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Occupy The Hood Daryl Lamont Jenkins is involved with Occupy Philadelphia, and is the founder of One People’s Project, an anti-racist organization. He’s also involved with Occupy the Hood. He spoke with the Columbus Free Press at Freedom Plaza, one of two Occupy DC sites. “This is our way of encouraging people in the Black and Hispanic communities and poorer communities to know--- straight up---‘this is about you.’ Matter of fact, we’ve been the 99 percent for a very long time.”

Jenkins said it’s not a case of being segregated. It’s a matter of connecting various occupations around the nation with people in the nearby communities who might not recognize their affinity with people protesting and camping out in their cities.

Occupy DC Shuts down a K Street banch of Citibank Oct 20 ----If Occupy DC is doing this, why aren’t we ? About 25 activists shut down a branch of Citibank on K Street this afternoon amid the high-rise offices of lobbyists. People in expensive business suits walked past as we chanted, “ Hey, Citibank, stop all foreclosures. Hey CEOs, pay all your taxes…”

Management there apparently instruct their staff to shut down during protests in order to prevent persuaded customers from closing their accounts. And closing accounts is exactly what we intend to get an increasingly greater number of people to join us in doing, whether it’s here in D.C. or in Columbus.

Three days before we vote down SB-5, there will be an international Move Your Money day of action.

Last week, President Obama racked up several more broken campaign promises as he pushed through Congress three new job-killing corporate trade agreements. The Senate Finance Committee was quite open about the fact that these agreements will kill off more jobs and eager to mitigate the damage with band aids attached to the treaties. Some of us who were in the hearing room felt an obligation to speak up and ask why in the world the senators -- with perfect bipartisan harmony -- insisted on causing the damage in the first place. And for that we were thrown in jail.

Imagine the denunciations of human rights abuses in Colombia if the plan for that country this week were war rather than corporate exploitation to produce impoverishment to produce drug crops to produce war. Imagine the denunciations of human rights abuses in Iran having continued as usual if U.S. cops weren't cracking skulls in New York, Boston, Denver, and San Diego. Maybe we wouldn't have needed the Tale of the Moronic Mexican Iranian Assassins at all.

Occupy Columbus unanimous in support of union fight to repeal SB5
The Occupy Columbus General Assembly has voted unanimous support to the union fight to repeal SB5. This is the first specific issue the local group has formally endorsed. Occupy Columbus met for its weekly General Assembly at Bicentennial Park Amphitheater last night (October 18).

Other issues of concern but not yet formally adopted by the group include publicly funded elections, over-reaching corporate influence in politics, home foreclosures, extraordinary debt incurred by college students, and protecting social safety programs like Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, and programs for women, children, the elderly and the poor.

The group also authorized their legal team to continue talks with City officials to obtain a site for their occupation camp. So far the City has stonewalled requests. A request to City Council to intervene on the group’s behalf was denied on Monday night.

BANGKOK, Thailand -- Floods have smothered much of Thailand, killing at least 317 people and prompting Bangkok to surround itself with makeshift walls, leaving those outside the perimeter to suffer from diverted water, reminiscent of medieval times when people dug moats and sealed off their fortress cities against plague, war and other calamities.

"We have been doing everything we can, but this is a big national crisis," Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra told reporters on Wednesday (Oct. 19).

"I'm begging for mercy from the media here," she said, after heavy criticism for her poorly coordinated response to the floods.

Bangkok is now a virtual island under siege from a relentless flow of brown water, strewn with garbage and chemicals, after three months of widespread monsoon rains and increasingly swollen rivers, all flushing alongside the capital and draining into the nearby Gulf of Thailand.

Nuclear Critics Say Containment Cracking May Be Cause for Public Concern - Press Conference Held in Toledo, OH
A growing Coalition of groups that opposes a 20-year operating license extension for the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant near Port Clinton says it is closely watching developments since the discovery last week of a 30-foot-long crack in the plant's reactor containment building. The cracking, which is being investigated by the utility and U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, has prompted critics to widen their opposition to the continued operation of Davis-Besse for the generation of electricity.

Mayor Michael Coleman is not allowing Occupy Columbus to convene for more than a day. As mayor, he should recognize the people's constitutional right to assemble. That's why I created a petition to Mayor Coleman on SignOn.org, which says: Let Mayor Coleman know we want our constitutional right to assemble to be recognized. Occupy Columbus is here to stay. Will you sign the petition? Click here to add your name, and then pass it along to your friends:
Mayor Coleman petition

Occupy Columbus Ohio Show your support this afternoon around 5 by coming to Broad and High or city hall as we present a petition to Columbus City council for a long-term site for what would be essentially a tent city for Occupy Columbus. If you can't make it to that, help out in any other way you can in the fight to defeat corporate rule, making our government more accountable to We the People. A better world is possible. We will graciously accept however much money or time you can spare, whatever talents you may have to share, and whatever else you can donate such as food, water---you name it. Showing up in-person is best, but you can visit our site at occupycolumbus.org or find us on Facebook.

Despite voting NO in May 1997 – you as a citizen of Columbus, Ohio, just helped purchase and now subsidize the Nationwide Arena! The Columbus City Council decided to defer to Mayor Michael Coleman and purchase Nationwide Arena pledging future casino tax revenue funds – already promised to the taxpayers of Columbus as the way to make our city, and particularly the west side, a better place to live. The Council bought the arena from the Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company on October 3, 2011.

Oddly, the Columbus Dispatch reported that “the vote authorized the administration of Mayor Michael B. Coleman to pledge a growing share of the city’s casino tax revenue to help the Franklin County Convention Facilities Authority purchase [of] Nationwide Arena for $42.5 million, and to pay millions more to operate the arena through 2039.”

October2011.org movement denounces the pollution of money from concentrated wealth.
Washington, DC: The October2011.org Movement that is occupying Freedom Plaza, led an impromptu march of 250 people up Pennsylvania Avenue to the U.S.Supreme Court where Dr. Cornel West climbed on the steps of the Supreme Court and denounced court decisions that have produced money-based elections that empower corporations. Dr. West was holding a sign that said "Poverty is the Greatest Violence of All." He was arrested because holding political signs on the Supreme Court steps is illegal.

Dr. West spoke to more than 500 people on Freedom Plaza where he said that "if Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were alive today, he would be on Freedom Plaza." West described how the struggle against, poverty, war and injustice continues and confidence that the people will succeed. He applauded the occupation as "an inclusive social revolution for all of us" and a "leaderless-leader-filled movement" where people are "finding their own political voices rather than echoing others."

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