Occupy Seattle

Occupy Walmart - Renton, WA

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 21:21:42 -0800

Occupy Walmart - Renton, WA

March/Rally Take the Bridge Working Washington/occupyseattle...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 05:44:39 -0800

March/Rally Take the Bridge Working Washington/occupyseattle 11-17-11 Part 4

March/Rally Take the Bridge Working Washington/occupyseattle...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 05:42:00 -0800

March/Rally Take the Bridge Working Washington/occupyseattle 11-17-11 Part 3

March/ rally Nov17th take the Bridge with Working...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 05:41:00 -0800

March/ rally Nov17th take the Bridge with Working Washington/occupyseattle Part 1

March/Rally Take the Bridge Working Washington/occupyseattle...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 05:41:00 -0800

March/Rally Take the Bridge Working Washington/occupyseattle 11-17-11 Part 2

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Fri, 18 Nov 2011 05:39:50 -0800

wearethe99percent: I’m 31 years old. I have a master’s degree...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 03:14:56 -0800

wearethe99percent:

I’m 31 years old. I have a master’s degree from a leading university and over $58,000 in student loan debt. For years I worked as an adjunct college instructor with no health insurance. I became ill and now have thousands in medical debt. Luckily I’ve found a job with health insurance, but I still live paycheck to paycheck and occasionally forgo food to get by.

I am the 99 percent! OccupyWallStreet.org

wearethe99percent: I am a 47 year old single parent of 5 kids...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 03:14:25 -0800

wearethe99percent:

I am a 47 year old single parent of 5 kids ranging in age from 11 to 30. My children are owed 37,000.00 in child support and the state of MD doesn’t care. I have health insurance because I have health issues but cannot afford it for my 2 youngest children.

I cannot pay my mortgage and owe the electric company over 6000.00. I have many medical bills for my children because I take them to the ER when they need to see a doctor.

I can’t afford to feed everyone so I pretend I’m not hungry so the kids can eat.

I AM THE 99 % and it makes me sad that my children will always be too.

wearethe99percent: I am a member of the 99% - over the last 4...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 03:13:27 -0800

wearethe99percent:

I am a member of the 99% - over the last 4 years my husband and I have taken more than 20% in pay cuts! Tuition for college for our 3 children has increased by 70% - our savings are gone! We wonder if we will lose our house next!

staff: Yesterday we did a historic thing. We generated 87,834...

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 03:11:10 -0800

staff:

Yesterday we did a historic thing. We generated 87,834 phone calls to U.S. Representatives in a concerted effort to protect the Internet. Extraordinary. There’s no doubt that we’ve been heard.

So just to keep you updated: The well-intentioned, but immensely flawed “Stop Online Piracy Act” is still in the House Judiciary Committee. The hearing was yesterday and now members will debate and bring amendments to the bill. The Committee will reconvene in a few weeks — the date has yet to be scheduled. Nothing has been brought to a final vote. Everything is still very much in play. We’ll keep you posted on what’s going on and what you can do to help. But for now, we want to thank you.

One encouraging thing we heard yesterday:

I don’t believe this bill has any chance on the House floor. I think it’s way too extreme, it infringes on too many areas that our leadership will know is simply too dangerous to do in its current form.

— Representative Darrell Issa

We also want to express our tremendous gratitude to our friends at Mobile Commons who, on 30 minutes notice, hooked us up with their amazing platform (and provided their expertise) to automatically connect callers with their Representatives.

uncleclark: OCCUPY WALLSTREET - POSTER

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 03:10:19 -0800

uncleclark:

OCCUPY WALLSTREET - POSTER

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Fri, 11 Nov 2011 04:33:30 -0800

He Teaches Ethics At Harvard

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 09:14:39 -0800

Harvard Law Professor of Ethics Lessing said tonight at the CEU in Budapest that Members of Congress taking money from corporations and then voting in their interest is corruption but not a crime. Before our representatives made a habit of taking money from corporate lobbies for their election campaigns the corporations simply left sacks of money on their desks. The politicians are not essentially bad, the professors says, they’ve outgrown that habit now, but they need money for their campaigns and have to spend half their time raising it. Public funding of elections would go a long way to solving the problem of corruption.

