FDL’s Livestream from Occupy Wall Street / Global Day of Action in NYC


Video streaming by Ustream

[FDL will be streaming live from Occupy Wall Street at about 11 am ET and 4:30/5 pm ET. And FDL's Lisa Derrick will be live from Occupy LA at 3 pm ET.]

The world is engaged in mass protest today. Actions for today have been in the works for at least a month, however, the success of Occupy Wall Street spurred the organization of worldwide “occupy” actions. Just like the young people inspired by the uprisings in Egypt, Tunisia, Greece and Spain, etc, countries around the world are seeing Americans finally rise up in mass protest and they are showing solidarity.

OccupyWallSt.org explains why massive global demonstrations are called for today:

Over the last 30 years, the 1% have created a global economic system - neoliberalism – that attacks our human rights and destroys our environment. Neoliberalism is worldwide – it is the reason you no longer have a job, it is the reason you cannot afford healthcare, education, food, your mortgage.
Neoliberalism is your future stolen.

Neoliberalism is everywhere, gutting labor standards, living wages, social contracts, and environmental protections. It is “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.” It is a system that ravages the global south and creates global financial crisis – crisis in Spain, in Greece, in the United States. It is a system built on greed and thrives on destablizing shocks.

It allows the 1% to enrich themselves by impoverishing humanity.

OccupyWallSt.org concludes this has to stop and an era of democratic and economic justice must begin.

Actions are already going on in London as Occupy London Stock Exchange. There is a nice contingent of demonstrators in Melbourne and Perth in Australia.

Reuters reports a group came together in Taiwan “at the Taipei 101 skyscraper, home to the stock exchange, chanting ‘we are Taiwan’s 99 percent,’ saying economic growth had only benefited companies while middle-class salaries barely covered soaring housing, education and healthcare costs.” In the Philippines, protesters marched on the US Embassy and carried banners that said, “Down with US imperialism,” and “Philippines not for sale.” There also was an action on Friday in Italy, where students stormed Goldman Sachs in the financial district of Milan and ended up putting “red graffiti” on the walls that said, “Give us money.”

*

I am in New York City to cover the actions that Occupy Wall Street has planned or endorsed for the Global Day of Action. Here is the tentative schedule:

11AM – MARCH ON THE BANKS
From Zuccotti to Chase - We will then march to student meet up at Wash. Sq. Park

11AM – OCCUPY THE BRONX MEET-UP

12PM – ANTI-WAR MARCH AND TEACH-IN
Wall Street And Broadway
12PM – MASS STUDENT GENERAL ASSEMBLY
Washington Square Park – Student meet up and student loan lender bank action

1PM – #SANKOFADAY -

Sponsered by the Malcolm X Grass Roots Movement - Liberty Plaza/Zuccotti Park

3:30PM – ENVIRONMENTAL ACTION AGAINST MOUNTAIN TOP REMOVAL
New York Public Library Main Entrance
42 and 5th avenue

4PM – OCCU-PIE TIMES SQUARE RECRUITMENT CENTER

5PM - TAKE TIME SQUARE CONVERGENCE/ OCCUPATION PARTY

Firedoglake’s premier live blog continues. Here is the Twitter list to follow for all the latest updates on the “occupy” protests and the Day of Action.

3:19 PM Police violence in London escalating. Occupy London tweets, “Police charged up the stairs of the Cathedral throwing people down the stairs. People peacefully resisting.”

3:13 PM A teach-in is being attempted on the sidewalk outside of the bank where people were arrested for trying to withdraw money from their accounts. Police are claiming the act was announced as a sit-in so that is why they decided to make arrests. (via @kstrel)

Meanwhile, the march to Times Square is starting. I will not be live streaming until 4:30 pm ET but I will be tweeting the march.

3:04 PM Occupy London reporting police using shields and batons on demonstrators who are sitting peacefully. The demonstrators set up a camp that the police are in the process of trying to disperse. It is 8 pm in London.

3:00 PM Occupy Rome violence as police fire off tear gas at thousands of demonstrators

2:56 PM Photo of police arresting people at CitiBank

2:51 PM Seeing reports of individuals who went into Citibank to close their accounts and then were locked in until NYPD could arrive. They were arrested. NYCLU was on the scene.

And, now, a march that left Washington Square about 10-15 minutes ago seems to have made a circle and headed back to Washington Square. A police van is also taking off and decided to turn on it sirens and make obnoxious noise.

9:17 AM Stream from Rome, Italy

9:07 AM It appears Julian Assange has just been arrested at Occupy London Stock Exchange:

Photo via @JoshAHall

9:02 AM @USDayofRage, one of the original three “groups” to help kickstart Occupy Wall Street, reports on their Twitter account: 100+ police + horses attack peaceful #OccupySYDNEY protest tearing down tents & putting everything in rubbish trucks – arrests.

8:55 AM Crowd-sourced database for the October 15 protests/demonstrations.