Post navigation

Prev: (04/27/12) | Next: (04/27/12)

Seattle mayor issues May Day warning — UPDATES

UPDATE: We’re elevating this back to the top of the homepage given questions and concerns we’re hearing via mail and Facebook. Robocalls went out Monday night telling parents that after-school activities at at least one Capitol Hill elementary school have been canceled because of concerns for public safety. UPDATE: A Seattle Schools representative confirms the decision but clarifies the closure at Stevens Elementary was made “because of concerns about transportation issues with the May Day marches (no safety concerns). The concern was for students on the southern end of the Stevens attendance area not getting stuck in the traffic mess.”

We’ve added updates from Occupy Seattle and Metro regarding possible issues with Tuesday afternoon’s commute to the bottom of the post. The Seattle Times has information about the march from the Central District to downtown.

INITIAL REPORT: The Seattle Mayor’s office Friday issued a statement warning about possible violence and property damage around Tuesday’s planned May Day marches and protests. “We also have evidence that other people may be coming to Seattle on Tuesday with the intention of using the public demonstrations as an opportunity to commit violence, damage property and disrupt peaceful free speech activity,” it reads. The full statement is below. 2011’s Seattle May Day rallies were peaceful — and well attended

A Seattle Central student walkout is one of several actions planned for the day. May1stSeattle.org features a schedule of the planned rallies and events.


Statement on May 1 Demonstrations

SEATTLE –On Tuesday, May 1, several organizations will be holding public demonstrations in Seattle. This will include an annual May Day March for Immigrant and Workers Rights from Judkins Park to downtown Seattle, an Occupy Seattle-sponsored General Strike, and rallies scheduled throughout the day at Westlake Park. The Seattle Department of Transportation advises that delays should be expected downtown during the Tuesday afternoon commute.

We also have evidence that other people may be coming to Seattle on Tuesday with the intention of using the public demonstrations as an opportunity to commit violence, damage property and disrupt peaceful free speech activity. There has been a significant increase in graffiti and posters alluding to violence around the May 1 events. Websites have described trainings in how to conceal weapons beneath signs and banners, and how to target police officers on horses. At a protest at the Port of Seattle in December 2011, several people used peaceful demonstrators as a shield to throw projectiles and incendiary devices at police officers.

Early Thursday morning an incendiary device was thrown at a bank in Columbia City. This was similar to an attack on a bank that took place in Portland late Wednesday night.

Seattle Police command staff and Mayor’s Office staff have been working with protest organizers, property owners, and other stakeholders to facilitate peaceful, constitutional demonstrations. Officers will respond appropriately to criminal acts and threats or harm directed against participants, non-participants, and property.

While much of the day is expected to be peaceful, CHS is told that posts on sites like pugetsoundanarchists.org have concerned authorities and prompted the warnings. This post on the site says Seattle Police referenced an “intelligence report” in a meeting with May 1st organizers. “During the meeting, the SPD revealed that they are very worried that people will attempt to de-arrest each other if the police attack them,” the post states.

Graffiti and postering related to the May 1st actions has been prevalent throughout the Hill and the Central District for weeks including several posters including messages about the 1999 WTO riots

Subscribe and support CHS Contributors -- $1/$5/$10 per month

74 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Russ
11 years ago

But i’ll be bringing my pocket camcorder with me to record idiots near the convention center bus tunnel. I also brought a blackjack with me in case they dont like a camera pointed at them and want to make something of it.

Roberta
11 years ago

Gee, I wonder where those reports of people planning on bringing weapons could POSSIBLY be coming from.

johnny88
11 years ago

Hoooooo, sounds like fun. Too bad I’ll be at work :'(

TroyJMorris
TroyJMorris
11 years ago

It’s been all over downtown and Belltown as well. It pisses me off.

Jane
11 years ago

I go to SCCC, and I’m debating if I should even go to school that day. Not because I’m for whatever it is these anarchists are “protesting,” it is because I’m afraid I’ll get tangled up in whatever violence erupts during the peaceful protests. All it takes is one asshole to get a riot started, and I really don’t want to feel the “wintery freshness of mace” while going from one building to another for my classes.
This is bullshit, I shouldn’t be afraid to go to school.

JohnB
11 years ago

Luckily going to a job is not an issue for the Occupy movement.

JimS.
11 years ago

It’s really too bad the Occupy movement allowed their message to get so corrupted. They just didn’t have the discipline to fight the infiltration and takeover by the usual gang of professional Seattle protesters; and moving the site to SCCC just clinched the image in everyone’s minds that Occupy is a bunch of unemployed losers. Message totally lost. Too bad. Now more of the S.O.S. as “anarchists” and their silly gibberish pile it on.

