UPDATE: The judge ordered them released, and chided the governor's office for "deciding which protestors" are allowed on public land.

These sure are some dangerous hippies. Not only do they get thrown off public land, guards have to be posted to make sure they don't come back:

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Authorities in Tennessee made about 30 arrests early Friday at the site where a few dozen Wall Street protesters have been encamped for about three weeks in Nashville, protesters said.

Authorities began moving in a little after 3 a.m. using a newly enacted state policy that set a curfew for the grounds near the state Capitol, including Legislative Plaza where the protesters had been staying in tents. The state's new rules specifically banned "overnight occupancy" at the public space and require permits and use fees for rallies.

But later in the morning, Jeff Blum of the Davidson County Sheriff's Office said the protesters were being released after a night court judge wouldn't sign the warrants. He didn't elaborate on the judge's refusal.

Protester Steve Reiter, who works closely with the group's legal team, said there were apparently problems with how the protesters were taken into custody, particularly concerning being given proper notice. Reiter said their release is a victory for Occupy Nashville.

Katy Savage, another of the protesters, said she peeked out of her tent around 3 a.m. and saw that the camp was surrounded by state troopers.

"I was grabbing our stuff to try to get it off the area," she said.

Savage said people who had already decided they would get arrested sat down together and began singing "We Shall Overcome" as troopers took them, dragging some to waiting buses.

About 20 protesters, who remained on a sidewalk, were not arrested and were still there later in the morning. All the tents had been removed from the plaza and state workers could be seen picking up items left by the protesters. Several state troopers stood guard at the steps to the Capitol.

More than half-a-dozen Occupy Denver protesters were arrested on Saturday after protesters marched downtown today.

Via:

"Denver police spokesman Matt Murray said seven arrests had been made — including two for assault and one for disobedience."

"He said some protesters had received medical treatment on the scene, but no one had been taken to a hospital."

DPD says officers used "non-lethal agents," like pepper spray and rubber bullets, to subdue the crowd.

We've all witnessed just how deadly those 'non-lethal' agents can be. Occupy Oakland protester, and Iraq war veteran Scott Olsen only yesterday came out of a coma after being hit in the head by non-lethal agents.

Update: Denver police again clashed with Occupy Denver protesters, in possibly one of the most violent actions against the group to date. A total of twenty protesters have been arrested there as of this update:

Via

"Just before 6 p.m., with ambulances waiting and police cruisers covering whole blocks around the park, officers donned gas masks and used megaphones to warn protesters the remaining tents were illegal. Wielding long batons, a few dozen officers pushed into the park and formed a circle around the tents."

"CU student Daniel Ellen tried to jump through a gap to help other protesters he feared were stuck in the tents, but was knocked to the ground by police. He stood up and charged at them again, screaming in anger, took a blow to the temple with a baton and was pushed down twice more."

One of the protesters arrested in the evening police action needed to be taken to an area hospital for treatment. No word yet on that person's identity, or the extent of the injuries.

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I had the unfortunate circumstance of catching this segment first thing in the morning from MSNBC's Morning Joe where Meet the Press host David Gregory made an appearance and decided to do a little Republican messaging to smooth over the extreme amount of obstruction we've seen from the Senate since President Obama got elected.

Mediaite's Tommy Christopher did a nice job of summing up just what's wrong with just about everything that came out of Gregory's mouth here -- David Gregory Cites ‘Resonant’ Mitch McConnell: Obama ‘Got Everything He Wanted and It Didn’t Work’.

Here's part the transcript via Newsbusters, who they linked over at Mediaite, and who humorously also think it's some kind of rare occasion for David Gregory to repeat Republican talking points on the air:

WILLIE GEIST: Hey David, it's Willie. I want to ask you a fundamental question we've been talking a lot about around this table. The argument from the White House and from many on the left is that the president can't get anything done because he has a party of "no" working against him. Is that a fair characterization based on the evidence we've seen over the last two-and-a-half, almost three, years now, of the way Republicans have handled themselves? Are they out to see the president fail, or are they just standing up for their core beliefs?

