“As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the cor- porate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race re- quires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon cor- ruption of that system, it is up to the individu- als to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the pro-

cess is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assem- bled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

They have taken our houses through an ille- gal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.

They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Execu- tives exorbitant bonuses.

They have perpetuated inequality and dis- crimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.

They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming sys- tem through monopolization.

They have profited off of the torture, con- finement, and cruel treatment of countless ani- mals, and actively hide these practices.

They have continuously sought to strip em- ployees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.

They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.

They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut work- ers’ healthcare and pay.

They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the

culpability or responsibility.

They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.

They have sold our privacy as a commodity.

They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have de- liberately declined to recall faulty products en- dangering lives in pursuit of profit.

They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have pro- duced and continue to produce.

They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them.

They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.

They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives or pro- vide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit.

They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.

They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.

They have accepted private contracts to mur- der prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.

They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the tor- ture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.

They continue to create weapons of mass

destruction in order to receive government contracts.

To the people of the world,

We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.

Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to ad- dress the problems we face, and generate solu- tions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

Join us and make your voices heard! Occupy Wall Street”

— October 4 

IMPUNITY, n.  Wealth. Ambrose Bierce

Ambrose Bierce. The Devil’s Dictionary (The Peter Pauper Press 1958)
Pp 31

DANTE’S INFERNO, Illustrated by DORE

PLATE 44

CANTO XIX

“They come to the third gulf, wherein are punished those who have been guilty of simony. These are fixed with the head downwards in certain apertures, so that no more of them than the legs appears without, and on the soles of their feet are seen burning flames.”

Dante Inferno Illustrated by Gustave Dore,Paddington Press (New York: 1996). First published in 1890? ed. Divine Comedy A.L. Burt, New York.

“The Money-changers Have Fled From The Temple Of Our Civilization:” F.D. Roosevelt Inaugural Address

“Many of the of the most sensational exposures of the Pecora investigation would come later, but by early March, 1933, enough had been revealed for the American people to recoil indignantly from the evidence of chicanery, greed and simplemindedness among the nation’s largest bankers. And the failure of the banks, which had wiped out untold millions in life savings, seemed a final indictment on the private banking system. Roosevelt himself had declared in his inaugural address that

“…the rulers of the exchange of mankind’s goods have failed through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and have abdicated… The money-changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization.”"

F.D. Roosevelt, Inaugural address, cited in Goldston. March 04, 1933.

Cited in Robert Goldston, The Great Depression: The United States In The Thirties (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1968) Pp 114

Drawing by Heinrich Kley. The Drawings Of Heinrich Kley, Dover Publications Inc. (New York: 1969) pp. 92

Those Who Think Action Might Be In Order Will Be Called Men Of Little Faith: John Kenneth Galbraith

The market will not go on a speculative rampage again without some rationalization. But during any future boom some newly rediscovered virtuosity of the free enterprise system will be cited. It will be pointed out that people are justified in paying the present prices –indeed, almost any price- to have an equity position in the system. Among the first to accept those rationalizations will be some of those responsible for invoking the controls. They will say firmly that controls are not needed. The newspapers, some of them, will agree and speak harshly of those who think action might be in order. They will be called men of little faith.

John Kenneth Galbraith, The Great Crash 1929 (50th Anniversary Edition: Houghton Mifflin, New York 1979) Pp 190

“As In The Twenties, Voices Of Protest Were Attacked As “Subversive,” or “Un-American.”” Robert Goldston

“The New Deal reached a stalemate in 1938 and was drowned by the war. Unfortunately, also drowned was the spirit which had supported it. The years following World War II were to see a dreary repetition of the hysteria, public apathy, and return to overweening private greed which marked the years after World War I. There was to be another and even more damaging “red scare” presided over by Wisconsin’ Senator Joe McCarthy (and supported by a large segment of the American people). There was to be a return to business ethics and private morality in place of the public ethics of the thirties. Bruce Barton’s revelation of Christ as a businessman was hardly more indicative of the spirit of the twenties than General Motors President Charles Wilson’s brusque “What’s-Good-For-General-Motors-Is-Good-For-America” was of the fifties. While the newfound prosperity of America was poured into goods, services and hardware, into ever bigger and more vulgar automobiles, ever flashier kitchens, ever more clever gadgets, it was to be withheld from the public sector of the economy. The shiny new cars cluttered poorly paved city streets. The flashy kitchens were often found in crumbling public housing. Well-dressed children attended public schools whose buildings were a national disgrace; they were taught by teachers whose salaries were a national shame. And once again, as in the twenties, voices of protest against the decay of public community were attacked as “subversive,” or “un-American.””

Robert Goldston, The Great Depression: The United States In The Thirties (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1968).

Guerrilla Comics: WHERE WE’LL BE BUYING OUR GASOLINE.

Interesting how this has gone- we may not have thought a huge decline in gasoline demand would be so early and obvious. Or leave such tidy relics. They’ve neatly left the sign- the building code must not have required its removal. Later (and in other environments), we imagine the derelict sites of gasoline stations may look rather different. What do you think?