OCCUPY WALL STREET

[MsMerrick]

Originally Posted by Corkey

Well I hate to tell them but employers are required to give employees time off to vote if their work day is between pole hours. Otherwise it can be done before or after work. Weekend elections are a really bad idea if one wants people to actually get to the poles.

Sure and how many people risk their boss's ire, to ask for that time off? In these times when you can easily lose your job ? How easy is it to vote before or after work when you work a long day and live someplace where the lines are long to vote? Election Day use to be a day off or a half day off, now it isn't. I think the point is to encourage people to vote not to make it harder... Personally I wouldn't mind if we had Australia's system, where you are required to vote, or you get fined.... And there already are places you can vote early.. which Florida did away with, so you cna vote the weekend before, why isn't that a great idea? Cuts down on lines the actual day and..whats wrong with it ? Whats the down side of more people voting? Well except for the Republicans, who win less elections, when more people vote...

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by SoNotHer

From the latest Boldprogressives.org email -

We recently told you about Rep. Tammy Baldwin's (D-Wisconsin) bill opposing the proposed deal that would give Wall Street banks immunity for crimes that haven't been investigated yet. 1,000 phone calls and 55,000 signatures from people like you helped catapult Baldwin's co-sponsors from 27 to 48 members of Congress! This is huge momentum, and we're not done yet.

Our Capitol Hill outreach program, P Street (the progressive alternative to K Street), will continue updating members of Congress about grassroots support while asking them to sign on as co-sponsors. Add your voice today.
Thanks for being a bold progressive.

P.S. More good news: The Massachusetts Attorney General recently announced a lawsuit against 5 big Wall Street banks for illegally foreclosing on homeowners. Progressive activism against Wall Street immunity, coupled with the Occupy Wall Street momentum, has undoubtedly empowered investigations like these. And it's been announced that more are coming in California and Nevada. But a deal with Wall Street banks would make these lawsuits go away, so please add your name as a citizen signer of Baldwin's resolution today

http://act.boldprogressives.org/sign...non/?source=bp

Yes, investigations need to proceed! But, under the actual laws/regulations governing Wall Street and the banks during the mega-rip off most of what was done was not illegal. That is why it is so important to get the agencies created and the new regulations they are to enforce going. And the GOP in Congress has done everything including blocking confirmation of directors of consummer agencies that will make those kinds of actions illegal and subject to prosecution in order to protect Wall Street and banking further.

Not one damn thing is going to get done that helps the 98% without changing the composition of both the Senate & House and elect Democrats and Independents that are left of center. This general election is so critical and we need to focus on all of the GOP backed voter suppression activity going on.

[atomiczombie]

Portland Port is CLOSED
Oakland Port is CLOSED
Long Beach partly CLOSED
Longview Port is CLOSED

[turasultana]

CNN reports some disruption to ports, but not closings:


(CNN) -- Protesters chanting, "Whose port? Our port!" protested at West Coast ports on Monday, temporarily shutting down some of the facilities in a protest against what they called corporate greed.

The protesters, affiliated with the nationwide "Occupy" movement, set out in the pre-dawn hours in Oakland, California; Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon, to shut down ports in an effort to "disrupt the economic machine that benefits the wealthiest individuals and corporations," according to organizers.

Long Beach police arrested two people during the demonstration there, police Chief Jim McDonnell said. Port operations were not significantly impacted beyond some traffic delays, he said.

A spokesman for the port in Portland, Oregon, said the protests had partially shut down the port there. In Oakland, the port said in a statement that operations were continuing "with sporadic disruptions for truckers trying to enter and exit marine terminal gates."

About 80 protesters demonstrated outside the gate of San Diego's port, but caused no disruption because, port spokesman Ron Powell said.

"They were there at a time when we really didn't have a lot of truck traffic coming in and out," he said.

Four people who sat down in the road were arrested he said. San Diego police did not immediately return a telephone call seeking information on the arrests.

Protesters were planning a second occupation of the Oakland port Monday afternoon. Protesters in Seattle also were preparing to protest at the port there, according to organizing websites and posts on Twitter.

In addition to the West Coast port blockades, protesters also were planning to demonstrate at the port in Houston, while demonstrators in Salt Lake City and Denver were planning to disrupt operations of Walmart distribution facilities. About 40 to 50 people protested at the Denver facility, CNN affiliate KCNC reported.

