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The Root of All Oakland
Townhall.com ^ | November 6, 2011 | Debra J. Saunders

Posted on 11/06/2011 7:38:02 AM PST by Kaslin

The morning after Occupy Oakland's midweek violent protests, the take in the Bay Area was that it was a dirty, rotten shame that a few bad-egg anarchists hijacked a mostly peaceful protest and made an otherwise good cause look bad.

That is so delusional.

From the start, troublemakers have advocated violent protest during the group's general assemblies. Guys with masks and ill intent threw rocks and bottles at police before officers used tear gas -- and Iraq vet Scott Olsen, 24, sadly was injured -- to clear Frank Ogawa Plaza on Oct. 25. They were armed with incendiary devices when the sun went down Nov. 2.

Councilman Ignacio De La Fuente is sick of hearing about how peaceful the majority of protesters were. "The reason the minority's here," he sputtered, is "the majority's here."

The majority of Occupy protesters aren't victims; they're enablers.

There was no positive political message. The goal of the general strike was supposed to be to "liberate Oakland and shut down the 1 percent." That's not positive. They want to shut down the city, but they don't want to get anything done. The strike didn't hurt Wall Street bankers or other big shots among the top 1 percent; it cut into the pockets of baristas and truck drivers.

Free speech does not mean free camping.

Councilwoman Nancy Nadel doesn't understand the First Amendment. She authored a resolution that says, "Occupy Oakland demonstrators are asserting their rights to free speech and peaceful assembly 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in order to create public dialogue around corporate control of the political process and public space." The resolution would have put the City Council on record opposing "the use of force to remove the encampment unless absolutely necessary."

Free speech rights do not include a right to trample the rights of others or keep other people from making a living.

Do not think that this general strike only cut into business activities in Oakland for one day. Oakland Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce head Joseph Haraburda has seen the lasting damage these actions have inflicted on Oakland's reputation as a place to do business. He counts three commercial tenant cancellations, including one for an operation that would have hired 100 employees.

California Gov. Jerry Brown, a former mayor of Oakland, devoted his tenure to enticing 10,000 new residents to live downtown. Mayor Jean Quan has undone that good work. Who wants to buy a condo in the land of broken windows?

Oakland has thriving, top-rated restaurants. Who wants to dine out in a town littered with too much graffiti and too little police protection?

These demonstrations threaten to starve the goose that pays for precious city services.

Once people start believing that they're part of an oppressed 99 percent, you never know where they'll see the 1 percent. One parent told the Oakland Tribune that members of Oakland's politically correct school board should consider themselves "on notice that they will be evicted from office in the next election for doing the dirty work of the 1 percent."

Quan started last week with the apparent belief that if she could assure activists that she is as liberal as they are, then Occupy Oakland protesters might behave. Thus, as the general strike dawned, Quan issued assurances that the city would "maintain a minimal police presence."

Now, if Oakland were a Wall Street boardroom, then activists would be swept out of sight. But because Oakland is a liberal enclave -- and Quan invited activists back to their encampment after the Oct. 25 police sweep -- the number of tents in front of City Hall, currently 165, has been growing.

Thursday's City Council meeting may signal a turning point. More than 100 people, overwhelmingly in support of the protesters, scolded, lectured or addressed councilors. Most councilors had been friendly toward the protests. But by the end of the night, Nadel conceded that she did not have the votes to pass her resolution.

It would appear warnings issued for weeks by Councilmen De La Fuente and Larry Reid finally have sunk in. As De La Fuente asked earlier, why did Oakland become the center of the Occupy movement? Because City Hall was "obstructing the police from doing their damn job. That's why this is happening."

Quan, Nadel and company made trashing Oakland after dark as easy as mugging an old lady.

"I think people are waking up," Haraburda told me earlier. "I'm getting more and more pointed in my comments because I'm more and more upset."

Waking up is good. Because when Occupy Oakland boasts that it plans to "Occupy Everything," the public is beginning to understand: Anarchists and their enablers don't start with the 1 percent. They cut their teeth on the soft meat.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; US: California
KEYWORDS: anarchy; mop; occupyoakland; violence

1 posted on 11/06/2011 7:38:03 AM PST by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin
"a few bad-egg anarchists hijacked a mostly peaceful protest and made an otherwise good cause look bad."

Yeah, BALONEY!

