Why now?

There haven't been large-scale campus uprising for literally *decades*. Why are we starting to see them now? Why didn't we see them before?

Well... basically, kids are graduating from college with unpayable debt, can't find jobs, and their little brothers and sisters now in college are seeing what happened to their older brothers and sisters and saying "This isn't right" -- and also seeing that they have nothing to lose . So they get expelled for taking part in a student uprising. So what. A college degree did how much good for their older brothers and sisters? None. What do they have to lose, other than a worthless piece of paper and a bunch of debt?

The *only* time you see large-scale uprising and disturbances is when there is a large number of people who have nothing to lose. I study history so I remember past uprisings and disturbances and recall the two ways of ending them -- imposing totalitarian dictatorship, or implementing a "Fair Deal" where hard work and study will get you ahead in life and thus people have something to lose if they instead participate in an uprising or disturbance. Well, there's also the third choice -- the uprising accomplishes the toppling of the government, at which point things go to bleep in a handbasket. That's the choices -- Madam Guillotine, Vladimir Putin, or FDR. Which one do our 1% choose? We'll find out, I suppose...

-- Badtux the Vacationing Penguin

Must See

Wonkette today features A Children’s Treasury of American Cops Brutally Attacking Citizens. Like a fashion show of fascism, yo.

But never fear. The Atlantic's editor sez it's not the fault of the cops. Because of course they are just following orders. And if those orders called for a Final Solution? Well...

-- Badtux the Snarky Penguin

Where Occupy should go next

Mao Zedong was a major grade-A monster, but one thing he knew was guerrilla warfare. He *won*, in case you don't recall. So here's one of his dictums: "When guerrillas engage a stronger enemy, they withdraw when he advances; harass him when he stops; strike him when he is weary; pursue him when he withdraws."

In other words, when faced with a stronger enemy, *LEAVE*. Let the coppers stand around a deserted square wondering what to do. Then when the police go home -- which they will -- *show up somewhere else*, doing something unexpected. The point of the guerilla is to confuse and bewilder and exhaust the opponent by never presenting a fixed target for the opponent to concentrate upon, *not* to hold ground against an opponent armed with superior weapons -- and the 1% can afford to buy a *lot* of weapons (and the police forces to wield them), given that they own more assets than the bottom 90% *combined*. We have the Internet now. We have dark forums where flash crowds can be near-instantly marshaled to show up at random points. We can have the 1% exhausting their limited manpower resources scrambling frantically all over the place trying to suppress flash mobs and deal with instant protests outside of banks, political offices, and Wall Street establishments. The G is about *movement*, and in that respect Occupy's camps were the wrong idea entirely.

Okay, so that's tactics. The other thing Mao focused on was the strategic long view. What is the objective? Mao's objective was to overthrow the Nationalist government and install a Communist dictatorship with him as its head. But what are the objectives of the Occupy movement?

One thing I'll point out is that the American people are basically conservative. They aren't going to embrace a Communist revolution anytime soon. Note that I say "basically conservative" in the old sense of the word, not in the "rabid right wing radicals" sense of the word. True conservatives don't want wholesale change, what they want are changes around the edges to make the system work better. So what are some conservative goals?

1. Prosecute the Wall Street fraudsters who caused the real estate bubble and collapse. They stole us blind -- their fraud of selling bundled liar loans as "AAA investment grade securities as safe as U.S. Treasuries" cost me 1/3rd of my retirement savings, for example. They need to be perp-walked and jailed and their ill-gotten gains removed.
2. Tax the rich. If these frauds had been taxed at Eisenhower levels they wouldn't have perpetrated these frauds because it wouldn't have been worth their while, since the money they obtained via fraud would have mostly gone into the U.S. Treasury.
3. Break up the too big to fail banks and restore banking competition. If they're too big to fail, they're too big to exist.
4. Regulate. Regulate the banks. Banks should exist to be banks, and should be prohibited from gambling on Wall Street with their customers' funds. Regulate Wall Street. We need full market transparency (meaning, none of these weird derivatives that hide the core product beneath layers of obfuscation), we need to regulate credit rating agencies to eliminate their incentives to provide fraudulent ratings, and we need a zero tolerance for any misrepresentation, as well as transaction taxes to slow down trading and provide an incentive for long-term investment rather than the rigged casino game that is the current situation on Wall Street.