The demonstrations were part of a nationwide day of protest called in the aftermath of efforts by cities across the country, including New York, Boston and Oakland, to clear demonstrators from encampments they had set up in public parks and other locations.

"We are occupying the ports as part of a day of action, boycott and march for full legalization and good jobs for all to draw attention to and protest the criminal system of concentrated wealth that depends on local and global exploitation of working people, and the denial of workers' rights to organize for decent pay, working conditions and benefits, in disregard for the environment and the health and safety of surrounding communities," organizers said on their website.

The port protesters are focusing on terminals owned by SSA Marine, saying it is owed by the Goldman Sachs investment firm, which they argue exemplifies corporate greed and is anti-union.

SSA Senior Vice President Bob Watters disputed the protesters' claims, saying Goldman Sachs owns less than 3% of an investment fund that has a minority stake in the company. He also said the company is the largest employer of International Longshore and Warehouse Union members on the West Coast.

That union, which represents 15,000 dock workers, has distanced itself from the effort.

In a letter to members sent last month, union president Robert McEllrath said the organization shares Occupy protesters concerns about what they consider corporate abuses, but he said the union was not sanctioning any shutdown.

Protest organizers said on their website that they were acting independent of organized labor only because the unions are "constrained under reactionary, anti-union federal legislation."

Some port workers are also against the planned blockade.

"I'm just barely getting on my feet again after two years, and now I gotta go a day without pay while somebody else has something to say that I'm not really sure is relevant to the cause," trucker Chuck Baca told CNN affiliate KGO.

Port officials say shutting down their facilities will only cost workers and their communities wages and tax revenue.

"Protesters wanted to send a message to the 1% but they are impacting the 99%," said Portland port spokesman Josh Thomas. The stoppage is resulting in "lost shifts, lost wages and delays," he said.

Port of San Diego board chairman Scott Peters issued an open letter to the community on Sunday asking that protesters not disrupt work.

"The Port of San Diego is made up of working people with families who serve the public each day by helping to bring in goods that are important to the people of the San Diego region," Peters wrote.

"They are the 99 percent, the gardeners, the maintenance workers, the dock workers, the Harbor Police officers, the office workers, the environmental workers -- all working to improve the quality of life in San Diego Bay and on its surrounding lands," he said. "It is these people who would be hurt by a blockade of our Port."

[Corkey]

Originally Posted by MsMerrick

Sure and how many people risk their boss's ire, to ask for that time off? In these times when you can easily lose your job ? How easy is it to vote before or after work when you work a long day and live someplace where the lines are long to vote? Election Day use to be a day off or a half day off, now it isn't. I think the point is to encourage people to vote not to make it harder... Personally I wouldn't mind if we had Australia's system, where you are required to vote, or you get fined.... And there already are places you can vote early.. which Florida did away with, so you cna vote the weekend before, why isn't that a great idea? Cuts down on lines the actual day and..whats wrong with it ? Whats the down side of more people voting? Well except for the Republicans, who win less elections, when more people vote...

It's the law, they have to let one vote if they are working during voting hours. Granted not that many work 12 hour shifts except nurses, EMT's, police and Fire, military, but it is the law and one can not be fired.

[atomiczombie]

Originally Posted by atomiczombie

Portland Port is CLOSED
Oakland Port is CLOSED
Long Beach partly CLOSED
Longview Port is CLOSED

This is from an FB post from Occupy St. Louis. Meant to cite it, sorry.

[atomiczombie]

Watch the port shut down live on UStream today:

http://occupywallst.org/article/watc...-port-shutown/

[atomiczombie]

This is seriously shocking. Call, email the white house now!!

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/write-or-call#write

[Corkey]

Sent an email to the white house requesting a reply.

[Cin]

Robert Fisk: Bankers are the dictators of the West

Writing from the very region that produces more clichés per square foot than any other "story" – the Middle East – I should perhaps pause before I say I have never read so much garbage, so much utter drivel, as I have about the world financial crisis.

But I will not hold my fire. It seems to me that the reporting of the collapse of capitalism has reached a new low which even the Middle East cannot surpass for sheer unadulterated obedience to the very institutions and Harvard "experts" who have helped to bring about the whole criminal disaster.

