Yeast dough expands as long as the food, water, and structural support are there. It infiltrates, when there's a crack.

Explosions occur when the release of energy pushes everything out of its way. It's a one-time, one way event.

The authoritarian state response to OWS was profound in it's nature. The police really flirted with police brutality and ignoring protestors Constitutional Rights when OWS had some momentum a few years ago.

We can protest all we want as long as it's splintered and disorganized, the minute we appear to be actually effective at organizing a larger cohesive movement, that's when the militarized police with their eardrum exploding sound cannons and mace and pepper spray and rubber bullets and illegal choke holds will incite riots and whatever else to crush the dissent.

The great Chris Hedges has covered revolutions in Eastern Europe - his observation is that if ONE PERCENT of the population is engaged in revolutionary causes, it will trigger a revolution.

And right now I'm afraid to participate in protests for fear of physical harm and getting snagged in our stasi-like criminal justice system. Even among family and friends I'm starting to really feel like "I have to watch what I say."

The Oligarch's are turning the dial to eleven on quelling social unrest and dissident voices. Painful, because from my 60's baby boomer public education, I know a lot about the principles our country was founded on an it's painful to see our elected officials bulldoze over many of our former Constitutional Rights. They're perfectly comfortable stating on national TV that "Torture works and I'd do it again in a minute." Which speaks to the utter contempt they have for the rule of law and The Constitution that they took an Oath to uphold. I wonder what Oath's these people have taken that they actually follow? Is there a secret Oath taken by the leaders of the Military Industrial congressional Surveillance complex we should know about? Is there a Secret Oath to our DEEP STATE parallel government accountable to nobody but themselves?

It CAN happen here and IT IS happening here.

I think one of the few hopes left is collective action, which I think is impossible because there are so many special interest variants trying to fight the spread of Oligarchy - should I join the green party, should i join greenpeace, OWS, move-on and all the other hundreds of groups committed to social justice?

We need a Teddy Roosevelt for our times - somebody that will BUST THE TRUSTS effectively and for real. Well, we need a whole bunch of other things, cuz the wealthy authoritarians have been chipping away at Democracy at least since the Powell Memorandum of 1971 and then got going in full force once Reagan was in office.

Eizabeth? Bernie? And if they bail how about Alan Grayson?

-90% jimmy

"so many special interest variants trying to fight the spread of Oligarchy - should I join the green party, should i join greenpeace, OWS, move-on and all the other hundreds of groups committed to social justice?"

we have different groups means we can follow our own critera. For ex, I choose to work with groups which are not allied with the Dem Party, like move-on, or those which are into electoral politics like the green party.

So I have a choice of other independent grass-roots groups.

Also I think we are seeing more and more groups coming together to work together.
And also a growing realization that "one-issue" will not get it.

In my town we started a group to become educated in direct action.
I have never been arrested, but want to be arrested, when it seems the correct thing to do. (Not that all people who do direct action plan to be arrested of course.)

We have a large membership of many different groups. We hope that this group can serve as a "clearing-house" so to speak of unifying and alerting each other to our various actions.

that the New Left will congeal into something like the old left. Personality politics, despite claims of "you too can be a millionaire" have been ringing hollow, and one group competing against another for political traction, or media attention or donations is part of the problem. Time to find common ground (hint: 99% = We are all working class).

A strong unity of groups would scare the shit out of the establishment, like the true old left (ie Commies and Socialist) that were badgered to death, and the young progressive minds of the 60's who were sold a hollow form of economic inclusion in the 70's. They became part of the problem. Back to the drawing board, and learn some history along the way.

I don't think they were successful.
maybe you disagree.

I think that would did in the old left was the propaganda machine.

And the propaganda machine of yore has morphed into the "culture wars" of the '60's which continue today.
It is easy to point to bankers, cops, etc as the "enemy" but really the
"great unwashed masses" are the obstacle to change.

The ones who watch Karshians and survival reality show.
The ones who let the Earth and its creatures struggle for survival and die.

well... that is my morbid thought for the day lol.
happy new Year anyway.

(sometimes I think I should keep my yap shut if I have nothing constructive to say, other times I think I should share the 'wisdom of my years', FWIW.)

I always enjoy reading your thoughts.

Because the media kept their secrets, they probably thought the people were fooled. OWS grew so rapidly across the country and the globe, rather than the one city they had planned on, it became apparent that the public was seething at the corruption, that they do know and that they are capable of organizing.

The brutal crackdown made no sense. They were not violent, not promoting any kind of revolution, just exercising their constitutional rights to speak.

They succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Their clever marketing of their message has created a new language explaining succinctly the inequality created by Wall St.

AND most of all, they exposed the police state even as they tried to silence them. And that has created even more anger.

I think boycotts and strikes should be the next phase. No point in going out on the streets and allowing them to bring out the tanks again.

That part WAS successful. Now it is necessary to conduct protests that do not provide them with the opportunity to arrest and harm people.

'Don't buy their stuff'. Corporations depend on money to hold on to their power.

When they start losing money and their stocks fall, THAT will affect them more than anything else.

And they can't very well arrest people for not buying their garbage, well, I don't think they can.