DAVID GREGORY: Well, I think it's both. I think it depends how you want to cast it. I think liberals and defenders of the president will say this is the party of "no." I think conservatives would say this is the party of "we're going to stop him from doing more; stop him from hurting the economy further." I mean, the president--Mitch McConnell said something several weeks ago that I think really resonated, which is: the president got everything that he wanted and it didn't work. He got a big stimulus. He got health care reform, he got financial reform. The economy hasn't moved.

Here's more from Christopher:

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UPDATE: Local TV livestream here. "They're attacking everybody down here!"

Occupy Denver activists just read a statement of non-violent resistance and affirmation of their rights to police, after an altercation earlier today. Their last line: "Remember your oath."

DENVER - Police say more than half-a-dozen Occupy Denver protesters were arrested on Saturday after they say protesters wanted to occupy the capitol.

Denver Police say they knew there was going to be a protest on Saturday and wanted to keep the event peaceful. Officers say the protesters wanted protest inside the capitol, which is illegal.

Of the seven arrested, police say two were arrested for assault.

"Unfortunately at one point, that group did try to occupy the capital, which is illegal. We made sure that they knew that, it was pretty clear that they were not allowed to do that, they tried to do it anyway," Lt. Matt Murray with the Denver Police Department said. "We had to step in and push them off. Things escalated; we did have to call out city-wide for assistance."

According to Gov. Hickenlooper's office, protesters need a permit to protest on the steps of the capitol. Protesting inside is illegal.

Officers say the incident escalated after police tried to stop protesters from putting up tents in front of the capitol.

"The police started tearing down the tents and one guy, he just refused to leave," Chris Orchard, a witness at the protests, said. "Police said get back, but you know, they just kept moving forward. Finally, the police just took out the mace."

DPD says officers used "non-lethal agents," like pepper spray and paintball-like balls full of tear gas, to subdue the crowd.

"We did have an officer who was pushed off his motorcycle and we had two officers who were kicked," Murray said. "When it escalated to that point, we made a city-wide call [for backup]."

The Number Of The Beast

One more day until the wickedest of them all. What would Halloween be without some Iron Maiden?

Another BLR Soundbite -- Herman Cain:

Herman Cain lays it on the line, warning against "big potato moths." Recommends we "throw out the good guys' coal."

House Budget Committee chairman and supposed GOP wunderkind Paul Ryan chose the wrong the week to attack President Obama for "sowing social unrest and class resentment." After all, just one day earlier the CBO confirmed that income inequality in the U.S. is at highest level in 80 years, a yawning gap certain to be enlarged by the latest crop of proposed Republican tax cut windfalls for the wealthy. Worse still, 24 hours after Ryan accused Obama putting the nation on path to "painful austerity, the kind you see in Europe," new GDP figures showed the U.S. economy grew at a healthier 2.5 percent last quarter. Meanwhile in the UK, where the Conservatives' draconian austerity program is now well underway, the economy has ground to a complete halt.

Writing in the New York Times, Catherine Rampell summed up the new U.S. GDP data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. "The American economy, "she wrote, "has finally reached the size it was before the recession began four years ago." But as Martin Sullivan explained in words and pictures (above):

Republicans constantly remind us that the Obama stimulus--the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009--did not work. They voted against it. In the United Kingdom the government is led by Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron. His government did not adopt stimulus. Instead it boldly enacted an economic program that cut spending and raised taxes. The chart below shows the results and compares it to the U.S. experience. After three and a half years, U.S. GDP is just about returning to the pre-recession peak. That's awful. But it's far better than the U.K. where GDP is still five percent ($750 billion in US terms) below its pre-recession peak.

If anything, Sullivan understates the divergent paths and performance of Team Obama in Washington and David Cameron's Tory "austerians" in London. As the data show, the 2008 economic calamity in the U.S. was more severe. As The Economist and Ezra Klein of the Washington Post documented, only months after the February 2009 passage of the stimulus did the White House and the American people learn than the U.S. economy actually contracted by a staggering 8.9 percent in the last quarter of 2008. Reviewing CBO data, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that without the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, U.S. GDP could have been up to 2.5 percent lower. By the third quarter of 2011, CBO estimated that ARRA saved up to 2.5 million jobs and reduced the unemployment rate by 1.3 percent. As former McCain economic adviser Mark Zandi put it last year, federal intervention prevented "Depression 2.0."

To be sure, trillions in lost economic growth, persistently high unemployment and consumer spending stuck at 2006 levels are nothing to write home about. But British Prime Minister David Cameron would take U.S. economic performance in a heartbeat.

