PolEco: Looking Back: Highlights of the Occupy Wall Street Movement (from the OWS website)

2011: A Year in Revolt

Posted 1 day ago on Jan. 3, 2012, 7:52 a.m. EST by OccupyWallSt

2011 will be remembered as a year of revolution, the beginning of the end for an unsustainable global system based on poverty, oppression, and violence. In dozens of countries across the Arab world, people rose up against broken economies and oppressive regimes, toppling dictators and inspiring the world to action. Popular rejection of austerity measures and attacks on worker's rights brought millions to the streets in Greece, Iceland, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the UK, Chile, Wisconsin and elsewhere.
By midsummer, murmurs of "occupying Wall Street” were stirring online, and on July 14th, we registered the domain occupywallst.org and began organizing. The first New York City General Assembly was held August 2nd and the Occupation of Liberty Square began on September 17th.
Fueled by anger at the growing disparities between rich and poor, frustrated by government policies that benefit a tiny elite at the expense of the majority, and tired of the establishment’s failure to address fundamental economic inequalities, OWS offered a new solution. We built a People’s Kitchen to feed thousands, opened a People’s Library, created safer spaces, and provided free shelter, bedding, medical care, and other necessities to anyone who needed them. While cynics demanded we elect leaders and make demands on politicians, we were busy creating alternatives to those very institutions. A revolution has been set in motion, and we cannot be stopped.
As the mainstream media ignored us, we learned from other leaderless resistance movements in places like Tunisia, Egypt, and Iran to use social media and live video streaming to spread our message. We are part of a global movement that has radically democratized how information is created and shared, rendering centralized, corporate-funded mainstream media increasingly irrelevant. The rapid exchange of information allowed us to make collective decisions quickly, discuss information and ideas across the globe, mobilize effective direct actions, and document police brutality. Now more than ever, when we chant “The Whole World Is Watching!” it is not an idle threat.
Today, tens of thousands of everyday people are putting ideals like solidarity, mutual aid, anti-oppression, autonomy, and direct democracy into practice. Individuals are joining together in city-wide General Assemblies and autonomous affinity groups. Through consensual, non-hierarchical and participatory self-governance, we are literally laying the framework for a new world by building it here and now -- and it works.
The rest is history. In honor of a new year, here is a run-down of what we accomplished since then. It would be impossible to list every action or mention every place an Occupation has occurred. But let us start a new year by celebrating a few highlights of our victories -- along with a sneak preview of what's to come!

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PolEco: PLM Region IVA Celebrates Bonifacio Day

Bonifacio Day Mobilization (Nov 30, 2011) of PLM Region IV-A (with other allied organizations), for continuing the struggle of the great revolutionary Andres Bonifacio in the present day economic and political situation

Unified Press Statement - Occupy Ayala mob

Unified Press Statement - Occupy Ayala mob

UNIFIED PRESS STATEMENT

October 21, 2011

SANLAKAS

Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino (BMP)

Pagkakaisa ng Manggagawa sa Transportasyon (PMT)

Kongreso ng Pagkakaisa ng Maralitang Lungsod (KPML)

Samahan ng mga Mamamayan-Zone One Tondo Organization (SM-ZOTO)

Aniban ng Manggagawa sa Agrikultura (AMA)

Partido Lakas ng Masa (PLM)

KALAYAAN

Makabayan-Pilipinas

Corporate Greed: Wrecking havoc on the Filipino People

Our organizations join the worldwide call against “corporate greed” and the empire of capitalism. We look up to “Occupy Wall Street” (OWS) as a beacon to a world bled dry by global monopoly corporations.

Right at the very heart of the enemy – at the biggest capitalist economy – American workers have spontaneously begun to speak out against the widest rich-poor divide in the history of capitalism; not with their voices but with their feet by occupying selected choke points in several key cities in the US.

OWS is a trailblazer that set a wave of anti-capitalist protests around the world. In various countries, protesters have occupied public spaces to express their sentiment against corporate greed.

Because we are inspired by the resurgence in America, we are staging a protest here at the Philippine Stock Exchange - right before the institution which symbolizes capital’s naked and insatiable drive for profit.

But more important than the form is the substance, we are joining the global call for “People before Profit”. Indeed, government must heed the primacy of people’s welfare over the right to profit by the elite few.

We are calling on the Aquino administration – in the name of social justice – to reverse the following trends, which are all manifestations of how corporate greed is wrecking havoc on the Filipino people:

a) No to Outsourcing! The President must issue a public apology for threatening to sue PALEA with “economic sabotage”. Declare a policy of protecting the right to regular and secure jobs against abusive practices of management prerogative such as outsourcing and downsizing.

b) No to Oil Deregulation! Review policies on how to revert back to a regulated oil market. Thirteen years of deregulation is enough evidence to prove that without state intervention, the public would be defenseless against shameless profiteering by the oil oligarchs.

c) In-city Development! Humane and sustainable conditions (not higher land values for real estate moguls) should be the starting point of any resolution to the urban poor question.

d) No to Privatization! The sale of basic public social services (i.e., electricity, water, roads) to the private sector (local and foreign) has resulted in exorbitant prices. Government should not turn its back on its role to provide its people social goods and services. End privatization schemes; do not deny the people of social services.

e) No to Liberalization! Economic development should not be dependent on foreign investment (i.e., foreign monopoly capital) much less foreign products. Develop the national economy through industrialization and modernization of agriculture.

f) Climate Justice Now! Capitalism’s greed does not only deny jobs and income to the people but also threatens our future. The world is for everyone. Uphold sustainable and planned utilization of natural resources.

US weighs new options against North Korea—Gates - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos

US weighs new options against North Korea—Gates - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos

The attack on the South Korean warship Cheonan, and all attacks of this kind for that matter, is a provocation to war, and this must be condemned to the highest level of the capitalist bureaucracy. Its ally, the US, is quick to take actions against North Korea, if indeed it's proven by the UN Security Council that they fired the shots that sank the warship. This provocative act could lead to a world war, where nobody wins but the capitalist system. War is a prerogative of capitalism. But there is a bigger question here: Why does the US sees this North Korean action as a threat to the peace and order, but can actually launch their own offensive against countries that they see as a threat to world security, like that of Iraq and Afghanistan, and get away with it?