I can hardly believe what I’m hearing. Didn’t this Harvard Law professor of Ethics just get through saying that more than half of all Members of Congress go to work as lobbyists after their terms of office were over? They did not need to have sacks of money left on their desks to be motivated, public financing of elections wouldn’t change anything. Germany has it already, to not much effect, Hungary where this lecture is being held has it too, to even less effect.
But it is not this that makes me angry. The talk concludes with the Harvard Law Professor of Ethics saying that we all have responsibility for permitting the situation to get out of hand.
Questions from the audience? I am first to raise my hand.
- Why do you say that representatives taking money from corporations and then voting in their interests is legal? Don’t they have contracts of employment with the government? For their two hundred or three hundred thousand dollars a year their job is to represent the people, not special interests. What representation means is clearly spelled out in the founding documents of the nation, especially in the Federalist papers. You just spent a hour detailing how these government employees are not representing the people who elected them because they are being paid by other people not to represent them. How is that not a crime? How not breach of contract, not fraud?- I don’t think the courts would rule it was.- Then those judges, whose election campaigns are also commonly supported by corporations, ought to be accused of crimes too.- That is extreme.- You are permissive, and you just got through with accusing us all of permitting the corruption to take place. I for one don’t permit any of this. You explicitly do.
The microphone is taken away from me at this point. I leave the auditorium.
The caterers outside in the lobby scold me away in Hungarian when I approach the glasses of wine. My attempt at a quick grab is foiled, the solid female server immediately gets my forearm in a firm grasp and I am forced to give up. Ten minutes later the audience emerges and I with wine glass in hand and rolls in pocket go around to one person after another, saying,
- I know you, you permitted the politicians to trade their votes for legislation in exchange for campaign contributions. You are the one responsible for permitting the politicians to destroy democracy. What the politicians do is not criminal, however you are guilty of allowing them to become corrupt. The Harvard Law Professor of Ethics says so. You just heard him. And? You know you didn’t really permit anything. What could you do? Who listens to you? Who cares about what you think? On the other hand the Harvard Law Professor of Ethics went to school with these legally corrupt politicians, he ate meals with them, he lived next door to them. They are not evil, he told us. We all share the guilt.
I am very angry.

UW Student Walkout in Solidarity with Occupy Oakland.

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 19:08:00 -0700

UW Student Walkout in Solidarity with Occupy Oakland.

UW Student Walkout in Solidarity with Occupy Oakland

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 19:04:00 -0700

UW Student Walkout in Solidarity with Occupy Oakland

we are the 99%

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 19:01:05 -0700

we are the 99%

Lost my job January. Boys & Girls club director. Husband lost his job in August, Solar Power Technician in concentrated solar. His 401k with $45,000 in contributions worth less then $12,000. Our mothers lost their retirement funds in the 90’s. No health insurance as of this month. We are oh so the 99%.

I am 21 years old. I am currently $15,000 in student debt and...

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 19:00:07 -0700

I am 21 years old. I am currently $15,000 in student debt and climbing every day.

When the economy tanked, Chase bank said they couldn’t handle the burden of student loans anymore, and sold off my loan to a collection agency while they rolled in money from a government bail out.

The collection agency refused to honor the contract I had with Chase, and I had to start paying my loans back while still in college. I ended up dropping out since I had no way to pay my loans or current tuition.

I want to finish college but I am too scared to rack up more debt I cannot pay off.

I currently work at a diner part time and minimum wage and I only got that job through a family friend or else I would still be looking.

I am the 99%

"Jamie I am part of the 99% because I have spent most of my life believing that something is very..."

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 18:58:28 -0700

“Jamie
I am part of the 99% because I have spent most of my life believing that something is very wrong with the way this country is run, with the lack of community, the lack of connectedness between people who live next door to one another. I have been called an idealist and naive in the face of expressing my dissatisfaction with the inequalities perpetuated by the people in charge, the people with power. I was told to just accept things the way they are, that change is not possible. And they were right, change is not possible if everyone believes that and endorses that as true. But now, cities and communities all over the US are standing up and yelling and throwing their peaceful, idealist fists in the air because change is not only possible, it is imminent.”

- jamie

GIVE A DAMN Mr President, Tear Down This Wall Street

Wed, 02 Nov 2011 04:53:19 -0700

GIVE A DAMN Mr President, Tear Down This Wall Street

wearethe99percent: The last time I lost my job, I nearly...

Sat, 29 Oct 2011 04:19:41 -0700

wearethe99percent:

The last time I lost my job, I nearly starved to death.

I don’t garden for pleasure. I grow food because I’m terrified of being that hungry again.