Let me jog your memory Karl: That would be the framers of the Constitution. It’s their birthright as Americans, fuckwit!

Hilarious. Last night at Johns Hopkins University, the man who history will ruefully recall as “Bush’s Brain,” Fox News commentator Karl Rove, got the business from Occupy Baltimore. He didn’t handle it too well…

Via Think Progress:

“Karl Rove is the architect of Occupy Iraq, the architect of Occupy Afghanistan!” yelled the demonstrators. Occupy Baltimore had infiltrated the crowd and began chanting against Rove. “Who gave you the right to occupy America?” asked Rove to the protesters, apparently unaware of the Bill of Rights. As they repeated their slogan, “We are the 99 percent!” Rove petulantly responded, “No you’re not!” He snidely added, “You wanna keep jumping up and yelling that you’re the 99 percent? How presumptuous and arrogant can you be?”

Johns Hopkins spokeswoman Tracey Reeves told the media that around 15 people, none of them students, were asked to leave and that some were forcibly removed by campus security. No one was arrested.

If you don’t want to listen to this lying turd’s lips flapping, you can scroll right to the 1:48 mark when the fun begins! As astonishing as it may sound, Karl Rove, one of the chief architects of the invasion of Iraq—not to mention much of what’s wrong with this country—seems to think he’s got a leg to stand on when lecturing people on “moral cowardice”! Incredible.

WHY should people be expected to be polite to a class warrior/war criminal like Karl Rove? He was the troll under the bridge of the Bush administration and now he’s getting paid as a propagandist on Fox News. HE deserves respect and politeness? He deserves to be dropped in the middle of the streets of Baghdad in the nude is what the fuck he deserves!

Get used to the rest of your life, doughboy. This isn’t going away. And even if your side wins a few battles along the way, our side is still going to win in the end.
 

Above, “fair and balanced” Fox News graphic. Apparently even the art department there is staffed with braying assess.

Casey Neistat put together this “music video” of this week’s eviction of the Zuccotti Park protesters, cut to the music of guess which Frank Sinatra standard?

My office isn’t far from Zuccotti Park and when I heard it was being cleared I went down with my camera. I ended up filming for 18 hours until the Park was reopened at 6pm on November 15, 2011. The police presence was overwhelming, more than I’ve ever - more than during the blackout, more than the days after September 11th.

 
Via Glen E. Friedman

Dorli Rainey 84, after being pepper sprayed at Occupy Seattle protest: Photo by Joshua Trujillo, SeattlePI.com

An 84-year-old woman pepper-sprayed by cops during the evicition of Occupy Seattle has become the accidental poster girl for the movement in a photo that’s getting seen around the world this morning:

Via the Keep Your Boehner Out of My Uterus Tumblr blog:

I have only posted about OWS one other time. I just can’t let this go by. 

This is what can happen to you and your body if you just show up, place your body somewhere that freaks out the establishment, and actively protest the problems inherent and rampant in the system. This type of over-reaction by the authorities is something that people of color and minorities face ALL THE TIME simply for being, let’s remember. But seriously, Holy Fuck.

We owe it to this woman to look in her eyes, to see her face, to SEE her. We owe it to her to hold her gaze, to not move our eyes away because it is hard to look. We need to keep looking at her specifically BECAUSE it is hard to look. 

Meanwhile, Occupy Wall Street ain’t going anyplace... Here’s a nifty history lesson via Rachel Maddow. This is some damned good reporting.
 

 
Hell, the NYPD sure didn’t hesitate to use a lil’ force last night, did they?
 

 
Via Glen E. Friedman

 
“When they kick at your front door, how you gonna go?”

God bless former Clash bassist Paul Simonon. I’ve always considered him to one of the coolest motherfuckers alive and this only elevates my opinion of him even further into the stratosphere: According to an article in today’s Guardian, Simonon recently spent time as an “undercover” activist on board the MV Esperanza, one of the ships of the Greenpeace fleet, working as a cook, and apparently quite a good one, too:

Simonon was one of 18 activists arrested in June, after the Esperanza launched speedboats at the Leiv Eriksson oil rig off the coast of Greenland. Greenpeace was protesting against the Arctic rig, whose owners had allegedly refused to disclose their oil-spill disaster plan. “It’s obvious why Cairn [Energy] won’t tell the world how it would clean up a BP-style oil spill here in the Arctic, and that’s because it can’t be done,” campaigner Ben Ayliffe explained at the time.

“We stormed the oil rig,” Simonon said. “They said if you don’t get off … we’re going to phone the authorities in Greenland and say you’ve hijacked the oil rig, and the police will come and arrest you. And that’s pretty much what happened.”

