Hold Wall Street Accountable! Occupy Our Homes Week of Action, May 18-25

Via OccupyOurHomes.org and OccupyWallSt.org:

Over the last few years, homeowners and residents around the country have taken a stand against the banks and fought foreclosures and evictions. The growing network of Occupy Our Homes supporters have signed petitions, made phone calls, and showed up to events to help families stay in their homes. Dozens of homeowners around the country have won their fights, but the crisis is far from over.

Communities have been destroyed as millions of families have already lost their homes to foreclosure, while millions more are underwater on their mortgages. The big banks are bigger and more powerful than ever. To date, no high level Wall Street executives have been prosecuted for their crimes, such as mortgage fraud and predatory lending. US attorney general, Eric Holder even admitted recently that in the administration's eyes, the banks are not only ‘too big to fail,’ they're now ‘too big to jail.’

As a new housing bubble fueled by Wall Street speculation is forming, it's clear that the financial industry didn't learn their lesson from the last mess. It's more important than ever for us to take action to demand meaningful relief for homeowners and prosecutions for the criminals at the top. Only through the power of thousands of organized homeowners taking action in the streets can we make the Attorney General and the President listen. Occupy Our Homes, the Home Defenders League, and others are joining fed-up homeowners who are ready to demand action-- join us the week of May 20th.

Over the next two months, Home Defenders from across the country will have an opportunity to tell their stories and fight back. Some will travel to Washington, DC the week of May 20th to make their voice heard directly at the Department of Justice. Join the fight! Sign up now to fight in your city. Scholarships will be available to attend the Department of Justice Action in Washington DC.

Click here to sign up

Video: Occupy protesters march in protest in September 2011.

Some of the findings included in a newly-released study(pdf) conducted by sociologists at the City University of New York, that looked at the backgrounds and motivations of Occupy supporters as well as the impact of the movement may make a few conservative pompous windbag heads explode.

*Gasp* They had jobs!

• More than a third of the people who participated in Occupy Wall Street protests in New York lived in households with annual incomes of $100,000 or more, and more than two-thirds had professional jobs.

• Nearly 80 percent had at least a bachelor’s degree, and about half of those with bachelor’s degrees had a graduate degree.

• Many participants in the movement had been involved in previous political demonstrations, and far from being spontaneous, the Occupy Wall Street protests were carefully planned.

• Nearly a third of the protesters had been laid off or lost a job, and a similar number said they had more than $1,000 in credit card or student loan debt.

• Researchers found that a significant percentage of Occupy participants were underemployed, with nearly a quarter working fewer than 35 hours a week.

Prof. Stephanie Luce, one of the study's three authors, characterized the protesters who had problems finding full-time work as part of an emerging demographic that some commentators call the “precariat,” educated people forced into unsteady or insecure jobs because little else is available.

President Barack Obama thanked supporters Sunday evening during a candlelight inauguration gala at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., commending them for their commitment to "the basic notion that when we put our shoulders to the wheel of history, it moves."

From the President's remarks:

"As I look out on the room, we’ve got people from every walk of life, every corner and nook and cranny of this country, every state, every city, every suburb -- people who have invested so much heart, soul, time, money, energy. One of the things that made this campaign unique was the degree of investment and ownership people had in this common project of ours, because you understood this was not just about a candidate; it was not just about Joe Biden or Barack Obama. This was about us, who we are as a nation, what values we cherish, how hard we’re willing to fight to make sure that those values live not just for today but for future generations."

"All of you here understood and were committed to the basic notion that when we put our shoulders to the wheel of history, it moves. (Applause.) It moves. It moves forward. And that’s part of what we celebrate when we come together for Inauguration."

As supporters of Mitt Romney lined up outside Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum, the site of a Monday night rally, ProgressNow Action wanted to hear what those Romney supporters had to say as they strolled past the group’s cardboard cut-out of President Barack Obama. A Video camera caught every word:

“Go back to Kenya!” one person says.

“Strangle him!” says another.

Some of the comments were directed at the ProgressNow staffers holding up the cut-out and the video camera.

“Is that your Muslim communist buddy?” one person asks.

“Why are you supporting an Islamist, Marxist idiot?” asks another.

“He looks real good standing on a street corner,” one passerby says. “In about three months, he’ll be doing that all the time.”

The Obama cut-out was also wearing a button that said, “Thanks, Obamacare.”

When asked what they want people who watch the video to see, Joanne Schwartz, executive director of Progress Now had this to say:

“It’s clear that not all, but many within Romney’s base of support dislike the President for irrational and often hateful reasons. Comments like ‘go back to Kenya,’ and asserting Obama is ‘black and used up’ reflect a much uglier prejudice than most Americans would identify with.

“Others continue to repeat discredited race-baiting falsehoods about the President’s religion and nationality,” Schwartz continued.

“Everyone we videotaped yesterday has a right to free expression, but others have the right to publicly reject intolerance. In a free society, we have an obligation to call this out.”

I was a bit surprised that the hate speak was coming from all age groups, and virtually all of the Romney supporters. And they were all fully aware that they were being filmed! This video really confirmed for me what I've already suspected; that Mitt Romney has run the nastiest and most hate-filled political campaign that I've ever witnessed in my lifetime.

Three members of the Russian band Pussy Riot have spent the last six months in prison for staging a protest against Russian leader Vladimir Putin inside an Orthodox cathedral. On Friday, the group was awarded the LennonOno Grant for Peace award by the artist and activist Yoko Ono. On Thursday, Pussy Riot also received the public backing of Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who is currently on her first visit to the United States in more than three decades. DemocracyNow!'s Amy Goodman is joined by two guests who have traveled to the United States on Pussy Riot’s behalf: Pyotr Verzilov, husband of jailed Pussy Riot member Nadia Tolokonnikova, and Alisa Obraztsova, lawyer’s assistant with the band’s legal defense team.

