Occupy Oakland - Before & After

That's what permits are for, and I assure you I have one that allows me to crap in the bushes.

Rochard has a low iq ignore him.

Well, I am still trying to figure out what illegal shit the banks did to force people to get loans, or pay for inflated house prices? In the end still a decision made by an adult.

I am not saying the Banks did not do illegal shit and then we bailed them out, I WANTED them to FAIL.

Guess I nailed it.

You know a HUGE part of the problem is that nobody is talking about? The rating agencies. Since they were paid by these people that put these things together, and not the buyer, they felt they were under pressure to assign investment grade ratings to things they probably shouldn't have.

If you can get something rated investment grade you're golden and the rating agencies were all to happy to help you get there.

I'm sure the banks were doing something illegal. Like I said earlier, "business as usual".

But we keep blaming the banks when the truth of us all of us benefited from this. No one - NO ONE - went on the news networks and said "This is based on perceived value of the housing market, and it's going to crash, and it's going to crash hard". Everyone knows that real estate goes in cycles, but not one person stood up and said that we needed to stop it.

And still no one has done anything to stop this from happening again?

Not at all.

Our city union is on strike, and they are protesting daily. All thirty-nine of them. They protest from 9am until noon, every day, for the past month now. There was a little problem with them parking in my dentist's parking lot, but they put up a sign saying "customer only" blah blah blah problem solved. Great, the can sit out in the cold with their little signs all they want.

However, if they invite their extended families to camp out with them twenty-four hours a day for a month straight with no bathroom facilities, that's a completely different story.

Protest all you want. But if you fuck up other people's shit, then it's an issue.

Socks is right on the money here. The islands are full of vacationing cops who come down every 2-3 months to whoremonger like excons who just got released. They blow money like water, why... mucho overtime baby

This is a distinction that is lost on most of the people here.

people who sit at home on computers will always resent protestors, its just how it goes.

Dont expect much support for anything involving getting out there and doing anything, gfy is not the place for that lol

will always be haters against those who actually get off the sofa, they will encourage arrests, and violence against peaceful people never remembering that is what America is all about.

too bad the have no concept of american ideals or the freedoms that allow us to gather and protest.

Jubilee time.

I am, sadly, a keyboard warrior. I wish I could become more involved with local politics. My local home town has some issues (going broke, etc) and I'd love to jump in and get involved but I fear the first thing anyone will say is "pornographer" and then my child will be shunned. So I do my protesting from home.

In this case with the OWS movement, they don't have a objective or goal. They are all over the place, and in a lot of cases you have people protesting just because they like to protest.

Seems things are getting interesting in Oakland. No one can seem to make out what really happened last night. With social networking things get ugly quickly, and mis-information seems common. The protestors are saying the police used flash-grenades while the police say it was fireworks from protestors. Oddly enough, what's not being reported is that protesters attacked police to take back the part.

I just found a great video of one of our local GFY radicals sending a message to the Oakland PD. Is that you stocktrader23?

Next week on Tosh.0

Umm, and who does the due diligence responsibility go to? You can cry "people lied" from the mountain tops until you're blue in the face and your balls freeze off; but here in the real world, the banks allowed these dirty practices to happen. Plain and simple..

What is hilarious is how you're trying to shuffle all of this on to people who lied on loan applications... and in the process you are making the banks out to be some totally incompetent group of the filthy rich who didn't know how much people were really making.

"Of liberty I would say that, in the whole plenitude of its extent, it is unobstructed action according to our will. But rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual."

Thomas Jefferson

"The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite."

Thomas Jefferson

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. ... God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion; what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms." -- Thomas Jefferson

I remember this quote from college. and the professor who said it answered it.

Testosterone will never allow man to govern himself.

Holy shit that was comical.... I choked on my red bull.

Do you really think those guys that signed our constitution would be satisfied with the govt's actions of today? No they would be telling us to exercise our right to tear down this govt and start fresh, be it by protesting or by revolution.

wonder what this great man would do in these times with cops with riot gear throwing flash bombs at peaceful protestors?

people on this forum would have had Thomas jefferson beaten and locked up. True americans know what it means to be America, not sitting at home wishing protestors get hurt.

our founding fathers were the worst of hippies! and they had GUNS

I love how Republican responses to anything consist of nothing more than small talk. There is never any substance.

Lying during the mortgage boom was not necessary. If you go back to the early 90s, there were a lot of people renting that could perfectly afford a home mortgage, but lending standards were too high for even those people to get approved. Clinton and the GOP congress moved to change that by guaranteeing certain mortgages through Fannie and Freddie.

The problem is that after lenders saw that these sub prime buyers really could may their payments, they slowly lowered the bar within their own institutions to the point where anyone with a job got a loan of some amount.

The goal was to give out as many loans as possible and then sell the rights to those loans as low risk investments regardless of how high risk they really were. Then many of the lenders placed bets at AIG (which is in part essentially a Wall Street casino) that those loans would default.

So to reiterate:

Lender gives loan to someone they know can't afford it long term.
Lender places bet against borrower at AIG.
Lender sells loan to investors as a great investment.
Lender profits big.
Investor hurts.