In short: Go back to the New Deal policies that led to this nation's period of greatest economic growth in the period 1945-1980. All this risky experimentation that the right wing keeps urging on us? Radical nonsense. Communism, anarchism, anarcho-socialism, or things of that notion? Radical nonsense. Americans are conservative, and the notion of going back to a Golden Age of finance and taxes rather than forward to some new untried system is one that would appeal to way more Americans than you'd think.

I don't think you'll find many of the bottom 99% who would argue with the above, other than perhaps the crazed Republican core, who repeat the 1%'s cant as if it were holy scripture because they worship the wealthy as their gods. But there's not much that can be done about religious zealots of that sort other than interfere with their ability to make new converts to their religion. But if you start with conservative goals -- jail the thieves, regulate, tax, break up the too-big-to-fail banks -- the zealots will look like exactly what they are: crazed zealots in thrall to their high priests of the 1%, to be ignored by all sensible people.

-- Badtux the Sensible Penguin

Occupied

Over the past two days, a nationwide crackdown on the Occupy movement occurred. If this crackdown wasn't coordinated by Homeland Security then I'm a featherless waterfowl. Update: I'm not a featherless waterfowl after all. Talk about not being surprised!

So, uhm, why did the Obama Administration dispatch Homeland Security to destroy the Occupy movement or at least their tent encampments? Well, it was all about optics...

Uhm, that's a photo of a Hooverville, of probably the most famous one, the one that encamped right on Herbert Hoover's doorstep demanding jobs and money. The Obama administration, being populated by cowards, was scared that the Occupy movement's tents would get labeled as "Obamavilles" by the right wing. And of course the Obama administration then did what it always does whenever they suspect the right wing is even going to *threaten* to say boo -- they caved. Preemptively. Duh!

Now, as I've previously pointed out, the Occupy movement was a problem looking for a solution in the first place. Basically it was an expression of outrage at the fact that things are getting worse for each succeeding generation of Americans, that working hard and doing well in school no longer suffice to get you ahead -- all statistics show that Americans work harder and are better educated today than they've ever been before in American history, yet the average 35 year old man makes less money than his father did at age 35. That's fucked up, yo.

So anyhow, Obama didn't really give a shit about any of that, probably even agrees with the Occupy that things are fucked up, but his team was cowering in terror because, uhm, Newt Gingrich is now the not-Romney candidate in the GOP primaries after Cain self-destructed. And Newt the Reptile is reputed to know a bit of history, unlike the rest of the gang of morons and loons that are the Republican clown college. Newt might look at one of those pictures of an Occupy encampment and say, "Hey, it's an Obamaville!". Can't have that happen, right?

So anyhow, nothing's changed. Everything's all fucked up, still. But that doesn't matter, all that matters is optics -- making sure that there's nothing that Newt can point to and say, "hey look, an Obamaville!". Because it's all a game, to the people who rule us. They're not hurting. They're millionaires. They made their nut. So they don't care. They don't have to. It's all about winning with them, and America? Americans? What, you think they give a shit about America and Americans? In what universe? One where the unicorns are pink and cotton candy grows on trees?!

-- Badtux the Snarky Penguin

Bitter rain

As I type this, police officers are beating students in Berkeley. At least one student is lying bleeding on the ground and ambulances are being kept away by the police until the situation is "secured", whatever that means. Meanwhile, in Pennsylvania the Penn State students are rioting over the firing of Joe Paterno and the cops are just standing around with their nightsticks stuck up their asses, because hey, it's just kids letting off steam, it's not as if they were threatening the profits of the 1% or anything, right?

To say that I am disgusted beyond belief is an understatement. I cannot blog further on this tonight. So I will give you some bonus music that is all too fitting:

-- Badtux the Sickened Penguin

The cult

Regarding the black bloc and throwing bricks through plate glass windows: I’ve read the anarchist tracts. I’ve listened to the black bloc types try to explain why their tactics are useful. None of it makes any sense at all in the real world, where the majority have no problem with the violence inherent in the system as long as it's directed against people who do things like, well, throw bricks through plate glass windows. It’s like a cobbled up philosophy thrown together to attract alienated kids who want to feel powerful, sort of a cult now that I think about it, a cult that’s amazingly similar to Ayn Rand’s cult of perfect freedom without responsibility. And as with the Rand cult, it has absolutely nothing to do with leftists or left-wing causes, and black bloc in the midst of a protest should be treated the same as teabaggers in the midst of a protest — i.e., as a hostile force with a philosophy and goals completely incompatible with our own.