Hse
Hse
11 years ago

If you’re interested in going to school and not participating in the general strike then go to school. The events at sccc will be legal, peaceful, and short lived. Everything will be happening downtown except the student walkout and that will be going downtown. Sccc will be completely safe. Don’t worry.

traj
11 years ago

The Other or Constitutive Other (also the verb othering) is a key concept in continental philosophy; it opposes the Same. The Other refers, or attempts to refer, to that which is other than the initial concept being considered. The Constitutive Other often denotes a person Other than one’s self; hence, the Other is identified as “different”; thus the spelling often is capitalized.

—————————————————————————————–

By all means, commence running around in circles, tearing your hair out. “The Other” is coming to town.

JudkinsDog
11 years ago

I agree – all over street signs and personal property in our neighborhood. Totally lame.

Wake Up, God Dammit!
11 years ago

1. What you are witnessing is an official disinformation campaign against Occupy/Decolonize Seattle, the 99 percent of Seattle/america, and international working class generally.

This is what the powers that be do. It was done in 1919 during the last General Strike that was attempted.

This time around, the mayor opposes us. The same mayor who has ZERO plan for ending homelessness (except jail) and ZERO plan for police accountability (except for a report full of empty promises from the minds of those who are part of the problem; like Diaz).

During our Occupation at Westlake, McGinn brought us coffee in the morning, and allowed his police to bring us pepper spray and ass whippery that same night. And yes, we peacefully took both the breakfast blend and the before bed beatdown with dignity.

From 9am to 7pm on Tuesday, May 1st its FREE food, music, art, edutainment, marches, and shake a hand/make a friend. Go Look: http://www.hiphopoccupies.com

2. If they do (and they might not, due to the political climate), my guess is that the anarchists will probably penalize the institutions we all can’t stand AFTER the daytime events are done. Like the banks, for example. That’s what they’re into. Go look: http://www.pugetsoundanarchists.org

The banks should be punished! Did you know that Wells Fargo has a huge stake in the prison industry? They have a vested, financial interest in seeing people locked up. Chase (formerly J.P. Morgan Chase) admitted to its role in the trans Atlantic slave trade in the late 1990’s.

And then there’s the fees, and the speculation that leads to the poor decisions that lead to bailouts that we all pay for after we’ve already paid the fees.

Did you know that the Seattle Police Department, which remains firmly under u.$. Justice Department scrutiny, is still sending instructors to Afghanistan to train their national police force? And we pay for ALL of that more often, at a higher cost, than any dollar amount of property destruction that occurs locally.

Yet, the libturds and republikkkons in this city fixate on ‘violence’ against inanimate objects, and the costs, while the entire american lifestyle promotes misery and oppression all over the world at a cost of millions of lives every year.

Nominally religious folks who are monotheistic suddenly become animists when a window gets broken. They pray harder for the soul of that window than they do for the salvation of meek, angry, and/or impoverished they claim to care about.

3. WAKE UP, GOD DAMMIT! Lol. No, Seriously. Listen to the sound and the fury of the revolution unfolding in your own backyard. Learn of it! http://www.allpowertothepositive.info

Robert
Robert
11 years ago

Ditty. Some asshole spraypainted their “message” over the front of a historic building at UW (Bagley Hall).

If the “anarchists” are trying to be as offensive as possible and alienate everyone from their cause, they’re doing a great job. They just look like a bunch of bored, teenage criminals with too much time and privilege on their hands to me.

umvue
11 years ago

Agreed. Let’s put you in charge so we can all just starve to death and end the misery that is the human race.

Hello
11 years ago

You are just a sheep of a different herd. You are making excuses for turning peaceful protests into a reason to act out your adolescent defiance with loosely based facts and rhetoric. Wish i post post the “whoa, we got a badass” meme in here.

emmagoldman
11 years ago

Since Occupy Seattle voted to endorse the international call for a General Strike on May 1st, the mainstream media has not mentioned it once. That is, until the evening of April 26th. It was not until an arsonist attempted to torch of Bank of America that the networks were abuzz with the plans of shutting down capitalism on May 1st and the dangers of anarchists. In one particular broadcast made by the Mormon controlled Kiro 7 News, the reporter made sure to hold a Frosted Flakes poster in front of the camera and point at it, indicating to the public that the posters they have been seeing for two months have something to do with a minor char on the side of a Seattle bank.

