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In following this movement I have notice one thing. A lot of effort is being made to keep these viral videos showing Police brutality, under wraps.
As the news broke about the University of Davis public relation’s disaster, YouTube tried to suppress the video. It was on a search list, then pulled. ABC news published a white washed version without video, extolling the rowdiness of the students, nothing backing it up. Fox News was last to carry any mention. CBS flashed up the press release from the Chancellor condoning the use of force to remove tents, and saying it was absolutely necessary.
Only “the truth” of video, was their undoing. When what is now being called “The Empire Strikes Back”, when Homeland Security coordinated the police sweepings of the camps of Denver, New York, Portland, Oakland, University Berkley, they seemed to not to account for the fact, that everyone today has a video camera, either on their phone or in HD.
Actually proving that people think in preconceived patterns, they BANNED the press from filming the police moving in… obviously not wanting any provocative pictures to sway peoples opinion. They seemed to have forgotten, that in America, everyone has video. Perhaps had the press also been allowed to film the cleanup, more restraint would have been shown by rogue police, and these events now galvanizing the OWS Movement, would not have taken place…..
Boston, the heart of Brain USA ( Braintree is their suburb) actually forbid the police from doing anything to interfere with people expressing their constitutional right to protest. Brilliant. One has to hand to to those Mass’es…
Here is how to handle dissent effectively.
Don’t hide, run into the problem. Send the mayor into the Occupy Camp, unarmed.
As mayor, specifically say you agree that the 1% needs to be taxed and that their money needs to be gotten out of politics. As mayor, ask them for help, to make that happen. As mayor embrace the idea that low taxes on the wealthy create unemployment, unfunded mandates, too little money, and unfunded services.
As mayor, use the press to endorse the OWS Cause, saying these people who are camping here, ARE America’s true heroes…
To make them fade back into society we need to tax the rich, and remove corporate money from every political campaign.
If, by magic that were to happen today, within one week, there would be no tents. There would be no protest… There would be no grievances.
Tax the rich; remove corporate money from all campaigns.
The headline says it all… The estimate was provided by blogger Mike Matthews…
Charlie Copeland, Tim Ross, and Mike Protack lead their crowd of lemming-like nobodies over the cliff into oblivion. Apparently there currently are too many for their local habitat to support.
You have a Herculean task before you… Essentially to clean up what Republicans have left behind.
However, it would be fair to warn you that my support for the Constitution of the United States of America, and my sworn duty to obey it to the best of my abilities, has me fearful of some the changes you propose for public safety. As an American, I have the right to live unsafely if I wish…
My ancestors had the same right.. They chose to come to America… and because of that… here we are today.. Our ancestors chose to travel west for opportunity, and because of it, here we are today.. Our ancestors chose to sign up and wear blue, to keep the grays from splitting us apart.. and because of that, here we are today…
I want that same right to maximise any opportunity that may present itself before me..
So, with fair warning, any criteria you propose to tame the Internet, which limits the right I hold so dear, the right to express my opinion with impunity, will cause you to lose the battle of public opinion… because I will fight you there..
The rules for engagement are as follows… YOUR PROPOSALS MUST FIT WITHIN THESE GUIDELINES… Once offered in high prose, but for everyone’s benefit today, I have put them in street language… For after all, that is where these values need to be upheld… on the streets of this great nation…
The ten basic rules are as follows…
1) You can’t tell me what to believe, or make me go home and shut up.
2) I’ll go armed and defend myself, thank you.
3) You can’t make me let someone else live in my house.
4) This is MY house; if you can’t demonstrate a compelling need to
snoop, stay the f*** out.
5) This is MY sh**; keep your greedy hands off it. And don’t go
accusing me of Evil without evidence.
6) If you’ve got evidence, lay it on the table. And no fair getting
a confession by pitchforking me in the ass.
7) I ain’t guilty just on YOUR say-so.
8) You can’t keep me in jail just because you want to.
9) As to the rest of my life, you can’t tell me what to do or not
do.
10) And neither can your big fat uncle in Washington.
Keep these in mind.. As long as you remain within the parameter of what I have sworn to cherish and uphold, you will continue to have my support… especially the fourth, since it’s misuse directly applies to us bloggers….
photo from file.
(Overheard on his cellphone to his developer boss; paraphrased, coming from a skinny twenty something, logo’d in a golf shirt, khaki pants, standing in the vestibule corner as everyone filed out; “it’s spinning out of control. E-v-e-r-y-b-o-d-y is angry. I don’t think we can fix it. It’s going the wrong way. I think we lost the election.”)
Now I’ve seen many meetings. Usually it’s always the same comfortable group, the same participants, with one or two of the same troublemaker activists. We all know each other, politely nod to our enemies, and once our duty is performed, socializing progresses afterwards. The short story version appears in the News Journal two days later….