-- Badtux the Left-wing Penguin

Poverty

I was going to write an article about the new numbers that came out that show that 16% of Americans live in abject poverty, the sort of poverty that is utter misery as vs. the paradise depicted by the right wing, but it's too goddamned depressing. You just know that the right wing is gonna start whining that our poor aren't *really* poor 'cause they're not starving to death because they get food stamps, so there. Doesn't change the fact that being poor in America sucks. I've been poor, and believe me, I much prefer being *not* poor. Asswipes making fun of the poor are just assholes and bastards who ought to immediately have their trust funds revoked, their bank accounts seized, their homes and Mercedes Benzes repo'ed, then thrown on the street in some far away city to make their way. I can guarantee you that after a few months of living on the street they won't think the same about being poor.

- Badtux the Disgusted Penguin

Another vet almost killed by Oakland PD

This time they got a Ranger, Kayvan Sabeghi.

Now, the spin the officials are going to put on it is "he was violent and resisting arrest and thus had to be subdued by force." At which point I ask: Where are the bodies?

Uhm, bodies, you ask? Yes, bodies. If a U.S. Army Ranger is violent, people die. That's sorta the whole point of being a U.S. Army Ranger. And lest you say, "but he was unarmed and the policemen were armed!", dude. That doesn't matter. Not at all. If you're close enough to a Ranger to put your billy club on him, if he wants you dead, you are *DEAD*. Period.

Those cops are damned lucky that Sabeghi was *not* violent, or there would be a *lot* of funerals today. One of them undoubtedly Sabeghi's, but probably five or six cops woulda ended up dead too before they got him down. So keep that in mind as the officials spin and spin and spin. Rangers are hardcases. If a Ranger decides on a course of violence, there *will* be bodies. There are no bodies here. Draw your own conclusion.

-- Badtux the Military Penguin

Update: Aside from being a former U.S. Army Ranger, Kayvan is a small businessman who co-owns a popular brew pub and was walking towards his home when he was accosted by the police. So we ain't exactly talkin' about no dirty fuckin' hippy here, we're talkin' about the Oakland PD did the beat-down not only on a war hero, but on a genu-wine JOB CREATOR. Yay Oakland. If you was tryin' to solidify your claim as the hellhole of California, u're doin' it rite.

Waiting for the explosion

I've previously talked about the concentration of wealth -- about how 60% of Americans are dirt-poor, lack access to the fundamental capital to make anything of themselves due to everything being hogged by the top 5% and especially the top 1%, and how this is not a tenable situation in a democracy. I view OWS (and to a lesser extent the teabaggers) as a symptom. People are seeing that things are getting worse for most people while certain people (the 1% in particular) thrive, and they don’t know what to do about it, so first thing they start doing is complain about it — the OWS protests. The oligarchs are betting that putting down the OWS protests with force will make everything okay for them, but the problem with that notion is that OWS is a symptom, not a cause. Suppressing OWS won't relieve that pressure building up underneath, it will simply deny it an outlet -- and it will keep building until either there is an explosion and Very Bad Things happen, or the oligarchs are forced to impose a police state so blatant and obtrusive that the notion of America as a free country would be ludicrous to even the ill-informed.

OR the oligarchs could come to their senses and realize that their current route is to either the guillotine or irrelevance. The guillotine if the explosion happens, and irrelevance if they impose a police state. Because the end game of police states is always the secret policemen taking over — see, e.g., Vladimir Putin in Russia, and the imprisonment or exile of many of the Russian oligarchs who crossed swords with him. The only solution that would allow our oligarchs to preserve their own importance is to return back to the New Deal regime of regulation and taxation that served the nation so well in the period 1945-1981, but that would require our oligarchs to be smart, and due to inbreeding (less than 10% of our oligarchs got there because of merit, the rest got there because of winning the lucky sperm contest and being born rich or going to the right school with the right people and getting a "Gentleman's C" like Dubya), they’re not all that smart anymore…

Americans have figured out the game is rigged, and they want it fixed. They want the America of their parents and grandparents, when hard work and education provided you with a living. If something isn’t done to take us back to when that was so, all hell will break loose, with uncertain results. Well, let me rephrase that. The results will be *disaster*. Because I can't think of any violent revolution, anywhere, that has ever ended up well. They always ended up with thugs of the worst kind in charge. Maybe mailing Marie Antoinette Action Figures to the CEO's of the Fortune 500 and to every Senator and Representative would make that clearer (note that the outcome of the French Revolution was *disaster* for France -- virtually every French male between ages 18 and 35 ended up *DEAD*), but frankly I doubt that our feudal overlords are smart enough to "get it". More likely they'd just arrest you for terrorist threats or some shit like that...