The area around the bank, located in the Columbia City neighborhood, was filled with SPD, ATF, and FBI for hours. The pigs were on the roof making a spectacle, on the street picking up pieces of glass, and investigating what ultimately amounts to a smashed window and a scorch mark.

If I were a reactionary or filled with fear, I would either start rambling on about a police conspiracy or lauding the inherent beauty of such a gesture. In my opinion, this was probably someone who was angry and had never done anything like what they were about to do. But all possible conjectures, even my own, are completely meaningless. The only important thing to focus on is how the authorities, the media, and the capitalists they protect are going to use this manufactured hysteria to their advantage.

One of the ways they could do this is by promoting a climate of fear and distrust amongst the people who are most likely to come downtown on May 1st. Another way they could do this is by building a strong case in the public perception for a very blunt and utilitarian repression against everyone who intends to take the difficult and less traveled road away from the rituals of useless procession.

There are two main groups having events on May 1st. One of them is the May 1st Coalition, a network that is planning a rally and march in the early evening, well after the city has finished its workday. This network contains many unions that are sympathetic to (if not working for) the current Democratic Party. The other group is Decolonize/Occupy Seattle, composed of a diverse cross section of people and tendencies. Unwilling to let itself be taken under the wing of the Democratic Party and its pro-capitalist agenda, Decolonize/Occupy Seattle refused to let May 1st pass in the traditional manner: long marches on the same old routes, long speeches from the same old mouths, long walks back home, back to bed, back to work, again and again.

The SPD and the City clearly have an interest in pitting these groups against each other. There may even be some on the old left who want this to occur. However, it is my hope and assumption in writing this that not everyone involved wants to be tricked by the pigs. Their goal is to crush resistance and they will do so with whatever weapons they have at their disposal, especially the ones we give them.

Let us not forget that Chase bank helped finance the Nazis and made themselves 50 million dollars wealthier. Nor let us forget that Wells Fargo profits off financing companies that maintain prisons and immigrant detention centers across the world. These banks exist because people still willingly give them their money and because people have not yet burned them to the ground. Remember that Bank of America was once the Bank of Italy and that it was the only bank in San Francisco that still could loan money after the great earthquake destroyed the city. Were it not for the desperation of the people wandering the rubble, there may not have been a Bank of America at all.

During the peak of the Occupy fall, I tried to open an account at a local credit union, something that was being promoted heavily by the left. Once they checked my credit, they denied me. However, were I to have walked three blocks down the street, Bank of America would have opened their arms to me. This is a situation that thousands of other people find themselves in. I can get a one dollar burger at McDonald’s and I can quickly set up a Bank of America account. If I choose to do this, I have no one but myself to blame. If I get caught stealing non-polluted meat from the co-op, the employees will get upset and call the police. If I have bad credit, the friendly credit-union will deny me membership. I do not want to have to eat filth every day, nor do I want to have to pay for organic food. I don’t want to have a tobacco can filled with money hidden away in
the basement, nor do I want to help the economy, either the local one or the global one.

I want no economy, no money, no banks, no capitalism.

Marching in circles and listening to speeches will do nothing to help any of us get rid of these things. And so, naturally, when some people try to break the mold and shut down the functioning of metropolitan capital, there are many others who want us crushed. And why would they not? We want to do away with their system of death, the system that keeps them isolated in their cocoons and high on their power, the system that exists only because we allow it to.

These notes are meant to reach the right eyes and ears. Hopefully they get there. Let’s all have each others’ backs in the coming few days. I think its time to break out of the roles we are expected to play. On May 1st, let’s create something no one has seen before.

Capitalism is death. Capitalism is dying. Capitalism is boring.

GEN X
11 years ago

Let’s not feed into the propaganda, they want us to riot and protest or be afraid so you don’t show up. What if we could really do it, make it peaceful. Start tweeting, posting, pinning, whatever you choose. Let’s all come together and prove the mayor and mother f’in America wrong! Who’s in?

traj
11 years ago

Let’s all march like little ladies and gentlemen just like we were told to!

That’ll show them how reasonable we are. Surely they will meet our demands after that.

Wake Up, God Dammit!
11 years ago

Shut Up and Shake Yer Butt,God Dammit!
http://minicasts.podomatic.com/play/1239758/3920894

etaoin shrdlu
etaoin shrdlu
11 years ago

Unnecessary, inflammatory, and totally irresponsible pronouncements from the mayor’s office about the upcoming May Day protests.

