Oct 12 2011
Live Reports From Occupy DC and Boston
The US Senate last night voted down President Obama’s American Jobs Act, a $447 billion package of new spending and tax cuts that the President has spent weeks stumping for. It didn’t even make it up for debate, losing a procedural motion on a 51 to 48 vote. The Huffington Post reports some Democrats opposed the legislation, including Senator Jim Webb from Virginia, who said he is against raising taxes on the wealthy to pay for spending increases. The American Jobs Act includes a tax increase on households earning more than $1 million, upped by Senate Democrats from Obama’s initial proposal to raise taxes on annual incomes over $200,000. On Monday the group Good Jobs LA joined Occupy LA protestors and held a candle light vigil in support of the American Jobs Act. Good Jobs LA said if the Senate failed to pass the bill, more actions would take place, beginning today. Protestors with the Occupy DC coalition yesterday afternoon disrupted a Senate Finance Committee meeting during discussion on a raft of Free Trade deals with Columbia, Panama, and South Korea. Earlier in the morning, Capitol police arrested 6 protestors inside of the Senate’s Hart Building. One participant told the Washington Post that a few hundred protestors occupied the building for half and hour, chanting, “How do you fix the deficit? End the Wars! Tax the rich!” before the arrests began. Meanwhile in Boston activists are still reeling from a violent police crackdown at 1am on Tuesday morning at their expanding encampment in downtown Boston. Witnesses say officers with batons assaulted activists, including older protesters with the group Veterans for Peace, before arresting more than a 100 people. Later in the day a spokeswoman for the Boston PD described the police action as, “respectful and proportional” to the situation. Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino made headlines for telling the media, “I’m open to suggestions, but civil disobedience will not be tolerated.”
GUESTS: Stephen Squibb, volunteer with Occupy Boston; Kevin Zeese, organizer with October2011.org.
One Response to “Live Reports From Occupy DC and Boston”
So the Democrats are co-opting the OWS movement with astroturf groups and faux-liberal celebs. Well, so long as President Hopey-Changey gets his bullshit “jobs’ bill passed in time for the next election, that’s the really important thing.