Let's kick off with the "Arab Spring" – in itself a grotesque verbal distortion of the great Arab/Muslim awakening which is shaking the Middle East – and the trashy parallels with the social protests in Western capitals. We've been deluged with reports of how the poor or the disadvantaged in the West have "taken a leaf" out of the "Arab spring" book, how demonstrators in America, Canada, Britain, Spain and Greece have been "inspired" by the huge demonstrations that brought down the regimes in Egypt, Tunisia and – up to a point – Libya. But this is nonsense.

The real comparison, needless to say, has been dodged by Western reporters, so keen to extol the anti-dictator rebellions of the Arabs, so anxious to ignore protests against "democratic" Western governments, so desperate to disparage these demonstrations, to suggest that they are merely picking up on the latest fad in the Arab world. The truth is somewhat different. What drove the Arabs in their tens of thousands and then their millions on to the streets of Middle East capitals was a demand for dignity and a refusal to accept that the local family-ruled dictators actually owned their countries. The Mubaraks and the Ben Alis and the Gaddafis and the kings and emirs of the Gulf (and Jordan) and the Assads all believed that they had property rights to their entire nations. Egypt belonged to Mubarak Inc, Tunisia to Ben Ali Inc (and the Traboulsi family), Libya to Gaddafi Inc. And so on. The Arab martyrs against dictatorship died to prove that their countries belonged to their own people.

And that is the true parallel in the West. The protest movements are indeed against Big Business – a perfectly justified cause – and against "governments". What they have really divined, however, albeit a bit late in the day, is that they have for decades bought into a fraudulent democracy: they dutifully vote for political parties – which then hand their democratic mandate and people's power to the banks and the derivative traders and the rating agencies, all three backed up by the slovenly and dishonest coterie of "experts" from America's top universities and "think tanks", who maintain the fiction that this is a crisis of globalisation rather than a massive financial con trick foisted on the voters.

The banks and the rating agencies have become the dictators of the West. Like the Mubaraks and Ben Alis, the banks believed – and still believe – they are owners of their countries. The elections which give them power have – through the gutlessness and collusion of governments – become as false as the polls to which the Arabs were forced to troop decade after decade to anoint their own national property owners. Goldman Sachs and the Royal Bank of Scotland became the Mubaraks and Ben Alis of the US and the UK, each gobbling up the people's wealth in bogus rewards and bonuses for their vicious bosses on a scale infinitely more rapacious than their greedy Arab dictator-brothers could imagine.

I didn't need Charles Ferguson's Inside Job on BBC2 this week – though it helped – to teach me that the ratings agencies and the US banks are interchangeable, that their personnel move seamlessly between agency, bank and US government. The ratings lads (almost always lads, of course) who AAA-rated sub-prime loans and derivatives in America are now – via their poisonous influence on the markets – clawing down the people of Europe by threatening to lower or withdraw the very same ratings from European nations which they lavished upon criminals before the financial crash in the US. I believe that understatement tends to win arguments. But, forgive me, who are these creatures whose ratings agencies now put more fear into the French than Rommel did in 1940?

Why don't my journalist mates in Wall Street tell me? How come the BBC and CNN and – oh, dear, even al-Jazeera – treat these criminal communities as unquestionable institutions of power? Why no investigations

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion...t-6275084.html

[Cin]

In case you think laws like NDAA 1031 Citizen Imprisonment Law can't or won't be used against you by the government because, well, because you actually aren't a terrorist, think again. These are laws that give the government unprecedented, in the U.S. anyway, control over it's citizens. And removes a great deal of your rights and possible recourse should you be picked up and dragged off to a detention center for a round of torture and questioning.

10 Ridiculous Things That Make You a Terror Suspect

"I'm not anti-America, America is anti-me"

You thought you weren't doing anything wrong, so why should you care about who they call a terrorist? Well, you may not believe it, but you're likely a terror suspect in America's new paradigm of the Land of the Fear.

The government is casting a wide net over its citizens in its search for potential threats. Now, you don't need to actually commit a crime to be hauled away to a detention center and held without charges while you are tortured; you just need to appear suspicious by sympathizing with anti-government views to be labeled a domestic terrorist.