Usually.
That was not what happened last night, August September 4th ( 🙂 h/t rsmitty) inside the Crossroads Presbyterian Church, which had blissfully wonderful cushioned green seats; that is if you were early enough to grab one…
Standing-room-only would be too cliche to describe the turnout. This issue at hand was so hot it swelled participation far above the 200 the organizers had expected…. (237 cars were counted; 500 participants?) They had even forgotten to plan for a microphone, assuming normal voices would suffice.
They didn’t, and fortunately a microphone was found.
Dignitaries (ie our politicos) sat across in front of the crowd… Dick Cathcart sat center, Bill Bell sat next to him. Bill Powers sat and stood on Cathcart’s left. Penrose Hollins drove down to represent Council. Bill Dunn, Bethany Hall Long, Earl Jacques, Rebecca Walker, Tom Scherer, Mike Protack, Bruce Ennis, members of the land use committee, and the Superintendent of the Appoquinimink School District showed up. Ms Fitzpatrick (sp) came in place of Representative Lofink, who was unfortunately at his son’s wedding rehearsal, to which one irate resident blurted out….”that’s no excuse!” Her spouse, quickly put his hand on her leg, and warned her to calm down..”it’s his son’s wedding….”
Yes tensions were that high…..
But the real star of the entire evening was the map…. Yes, a silly map. It stood tall over the entire meeting, dominating everyone’s attention… It out staged the County Council Head, Penrose Collins, who stormed off when it became obvious that the audience was not interested in his point of view….
Most felt that was fair play…. for no one had taken the time to consider their point of view when these ordinances were passed, affecting the entire lower region of the New Castle County… That it turns out, appears to be true…. no one.
The map stood tall over the entire proceeding, reminding everyone, every minute of the immense changes coming soon. And the changes were immense….
Here is the scale they are speaking off.
Three new schools will need to be built, one each year, to accommodate the new influx of students. The school district was surprised tonight; the plans were made without consulting them. They have no money to grow.
Traffic will grow by 1800 cars. What’s the visual of 1800 cars? At fifteen feet per vehicle, 27,000 feet total divided by 5280 ft/mile, equals a line of cars, parked bumper to bumper, a little over 5 miles long… Imagine a line of cars parked on the shoulder of RT 1 from St. George’s bridge to the heart of Odessa. There is your visual image. Deldot was surprised tonight. The plans were made without consulting them. And they too, have no money to grow.
Most of the areas do not have sewer capacity yet; however in a rush, building will progress, anticipating promised waivers to use septic systems, until the county sewer system can catch up….. (Do you follow county finances?) They have no money to grow…..
The wells to supply additional amounts of water; they are not yet drilled. They are on hold, for they have no money to grow….
The anger seemed to grow exponentially within that room… (Thank heavens they held this disclosure within a church).
Hats off to a great job done by the organizers, including one Chuck Mulholland. No one could have prepared them for what took place. Their natural demeanor saved the day, rising to the challenge of the moment. Particularly impressive was Chuck’s impromptu changing of the agenda, as it became quite apparent that citizens were there to make their voices heard, not listen to failed excuses…. That change-up, diffused some tension, perhaps saving a riot… I’ll bet he never expected to put 3 miles on that evening, all the while carrying the microphone.
The question of the day? How could this have happened…
The answer:
Mr. Pam Scott Paul Clark, President of County Council.
All these elements were rushed though, without vetting, to get developers in construction phase before the public could become aware of what was aimed at them. No vetting was done, so no leaks would occur. The last thing developers and Paul Clark needed, was a large meeting of outraged citizens.
Obviously the details of the arrangements were made in his home, and presented fait accompli to the Council for its rubber stamp. That is after all, what New County Council’s tend to do…
Therefore Paul Clark needs to go.
Councilman Bill Bell, who resembles the Stay-Puff Marshmallow Man, performed the role of a stool quite adequately. “No one told me” was his response….” I didn’t know…” he stammered. The question which immediately popped into every head but one, was ” why not?” That’s your job…
Obviously his principal function was to be the Rose Margaret Henry of the County Council. Being put in that position by the developers and unions, means he obviously feels he doesn’t need to call back his constituents, doesn’t need to show up at their meetings, doesn’t need to answer their letters or emails… Like Margaret Rose Henry, all he needs to do is show up… and vote the way he is told..
When faced with 450 some people he began to get nervous. His primary is days away… His opponent Tom Scherer, who is having his own personal fight with the developers of his development, over their unfulfilled promises.. certainly does appear to be the better choice, Towards the end, almost reduced to pleading for his seat, Mr. Bell promised too late, to “not support” the resolution that due to his complicity, has already been passed….