The "Occupy Movement" is nothing more than the latest belch of the Counter-Culture Movement of the 1960s, whose embodiment was The Manson Family (not "the flower children" or anything high minded, contrary to the mindless claims of its advocates) and whose "cause" made about as much sense and produced about the same results as Charlie Manson.

2 posted on 11/06/2011 7:46:44 AM PST by Savage Beast (A backwoods southern lawyer is a safer trustee for your soul than a Washington politician.)
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To: Kaslin

For those who aren’t aware, our wonderful Mayor Quan is the same Quan who tried to get money from the Feds (read your tax dollars) in order to treat “Ebonics” as a foreign language.

And if you want a few giggles, try looking that whole episode up at wikipedia. They have been rewriting history so fast your head will spin.


3 posted on 11/06/2011 7:55:01 AM PST by JoeDetweiler
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To: Kaslin

Democrats.....they’re just Democrats.


4 posted on 11/06/2011 7:58:42 AM PST by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer")
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To: Kaslin
From David Horowitz's FrontpageMag.com /DiscoverTheNetworks.org:

"Throughout its history, one of RCP's [Revolutionary Communist Party's] principal objectives has been to foment civil unrest in the United States. The most notable example of such efforts occurred on April 29, 1992, when RCP members looted and trashed the downtown and government districts of Los Angeles, triggering the infamous Rodney King riots. During the days immediately preceding the violence, RCP -- which maintained close ties to the L.A. gangs known as the Crips and the Bloods -- had circulated throughout South Central Los Angeles a leaflet featuring a statement by RCP National Spokesman Carl Dix, titled 'It's Right To Rebel' -- a quote popularized by Mao Zedong.

Encouraged by Dix, RCP activists helped lead the riots that would leave 58 people dead, more than 2,300 people injured, some 5,300 buildings burned, and $1 billion in property damaged or destroyed. On the ten-year anniversary of the rioting, RCP member Joseph Veale fondly recalled the violence as 'the most beautiful, the most heroic civil action in the history of the United States.'"
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/groupProfile.asp?grpid=6197
_________________________________________________________

"The RCP [Revolutionary Communist Party] upheld the 1992 sometimes-violent unrest in Los Angeles and nationally as a 'rebellion' in the aftermath of the Rodney King verdicts. Then-LAPD chief Daryl Gates alleged that the RCP was involved in the 'riots'. Los Angeles has long been one of the RCP's larger and more active branches. William 'Mobile' Shaw was a local leader who recently passed and received public commendation from the party."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutionary_Communist_Party%2C_USA
_________________________________________________________

"I maintain it was somewhat understandable, if not acceptable. So I call it a rebellion."--Maxine Waters

5 posted on 11/06/2011 8:06:10 AM PST by ETL (ALL (most?) of the Obama-commie connections at my FR Home page: http://www.freerepublic.com/~etl/)
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To: Kaslin
The RCP calls for the violent overthrow of the U.S. government...

From the website of the Revolutionary Communist Party (revcom.us or rwor.org) :

"Create Public Opinion, Seize Power: We are preparing minds and organizing forces for the time when there is a major crack in the system, whenever it comes and wherever it comes from: an opening that makes it possible to bring the future Revolutionary Army of the Proletariat (R.A.P.) into the field and wage a revolutionary armed struggle that actually has a chance of winning.

And we have said that building our party itself is the most important part of organizing forces for revolution. This is true now, and it is true looking forward to the creation of that future R.A.P. and the waging of that armed struggle.":

http://revcom.us/a/v20/1000-1009/1000/barw.htm
__________________________________________________________

Photobucket

REVOLUTION: Voice of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA [Maoist]
[Revolution] Interview with Bill Ayers, Revolution #63, October 1, 2006:
"On Progressive Education, Critical Thinking and the Cowardice of Some in Dangerous Times"
http://rwor.org/a/063/ayers-en.html
__________________________________________________________

From Investor's Business Daily (IBD), August 27, 2008:

"Ayers, now a tenured distinguished professor of education at UIC, works to educate teachers in socialist revolutionary ideology, urging that it be passed on to impressionable students.

One of Ayer's descriptions for a course called 'Improving Learning Environments' says prospective K-12 teachers need to 'be aware of the social and moral universe we inhabit and ... be a teacher capable of hope and struggle, outrage and action, teaching for social justice and liberation.