First, it's important to understand the official definition of domestic terrorism in the United States. The ACLU reports that a person is a domestic terrorist if they engage in any "act dangerous to human life" that "appears to be intended to (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping."

Although recent White House action plans claim to be targeting "violent extremism in all its forms," the government itself is clearly guilty of countless "acts dangerous to human life intended to coerce the civilian population, to influence the policy, and to affect the conduct of a government." But that's for another article.

What's more disturbing, is the government's expansion of guilty parties to "terrorist sympathizers." This is where the net gets really large. What exactly constitutes sympathizing with a terrorist? Is questioning the imperial foreign policy and the destruction of civil liberties, sympathizing with the enemy? In the U.S., it seems that if you don't agree with the violence and coercion America commits, then you're an anti-American terrorist sympathizer, as evidenced by peace organizations being added to terror watch lists.

So, what makes you a terror suspect in America? Here are 10 ridiculous things that make you a terrorist according to "officials" running the U.S. government:

1. Tea Party Activists: The political Left demonized peaceful Tea Party activists as right-wing extremists, leading to the second most powerful official in the U.S. government, VP Joe Biden, to liken them to terrorists. Do you sympathize with those who are angry about bank bailouts on the backs of taxpayers? Well, you're likely a terrorist in the eyes of the State.

2. Occupy Activists: Now, the "Occupy" movement, said to be made up of left-wing extremists, is enjoying the same treatment as the Tea Party's right-wing extremists. The United Kingdom has officially labeled "Occupy" demonstrators as domestic terrorists. The U.S. hasn't gone quite that far, but the violent Police State did spy them in search of "domestic terrorists." Watch out, you may be a terror suspect if you sympathize with the 99%.

3. 7 Days of Food: The Department of Justice and FBI considers you a terrorist threat if you have more than 7 days of food stored, as explained by Rand Paul on the Senate floor:

Paul was referring to an official FBI/DOJ flyer given out to business owners to help them identify potential threats. And recently, Federal agents went to food storage facilities demanding customers lists, while citizens were harassed by the government with door-to-door "assessments" of their preparedness.

4. Missing Fingers: The document referred to by Rand Paul above, also claims that if someone is missing a finger or has burn marks, they're more likely to be a terror suspect.

5. Buying Flashlights: Also from the same official source, if you're buying night-vision devices including flashlights, you should be considered a terror suspect.

6. Paying Cash at Hotels: Watch out if you want to pay with cash for hotel rooms. This DHS commercial indicates that you're a terror suspect if you do:

The DHS has also launched their citizen spy program for hotels and has sent them hotel protection guidelines which lists suspicious activities like persons carrying observation equipment or standing around in the same area.

7. Texting Privately in a Public Place: According to this DHS commercial for their citizen spy program, if you're texting while sitting in a public park, but trying to keep it concealed from people who pass by, you should be reported for suspicious terrorist activity:

8. Ron Paul Stickers: A 2009 law enforcement report from the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) labeled Ron Paul supporters, Libertarians, and people sharing movies about the Federal Reserve as "domestic terrorists." When supporters of a political candidate who stands for peace and freedom become terror suspects, America is in big trouble.

9. Belief in Conspiracies -- Obama's Information Czar, Cass Sunstein, has identified those who hold conspiracy theories as targets for online "cognitive infiltration." Do you question the motives for war? Question the motives of the private Federal Reserve bank? Question any government policies? Chances are you already have been marked as a suspect.

10. Own Precious Metals -- Despite the fact that the Federal Reserve paper note (a.k.a. the dollar) is only sustained by faith, you could now be a suspected terrorist if you would like to preserve your wealth with something that holds real value like precious metals. And forget about establishing an alternative currency made from silver or gold like Bernard von NotHaus as you may be lumped into a "unique form of terrorism."

And now the bonus round for being registered as a potential terrorist -- #11-- Owning guns and ammo. Let's face it: you disagree with the American government colluding with international banks to rob you blind AND you've armed yourself? This also why returning veterans have also been labeled potential terrorists -- they have guns, know how to use them, and may be angry about the lies that sent them to war.

