ydannis Rodiguez, who was beaten and then arrested for resisting arrest. (Resisting arrest is such a bunk charge if there is no accompanying charge—resisting what arrest? it’s so confusing.) Or, think of all the homeless people who had been making Zuccotti Park their home; it’s certainly a health and safety problem to return them to the streets.
Posted in Occupy Wall Street | Leave a Comment »