As jseattle correctly notes, “2011’s Seattle May Day rallies were peaceful — and well attended.” Given that precedent, why is the mayor stirring things up? Except maybe to scare away those planning to participate in peaceful free speech activity.

“We also have evidence that other people may be coming to Seattle on Tuesday with the intention of using the public demonstrations as an opportunity to commit violence, damage property and disrupt peaceful free speech activity.”

How can the mayor say they are “coming to Seattle” when the Seattle Police are already here?

hahahahahahaha
11 years ago

Capitalism is boring.

As opposed to logorrheic 1,000-word blog comment screeds? You couldn’t be more amusing if you tried. Thank you!

Monty B
11 years ago
traj
11 years ago

The consistent, major purveyors of terror and violence will be there, in force. SPD: Thugs with Badges.

There is also not a hint of self-consciousness in this warning about his own attempts at stirring up people to oppose supposed outsiders at a rally with a large immigrants rights contingent.

Liberal Fool or Neoliberal Tool?

traj
11 years ago

Press Release Regarding SPD Rumors
Thu, 04/26/2012 – 10:29am — Anonymous

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

To all concerned,

Representatives from the City of Seattle and the Seattle Police Department
held a meeting on April 25th with members of Occupy Seattle, a
representative from the Real Change newspaper, and a representative from
the May 1st Action Coalition. During this meeting, the City and the SPD
expressed their concerns regarding the May 1st General Strike and revealed some startling pieces of information.

Firstly, the SPD claimed to have an “intelligence report” on the table in
front of them. Throughout the meeting they constantly referenced this
report and the information contained within it. Apparently, their
“intelligence” teams have gathered that the anarchists are going to fill
light bulbs with gasoline. For what purpose the anarchists would do this
was left unclear. Perhaps the light bulbs would merely be filled with
gasoline and left inside the secret anarchist headquarters where they would slowly accumulate enough electrical charge to spontaneously explode and destroy all of the evidence in their dreaded lair. Or maybe the
gasoline-filled light bulbs would be sold as decorative ornaments in fancy
Ballard boutiques, with the gasoline serving as a novelty that would
increase the sale price. The SPD did not make clear what these strange
devices would be used for and a cursory Google search does not reveal very much. Nevertheless, the “intelligence report” is filled with mention of
these light bulbs.

Secondly, the report also mentions that various people are holding physical
trainings to prepare for battle on the day of May 1st. During the meeting,
the SPD revealed that they are very worried that people will attempt to
de-arrest each other if the police attack them. The idea of people
resisting arrest and defending each other is a nightmare the SPD wants to
avoid. This was what they spoke the most about during the meeting.

Regarding the “intelligence” about the gasoline-filled light bulbs, we
would like to assure the public that such devices do not exist. The SPD is
so stupid that they have literally invented a device with which they can
alarm people and stoke fear. However, being the moronic half-wits that they are, the SPD cannot even invent a believable threat and have revealed their cheap strategy of psychological intimidation before they even got started with it. Very few people will be influenced by their ploy and we would like to make it perfectly clear that we are on to them.

As for their concerns with people learning to defend themselves, this
obviously would be a concern to a gang of crack-smoking, steroid-taking,
wife-beating, murderous sociopaths who cannot stand to have their authority challenged for even a moment. The thought of thousands of people rising up against their arbitrary and disintegrating authority is enough to make theminvent stories of secret cabals training in the dark. Oddly enough, this is something the SPD does routinely. All of their training and planning is
done in secret, hidden from the public. During the meeting, Assistant Chief
of Police Mike Sanford was clearly externalizing his own guilt and shame
for overseeing a conspiratorial and corrupt organization that hides in the
dark like a band of diseased pigs, constantly attempting to bury their own
filth and outrun their legacy of drugs, lies, and murder.

In short, the City and the SPD attempted to stir up fear during this
meeting but failed due to their own inherent stupidity. Our highly
sophisticated and virtually impenetrable intelligence team was right there
in front of them and they didn’t even know it. Any further attempts to
spread more lies and disinformation will be met with further humiliating
secrets and insults. We are not to be trifled with.

oh cute
11 years ago

The anarchists found CHS seattle! Destruction! Rhetoric! YAY! Move along kids, move along.

Kit
Kit
11 years ago

I hope Law Enforcement Officers will stand in solidarity with the 99ers demands for criminal prosecution of the embezzlers who have stolen their/our retirement money to fund the bank bailout and record bonus’.