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It appears that Fox's Liz Trotta is terribly upset that PBS decided to give Democracy Now's Amy Goodman a little face time on the Charlie Rose Show earlier this week. She spent the better part of her weekly commentary time with Fox's Uma Pemmaraju this Saturday being completely dismissive of Goodman and Democracy Now because heaven forbid they represent a "lefty" point of view and continually lied to their audience calling the rest of the "mainstream" media, which we all know is actually the corporate media, "liberal" as well.

Given the fact that Fox did its best to ignore the protests completely along with most of the corporate media until they started growing to a point where they could no longer be ignored and Fox's continual mockery and dismissive attitude towards the movement and the protesters since then, segments like this are now the norm on that network. What I found surprising about this segment is the fact that they decided to acknowledge that Amy Goodman and her program Democracy Now even exist at all.

PEMMARAJU: Alright, amid the flurry of Occupy protests, a news program called Democracy Now is getting much more attention than usual. Fox News contributor Liz Trotta is joining us now to explain. Hi Liz.

TROTTA: Good morning, or good afternoon Uma. You know, Democracy Now, as this so-called independent grass roots network is called has been around for about fifteen years. And the star of the show is a rather sternly prim lefty by the name of Amy Goodman. And they deal with all manners of left wing... all manner of left wing causes and have been particularly under the microscope since these Occupy protests, which they've fallen in love with of course.

But you know they're... Amy Goodman and her compatriots are charging that the mainstream media, that means the liberal mainstream media, hasn't gotten their story right. So she gave... this was said in an interview she gave with Charlie Rose last week. Let's see... let's hear a little bit of it, of Amy Goodman from Democracy Now.

(VIDEO)

GOODMAN: I think the mainstream media has been revealed through all of this over these last five weeks as not being mainstream any more... because if you look at the polls now, most Americans actually support these Occupy Wall Street movements all over the country.

(END VIDEO)

TROTTA: Well, we can't call her wrong on that. The polls have shown support for the Occupy movement. But what's really amazing is how she's giving a lash to the mainstream media, which of course if the liberal mainstream media and saying really that they're not liberal enough. And I guess when you look at it from Amy Goodman's point of view, it's absolutely true.

Now who are these people? They're on an hour every night in New York. Check your local guides for times and stations. They claim to be on nine hundred and fifty stations across the country, they don't carry ads and they said they don't have ratings. And they also say that they run... are run by contributions from individuals. One can just imagine what that lefty list looks like.

Their subjects are quite interesting but very predictable; the Oakland and New York protests, protesters of all kinds, activists from Egypt who even admit on the air that they're here to see if they can get a handout and even some old time Vietnam war veterans; even Iraq veterans against the war, you name it.

They're all there for an hour everyday. Look for this program if you really want to be entertained and they promise to be on a lot more to delve even deeper and support even more what we now know as the nationwide, Occupy protest movement.

PEMMARAJU: Well, there you go Liz. It will be interesting to see what this winter weather does to all those folks who are camping out and about.

TROTTA: Oh, good point. Good point. I got up this morning and looked out the window and thought hmmm... I wonder how many are left.

PEMMARAJU: Exactly Liz. We shall see.

Time for your weekly podcast with the Professional Left, otherwise known as our own Driftglass and Bluegal.

You can listen to the archives at The Professional Left and you can make a donation there if you'd like to help keep these going. And you can follow them on Facebook at The Professional Left Podcast with Driftglass and Blue Gal. Have a great weekend everyone and enjoy the podcast.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka came out strongly Friday in opposition to reports that Democrats are offering significant concessions in hopes to make a deal on the congressional "Super Committee" whose job it is to cut the deficit. He said the union opposes any cuts to Social Security and Medicare or to the federal contribution to Medicaid. Trumka made it clear that he thinks draconian cuts to the social safety net are a bad solution for what he called a fabricated crisis.

He called on those who agree to show their support by texting DEBT to 225668.

The text of the full press release:

People around the country are raising their voices in protest because they’re fed up with a system that is stacked in favor of the richest one percent of Americans -- at the expense of the other 99 percent of us. Unfortunately, what reportedly happened this week in the so-called “Super Committee” just proves their point.

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