Mostly peaceful protests mark Zimmerman’s acquittal

Looks like the ‘baggers won’t get the race war they’ve so been looking forward to. Those itchy trigger fingers of their’s will have to remain itchy.

Washington Post: Protesters angered by the acquittal of George Zimmerman held largely peaceful demonstrations in three California cities, but broke windows and started small street fires Oakland, police said.

The gatherings Saturday night ranged from a few dozen to a couple hundred people turning out to protest the verdict in the Florida courtroom over the death of Trayvon Martin, and police said some of the demonstrations continued into the early hours Sunday.

The Oakland police dispatch office said about 100 people protested, with some in the crowd breaking windows on businesses and starting small fires in the streets. As the protest wound down with the crowd dispersing, the office said that as of 2 a.m. PDT it had no word of any arrests.

Local media reports said some Oakland marchers vandalized a police squad car and police formed a line to block the protesters’ path.

Oakland protesters apparently burned American and Californian flags, so prepare for the right freaking out over the WORST THING EVER!, but even by the broadest possible definition of the term, riots did not happen.

And keep in mind that the anger behind Oakland protests isn’t entirely about Trayvon Martin, as that community is engaged in a long struggle to get a racist and rogue police department under control. Any racially-charged protest is going to include actions directed at provoking Oakland police. It’s unfortunate, but understandable. You can only take so much.

The assumption that people would riot if Zimmerman walked shows why those people were about 99% Zimmerman supporters: they were racially profiling the entire African-American community in the same way that George Zimmerman profiled Trayvon Martin.

So put the shootin’ irons down, Teabillies. Your little race war isn’t going to happen. You won’t get to shoot any more kids today.

[photo by orangesparrow]

Stories to Watch: 11/22/11

I'm not posting to Griper Blade this week, to give me more time to do that whole Thanksgiving thing. I'm raising some sourdough right now and I should be able to bake it later tonight. Then I'll freeze it until the big day. My bread has been turning out well lately, so it should be a nice addition to the feast. Now here's the news...


When it comes to climate, the media really are chumps.


Another GOP debate to skip.


Dems are standing by Occupy Wall Street -- even as OWS isn't necessarily standing with them.


David Brooks wrote something stupid again.


A pregnant Seattle protester miscarries after being subjected to police abuse at an Occupy protest. Time for all the "pro-life" types to start freaking out of police brutality -- but we all know they won't. I'm guessing "abortion-by-cop" is going to be A-OK with them.


Finally, Republicans say that businesses are overtaxed and over-regulated. Business owners disagree.

Related articles

• Occupy Seattle protester claims police caused her miscarriage (guardian.co.uk)
• Fox News calls pepper spray a food product (rt.com)
• OWS protesters interrupt Obama's speech (VIDEO) (rt.com)
• Pregnant Woman Blasted with Pepper Spray by SPD Reportedly Miscarries (slog.thestranger.com)

Stories to Watch: 10/30/11

Trying to find a better way to integrate the Tumblr blog into my BlogSpot blogs. I think the robot posts from Diigo are just too hard to read -- the formatting sucks and I can't really fix it. I stuck a widget in the right sidebar where my Twitter widget used to be (that widget's really kind of redundant), but it's kind of CPU demanding. I think I've found a decent solution here and I'll put that up later today. It can include photos, but you can't do that unless you include the entire post as well -- so it'll be photo-free for now. I'm hoping to be able to figure out how to truncate the entries using CSS -- I may be able to limit the height of each entry in actual pixels -- but I'm not exactly a whiz there. If not, I'll just go with text, which I can limit as an option. Anyway, we'll see how that goes. Now here's the news...


Sounds like another police riot last night, this time against Occupy Denver. Twenty were arrested, with "several protesters" making trips to the hospital and one "shot in the face with pepper bullets." "During a particularly poignant moment of the evening, Occupy Denver was separated by a police barricade from the Bill of Rights, which was printed on a poster and attached to a wooden stand as a symbol for the camp," the report relates. You couldn't come up with a more symbolic moment if you'd planned it.


The snow storm in the northeast was much more severe than expected. When it's warm, storms can have a lot of energy -- there's a reason why the hurricane season isn't in the winter.


A new WPRI poll (pdf) shows President Obama beating the entire GOP field in Wisconsin -- pretty easily. On the subject of recalling Gov. Walker, voters are split well within the margin of error, with those opposing recall taking the lead by two points. Those are the only good numbers for Walker, weak as they are. 56% disapprove of his job performance, with the vast, vast majority of the disapprovers (45% of the total) saying they "strongly disapprove."


Rick Perry says he plans to participate in (read "lose") at least 5 more GOP debates.


Michele Bachmann has absolutely no idea what a flat tax even is.


In his weekly address, President Obama pushes the crazy notion that maybe people in Washington ought to do something about jobs.


Al Jazeera does what the American press will not; take a real long look at the corrupting influence of money in American politics -- with special attention to the Koch brothers.