Ragdrazi
11 years ago

… there will be a march of kids coming down from Seattle Central. There will be a march of clowns. (Literally, people in full on clown makeup.) There will be a gay pride anarchist march.

And, yes, a shop window may get broke. And, yes, an bank window may get spray painted. Wow. Kids, clowns, gays, and a broken shop window. Oh, domestic terrorism is here.

It’s fear tactics. But the target isn’t us. It’s you. You’re supposed to be so afraid of us, you don’t care that the cops knocked the teeth in of that kid, those clowns, and the gays. And, oh yeah, maybe the guy who broke the shop window there at the end.

Mind you, for more then two decades now that shop has been selling clothes produced by the same kind of debt slave state model that is right now driving the world to hell. But, whatever, I guess all that’s a just little too technical. It’s better to be afraid. It’s warm. Sort of fuzzy. Black clad Anarchists are coming for you.

Right. So. My name is Jeremy. I have a job. On May 1st I will be in Westlake, and I will be wearing black. Feel how ever you wish to feel about that.

ocelot
11 years ago

Saving people from being (violently) arrested and detained! How VIOLENT! Interesting how this is the *only example* of violence that this article sites….

ocelot
11 years ago

uninformed ageist.

ocelot
11 years ago

yeah, i’m really glad this prick got to be the first commenter. who’s the violent one here, again?

ocelot
11 years ago

the assholes are the ones bringing cuffs and guns and tear gas and horses, friend.

ocelot
11 years ago

oh, poor, poor gentrified Belltown, home of the “Beat Cops,” white dudes in khakis who make it their mission to go around hassling homeless people for pissing in alleys…. yep, some graffiti is really the worst of that place’s problems.

anyoldtime
11 years ago

You really, honestly believe that? Like, really?

KarlWalther
11 years ago

My name is Karl. I have a job. On May 1st I will be in Westlake, and I will be wearing black, I will be taking photographs and collecting information that I will be turning over to the Seattle Police and other more sinister law enforcement agency’s, it isn’t even my job, it’s more like freelance charity work. If nothing else but to bring a bit of justice on communist kiddos who sully the name “anarchist.”

I was an anarchist during WTO and know my around that scene pretty well. I grew up and realized that non of these so called “revolutionaries” give a crap about me and that this is the United States and that I am solely responsible for my success, rather than some abstract idea of a state, or “capitalism” or any of the myriad of other ism that get tossed around by college age history/sociology/art major half wits who’s time in would be better spent studying science, medicine or engineering, something that could be used to benefit society as a whole as well as the individual.

Feel how ever you wish to feel about that.

traj
11 years ago

Cool story, Karl. I’m sure the SPD thinks you’re a pretty cool guy.

Ragdrazi
11 years ago

Right, but of course, we’re the immature assholes right?

Ragdrazi
11 years ago

Hey Karl. How are you doing.

I feel like I look good in black, and so I’d love you to take my picture. And if you were an anarchist during WTO you’d know the SPD isn’t going to care about your pictures, Karl. You’d know that very few of the arrests at protests are actually arrests with charge. That the bulk of the arrests are police attempting to disrupt the protest and drag innocent people off the street. The WTO was probably the most photographed protest in American history. 631 people were arrested. 511 of the charges were dismissed. And out of what was left came 14 trials and only 2 convictions. But if I try to do some really wacky pose at least the some of the pictures will be funny.

Karl, let’s not pretend. You were not an anarchist during WTO. And you don’t know anything about “that scene.” Because, of course, if you did, you’d know that neither this protest or the WTO is about “abstract ideas” or “my success.”

What it is about, Karl, it’s about the fact that very few of the players responsible for 2008’s financial collapse have been arrested, and that everything remains in place to allow them to do it again. And it’s about the debt slave state model, which has been so effective for 20 years now in destroying lives and creating cheap clothes for us in Latin America that they’ve decided to bring it to Greece and Spain. It’s not some hazy academic idea to say that’s about one step away from actually plunging the world into a really awesome Mad Max style apocalypse action. I mean, I got New York Times articles the same thing. Oh but we must want an apocalypse, right? Because of those vague anarchist ideals we have.

Karl, what really I feel is sad for you. You don’t know what we’re about, and you haven’t bothered to try to learn. Karl, I really hope you do come down to Westlake. Because we’ll have a lot of information for you.

And I mean that sincerely.

Boz
Boz
11 years ago

Why shouldn’t he? Just because it isn’t eloquent doesn’t make the discussion it heads to any less necessary or urgent. Peopled were hurt grievously by the irresponsibility of those in charge and no one seems to be interested in that fact. It seems to be easier to mock the earnestness of those who do.

