Thread: Occupy Wall Street protests spread to other cities

October 1, 2011 6:24 PM

Wall Street protests spread to other cities

(CBS/AP) Demonstrations against the power of banks and corporations that were inspired by the Arab Spring movement are entering their third week in New York - and are spreading elsewhere.

Hundreds of people were marching through lower Manhattan today as part of the "Occupy Wall Street" demonstration.

Protesters are upset over social inequality, bank bailouts and corporate greed .

"Corporations are not people," said Max Richmond in New York City. "They don't deserve the same rights people do."

Moira Laughlin, who traveled to New York from Ohio to participate, is frustrated because she's been out of work for two-and-a-half years. "We have two teenage kids, we still have to pay the mortgage. send them to college hopefully, and it's not easy."

Hundreds of people started camping and holding marches near New York's financial district. There have been arrests - including at least 20 today when marchers walked onto the Brooklyn Bridge. There have also been cries of police brutality, after video circulated online showing a high-ranking police official using pepper spray on several woman penned in by plastic mesh. The police said they were investigating.

Michael Moore helps to "Occupy Wall Street"

Critics say this leaderless resistance movement is unorganized, but protesters claim they don't need one focus.

"We don't have one central argument," said Jed Brandt of Brooklyn. "We have a lot, but the basic issue is our democratic structures are broken in this country."

And when a Congressman showed up - Rep. Charles Rangel, who told protesters, "We have to take our country back" - demonstrators made it clear government isn't working.

"You, sir, have no business being here - you're part of the problem," they retorted.

A supporter cheers from the pedestrian overpass as police arrest demonstrators affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street movement after they attempted to cross the Brooklyn Bridge on the motorway on October 1, 2011.
(Credit: Mario Tama/Getty Images) The Occupy Wall Street protestors say they are encouraged by growing crowds in lower Manhattan, and the movement is spreading to cities around the country.

People rallied in Albuquerque, New Mexico ... and marched to City Hall in Los Angeles.

In Chicago, the crowd outside the Federal Reserve Bank began growing a week ago.

Protestors in New York say they just want their voices heard, and pledge to keep demonstrating through the winter, reports CBS News correspondent Kerry Ederer.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has not said how long he'll let the protesters camp out in lower Manhattan.

Several unions are planning to join protesters in Manhattan for a march next week.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/10/ ... 4373.shtml

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OccupyNewOrleans

The resistance continues in New Orleans and Nationwide!

Posted Oct. 1, 2011, 4:02 p.m. EST by OccupyNOLA

OccupyNOLA is leaderless resistance movement with people of many colors, genders and political persuasions. The one thing we all have in common is that We Are The 99% that will no longer tolerate the greed and corruption of the 1%. We are using the revolutionary Arab Spring tactic to achieve our ends and encourage the use of nonviolence to maximize the safety of all participants.

http://occupynola.org/