The Denver Greens, a local of the Green Party of Colorado, participated in a rally and march for the May Day General Strike.  This event was organized by Occupy Denver and the Denver IWW General Membership Branch.  Similar May Day actions were organized across the country.  The Denver Greens were one of the many organizations that endorsed this event.  The full text of the Denver Greens’ endorsement is after the jump.

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Chung-Ming Wang, activist at Occupy Taipei  and member of the Green Party Taiwan, talks about the experiences of Occupy Taipei while at the Global Greens Congress  in Dakar, Senegal. March 29, 2012. Interviewed by Mike Feinstein, Green Party of California.

Outside the Oakland Federal Courthouse @greendoula January 20, 2012 4:43 PM – Captured Live on Ustream at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/greendoulawith the Ustream Mobile App

In Princeton there is an Occupy group on campus and another active in the township. They work closely together. Here is the Facebook page of the latter:

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Occupy-The-Streets-Princeton/250535108326728

http://www.occupyprinceton.net/?p=92

Pepper Spray Victim

Additional photos of the police attack on OccupyAlbany taken by  Jonathan Flanders can be seen here.

Tonight, the peaceful occupation of Albany, NY was attacked and dismantled by the police.

The encampment was broken up suddenly at 2PM after the city decided it had enough of the occupation, a full 9 hours prior to the expiration of the permit.  At approximately 5:30PM, the police invaded the camp and destroyed the remaining tent, which had been saved from the eviction and become a focal point of a protest march.  Multiple people, including a city councilperson, were pepper sprayed by a violent show of force by the police.  Four were arrested and one was taken to the hospital to be treated for a severe reaction to the pepper spray.

After a press conference with all the major local news stations, a large portion of the Occupy members decided to march to the station where their four fellow protesters were being held in order to demand their release, which culminated in a protest at Albany’s South Station.

After months of peacefully occupying a small park near the state capital and city hall, the protest was ambushed by a  city long dominated by the Democratic Party and its mayor Jerry Jennings, who has been in office for nearly 20 years.  The power structures in New York State and especially the state legislature and governor’s mansion (Gov. “1%” Andrew Cuomo) had no appetite for protest or dissent from the mantra of cuts and austerity preached by the parties of the ruling class.

It’s no wonder the city lied to the protest about not dismantling the occupation in a police raid, then turned around and did just that.  As we’ve witnessed across the nation it matters little whether a Democrat or Republican is in charge, the end result is the same: the elite that control the levers of power loathe any real resistance to their agenda.  It is up to us to organize, occupy, and begin to turn back their tide of austerity; to build a truly human society.

Green Party Santa and the 99%

The Occupy Wall Street movement has energized many people across the country and world, bringing young folks together with re-invigorated older activists! On Cape Cod the large majority of our five town-based groups are over 65, life-long Dreamers from the 60′s as well as members of Veterans for Peace, Quakers and UUers (where are all the other church goers??), teachers, and homeless advocates. Some college and high school students have made appearances here and there. We are now into Stage 2 – defining our goals and strategies including the Occupy Our Homes efforts to stop foreclosures. Bank of America is our favorite site to gather and we have asked their managers to meet with us.

My friends, longtime activists, the Nicholsons have attended the local OCCUPY TAMPA multiple times now and continue to inspire the activists and continue to BE inspired by them. Every time they attend the Occupy Tampa’s General Assembly, they write a report and send it out to their local and very lengthy email list. The memes from the mainstream media continue to play out that OCCUPY EVERYWHERE is mostly comprised of young, unemployed people without goals or plans for their future. The Nicholson’s are just two of the over 50 that are part of the 99% and continue to prove that activism does not end when someone reaches their golden years!

Like the sit-ins in the South (marked by the February 1, 1960 Greensboro sit-in at a Woolworth lunch counter), the Occupy Wall Street movement has spread like wildfire. When the water hoses and dogs were turned on children joining the movement in Birmingham, we vowed never to turn back. When the students at UC-Davis were sprayed with canisters of pepper spray, they didn’t turn back. These two periods (with 50 years of separation) have some commonalities in terms of fairness expectations. In the 60s, it was obvious to all people of good will that the Jim Crow policies in the US South were wrong. Banks and corporations have operated so long with impunity, resistance targeting them was never expected. I’ve dreamed of the day when working people and college students would again rise up against corporate greed and all its schemes. We must not lose this moment. We must learn from the past period of resistance and seek multiracial unity in building the OWS. The missteps in Atlanta, Philadelphia, New York and elsewhere must be overcome to create space for all oppressed sectors to participate. It’s time for all people to recognize that capitalism has no pets. Regardless of race, age, gender or immigration status, we must unite and resist the policies that favor the 1%. We are the 99%! We will win!