Lifeguard
11 years ago

Be there or be square!

Luther Henry
11 years ago

I recently heard a viable solution to these ne’er do wells and malcontents. Let’s solve two problems, trade them even up for hard working, God fearing South Americans who want to come here to work and succeed. Obviously these idiots do not.

Ann Brodsky
11 years ago

Comrades mcginn, holmes and diaz set expectations through their reminder to attend Tuesday’s riot, in my opinion.

Comrade mcginn again welcomes those whom he explicitly supports, all under the “free speech and assembly” banner (nothing like a comrade perverting founding documents).

This is what we know at this point:

1. Comrade mcginn supporters – communists, anarchists, unionists, socialists, marxists, leninists, stalinists and their fellow misanthropes are ready for action.

2. From experience, we know the street cop will be told to use a light hand on the dregs.

3. Due to recent events, the light hand will be even lighter with communist lawyer guilds and comrade holder’s DO(in)J “monitors” filming from every angle.

4. Violence is expected.

5. If the vandalism exceeds expectations or a non-white/old/young is killed, the blame has been pre-placed on “outsiders”.

6. Comrade mcginn is a lawyer and as such is careful with his words, so let’s carefully look at his reminder dated 4/27.

– We see ZERO condemnation of violent activity or threats against street cops.

– We see “May Day March for Immigrant and Workers Rights”, “Occupy Seattle”, and “General Strike” capitalized, why? To give it authority, legitimacy and status, all of which it doesn’t have. This is a PR not for Seattle citizens, but for the communists.

-We see the statement: “Seattle Police command staff and Mayor’s Office staff have been working with protest organizers, property owners, and other stakeholders to facilitate peaceful, constitutional demonstrations. Officers will respond appropriately to criminal acts and threats or harm directed against participants, non-participants, and property.”
Look who is listed first – who has comrade mayor’s office been “working with?” their comrades, “protest organizers.” SECOND comes evil Capitalist “property owners” and LAST “stakeholders” – the general public whose downtown will be wrecked for the day. Not convinced? Look at the next sentence: officers will respond to…FIRST “harm against” the communist rioters and SECOND the general public.

The stage is set. Everyone knows what is coming.

Those who lose property, surviving family members and insurance companies should sue the city and others personally, for every Ruble.

Tim
Tim
11 years ago

To the protestors: Remember that Steve Jobs started Apple from a garage. Look at the company now. And if you don’t like that Capitalism enabled Steve and Apple to succeed, then stop using your iPhone, iPod, etc. Can’t you see how hypocritical you’re being?

ERF
ERF
11 years ago

Da, Pravda!

Luther Henry
11 years ago

Very well thought out and written. You have analyzed the whole situation with expertise and expressed it well enough for anyone willing to understand. This would apply nationwide and it is obvious to me that there is much more sinister motivation for the use of these slack jawed useful idiots and it all begins with those who are pulling the strings for the puppet in the White House. We are in deep danger and there are few in positions of authority who recognize it or have the courage to take action against it.

anyoldtime
11 years ago

The problem is that the “wronged people” are just as responsible! They make the investment decisions as where to invest their money (or not invest, depending on their choice.)

I’m really tired of hearing this same old argument. Sure, there are people who worked at banks, etc that misled folks, especially when it came to mortgages, but the people that were wronged ALSO have responsibility. They signed the mortgage. It should have crossed their mind to either (a) understand what they were signing or (b) realize making $30,000 a year would not support a $500,000 mortgage.

Besides, I would love you to tell me what would happen had we not “bailed out the banks.” The economy would be so much worse off than it is now. And, it worked. Did you know the government even turned a profit on that bailout? (See: http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2011/07/08/surprise-the-big-b )

EVERYONE has responsibility here. Stop trying to pin this on some bank workers or the government. You need to look at yourself and take some individual responsibility, too.

Borden
11 years ago

Steve Jobs has never made an iAnything. Commodities are not made by ideas. They are made by labor.

KarlWalther
11 years ago

Yea Jeremy,

I got a few arrest (no formal charges) and more teargas than you can shake a stick at under my belt. You want to talk about Proudhon, Bakunin, Goldman, Bookchen, Zerzan? Maybe a musical discussion about the higher points of Crass, nausea, aus rotten, amebix? We could discuss ideas about Kronstat, or the FAI-CNT? We can speak about decentralization, white priveledge, the prison industry complex. Or perhaps Peltier and Mumia? Situationist propaganda or post 20th century anarchism in the vein of Crimethinc?