The Annenberg papers are quite extensive — 132 boxes containing 947 file folders with 70 linear feet of material. They undoubtedly contain more surprises regarding Obama's relationship with Ayers, one of many relationships Obama has sought to hide.'..."

Article: Annenberg Papers: Putting On Ayers?
http://www.ibdeditorial.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=304729375940845

6 posted on 11/06/2011 8:07:01 AM PST by ETL (ALL (most?) of the Obama-commie connections at my FR Home page: http://www.freerepublic.com/~etl/)
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To: Kaslin
Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Maxine Waters on the Los Angeles riots of 1992 (Rodney King riots):

"[Maxine] Waters has been criticized for her comments regarding the Los Angeles riots of 1992. In defense of the people that looted stores and damaged property, Waters said 'If you call it a riot it sounds like it was just a bunch of crazy people who went out and did bad things for no reason. I maintain it was somewhat understandable, if not acceptable. So I call it a rebellion.'[5] She also said it was 'a spontaneous reaction to a lot of injustice' and 'The anger in my district is righteous. I'm just as angry as they are.' She responded to the mass looting of Korean-owned stores by saying: 'There were mothers who took this as an opportunity to take some milk, to take some bread, to take some shoes. They are not crooks. Everybody in the street was not a thug or a hood.'"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxine_Waters#Los_Angeles_riots_of_1992

7 posted on 11/06/2011 8:08:04 AM PST by ETL (ALL (most?) of the Obama-commie connections at my FR Home page: http://www.freerepublic.com/~etl/)
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To: Kaslin
Re: Occupy Wall Street, 2011

He [NYC Police Commissioner Ray Kelly] said that following Wednesday's [Oct 12, 2011] 10,000-strong union march, a much smaller group tried to storm police barricades at Wall Street and Broadway.

"They locked their arms. They counted down - 10, 9, 8, 7, 6. Then they decided to charge the police. That is going to be met with some physical force," Kelly said.

(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...

*********************************************************************************************************************

Re: Kent State, 1969

"the purpose of all this agitation at Kent State was to recruit as much cannon fodder as possible, and then to provoke a "major confrontation." When it came, it would be neither accidental nor spontaneous. It would be exactly what the revolutionaries wanted.

On April 8, 1969, S.D.S. toughs marched through various campus buildings, disrupting classes as planned, chanting "Ho, Ho, Ho chi Minh," and striking campus police officers. One of these hoodlums pleaded nolo contendere to a charge of assault and battery, and drew a fine and jail sentence. The university scheduled a disciplinary hearing for two others on April sixteenth, at which time about one hundred revolutionaries smashed into the Music and Speech building where the hearing was being held, destroyed property, and again attacked police officers. Of the fifty-eight demonstrators arrested, ten were not even students at the school. At the rally preceding the march on the disciplinary hearing, non-student Jim Mellen told the audience as follows: "We're no longer asking you to come and help us make a revolution. We're telling you that the revolution has begun, and the only choice you have to make is which side you're on. And we're also telling you that if you get in the way of the revolution, it's going to run right over you." Mr. Mellen's remarks were included in a liberally distributed S.D.S. pamphlet, which began with a quotation from Mao Tse-tung and the following warning: "The war is on at Kent State University ...."

At a meeting in Williams Hall on April 28, 1969, revolutionary Communist Bernardine Dohrn said that people fighting "oppression" would have to carry weapons for "self defense." On May sixth, at another campus rally, Joyce Cecora called for armed rebellion: "They used guns at Cornell and they got what they wanted. It will come to that here!" And at still another rally on campus on May twenty-second, S.D.S. member Rick Skirvin said this: "We'll start blowing up buildings, we'll start buying guns, we'll do anything to bring this motherf***er down."

Michener quotes a student named Ken Tennant as follows: "With me it goes back to the music festival they held at Fred Fuller Park in September, 1969. Four Weathermen came down from Chicago, with insignia on their bib overalls. They were selling their organization newspaper, and I said, 'I'll buy a copy if you'll tell me what your outfit stands for.' They said, 'We're going to destroy this corrupt American society and build a better.' I asked how, and they explained, 'We've decided to close down schools all over the nation. We're going to start in Chicago. But we have our eye on Kent State, too. It could be ripe.' "

Bear in mind that we have room here to cite only a few examples of the inflammatory agitation and propaganda on the campus at Kent State for almost two years. The evidence establishes—in the words of the revolutionaries—that the goal of S.D.S. was to provoke a violent confrontation in which somebody would be hurt, or even worse.