Finally, Herman Cain gets booed by Ron Paul supporters in Alabama.

Related articles

• Herman Cain: NYT Doesn't Know What It's Talking About (huffingtonpost.com)
• Herman Cain Sings Ode to Pizza (news.icanhascheezburger.com)
• Denver Police Fire Rubber Bullets On Occupy Denver Protesters (businessinsider.com)
• Occupy Denver Protesters Met With Violent Police Reaction (alan.com)

Stories to Watch: 10/16/11

Pancake brinner tonight. Life is good. Now here's the news...


99-percenters go global.


Be prepare for a political shitstorm of biblical proportions; a far-left wing activist obtains emails from the Tea Party, then shares them with the FBI so the government can keep tabs on the movement. Oh wait, I read that wrong -- a far-right wing activist got leaked documents about Occupy Wall Street to the feds. Well, then that's just fine. Move along. Nothing to see here.


Police arrest protesters in an NYC Citibank for "trespassing." Protesters say they were trying to close their accounts and were arrested for it. Citibank says "Only one person asked to close an account and was accommodated." Neither the trespassing charge nor Citibank's statement account for video of a bank customer being arrested outside Citibank -- apparently her crime was in talking to protesters holding cameras.


Herman Cain, Koch addict.


Unsurprisingly, Mittens "Pink Slip" Romney is Wall Street's candidate of choice -- which explains why Obama's targeting Romney as a Wall Street shill.


Things do not look good on the climate front.


Fox & Friends continues to be the most ridiculous, brainless morning news circus out there.


Finally, mass arrests in Occupy Chicago protests.

Related articles

• Woman arrested while trying to close her Citibank account (dangerousminds.net)
• This Video of NYPD Arresting a Woman at Citibank Certainly Doesn't Look Good [Video] (gawker.com)
• NYPD Arrests 24 for Attempting to Close Their Citibank Accounts; BoA Threatens Customers Attempting to Close Theirs (slog.thestranger.com)
• Meet the Guy Who Snitched on Occupy Wall Street to the FBI and NYPD [Occupy Wall Street] (gawker.com)

News Roundup for 10/10/11

Getting someplace

-Headline of the Day-
"Poll: Half the country has heard about the Occupy Wall Street protests."

CNN is out with a good news/bad news poll. The good news is "roughly half" (51%) of the people CNN polled were aware of the Occupy Wall Street protests and the bad news is that, of them, 54% don't have an opinion about them either way. But the bad news breaks down further as good bad news for the 99-percenters and bad bad news for the people backing the suits. CNN reports that "27% say they agree with the movement's overall position on the financial system and social change, with 19% saying disagree with Occupy Wall Street on those issues."

In better news for the 99-percenters, Occupy Wall Street is winning the internet by an extremely wide margin. "Those who use social media were more likely to support the goals of the movement, with a full third of those respondents saying they agreed with the group's overall position," reports The Hill. "Only 14 percent of social media users said they did not support the protesters."

It's a start. Occupy Facebook! (CNN)


-GOP consistency on display-

>
Click to embiggen

No comment needed, I guess. (DailyKos)


-Bonus HotD-
"Almost Twice As Many People Have Heard of Occupy Wall Street As Rick Perry."

Or, "Fun With Mix-and-Match Polling." (Wonkette)

Stories to Watch: 2/18/11

I'm in Madison, which seems like the center of the universe right now. It's not, it just feels that way. Just sayin'. Now here's the news...


Massive, sustained protests in Wisconsin have the corporate right running scared. Tens of thousands descend on the capitol day after day and something simply must be done. The rabble cannot be allowed to challenge the elite.

So it's wingnuts to the rescue. Andy Breitbart and a few other rightwing nutjobs are putting together a counter-protest tomorrow and it's looking less than impressive. An "I Stand with Scott Walker" Facebook page promises 1,774 attending, as of this writing, and that's the result of optimism. In contrast, the pro-union folks have been averaging about 25-30,000 daily.

Here's the thing though. If I know anything about Andy Breitbart, he's not going to be here to make a show of strength, but to try to make the union folks look bad. This means we'll probably be looking at a few hundred assholes trying to pick a fight. My advice; when they make some jerkass comment or give you a little shove, go ahead and laugh at their pathetic numbers and let it go at that. It's going to be the first weekend protest, so expect the pro-union numbers to be even bigger. We'll have nothing to prove, so don't let Breitbart's agent provocateurs get under your skin.


Other stuff hapenned too. For example, House Republicans voted to shut down Planned Parenthood, because that's going to create jobs or something. If you're a woman and you voted Republican, enjoy a smoke, because you just screwed yourself.


Nancy Pelosi says a government shutdown is probably in the works.


Democratic Senator Jeff Bingaman to retire.


Middle eastern autocrats launch a violent crack down on protesters.


Finally, Joe Klein writes one surprisingly idiotic piece on Wisconsin.