The 55% have spoken

A sea change is in the air. Yesterday, the shareholders of Citigroup voted against the proposed compensation packages of its top 5 execs.  While the vote is not binding, the 55% who were opposed sent a clear signal about outrageous outsized pay to these corporate cats.  The tents of Occupy Wall Street have been taken down, but the sentiment has rooted, and not just within a fringe-y radical element.  One of the nay voters represented a Philadelphia money management firm that lays claim to 5 million shares of Citigroup.  I'm pretty sure their rep was not camped out in Zuccotti Park. I can't help but wonder if there was some organzing around this vote.

It's about equity; it's about fairness (The Buffett Rule); it's about stakeholder (and shareholders) exercising their voice.  The pendulum is swinging - it's a long, and not altogether smooth arc.  And this is not a 4-year term, but rather a generational shift, and thus more like 20 years.  I'm recommending a veggie share in your local CSA (community-supported agriculture).  It's a different kind of dividend.   

#OccupyDC - Action

Today there was some OccupyDC action.  Some planned protests of both the sleepers (those who love in tents) and other Occupy activists intended to disrupt Washington.

Today's demonstration was about 100 or so protesters marching down K Street NW, and blocking the intersection at 14th.  This is a block from my work, so I could see and hear it from the windows, and at some point walked over to observe and take some pictures.

Streets were blocked with heavy metal newspaper boxes, trashcans and chairs, and the Occupiers stood in the boxed intersection in the pouring rain chanting.  Police had all four sides cordoned off with police cars, horses and ultimately a wall of police facing off.  It was pretty non-confrontational - protesters chanted and sometimes taunted, police watched them stone-faced and sometimes took the bait.  There were easily an equal number of protesters and police, and an even greater number of spectators taking pictures with their phones.  But you can't block traffic forever, and eventually police began clearing media and bystanders to sidewalks, and then told protesters to also clear the street or face removal.

At this point, as I understand, police rode a bunch of horses slowly into the center, scattering a good number of protesters who did not enjoy facing off against a large imposing animal.  Soon enough the protesters played their role and lay down in the street.  And the police played theirs, giving them warnings, and then began removals and arrests, as protesters again played their part resisting arrest in acts of civil disobedience.   I checked Twitter a few times - #OccupyDC - to see how the scene was described, and I was a bit disappointed to see the tweets, while overall accurate, seem more sensational than what I had witnessed,

I'm quite proud of my city in the handling of OccupyDC.  There hasn't been evictions of the tent cities.  McPherson Square park (and Freedom Square a few blocks away) have codes of conduct posted by the protesters, including how to interact with police and respect the park.  Likewise, park police have posted signs of what is and is not allowed (generators must be cordoned off, for example).  DC's mayor and  Council has expressed support - as long as health and public safety are not threatened.  So far there has not been pepper spray, raids or helicopters as in Oakland and Atlanta.

The methods are a bit fringe-y for me, and the messengers far too scraggly to be effective.  But the principles of the movement speak to me - even with my iPhone and Starbucks and desk job.  Long live Occupy!

Occupy: Great Graphic Design

This, and many other fabulous graphic posters available at www.occuprint.org

Occupy DC

I am an avowed sympathizer of the Occupy movement.  Some people question it's coherence and challenge its lack of clear objectives.  Fair enough criticism, but I'm quite clear about it.  The income gap between  rich and poor is widening, and the super rich are becoming richer by orders of magnitude, while the middle class stagnate and fall behind  Foreclosures, upside-down mortgages, and student debt prohibit decent hard-working people from getting ahead, but these ills were in many ways created by the large financial institutions that are reaping record profit, with the managers of said institutions rewarded with massive bonuses.  And all the while, fiscal policy is structured to save, if not reward, these structures.  That is the 1%, and the rest is the 99%.  The tail is wagging the dog.

The Occupy DC site is in McPherson Square in view of the White House, and about 3 blocks from my office.  Over the last month, I've made it a point to use the Metro exit that allows me to walk past and through the tent city.  I've enjoyed watching it grow and take shape.  It now consists of about one hundred tents - residential sites - pretty much right next to each other in the center and southwest of the square.  The northwest section has grown to become a community hub, complete with medical tent, kitchen, community library, media tent (with solar panels and generator) and message boards.  The south end of the square seems to be loosely organized around social and community affairs - frisbee playing, spontaneous (or not) musical performances, and a meeting area.  Urban planners could not have done better - and this Washington Post article makes some interesting organizing and planning observations around that.

Who says they're not organized?  Check this out!

