Can't remember. Take it away, Steve. Bring it, Emmylou. It's hump day.

I just added an event to the calendar to pick up the PMA on October 29th. I hope someone from Olyblog will take part in the media workshop at 2:35 to talk about how Olyblog fits into the local indy media network.  get in touch with me at mike@smallblueplanet.org to follow up and formalize about that.  Thanks

here is the psa:

Upcoming People's Movement Assembly announcement

-Olympia Movement for Justice and Peace

Thanks to Abby Zimet at Common Dreams for her thoughts about this and for running this video there.

There are reports of police assault on the occupation of Wall Street.   The first amendment grants us the right to assemble and speak out.  It's a shame that this country has so little tolerance for first amendment rights. I am reminded of the video I have seen from China when the military was streaming toward Tiananmen Square and the Chinese people flooded into the streets to slow the military, they pleaded with the soldiers to join the protest, to side with the people. The pleas were not heard. It's going to be hard for the protestors who occupy Wall Street to reach the police who are ordered to come in and disperse the crowds, but things change when the shock troops of the empire hear the message that peace, freedom, equality, justice are not always compatible with order.   We have to reach across the lines and ask the police to choose constitutional freedoms over order.

It's a live feed, for as long as it lasts or as long as they loop the footage, so the activity and engagement level varies depending on what is going on at any given moment, but thought I would embed the video in case you want to plug in for a minute or two and "be present at this moment" in the Wall Street occupation.

Watch live streaming video from globalrevolution at livestream.com

I think it's fair to say that the corporate media coverage of this real occupation is very slight, but they will jump and run to cover a tea party event funded by right wing plutocrats. Connect the dots, Kemosabe. Catapult the propaganda.

Dear Sirs and Madams: Could the City make arrangements to have the public bathrooms at City Hall open on a 24 hour basis? We have already paid the construction cost, there is pretty good security in that building and there is daily maintenance of the bathrooms. We really need to increase access to public bathrooms in downtown Olympia. This is a win-slanger@ci.olympia.wa.uswin situation.

in so many ways... but let's start with revenue. The Olympian reported (so it might be true) that the Gov is calling the legislature back in special session to deal with a revenue shortfall of at least 1.3 billion dollars. It's probably a 2 billion dollar deficit, but the accountants are still penciling that out. So the legislators are coming back sometime in November to address the shortfall. The tea party tax initiative that passed last general election cycle requires a super majority for the State to raise taxes, and the repub side has not yet warmed to the necessity of taxes for essential services, so this is likely to be another session devoted to finding things to cut. The activists who like education and essential services like medical care, disability services and more will be doing all they can to oppose another all-cut budget, but it's going to be a struggle. There are arguments over whether the super-majority initiative is constitutional, whether closing tax loopholes (that could produce the 2 billion) are subject to the super-majority rule, but it's an uphill battle. You have to give the Norquist puppiteers credit for creating a wildly successful and destructive political agenda, but what is the end game? When the success of trickle down, unregulated, free market economics is the meltdown of 2008, it does raise the question of "where do we go from here?" Further down the right wing rathole?

What better place than Olympia to gather if the economy has put you on the street? Come to Olympia to assemble and petition for redress of grievance. Come and sit on the streets of Olympia as a demonstration and act of free speech. Come to Olympia and greet the legislators and the policy makers who will have to step over you, or walk around you, as they move around in their daily lives. The City of Olympia is criminalizing poverty in the downtown area, but the First Amendment comes in... uh... First! We have the right to sit, recline, sing, grieve, and beg for good public policy in Washington State. Come to Olympia. If you get hassled by the Olympia Police Department for exercising your free speech rights, email the particulars: Where, when, police officer name to olympiacopwatch@gmail.com and we will challenge the City and the Police Department to justify the violation of your first amendment rights. I know that some folks get scared when they have to be close to houseless people. I encourage those folks to come down to the Artesian Well during daylight and introduce themselves to the people who move through that setting. There are lots of tattoos, piercings, and a fair amount of cursing, but there is also a lot of openness, music, support, and community.

I don't know what to say. This is the state of our justice system.

So little, so late. So many squandered opportunities, and now Obama wants to take a stand. Is this because the poll numbers show his job is now on the line? I am eager to see the guy use the bully pulpit to push good public policy, but I have very little confidence in this guy. I hope I am wrong about him. Maybe he has hit an "aha" moment where he understands what he needs to do, but he does have a significant history of talking the good talk, then caving in to right-wing demands. And the pattern has strengthened the right-wing, so progressives/liberals/scientists (however we might identify ourselves) now face a Republican party that would repeal the law of gravity on behalf of corporate interests if they could. We are moving in an election cycle where the Dems have a very large number of Senate seats in play and where the mood of the country provides fertile ground for demagoguery. It may have finally dawned on President Obama that despite serving corporate interests pretty loyally during his term in office so far, that the "deciders" don't really need him, the deciders can do quite nicely with Romney or Perry. So I have two questions about President Obama's sudden commitment to taxing the rich: 1.