If there was another star, other than the map, the organizers, and the citizens themselves, it was Representative Dick Cathcart… Angered at the incompetence bordering on deceit coming from Mr Pam Scott Paul Clark and his Council, he promised legislation to forever put County Council growth under State oversight…. it’s about time.
Bruce Ennis, surprised everyone in the room by coming down hard for a moratorium on all new development. Two, three, four years whatever it takes to get local citizens to become comfortable with the new developments. He cited Kent County as a place where citizens took control and booted all developers our of governmental oversight positions…. That county is once again under control of its citizens; spawning a series of lawsuits from developers against it. Ennis implied that as long as New Castle’s citizenry supported the continuation of a moratorium against such lawsuits, he would as well. Most nuisance lawsuits would be thrown out, costing nothing since they were filed with no legal grounds to support them, but still the stigma of having lawsuits might make some citizens feel uneasy…. The consensus in that room was: if you take on the developers…. we got your back….
Go get them Bruce.
They came to listen. They got their earful.
Distilled to its basic elixir, here is the essence.
New Castle County development is controlled by developers and the Building Trades Union who are linked together in their interest for growth. Money for developers, jobs for employees. They own the following: Chris Coons, Paul Clark, Bill Bell, Bill Powers, George Smiley, and Bob Weiner….
Breaking that connection is the first step in returning Democracy back to those New Castle County citizens who live outside the city. Democratic Voters have the opportunity to sever that connection during Tuesday’s primary, September 8th. Voting Bill Dunn over Paul Clark, Tom Gordon over Chris Coons, Tom Scherer over Bill Bill, and Carl Colantuono over John Cartier, will do your part in returning Democracy to County Government. (Yeah, I know one is controversial, but if elected, we will own him, not the developers).
I’ve run out of time and space. Not mentioned here was the citizens fear of falling property values; not mentioned here was one realtor who spoke 6 (?) times, warning citizens of how workforce housing would affect their property values, not mentioned here was the question of where these workforce housing residents, transferred from Wilmington’s projects on the East Side, would find ever find work to pay for their housing, pimps, and bags of crack; not mentioned here was the cost of someone to cut down tennis shoes hanging from electric wires; not mentioned here was how noble Bill Dunn looked when working the crowd, compared to Paul Clark 4 years ago; not mentioned here was how poorly workforce housing residents obey driving laws; not mention here was how insufficient the current sewer systems are today, even without additional units; not mentioned here was how County Council increased the density levels, so developers could sell more houses per lot, more profit per lot; not mentioned here were the number of minority citizens who vehemently said they left the city to get away from the trash the County was again forcing upon them; not mentioned here was how hard everyone has worked, and suffered, to build their piece of the American dream, which now the County Council, at the bequest of Developers and Building Trade Unions, was about to destroy, WITHOUT EVEN CONSULTING THEM!
I wish I had more time…
Nancy, Geek? Can you add more?
The next time a blogger gets close to Mike Castle, he should ask this question. “Why do you persist in supporting the Bush war when it is obviously in your best political interests, not too?
Talk about a political scoop. That answer would race to the top of both right and left political discussions.
So why does Republican Congressman Mike Castle persist in supporting a president who, within Delaware at least, has a popularity level even below the national average of 27%?
The answer could perhaps found in this Machiavellian advice that whenever you find yourself on the wrong side of the issue, dig in and fight, otherwise you will be viewed as weak and compromising.
Across America today citizens are opening high school yearbooks and gazing on pictures of what could have been. Young, beautiful faces looking out from the pages with excitement and hope for the future.
It is okay to doggedly pursue a course of action that you firmly believe is morally correct. Ghandi, Mandala, and Martin Luther King all come to mind. But to pursue a course you know to be flawed, to cause unnecessary pain and suffering, for no reason but your own political self interests, is morally indefensible.
So how is it that Delaware, the first state, the home of Caesar Rodney, could support a Congressman who is morally indefensible?
Perhaps past loyalty? How often have marriages lasted too long, have bosses not been fired fast enough, have children been allowed to be abused, because personal feelings got in the way of clear judgment? There is a gentle human tendency to having once loved, to always have affection for that person, place, or thing. We should not be faulted for this. Just the opposite, we should exalt it. But we need to balance this emotional perspective with reality.
The reality is that Americans are dying in an religiously infused Iraqi Civil War. I wonder how many British died in our Civil War? How many French? I can find no answers, so my assumption is none. So why are we losing Delawareans to determine which ancient Muslim prophet was divinely inspired?
Mike Castle. Please change your view on this war to reflect your own beliefs, and those of the citizens of this patriotic first state. Others in your party, blessed with a common sense, have made the change. Please do so soon, before Delawareans have to open up another recent yearbook, and see another ghost looking back……..