OccupyOakland continues to do what it does best -- make life difficult for the City of Oakland and make the Oakland Police look barbaric. The latest incident occurred at Frank Ogawa Plaza / Oscar Grant Park yesterday, where #Occupiers were putting on a Thanksgiving feeding for themselves and anyone else who happened by.
As Press TV put it:
A confrontation occurred between police and Occupy Oakland protesters during a Thanksgiving gathering.
Portable toilets were delivered but police prevented them from being unloaded. While attempting to get the toilets unloaded, a police officer attacked one resident dragging him to ground and arresting him.
Later in the video, you can see a cop drawing his taser, and a resident preventing him from discharging his weapon.
Another example of cops creating civil unrest at peaceful gatherings in Oakland by showing force for ridiculous reasons, such as guarding "porta-potties" camping, and exercising freedom of speech and assembly.
There is a dispute as to whether portapotties are legal on the plaza -- whether a permit is needed or whether conducting a 24-hour vigil as the #occupiers now claim to be doing precludes the necessity of obtaining a permit.
Phil, a lawyer ... explains that having access to portable toilets is completely legal and is for public health and safety. Phil has papers prepared for the case as an attorney and says to the interviewer that he has tried explaining the case to the sergeant but the sergeant "didn't want to hear about it".
In any case you might think that on Thanksgiving, in a downtown area bereft of any public bathroom facilities, the police would prefer to have a couple of portapotties on hand rather than potentially having people relieve themselves in alleys and back corners. Or at a bare minimum just look the other way. But no. Instead of being cool the Oakland police had to a) nearly incite a riot and then b) tackle people and arrest them for no apparent reason. Why am I not surprised?
If you want to follow #OccupyOakland on twitter, intrepid reporter Susie Cagle has set up a twitter list you can follow of all the important players. And yes, our own allie123, aka alyssa011968, made the cut.
Other Bay Area #Occupy Happenings
Occupy UC Davis seems to be calm this holiday weekend, but today may well be Black Friday for UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi, and not because her credit cards are maxed out.
Barring some statistical anomaly, the 100,000th person will likely sign the petition calling for Katehi to resign late today. (As this is being published, almost 97,000 signatures have been gathered.) If you haven't signed it yet, do so. If you haven't told your friends to sign it, do it now. If you haven't Facebooked and tweeted and otherwise spread the electronic word, go for it.
Occupy UC Berkeley has no active petition action, but one student chose to continue the #occupation yesterday instead of going home.
While most UC Berkeley students chose to head home for the Thanksgiving break, senior Alex Kim decided to do something decidedly different early Thursday morning.
Kim cancelled his plane ticket home and instead lugged camping equipment and his pet cat Obi to Chancellor Robert Birgeneau’s front lawn around 5 a.m. There he pitched a tent in solidarity with the Occupy Cal movement that has shaken the campus over the last three weeks.
Kim stayed on the lawn for about four hours until deciding to relocate to Sproul Plaza later Thursday morning...
As far as the encampment goes, Kim said in written messages with The Daily Cal that he would stay on the lawn of Birgeneau’s campus home until police arrest him. But around 9 a.m. Kim said UCPD officers approached his tent and asked him to leave the lawn.
"They said it's a holiday and not to get arrested or give them trouble till (Monday)," Kim said.
So Kim obliged and moved his tent to Sproul Plaza Thursday afternoon. Setting up tents is against campus policy , but since police used batons and pepper spray to clear out encampments at Occupy Cal and Occupy Davis, the campuses have taken a more laid-back approach to enforcing the no-tent rule.
I've seen no reports as to whether Kim and his encampment are still on Sproul Plaza.
And that's the latest from Lake Wobegon across the Bay Bridge, where going to the bathroom is about to become a major civil rights issue, and all the children are above the median.