May Day

Workers, students, jobless people, retirees of the world, unite!

The Haymarket Memorial, Chicago

It's May, it's May, the lusty month of May! And you know and I know there is no congenial spot like dear old Camelot any more in the United Amerikan States of the Homeland. (And I am not talking about the Kennedy mythos, either. Maybe the pre-Columbian era). Raining where I am, but we definitely need it after that dry, hot, climate change-controlled April we had. Whoever heard of brush fires in April?


If you can't make it to a protest, or if it's just not your cup of tea, be part of the striking hoi polloi and just don't buy anything today. That particular act is no big problem for me, since I rarely buy anything anyway. No banking, no commerce, no commenting on presidential politics in the threads of the corporate New York Times. No watching commercial TV, including cable. I chose today to cancel Netflix. For video addicts, here's a link to a whole bunch of Occupy livestreams, worldwide. The whole idea is for the 99% to either march in the streets, or disappear from money-grubbing One Percent World altogether. Peacefully resist.


Update: Firedoglake's Kevin Gosztola has an excellent liveblog on the May Day Occupy activities. He writes that corporate media outlets are focusing heavily on the expected "violence" at the various protests. Damage to property is feared by the Powers that Be. Meanwhile, I just got another annoying email from Obama which includes a video of his speech last year announcing the Osama assassination. When the government kills somebody, it's justice. When ordinary people peacefully protest, it's time for a major crackdown.


Another Update: To celebrate May Day and mark the anniversary of the Haymarket Massacre and its ensuing entrapment scandal, the FBI arrested five self-proclaimed "anarchists" for attempting to blow up a low-traffic Cleveland bridge spanning national parkland, using government-issued dud bombs. (The quintet had apparently initially just conspired to destroy corporate signage,) To prove that the feds are equal-opportunity entrappers, U.S. Attorney Steve Dettelbach of the Southern District of Ohio proclaimed: "The threat we face is a diverse one and terrorists can come from many hues and many homelands."


Yeah... nice to know those brown Muslim terr'ists caught a break today and the guvmint concentrated on homelandian white anarchist hippies for a change.