I have a feeling I know more about what you are all about than you do.

You kids are just tools, the sad thing is you are proud of it.

ERF
ERF
11 years ago

Karl,
You are only preaching to the choir…. Or at least a bunch of people that like singing.

Ragdrazi
11 years ago

I’m a WTO vet myself, Karl. And if this conversation is any indication, I can beat you in a argument about any of those topics.

I’m starting to get the real impression that all this hate you feel toward anarchists stems from some awful personal experience you had. Not any political point. You got an axe to grind, and it doesn’t involve Crimethinc.

Well, Karl, I wish I could help you with that. But I don’t know you or what you went though. I’m going to Westlake to protest a group of people who are just a tick away from completely destroying the world. (Again, not a hazy academic idea to say that.) I am not going there to support the individual or individuals who did what ever they did to you.

Who ever it was who did what ever they did could have been the biggest tool. And that doesn’t change the fact that both this protest and the WTO had a coherent and important political point regardless of where you stand.

Who, Karl, am I supposed to be a tool of? I am doing this

Ragdrazi
11 years ago

This board seems a little glitchy. “Who, Karl, am I supposed to be a tool of? I am doing this” was the beginning of a paragraph that I erased. Disregard it.

calhoun
11 years ago

Anyoldtime, I agree completely. Most of the people who now have “underwater” mortgages, or are in foreclosure, are not “victims” of the banks…they are victims of their own greedy, irresponsible choices.

calhoun
11 years ago

“Completely destroying the world”….????….hyperbole much?

--MC
11 years ago
boz
boz
11 years ago

That is simply untrue. Wishing it to be does not make it so. There are PLENTY of people who have, though no fault of their own, had their pensions destroyed, lost their homes and their jobs due to the callous misrepresentation of capital in the past five years.

Redefining
11 years ago

What is “Immigrant and Workers Rights”?

Richie G
11 years ago

Why don’t you marxist wannabe clowns go to N. Korea,Cuba,Venezuala,China and see what marxism really looks like and how destitute all of the wonderful marxist policies have left the people. You want to live like capitalists with all it’s advantages while complaining how evil it is,grow up and realize life isn’t easy,it never has been and never will be. Get A job ,make a living and use your time to actually help people instead of playing anarchist while living like every other capitalist in the country.

garyt5
11 years ago

Tim
you are aware that the new CEO of Apple said “we’re not concerned about America’s problems.” Read that NY Times article. A similar statement came from the CEO of Exxon-Mobil who stated, “we are not an american company and we don’t care about american issues.”

When are you going to get it. The corporations you conservatives love care nothing about America, period. What we have in this country is not true capitalism or anything remotely close to it. There can be no free market or true capitalism when you have 5 or 6 companies controlling 90% of an industry. When you have mom and pops being destroyed by the big box corporations.

There is no free market when governments of other countries pour billions into education, research and development and protect their industries while we complain about government getting in the way of ours. Solandra was a failure because the chinese put 30 billion into destroying the american solar industry while we complain about $550 million of taxpayer money going into the company.

Read the Italian definition of facism. That’s where we are going.

Capitalism, as practiced in America, is as failed a system as communism was in the old soviet union. Neo-liberal Reaganomics is a pipe dream of the sociopathic Rand devotees, her followers the Milton Friedman chicago boys, and others. It is a dismal failure that has destroyed every country where it has been tried with the same result. Read shock Doctrine by naomi Klein or Noreena Kurtz’s books. A minority controlling the wealth, destruction of a middle class, and thousands in poverty. Exactly what is happening here, right now, That’s what you want.

You who complain that you are productive workers while the young commies play do not realize that it may be your job that is next on the line, or your company that fails if the banks/power brokers collapse the economy again. What is it you don’t see that this affect you as well?

The founders were explicit in stating they did not want corporate or banking control of America. Our revolution was against a British corporation, the East India Company, that had a monopoly on goods coming into this country and leaving it. We could not even make our own stuff.

Corporations were chartered under the founders for 25 years and had to operate for the common good, as it was the commons that furnished the infrastructure for them to be successful. How do you think jefferson, washington and others would feel in seeing the country they risked their lives for being controlled by American companies who care not for their country of origin?

Read what Hitler did in Germany in the 30’s, how he got control by using communists as a scapegoat, his proclamations of 1932, and then look at what is happening here in America today. Read how the Bush, Walker and Harriman families all laundered money for Hitler and wanted facism to succeed.