As the Fast and Furious scandal has now revealed, it was done with a premeditated strategy to vilify the Second Amendment to the nation's Constitution. Wait -- actively planning to undermine the founding document of the country and plot criminal activity against citizens to spread fear and increase political power? Should that be considered under the definition of terrorism. . . .?

[Cin]

Originally Posted by AtLast

Yes, investigations need to proceed! But, under the actual laws/regulations governing Wall Street and the banks during the mega-rip off most of what was done was not illegal. That is why it is so important to get the agencies created and the new regulations they are to enforce going. And the GOP in Congress has done everything including blocking confirmation of directors of consummer agencies that will make those kinds of actions illegal and subject to prosecution in order to protect Wall Street and banking further.

Yes, many of the unethical and damaging acts of Wall Street were not illegal thanks to the orgy of de-regulation we have seen over the years. But much of what was done by Wall Street was outright fraud. Misrepresenting debt instruments to the public as sound and top-grade while scorning them privately as toxic junk is still very much illegal, criminal acts under existing statutes.

[Cin]

Published on Tuesday, December 13, 2011 by CommonDreams.org
President Obama, Veto the National Defense Authorization Act
by Center for Constitutional Rights

CCR urges President Obama to veto the NDAA. If he doesn’t, he will bear the blame for making indefinite military detention without trial a permanent feature of the U.S. legal system. He will be responsible for signing into law one of the greatest expansions of executive power in our nation’s history, allowing the government to lock up citizens and non-citizens without the right to fair trial. Indefinite detention is contrary to the most fundamental principles of the rule of law.

The NDAA would essentially prevent President Obama from bringing men from Guantánamo to the U.S. for trial and severely curtail his ability to resettle them in third countries. More than half of the men currently detained at Guantánamo – 89 of the 171 – have been unanimously cleared by the CIA, FBI, NSC and Defense Department for transfer or release. Yet no one has been transferred since last January, when Congress created restrictions similar to those in the NDAA. This marks the longest period without a transfer in the prison camp’s entire 10-year history and only underscores the president’s broken promise and failure to close Guantanamo.

As Obama himself, along with President Bush and NDAA co-sponsor Senator John McCain, acknowledged during the presidential campaign, Guantánamo’s very existence makes us less safe. Indeed, Guantánamo, Obama’s forever prison, has become a global symbol of human rights violations by a country that claims to be the world leader of freedom.

Are these the legacies Obama, the one-time professor of constitutional law, wants for his presidency?

[Sachita]

This really burns my ass:

http://www.truth-out.org/under-indus...ops/1323453319

EXCLUSIVE: Under Industry Pressure, USDA Works to Speed Approval of Monsanto's Genetically Engineered Crops

It seems like control is just accelerated but I sit back and wonder who is really pulling all the strings. I see protest, I even see positive change, however there are agencies fighting and even lying to get shit approved/passed. I do understand the weight of our financial scenario and it is beyond our control.

But I can't help but fantasize about 1000's of protesters heading out to farms, empty lots, anywhere there is soil and start protesting with shovels and seeds. What better way to slam so much of this then to take back our local food systems? The magnitude of corps effected by this would be huge and so many banks would come tumbling down. Are we going to continue to allow the UDSA and FDA control what goes into our bodies?

So there are a few occupy farm groups but they are setting up camps to protest. I hope by spring everyone is out digging, growing and preserving. Penetrating local markets and teaching people to become independent and sustainable.

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

Yes, many of the unethical and damaging acts of Wall Street were not illegal thanks to the orgy of de-regulation we have seen over the years. But much of what was done by Wall Street was outright fraud. Misrepresenting debt instruments to the public as sound and top-grade while scorning them privately as toxic junk is still very much illegal, criminal acts under existing statutes.

I agree but worry that time is running out to do anything about the acts of fraud leading to what happened. There was such a confusing wall built (of these securities) to protect Wall Street and the banks and housing financial services industries- they wanted this to be a nightmare to even figure out who the hell really owns properties! All of the lobbying paid off for nearly 30 years to get to this place. Those that profited simply put the cash offshore.

I don't think there will ever be trials against those at the core of all of this. I think that each and every mortgage held in this manner should be declared null and void with re-negotiation at todays market values and that any negative financial "marks" on mortgagees since the collapse of the housing market not be allowed to count in the new mortgage.