- Badtux the Waiting-for-the-explosion Penguin

Unemployed DFH's

Everybody knows that all those Occupy Wall Street thingies are just a buncha unemployed slackers with nothing to do. Like this one dude who was at the protests a couple of nights ago, who's clearly just a loser who needs to get a job. I mean, c'mon. You don't call a probably six figure salary as a network engineer at a startup a JOB, do you?! And nevermind Scott Olsen's previous job, as a U.S. Marine who received 7 medals over two tours of duty in Iraq and received a promotion to Lance Corporal over that time. Clearly he's just a lazy slacker who needs to get a real job... maybe one where he gets to wear another nifty uniform and says "will there be fries with that order sir?" all day long.

-- Badtux the Snarky Penguin

Non-event of last night

Various folks outside various SFPD police stations were watching to see the SFPD gather. Approximately 400 cops ended up crammed into six buses and a collection of patrol cars and motorcycles and left the Portello Hill station a little before midnight. And... and...

Nothing.

Perhaps the fact that several of the mayoral candidates including the one most likely to win the election were down at the street party that Occupy SF had become had something to do with that -- arresting your future boss is probably bad juju. Or maybe the cops never had any intention of moving in unless things got out of hand, and since the atmosphere from the live cams was more one of a big street party than anything ominous, they shrugged and just kept on driving. Or maybe it really WAS just a training exercise as SFPD is claiming today. I'm sure that there's some news stations disappointed that they didn't get yet more spectacular footage of protesters being gassed, beaten, and critically injured like former Marine Scott Olsen (who apparently is guilty of destroying police property by stopping a tear gas grenade with his head, funny that he survived two tours of Iraq just fine but the Oakland PD puts him into the ICU), but any sane person should be glad that, for once, sanity reigned.

-- Badtux the No-news-was-good-news Penguin

Quote of the day

A former police officer says, regarding the Oakland police riot yesterday evening and the video of the Oakland PD taking out former Marine Scott Olsen because, apparently, it's okay only to fight for our freedoms, not to use them:

Seeing those cops standing around while someone is injured, laying in the streets, really pisses me off. That is not how a professional police officer reacts, that is how a gang reacts. The Oakland PD is just another California gang.

-- Badtux the Can't-say-it-better Penguin

Occupy Wall Street in one picture

60% of Americans own less than 5% of America. I.e., they're flat broke, lacking the fundamental capital to do anything at all to improve their economic position.

Meanwhile, 5% of Americans own 59.4% of America. The top 5%, and especially the top 1%, have set up an anti-capitalist system where they are the rulers, and the bottom 60% are their serfs. This isn't capitalism. This is neo-feudalism. This is a return to the economic system of the Dark Ages, where the lords of the manor owned everything and you depended upon them for your very existence.

This is not sustainable in a democracy. It isn't. OWS is just a canary in the coal mine here. The amount of pressure building down below is enormous and when it blows... nothing good will happen, guaranteed. Nothing good. Which is why it is in the interests of the top 5% to restore capitalism to the global economy and make sure that the bottom 60% have access to the capital needed to make something of themselves, whether that be via education, access to grants and loans for small business incubation, whatever. Otherwise... uhm. I'm in that top 20% that owns 83.4% of everything, and I tell you, I *like* my neck and would prefer to have it continue keeping my head attached to my body. I am astounded that the top 1% think that the laws of physics don't apply anymore, that they can let pressure build up below and nothing bad is going to happen. Because that's insane. That's literally insane. And self-destructive, in the end, because the oligarchs are going to end up getting their cold-blooded lizard hearts ripped out and thrown onto the streets if this keeps on like it is, but our lizard overlords appear to be DUMB as well as greedy...

-- Badtux the Capitalist Penguin

Nice hat

From the Brooklyn Bridge OWS arrests.

Folks, you attend these things, you, too, can meet cool girls wearing Gir hats who smile for the camera while being arrested :).

-- Badtux the Wistful Penguin