DAILY SCHEDULE
11:00 [Scribble unclear] Outreach 102
12:00 pm Political education discussion
12:30 p.m Announcements
2pm De-escalation training
5:00pm Newcomer orientation
5pm Roots of the Crisis Workshop
6:00pm General Assembly
8:00pm Committee Meetings

NEEDS
juice
cooking oil
PLATES
Water
Round table for library
Sleeping bags
Tents
Giant coffeepot

This photo shows the library about 2 weeks ago, back when the request was out for a round table.  I passed by again today, and I wish I got a picture.  The library tent is gorgeous, complete with a round table, about four to six chairs, and at least four bookshelves brimming with over 800 books.

Other organic and spontaneous community innovations have taken root.  There is  a "Human Mic," where when announcements are made.  A person says "Mic," and three to six people around him (or her) echo "Mic" and the announcements proceed from there - a natural human amplification of sound.

And while I haven't fully figured out the kitchen, here's a WaPo article about cooking 3 meals a day every day for 100 to 200 protesters with volunteer labor, and donated foodstuffs.  There's also a steady supply of donated prepared foods - burgers from Five Guys (it's not clear whether the store donated or a citizen sympathizer bought and donated), day-old pastries from the Starbucks across the street, and Cherry Garcia ice cream served by Ben and Jerry themselves earlier this week.

This year, we witnessed an Arab Spring, in which long-standing, firmly entrenched and protected government structures were toppled from a more or less spontaneous uprising of civil society.  No one would have bet on it a month earlier.

I have no idea was the Occupy movement will bring.  I am disheartened, disappointed, and disillusioned by heavy-handed confrontations by police on Occupy protests in Oakland and Atlanta.  The Occupy message and the objectives are not concise; and discredited because those messages are expressed by a relatively disparate group of fringe progressives.  Winter is coming.  Attention wanes or gets diverted by Michael Jackson, Justin Bieber,  and Joe Paterno.  Yet still I remain impressed with Occupy DC's stamina, growth, and organic organization.  Thus far, there has been minimal police intervention and confrontation in DC.  I'm pleased for both the protesters and the police.  Occupy movements in other cities continue to form and grow.  They just may be another American Revolution ahead of us.

New York for Marriage Equality

A Marriage Equality vote is going to the State Senate soon - likely next week - as they try to catch up with DC's enlightened ways.  It's close, but it looks like it's just one vote away from passing, and that Senator remains undecided.  And in getting to that threshold, recently, Republican State Senator, Roy McDonald crossed party lines to state he planned to vote for it.   He was quoted as saying:

"You get to the point where you evolve in your life where everything isn't black and white, good and bad, and you try to do the right thing.

"You might not like that. You might be very cynical about that. Well, f**k it, I don't care what you think. I'm trying to do the right thing."  

Way to go, Mc Donald.  Here's to evolving.  Her's to not seeing life in black and white.  Here's to doing the right thing.  And while, I'm at it, here's to TMZ.com, the celebrity gossip site for covering it and standing on the side of love.

Michelle Rhee - Rant and Rave (my 25 cents)

Alas, my mayoral candidate, Adrain Fenty, did not win the primary last week, so it is looking more and more likely that his hand-picked, school reform champion and My Hero, Michelle Rhee, will not remain the Chancellor of the District of Columbia Public Schools.  At least that what it looks like here after Rhee and likely mayor-elect Vince Gray met yesterday. (Photo cribbed from the Internet)

As a mom to a child in the DC public schools, I'm pretty discouraged.  Rhee has been a reformer in the true sense of the word, bringing in sweeping and widespread change.  And while I'm usually not much of a radical - I believe that change is generally incremental and requires process - when the situation is as dire as it was when she arrived on the scene, there is no other choice in the matter than to be monomaniacal (City Paper's word - but I love it - check out their other endorsements for the primary, a total hoot!). Seriously, DCPS was an utterly failing system - poor performance, ineffective teachers, crumbling infrastructure, and a systems failure on everything from the timely delivery of textbooks to the opening of schools on time.  And yet somehow, in America, in Washington, DC (our Nation's Capital) that had become good enough.  Good enough for public school, good enough for urban schools, good enough for poor people, good enough for blacks.  Sorry, but that status quo is just plain unacceptable.  

Rhee didn't have the time nor the charge to fix things with finesse and pretty dancing - she needed to make tough, hardcore decisions - and frankly she had results to show for it.  Enrollment stabilized and went up for the first time in years.  Test performance improved.  Infrastructure improvement and schools modernization was plain staggering.  And she took a stand against ineffective teachers - she fired them!  hundreds of them! at a time!  Ouch, ok, that's harsh, and hard, and it did not win her many fans...except people like me who sort of sat there stunned, thinking, "Wow, she's brave...and I'm scared shitless of her."