That is the other side of this- so many people that had good credit now do not due to job loss and the whole damn mess.

[Sachita]

Originally Posted by AtLast

That is the other side of this- so many people that had good credit now do not due to job loss and the whole damn mess.

But on the bright side, if there ever could be one, private companies are writing low interest loans for people with bad credit, even foreclosures. I've been catching wind of a few people who said "what the hell", applied and found all kinds of options. I was lucky because the crooks that hold my mortgage seriously screwed up and recorded all conversations. they defaulted me on the governments home loan modification and almost forced me into foreclosure because of it. I ready to sue the crap out of them and would have won... maybe 10 years later. Anyhow they came in, took 20K off my principal and dropped my rate to 5%. It happened just in time because there is no way over the past year that would have been possible. But now people are fed up, builders and modular home companies are taking risk. I admit that I would rather see the already existing surplus of homes being lived in but it may take some time for this.

The other positive thing I'm seeing in the home market is people downsizing and moving to smaller homes. I would have loved to have seen this movement happen 20 years ago. That and the government putting a cap on auto makers to not make cars that used more then 25 MPG, forcing them to change unless businesses wanted to apply for a special permit. It would force more local change which is something we do desperately need,.

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

In case you think laws like NDAA 1031 Citizen Imprisonment Law can't or won't be used against you by the government because, well, because you actually aren't a terrorist, think again. These are laws that give the government unprecedented, in the U.S. anyway, control over it's citizens. And removes a great deal of your rights and possible recourse should you be picked up and dragged off to a detention center for a round of torture and questioning.

10 Ridiculous Things That Make You a Terror Suspect

"I'm not anti-America, America is anti-me"

You thought you weren't doing anything wrong, so why should you care about who they call a terrorist? Well, you may not believe it, but you're likely a terror suspect in America's new paradigm of the Land of the Fear.

The government is casting a wide net over its citizens in its search for potential threats. Now, you don't need to actually commit a crime to be hauled away to a detention center and held without charges while you are tortured; you just need to appear suspicious by sympathizing with anti-government views to be labeled a domestic terrorist.

First, it's important to understand the official definition of domestic terrorism in the United States. The ACLU reports that a person is a domestic terrorist if they engage in any "act dangerous to human life" that "appears to be intended to (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping."

Although recent White House action plans claim to be targeting "violent extremism in all its forms," the government itself is clearly guilty of countless "acts dangerous to human life intended to coerce the civilian population, to influence the policy, and to affect the conduct of a government." But that's for another article.

What's more disturbing, is the government's expansion of guilty parties to "terrorist sympathizers." This is where the net gets really large. What exactly constitutes sympathizing with a terrorist? Is questioning the imperial foreign policy and the destruction of civil liberties, sympathizing with the enemy? In the U.S., it seems that if you don't agree with the violence and coercion America commits, then you're an anti-American terrorist sympathizer, as evidenced by peace organizations being added to terror watch lists.

So, what makes you a terror suspect in America? Here are 10 ridiculous things that make you a terrorist according to "officials" running the U.S. government:

1. Tea Party Activists: The political Left demonized peaceful Tea Party activists as right-wing extremists, leading to the second most powerful official in the U.S. government, VP Joe Biden, to liken them to terrorists. Do you sympathize with those who are angry about bank bailouts on the backs of taxpayers? Well, you're likely a terrorist in the eyes of the State.

2. Occupy Activists: Now, the "Occupy" movement, said to be made up of left-wing extremists, is enjoying the same treatment as the Tea Party's right-wing extremists. The United Kingdom has officially labeled "Occupy" demonstrators as domestic terrorists. The U.S. hasn't gone quite that far, but the violent Police State did spy them in search of "domestic terrorists." Watch out, you may be a terror suspect if you sympathize with the 99%.

3. 7 Days of Food: The Department of Justice and FBI considers you a terrorist threat if you have more than 7 days of food stored, as explained by Rand Paul on the Senate floor:

Paul was referring to an official FBI/DOJ flyer given out to business owners to help them identify potential threats. And recently, Federal agents went to food storage facilities demanding customers lists, while citizens were harassed by the government with door-to-door "assessments" of their preparedness.