THIS is what brought the economy down. Unfortunately, those that should be arrested can't be arrested because their institutions are the financial foundation of America (something that Thomas Jefferson warned against allowing to happen).

"utterly no reason" ???

These 99% protests are to get a message out. To rile up voters. The Tea Party has spent a couple years attempting (and failing) to get where 99% has gotten in just a couple months. If the Tea Party had been successful in organizing massive demonstrations, I suspect you wouldn't be talking down their actions.

If a big Tea Party protest required a police force and cleanup, that would be perfectly fine. Right?

they made their point now back to work everybody

These protests don't have a message. They don't have any leadership. They don't have goals. Not once has their message been "get out and vote". And if that was their message, why do this now and not come election time?

From your comments, I'm guessing you seem to think that I support the tea party. I don't. I don't support any movement or group; I'm apolitical. Frankly, your just choosing between the lesser of the two evils, and at the end of the day everyone is just blowing smoke up everyone's ass and then spinning the best they can after the fact.

Political parties have the right to meet. However, when the Democrats or the Republicans meet up in public, they do so in proper forums - where they have hired staff to clean up shit. Protesters have the right to protest, and I'm glad that they do. But they don't have the right to camp out in public parks over night, they don't have the right to crap in bushes, they don't have the right vandalize the park or write grafiti, and the city - by law - is required to clean up and ensure it's sanitary. And the city governments and their respective police forces are being very decent about all of this. But the local residents who live next to the park have rights too - they don't want to listen to war drums beating at 2am in the morning. When the city comes to the protesters and says "you need to leave so we can clean up", you fucking leave. Go home, come back in the morning.

Get your message. Great. By don't waste my tax dollars and destroy local parks in the process.

I would venture to say that the actions leading up to the reactions of Oakland PD were not exactly what our forefathers had in mind when they came up with the right to peaceful assembly.

For once, we agree.

go read the jefferson quotes i posted above.. This is EXACTLY what our forefathers had in mind.

"rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual."

" God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion; what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance"

"The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first."
Thomas Jefferson

"When once a republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil."
Thomas Jefferson

Hi Smokey.

Wow....just wow. What a dick move by that cop. Great toss, by the way.

This whole movement could very soon degenerate into something ugly -- or be hijacked by anarchists at the very least. I mean something ugly that will involve lots of deaths.

Our forefathers wanted protestors to camp out in public parks in large numbers for weeks at a time? Our forefathers wanted protesters to crap in bushes in public parks? Our forefathers wanted protesters to vandalize the public parks our tax dollars paid for? Our forefathers wanted protestors to damage our parks?

Our forefathers set up rights and protections so that we have freedom of speech, and the right to protest. However, that does not give us the right to beat war drums at 2am in a public park, nor does it give people the right to for civil disobedience. When the city government says "We want to inspect and clean the park" you leave - not attack the local police in large numbers at 2am.

You want to protest, fine. Do it in an orderly manner without turning city parks into camp grounds, and stop throwing rocks and bottles at the police.

Umm I would have to disagree with you. You did study American history did you not? Have you read up on the riots against the British prior to the American Revolution? Hell even the most publicized being the Boston Tea Party was far more extreme than anything the OWS moment has done.

I'd be willing to bet if our forefathers saw what this country has turn to under our govt today they would be asking why we are all pussy's and haven't burned down the white house.. lol

Here read up a bit on the lead up to the Revolution.. http://www.homeofheroes.com/hallofhe...rth/1bc6a.html There are several instances of them using "mob violence or riots" during protests..They didn't exactly "protest peacefully " as we try to do today.

Our forefathers wanted us to do what ever is necessarily to keep this country free. Read about the history of this country and the actions that forged it from the beginnings, before you assume to know what they might have thought.

you say that as if you didn't just read what you quoted.

i will post it again for you

"God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion; what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance"

do you think jefferson is talking about singing kumbaya in the streets ?

So they said this as they were kicking out the British government. I wonder if they felt that same way when they were in office.

What a crock of bullshit... just goes to show how ignorant you are of what actually occurred... not once in that diatribe of ignorance did you mention mortgage backed securities, Credit Default Swaps or short selling...

Give the land back to the Indians.

I'm starting to think that when people look back on all this 10 years from now, anything that had the word "Occupy" in the forefront of it's title will be looked upon with many facepalms.

I'm actually surprised someone hasn't photoshopped "OCCUPY THIS" over a goatse image yet.

I'm sure it's coming.

personally i don't agree with protesting without a clear message but the fact they are speaks loudly of the frustration of many americans and i support their right to do it..

I see no reason why these people can't be allowed to protest unhindered. There is no reason for police to be there. No cops = no violence.

Sure it sucks having a bunch of people camping ,shitting in your parks, but oh well. We bailed out the banks for billions because they were having a hard time, we can spend a bit of that to clean up the parks after..

All of what you mentioned went on, and yes, the banks are guilty.