And the most incredible such example took place on April 10, 1970, when Jerry Rubin spoke on the campus at Kent State. Jerry Rubin is a Communist, of course. We can be absolutely sure of that because he has said so repeatedly. In fact he said he was a Communist when your reporter asked him about it at the Democrat National Convention in Miami in 1972. At that Convention Rubin also said that, when he and his Comrades take over, your reporter will be gassed. At Kent State, Communist Jerry Rubin said this: "The first part of the Yippie program is to kill your parents. And I mean that quite literally, because until you're prepared to kill your parents, you're not ready to change this country. Our parents are our first oppressors."

Your first reaction on reading a thing like this, of course, is that maybe I have taken it out of context. You refuse to believe that anybody would say this. But Rubin really told the students what you just read. It is important to remember that, at the time, Jerry Rubin was a convicted criminal—he had been convicted for leading the turmoil at the 1968 Democrat National Convention in Chicago, where terrorists attacked the police—which raises the question of how such a man could be permitted to address students on a university campus in Ohio.**

Rubin also told the Kent State students to burn down the suburbs. "The American school system will be ended in two years," he explained. "We are going to bring it down. Quit being students. Become criminals. We have to disrupt every institution and break every law. We should have more laws so we can break them, too. Everybody should have their own law to break." As for the campus itself, Comrade Rubin told the students to ignore their professors, and to "burn all the books. It's quiet here now but things are going to start again."

The campus was now ready. Almost two years of intensive Communist propaganda had their effect. A sufficient number of students was willing to serve as cannon fodder for the revolutionary "cause." The Communists needed only an excuse to provoke their "major confrontation." Three weeks later they got their excuse.

[snip]

"...it is important to quote at length from the state grand jury report on the affair: "Fifty-eight Guardsmen were injured by rocks and other objects hurled at them as they moved across the 'Commons' to Taylor Hall Hill and down to the practice football field, and were then forced to retreat .... it is clear that from the time the Guard reached the practice football field, they were on the defensive and had every reason to be concerned for their own welfare .... The circumstances present at that time indicate that 74 men surrounded by several hundred hostile rioters were forced to retreat back up the hill toward Taylor Hall under a constant barrage of rocks and other flying objects, accompanied by a constant flow of obscenities and chants such as 'Kill, Kill, Kill.' Photographic evidence has established, beyond any doubt, that as the National Guardsmen approached the top of the hill adjacent to Taylor Hall, a large segment of the crowd surged up the hill, led by smaller groups of agitators approaching to within short distances of the rear ranks of the Guardsmen.

"The testimony of the students and Guardsmen is clear that several members of the Guard were knocked to the ground or to their knees by the force of the objects thrown at them. ..."

MUCH MORE AT LINK:

http://25thaviation.org/facts/id960.htm

8 posted on 11/06/2011 8:09:19 AM PST by ETL (ALL (most?) of the Obama-commie connections at my FR Home page: http://www.freerepublic.com/~etl/)
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To: ETL

Riots do not succed unless you let the rioters write the rules of engagement between them and the police.

1. Tell them to disperse.
2. If the do not disperse arrest them.
3. If they resist arrest, use physical force.
4. If they endanger the life of a policeman or policewoman, use deadly force if needed.

Please note, when people are throwing Molotov cocktails at you that is deadly force. Kill the person.

Riot Over.


9 posted on 11/06/2011 8:18:20 AM PST by cpdiii (Deckhand, Roughneck, Mud Man, Geologist, Pilot, Pharmacist. THE CONSTITUTION IS WORTH DYING FOR!)
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To: Kaslin

Didn’t these dirtbags threaten to kill a reporter-ette a couple of weeks ago because she was white? Did that make the article? The escalation was destiny for this mob. Oakland and the press that covers it is very lame.


10 posted on 11/06/2011 9:09:44 AM PST by eyedigress ((Old storm chaser from the west)?)
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To: Kaslin

Free speech does not mean free camping.Agree


11 posted on 11/06/2011 9:16:56 AM PST by Vaduz
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To: ETL

Placemark for reading tomorrow.


12 posted on 11/06/2011 9:29:46 PM PST by little jeremiah (We will have to go through hell to get out of hell.)
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