A full transcript of the discussion is available here.

Poor Willard. No one seems to care for him except for Ann, and maybe the kids?

No previous presidential candidate has been viewed more unfavorably than favorably at this point in a presidential campaign in Pew Research or Gallup September surveys going back to 1988.

Romney has gained no ground on Obama in being seen as more credible or more empathetic, and Obama now leads Romney by nearly three-to-one (66% to 23%) as the candidate who connects well with ordinary Americans – an even wider margin than in June.

With the exception of jobs and the deficit, on which voter opinion is about evenly divided, Obama leads Romney on most key issues, notably healthcare, Medicare, and abortion.

And the survey, conducted amid an outbreak of violence in the Middle East and shortly after the killing of the U.S. ambassador to Libya, shows that Obama has a wide edge when it comes to foreign affairs and national security. Far more voters see Obama as a strong leader and as the candidate voters believe would use good judgment in a crisis. Voters also express more confidence in Obama than Romney to deal with foreign policy generally, as well as problems in the Middle East.

Perhaps the saddest reveal in this in-depth poll, roughly half of Romney’s supporters say they are voting against Obama rather than for the Republican nominee.

Much more data in the Pew report available here.

President Barack Obama sat down to chat with David Letterman on Tuesday, and while they discussed more than just politics, it seemed that his response to the leaked Romney fundraiser video was on everyone's mind. The video had over 2 million views on Monday alone.

Taking Mitt Romney to task, Obama said that "There are not a lot of people out there who think they are victims," and that voters want to make sure that their president is "not writing off big chunks of the country."

The secretly taped video showed the Republican presidential nominee describing "47 percent of the people" as Obama supporters who depend on government and believe they are victims. Romney said it is not his job "to worry about those people," referring to what he called Obama's locked-in supporters who believe they are "entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it."

"My expectation is that if you want to be president, you have to work for everyone, not just for some," Obama said during Letterman's "Late Show."

Romney has since said he made his point "inelegantly" in trying to describe differing visions for the nation.

Obama said people understand that the presidential candidates will make mistakes on the campaign trail. He said that includes one he regrets from 2008, when audio from one of his own private fundraisers had him saying that some residents of depressed rural areas get bitter and "cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them."

Having said that, Obama added, "One thing I've learned as president is that you represent the entire country."

The president and Letterman also chatted about lighter topics, with Obama joking about the Florida pizza restaurant owner who lifted him off the ground in a bear hug last week. `'I think he fixed something in my back," Obama said.

The two also exchanged compliments on their appearances:

"You look good," Obama said.

"You haven't seen me naked," Letterman said.

Obama replied: "We're going to keep it that way."

U.S. President Barack Obama speaks to thousands of supporters at a campaign event at the Living History Farms in Urbandale, Iowa, September 1, 2012.[ REUTERS]

Thousands of supporters wait in Colorado to hear U.S. President Barack Obama speak at a campaign event on September 2, 2012. [REUTERS]

The Chicago Teachers Union is currently on the front lines of a fight to defend public education. On one side the 30,000 members of the CTU have called for a contract that includes fair compensation, meaningful job security for qualified teachers, smaller class sizes and a better school day with Art, Music, World Language and appropriate staffing levels to help our neediest students.

On the other side, the Chicago Board of Education—which is managed by out of town reformers and Broad Foundation hires with little or no Chicago public school experience—has pushed to add two weeks to the school year and 85 minutes to the school day, eliminate pay increases for seniority, evaluate teachers based on student test scores, and slash many other rights.

Teachers, parents and community supporters in Chicago have fought valiantly—marching, filling auditoriums at hearings and parent meetings, even occupying a school and taking over a school board meeting. Most recently, 98 percent of our members voted to authorize a strike. But now we find ourselves facing new opponents—national education privatizers, backed by some of the nation's wealthiest people. They are running radio ads, increasing press attacks, and mounting a PR campaign to discredit the CTU and the benefits of public education.

Julian Assange makes his first public appearance in two months, ever since he took refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. The WikiLeaks founder was granted political asylum on Thursday -- a decision that ignited a wave of international responses, with the UK and Sweden opposing the verdict and Latin American countries strongly supporting Ecuador's move.

Assange called upon the U.S. to end its 'witch hunt' on wikileaks, and to 'end the war on whistleblowers.'

A full transcript of his remarks follows:

“I am here today because I cannot be there with you today. But thank you for coming. Thank you for your resolve and your generosity of spirit.

“On Wednesday night, after a threat was sent to this embassy and the police descended on this building, you came out in the middle of the night to watch over it and you brought the world’s eyes with you.

“Inside this embassy, after dark, I could hear teams of police swarming up into the building through its internal fire escape. But I knew there would be witnesses. And that is because of you.

“If the UK did not throw away the Vienna conventions the other night, it is because the world was watching. And the world was watching because you were watching.

“So, the next time somebody tells you that it is pointless to defend those rights that we hold dear, remind them of your vigil in the dark before the Embassy of Ecuador.

“Remind them how, in the morning, the sun came up on a different world and a courageous Latin America nation took a stand for justice.

And so, to those brave people. I thank President Correa for the courage he has shown in considering and in granting me political asylum.

“And I also thank the government, and in particular Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino, who upheld the Ecuadorian constitution and its notion of universal rights in their consideration of my asylum. And to the Ecuadorian people for supporting and defending this constitution.

“And I also have a debt of gratitude to the staff of this embassy, whose families live in London and who have shown me the hospitality and kindness despite the threats we all received.

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