4. Missing Fingers: The document referred to by Rand Paul above, also claims that if someone is missing a finger or has burn marks, they're more likely to be a terror suspect.

5. Buying Flashlights: Also from the same official source, if you're buying night-vision devices including flashlights, you should be considered a terror suspect.

6. Paying Cash at Hotels: Watch out if you want to pay with cash for hotel rooms. This DHS commercial indicates that you're a terror suspect if you do:

The DHS has also launched their citizen spy program for hotels and has sent them hotel protection guidelines which lists suspicious activities like persons carrying observation equipment or standing around in the same area.

7. Texting Privately in a Public Place: According to this DHS commercial for their citizen spy program, if you're texting while sitting in a public park, but trying to keep it concealed from people who pass by, you should be reported for suspicious terrorist activity:

8. Ron Paul Stickers: A 2009 law enforcement report from the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) labeled Ron Paul supporters, Libertarians, and people sharing movies about the Federal Reserve as "domestic terrorists." When supporters of a political candidate who stands for peace and freedom become terror suspects, America is in big trouble.

9. Belief in Conspiracies -- Obama's Information Czar, Cass Sunstein, has identified those who hold conspiracy theories as targets for online "cognitive infiltration." Do you question the motives for war? Question the motives of the private Federal Reserve bank? Question any government policies? Chances are you already have been marked as a suspect.

10. Own Precious Metals -- Despite the fact that the Federal Reserve paper note (a.k.a. the dollar) is only sustained by faith, you could now be a suspected terrorist if you would like to preserve your wealth with something that holds real value like precious metals. And forget about establishing an alternative currency made from silver or gold like Bernard von NotHaus as you may be lumped into a "unique form of terrorism."

And now the bonus round for being registered as a potential terrorist -- #11-- Owning guns and ammo. Let's face it: you disagree with the American government colluding with international banks to rob you blind AND you've armed yourself? This also why returning veterans have also been labeled potential terrorists -- they have guns, know how to use them, and may be angry about the lies that sent them to war.

As the Fast and Furious scandal has now revealed, it was done with a premeditated strategy to vilify the Second Amendment to the nation's Constitution. Wait -- actively planning to undermine the founding document of the country and plot criminal activity against citizens to spread fear and increase political power? Should that be considered under the definition of terrorism. . . .?

Once again I forgot to put a link to an article. Sorry. My brain is all christmasy and can't be counted on for much outside of dancing sugar plum fairies.
http://irritatethestate.net/2011/12/...error-suspect/

[SoNotHer]

I'm shocked, saddened and ultimately informed by your articles and posts, folks. Thank you for them. I am deep in the final weeks and the semester and frankly unmoved by even coffee lately. The exhaustion is in my bones this week. I'm overdue a marathon sleep and will be posting anything with gravitas after that....

Thank you again. I am reading your posts and appreciate them.

[ruffryder]

Originally Posted by Corkey

It's the law, they have to let one vote if they are working during voting hours. Granted not that many work 12 hour shifts except nurses, EMT's, police and Fire, military, but it is the law and one can not be fired.

There's a lot of laws regarding employer/employee but a lot of people still do not want to speak up about their rights and what is the law at work for fear of being reprimanded and/or fired. People get fired for shit all the time that employers shouldn't fire people for and they say it's something else for the reason. This is what some Occupy protestors are trying to change with this law on voting, so it's not directed around or by work and they have the freedom to vote when they want to at their leisure and at peace.

[Corkey]

Originally Posted by ruffryder

There's a lot of laws regarding employer/employee but a lot of people still do not want to speak up about their rights and what is the law at work for fear of being reprimanded and/or fired. People get fired for shit all the time that employers shouldn't fire people for and they say it's something else for the reason. This is what some Occupy protestors are trying to change with this law on voting, so it's not directed around or by work and they have the freedom to vote when they want to at their leisure and at peace.

Until people stop living in fear and allowing others to dictate their rights we will have problems. I for one am not opposed to stepping right up into any of my bosses faces and telling them they are breaking the law, and I will have their butts in a sling if they tried to stop me or fire me. Sometimes we have to be our own mouth piece.

Oh the weekend thing on voting, which of you has tried to get a bus on a weekend? And who isn't working weekends these days? Not every one has a 9-5 with weekends off. I never did.