UPDATE #2: 11/3/11, "Costs of Occupy Oakland disputed but on the rise," San Francisco Chronicle, Kuruvila
"Oakland's police union has estimated that last week's sweep of the Occupy Oakland encampment - which re-established itself within days - cost taxpayers more than $1 million....Every city department has been involved with Occupy in one way or another, according to city spokeswoman Karen Boyd....
"New video footage proves once again that violence began during, not after, the main “general strike” protest conducted by Occupy Oakland on Nov. 2.
Masked activists, marching with the main parade, begin smashing windows as the Occupy chants (“Banks got bailed out, we got sold out”) are heard in the background."...
---------------------More pictures from Oakland Occupy protests on Nov. 2, 2011
11/2/11, "Live from Occupy Oakland: Window smashing, vandalism, and more; charter buses to port, Teamsters in the house; port shut down, trucks overrun," MichelleMalkin.com, photo above protesters smashing window from Michelle Malkin
"I’m starting a fresh thread on tonight’s Occupy Oakland “strike.” (Previous post and background here.)
They’ve welcomed the Black Panthers and Communist revolutionary thug Angela Davis, and are currently marching to the Port of Oakland.
Various sympathizers and observers are tweeting live. Mother Jones reports that the Oakland Whole Foods store — after being falsely accused of threatening to punish workers who walked out on the job today — has been vandalized.
One person on scene writes: “Straight into window breaking and street furniture smashing at whole foods. #generalstrike #occupyoaklandwindow
- breaking and street furniture smashing at whole foods.”
Whole Foods is defending itself online. To no avail.
A big mob dressed in black is roaming around the streets. They’ve sprayed graffiti on the walls of businesses.
Wells Fargo windows have also been reportedly smashed.
Chase Bank vandalized.
Maybe the city enablers will use federal stimulus money to clean it up.
Overheard on livestream: Occupier sneers: “They can afford new windows.”
East Bay Express reports that approximately 75 shoppers were barricaded inside the Whole Foods as protesters threw rocks and smashed the windows.
I’ll keep you posted as they head to the port.
Teamsters are in the house, of course…"...
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CNN gushes, Seattle protests like scene from French Revolution.
11/2/11, "Occupy Seattle: Arrests, pepper spray, CNN – “Like a scene out of the French revolution”," MichelleMalkin.com
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"Protesters blocked streets near City Hall, smashed windows at a bank and gathered by the thousands in an attempt to shut down the nation's fifth-busiest port Wednesday....A group of about 300 protesters, many of them men wearing black, some covering their faces with bandanas and some carrying wooden sticks, smashed windows of a Wells Fargo bank branch while chanting "Banks got bailed out. We got sold out." The protesters spray-painted an expletive on the exterior wall of the bank and blocked the front door of a branch of Citibank, forcing customers to use a rear door.
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11/3/11, "California protesters shut down Oakland port," BBC
"Thousands of anti-corporate greed demonstrators have closed one of America's busiest ports.
A spokesman for the Port of Oakland in California said maritime operations had effectively halted.
The shutdown capped a day in which hundreds of city workers, including teachers, joined the call for a strike.
The crowds also stopped traffic at a junction where a military veteran was seriously injured last week as protesters clashed with police.
Ex-Marine Scott Olsen, 24, is recovering in an Oakland hospital after being struck on the head with a tear gas canister fired by police.
That incident catapulted Oakland, which is on San Francisco Bay, to the centre of the national Occupy Wall Street movement and has spurred fresh demonstrations across the US.
Elsewhere in the US on Wednesday:
- Police in Philadelphia arrested nine protesters who staged a sit-in inside the lobby of Comcast, America's largest cable firm
- In New York, about 100 military veterans marched in uniform and stopped in front of the city's stock exchange, where there was a heavy police presence
- In Boston, college students and union workers marched on Bank of America offices and the statehouse to protest over the student debt crisis
Organisers of the latest Occupy Oakland protest said they wanted to disrupt operations at the nation's fifth busiest port, which handles about $39bn (£24bn) a year in imports and exports.
"At this time, maritime operations are effectively shut down at the Port of Oakland," the port said in a written statement to Reuters news agency. "Maritime area operations will resume when it is safe and secure to do so."
Oakland police estimated that about 3,000 demonstrators were gathered at the port. Police said 4,500 people had marched across the city on Wednesday.
But a spokesman for the protest movement, who only gave his name as Aaron, told the BBC: "It is an order of magnitude larger than any protests we've seen and we've seen some big ones in the last week."
"There are pockets here and there going on for what seems like miles. I have heard people say 20,000, 30,000... it's impossible to tell".
A number of businesses, including several banks, were shut during the protests, which were largely peaceful during the day, with low police visibility.
The demonstration, which included students, families with young children and union members, began with a rally outside city hall.
One large protest banner read: "Occupy Everything, death to capitalism."
Oakland officials said about 5% of employees had taken the day off,
- including about 360 teachers.
One teacher at the rally, Brother Muziki, told AFP news agency: "Our classrooms are overcrowded. The banks are being bailed out - but not the schools."
The BBC's Alastair Leithead in Los Angeles says Oakland has a higher than average unemployment rate and suffered badly during the US recession."
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Just like the Tea Party.
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