Below is the official Occupy Wall Street/OWS video to thank supporters. This video was passed by consensus through the New York City General Assembly/NYCGA on Tuesday, December 20, 2011. It is posted at occupywallst.org.
Continue reading Video: Thanks To Supporters (The Holiday Message) from Occupy Wall Street
Tag Archives: economics
It takes a worried nation: Peace Song for 11/3/2011
“Worried Man Blues” is the Peace Song of the Day for November 3, 2011. This is a traditional song. You can find the lyrics in the Rise Up Singing songbook on page 105.
A new verse by Duchess Susanna: “It takes a worried nation, to make an occupation…”
Below is a video with Pete Seeger and Johnny Cash. (You know ol’ Pete will ask you to sing along…)
Continue reading It takes a worried nation: Peace Song for 11/3/2011
Wishing for warmth: Peace Song for 10/23/2011
“Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” is the Peace Song of the Day for 10/23/2011. This song is from the movie and musical “My Fair Lady”. That show was based on the play Pygmalian, by George Bernard Shaw, which has some interesting observations on class and privilege.
You can fine the words to “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” in the Rise Up Singing songbook on page 113.
More about the choice of this song as a peace song… Continue reading Wishing for warmth: Peace Song for 10/23/2011
Oct 20th: Occupy Wall Street with your bank account [PLUS Bank Transfer Day on Nov 5th]
Compassionate Finance: Bring Your Money Back To Your Community
Occupy Wall Street, and the occupy movement, are an attempt to solve the problem of disparity of wealth and political influence between the 99% of people, and the 1%. A lot of the focus is on making corporations accountable, and on keeping mega-banks in their place.
This week, there is a way for you to directly put a crimp in the power of the mega-banks. You can join with the 99% to make a shift from big banks, to smaller, locally-based credit unions. You can celebrate “International Credit Union Day“, an annual event sponsored by the Credit Union National Association [CUNA].
On October 20, 2011, consider closing (or starting the process of closing) any bank accounts you have with big banks, and moving your money to a credit union (or small, local bank.) That is all you have to do to make a big difference, and send a huge message to the mega-banks and to our government.
As CUNA notes:
Credit unions are unique because they
are not-for-profit, democratically controlled,
member-owned cooperatives. Continue reading Oct 20th: Occupy Wall Street with your bank account [PLUS Bank Transfer Day on Nov 5th]
Royal Book of the Week: Monday, August 29, 2011
Green Politics Is Eutopian by Paul Gilk is the Royal Book of the Week for Monday, August, 29, 2011. Duke August was recently reading an article about how environmentalist strategies are trapped within the paradigm of a capitalist system. These environmentalist needed to be handed this collection of Gilk’s essays. Did the Duke say “capitalist”? No, the Duke is not peddling a re-tread of the Communist Manifesto, so there is no need to reach for a copy of the oft-misquoted Wealth of Nations.
Gilk finds that capitalism and communism are two faces of the same utopian, patriarchal, urban, mechanistic civilization. He calls for a eutopian society as the antidote to this destructive path. The term eutopian, as used in the title of the book (At least it did for the Duke.) Gilk defines eutopian is defined in comparison. While Utopian means ‘no place’, Eutopian means the ‘good place.’
Despite the confusing contradictions in the respective titles, we can take two late-nineteenth-century novels as clear examples of the “no-place”/”good place” division: Edward Bellamy’s Looking Backward and William Morris’s News from Nowhere. the contradiction is clarified by Bellamy’s “ideal” story is set entirely in a city, while Morris’s “real” tale is situated in the countryside. Bellamy’s story is of an authoritatian, if also benevolent, urban nierarchy that directs a city-as-machine, while Morris’s tale is of robust community-oriented physical life in a classless and unspoiled countryside.
Continue reading Royal Book of the Week: Monday, August 29, 2011
Book of the Week: Your Money or Your Life
we make a dying at work so we can live it up on the weekend
Duke Augustus writes: Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence: Revised and Updated for the 21st Century by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez sparked the modern simplicity movement. It remains one of the pre-eminent sources for how to create financial freedom by separating your needs from your wants. This is not a get rich quick scheme. It is the progeny of Thoreau’s On Walden Pond. The Harvard-educated Thoreau freed himself from the business world by by taking the extraordinary measure of changing his life from pencil manufacturer to squatter. Dominguez and Robin suggest a less drastic change by helping you re-direct your prosperity from consumer driven wants to enough wealth to stop working.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8lz13SWZ5w&feature=player_embedded]
The publisher describes the book as: Continue reading Book of the Week: Your Money or Your Life