This is what occupiers are upset about. You should be as well if you care about the future of America at all.

susan
11 years ago

Anyone know which school has cancelled after-school activities for tomorrow?

Marvv
11 years ago

Thanks for getting my son’s after school comic book drawing class cancelled tomorrow assnozzles.

Marvv
11 years ago

Stevens

lifeguard
11 years ago

I appologize in advance for any inconvience people experience Tuesday —

we are trying to change the world.

Chris
11 years ago

It seems like almost every single person posting here is more interested in being right than in having a discussion. While it doesn’t surprise me too much coming from people that are totally against this event for whatever reason, the people that are *for it* are also doing a whole lot of yelling and hurling insults and names around. “Bored, teenage criminals,” “pigs,” “marxist wannabe clowns,” “assnozzles,” and so on.

Everyone wants to make this into a “this OR that” situation but it’s not that simple. Banks are responsible for the shitty situations people got into, but a lot of people made uneducated choices and have some responsibility to share, too. Cops are often the purveyors of violence at protests, but there are protestors who are full of anger and mainly out for a fight, and fairly often. Some cops are violent, mean, racist people whose authority dehumanizes them and some are very good people. Some anarchists are use property destruction and/or violent tactics and some don’t. I think that to only see one of these things is to take refuge in a seriously limited world view.

Whatever you think, everyone can agree shit is fucked up and going on tirades and calling people names is not going to change their minds about anything. Isn’t that what this whole thing is about? Changing people’s minds and changing the world? I think some more listening and civility would be good. Feel free to reply with some mean spirited flames now.

YAAG
11 years ago

ocelot, just because in your neighborhood there are bigger problems than graffiti and it seems like a non-issue doesn’t mean that everybody has to have it so bad! I don’t live in Belltown, but would like to live in a neighborhood which has no visible social problems, including graffiti!

What is it with people calling on other people’s problems that they are too small. If you are a failing student your problem is how to pass. If you are an A- student your problem is how to get an A+. Both problems are equally valid. Stop being so self-centered, people!

Alexandra
11 years ago

Thank goodness someone said this. Solving our problems will never be the result of ignoring or side-stepping the true complexity of the issue(s) at hand.

traj
11 years ago

The only one issuing threats thus far is The Mayor’s office and SPD. Occupy should read them the riot act.

johnny88
11 years ago

After all the hype about riots, if there is not fights, teargas, mayhem and general madcap rioting going on today I’m gonna be really pissed-off. If I don’t get my dose of violents I’m going to go on strike, and believe me, you don’t want that.

etaoin shrdlu
etaoin shrdlu
11 years ago

Why go to China when they are well on their way to owning the United States lock, stock, and barrel?

etaoin shrdlu
etaoin shrdlu
11 years ago

Dear Marvv,

Please provide us with your son’s activity schedule and we will make sure our demonstrations never again interfere.

Sincerely,
etaoin shrdlu
President, International Association of Protest Organizers

Russ
11 years ago

Then change it by not doing it in the most populated areas of the city. Blocking street traffic and taunting the police will not change anything. All you do is make life slightly more miserable for the people you say you support.

Want to impress people? Do it in Bellevue, or Medina. Go after the 1%, stop making the Capitol Hill neighborhood a political punching bag playground.

Herny
11 years ago

One statement reads: “One march is planned to leave the Central District at 5 p.m. and travel along South Jackson Street to Fourth Avenue.” I live in the Central District, but that a big area. Any detail as to -where- in the Central District this march is leaving from? That would be very helpful in planning my travel routes.

JudkinsDog
11 years ago

Funny that the “Should I even try?” comment and HSE’s reply were quoted on King 5 “News” last night! hahahaha!

Mr. John smith
11 years ago

Every one destroying property should be jailed for 6 months and everyone evolved should be 1 week in Jail. this would detour destroying property that is not there`s for no reason what so every.

Bark-O-Vama
11 years ago

That MayDay parade was SOO lame.
Where were the rocket launchers and missiles, tanks and such?
Let the Commie Ruskees show you how it’s done.

KarlWalther
11 years ago

After yesterdays juvenile attempt to reenact what happened 13 years ago perhaps you can see why I hate Seattle “anarchist.” They put the nail in the coffin of occupy, so thanks for that at least, I would hate to have another round of dirty jobless hippies doing drugs in the park.

>Cool story, Karl. I’m sure the SPD thinks you’re a pretty cool guy.

As a matter of fact they do. They also really like my dog, he got lots of police pets.