But so is my buddy who barely made $70k a year but took out so much money against his house that he had ever toy known to man. I mean, seriously. They took out like $150k against their house - bought a boat, a motorcycle, atvs (plural), a jeep, a $60k truck.... These people are just as guilty. It was these people who did this that are just as guilty. They spent this money buying toys, cars, etc etc etc - which just boosted the economy.

Our society is all about "me me me me". It's never "my fault" when we can just blame it some someone else.

The frustration is staggering. People are pissed. At one point exactly half of the houses on my street were vacant. People are loosing their jobs, houses, cars, etc etc etc.

There is no reason why these people cannot protest unhindered. With that said, there are a lot of issues just by the nature of these protests. Generally speaking protests is where you show up for ten hours - then go home. But the very nature of these protests are borderline illegal. These are public parks, not campgrounds. The park they are using in NYC doesn't have bathroom facilities for hundreds of people over a long term. They can't be serving food in bulk without permits.

Protesters have rights. But so do the citizens and business in the area of the park. They don't want war drums being beat at 2am, and they don't want hundreds of people being served on the street. It's a public park, not a circus.

And I love your comment about how we can afford to bail out the banks, so we can afford to clean up our parks. No, we can't. This is a democracy - We should have let the banks fail. But it's costing our cities millions of dollars that they cannot afford. They are targeting "corporate greed" which is vague, while forcing local cities to pay the bill for police, clean up, and damages. For some cities, this is coming out to millions of dollars.

did your buddy get a bail out?

*** add a paragraph of sadly hilarious comparisons on why this example makes retardedly little sense ***

I laughed at the vid too, but then started wondering if he was going to be the next Timothy McVeigh.

Did I hear a bit of a Canadian in his accent?

oh well send in some port-a-potty's and some military rations
i don't see it as a huge problem.. if it went on for months , then sure.
yes we can.. we waste money right and left this is a drop in the bucket.. charge it to the banks that got the bailouts stop giving handouts to israel you could buy every protester a new house
then let's vote on it..
we should have built a time machine.
the banks cost us billions, i don't see a problem.. like i said , bill the banks..
not really , they are saying we are pissed , be prepared to be yanked from your castles if you don't fix it. Like i said , i don't agree with the approach but that's why i am not there..
boohoo. i paid for the bailouts , i am paying for the cleanup. the difference is i paid 1000 times more for the bailouts.. so i am a little pissed at having to pay to cleanup after protesters , i am 1000 times more pissed at the bailouts

Smokey never gives up when it comes to proving a point. Just a warning. lol

"We can either have a democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can’t have both." - Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis

That's funny. They are protesting the government. Why would the government support them by paying for port-a-pottys and free food?

So it's perfectly okay for the protestors to disturb the peace and disrupt private businesses? What about the copy shop half a block away. People are afraid to visit there because they are afraid the free food will attract homeless people and criminals? What about the Starbucks - you know, the corporate coffee giant - who won't get any business because half a block away coffee is free?

I think it's unfair that we are asking cities to spend millions on this. Yes, millions. Hey, it's your tax dollars so whatever.

But I'll agree with you about Israel.

I fail to understand the point of protesting. You show your disapproval by voting. Has protesting ever really changed anything? Do you think Congress is not listening? Is OWS going to change anything at all. Is the White House even commenting on it?

Doesn't matter. Vote for whomever you want. It's just the lessor of two evils at this point. And all politicians lie to you. It's no longer about running on the issues and being on the right site. It's about making comprimises to get as many votes as you can.

But we can't bill the banks. You can't just say "you caused this" and hand them a bill. It's not legal.

From my point of view, we all caused this. Every fucker who sold a house or took money on a house with an over inflated value. Why don't we just send them a bill too?

Congress was asleep at the wheel. Why not send them a bill too?

Sure, no problem. We'll just grab everyone who works on Wall Street, force them out of their houses in their undies, and then.... Someone else will live there. Then we can force them out. There will always be a top 1%.

I don't agree with the approach either. You want to protest and get your message across, that's outstanding. But don't camp out in cities park creating a circus. Get some leadership, get an objective, and stop acting like children.

Our local city union is on strike - all forty of them. They do our garbage, city water, parks, a few other things. They showed up at the city hall meeting, which was moved to the big town park. As the city leaders walked out, they shouted obscenties at them - and got into what I call a shoving match. What no one seemed to notice is that there was 500 football players and cheerleaders at practice, that was just breaking up. They sat there for half an hour chanting cuss words. The next time a large group of parents went down to the protesters and told them this was unacceptable. You can protest all you want - that's your right - but do so in a grown up manner. They are still on strike a month later, and they protest city hall from 9am until noon each day. It's very peaceful and respectful like.

But if they occupied our parks and crapped in our bushes, no one would support them. A month into OWS, and I have yet to hear an official comment from the White House (did I miss that?)

I paid for the bailouts too. But I don't vote so I shouldn't be bitching about what they do with my tax dollars.

I understand people are pissed. People are loosing their houses. Exactly half of the people on my street lost their house in the past four years, maybe more. Get the message out there, protest. But stop this child like circus. Get some leadership, come up with clearly defined objectives, shut down the circus, and get real.