According to Greenpeace, Simonon joined the mission weeks before. He first approached the group’s UK action coordinator Frank Heweston, asking if he could “make a stand against Arctic oil drilling” by becoming part of a ship’s crew. Heweston agreed on the condition that Simonon go undercover. “Paul the assistant cook” was embraced by his peers, recalled third mate Martti Leinonen, as a “quiet, humble and funny guy”. “He worked really hard, cooking even on Sundays, which is usually the cook’s day off.”

After the Esperanza protesters were arrested, Simonon spent two weeks in a cell – still keeping his identity a secret. “The food was so bad, we finally got the guards to agree to let Paul cook,” Leinonen said. “He makes excellent vegetarian food.”

Although he is no longer a member of the Esperanza crew, Simonon paid tribute to his former associates at a gig earlier this week. Together with Damon Albarn and the rest of the Good, the Bad and the Queen, Simonon performed for Greenpeace supporters on the deck of the Rainbow Warrior II, moored in the Thames.

The man is a total bad-ass. I love this story!
 

 
After the jump, some live concert footage of The Good, The Bad & The Queen performing on the Rainbow Warrior II a few days ago…

 
Here’s the press release sent out today by Occupy Wall Street in answer to last night’s eviction of Zuccotti Park:

New York, NY — A massive police force is presently evicting Liberty Square, home of Occupy Wall Street for the past two months and birthplace of the 99% movement that has spread across the country and around the world

The raid started just after 1:00am. Supporters and allies are mobilizing throughout the city, presently converging at Foley Square. Supporters are also planning public actions for the coming days, including occupation actions.

Two months ago a few hundred New Yorkers set up an encampment at the doorstep of Wall Street. Since then, Occupy Wall Street has become a national and even international symbol — with similarly styled occupations popping up in cities and towns across America and around the world. A growing popular movement has significantly altered the national narrative about our economy, our democracy, and our future.

Americans are talking about the consolidation of wealth and power in our society, and the stranglehold that the top 1% have over our political system. More and more Americans are seeing the crises of our economy and our democracy as systemic problems, that require collective action to remedy. More and more Americans are identifying as part of the 99%, and saying “enough!”

This burgeoning movement is more than a protest, more than an occupation, and more than any tactic. The “us” in the movement is far broader than those who are able to participate in physical occupation. The movement is everyone who sends supplies, everyone who talks to their friends and families about the underlying issues, everyone who takes some form of action to get involved in this civic process.

This moment is nothing short of America rediscovering the strength we hold when we come together as citizens to take action to address crises that impact us all.

Such a movement cannot be evicted. Some politicians may physically remove us from public spaces — our spaces — and, physically, they may succeed. But we are engaged in a battle over ideas. Our idea is that our political structures should serve us, the people — all of us, not just those who have amassed great wealth and power. We believe that is a highly popular idea, and that is why so many people have come so quickly to identify with Occupy Wall Street and the 99% movement.

You cannot evict an idea whose time has come.

Below, footage from last night’s eviction of protesters from the park by heavy-handed NYPD tactics (tear gas, billy clubs and A BULLDOZER?)
 

 
A rightwing asshole version of the caped crusader (did Frank Miller script this???) confronts the 99% with GOP talking points and general bullshit.
 

 
Animation from the folks at Dorkly/Via the Comics Alliance

Image: Chris Cobb via SF MOMA

The current scene at Zuccotti Park via @TheOther99.  The feed is obviously coming from a mobile device, so it goes in and out. It’s watchable though, and one of the few places you can actually see what’s going on on-site.

Aside from a concrete park that’s pretty much already been cleared out and cleaned up—and a small army of NYPD—there ain’t much to see. Quiet. For now.

For anyone feeling down about what happened last night, buck up, for the laws of unintended consequences are about to go FUBAR. And probably quite soon, too.
 

What’s NEXT

Watch live feed via the Occupy Wall Street network. You can also listen live on WBAI radio.
 

 
Thank you Glen E. Friedman!

How much MORE hapless-looking can someone GET than beleaguered WI Governor Scott Walker?

The historical efforts to recall Republican Gov. Scott Walker will be kicking off Tuesday in Wisconsin with a late-night rally and early morning pajama parties. One hundred events across the state are planned for tomorrow as Democrats and unions begin signature gathering in earnest to recall Walker,  Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefsich and at least three more Republican state senators in addition to the two who lost their seats earlier this year.

“I fully anticipate there will be signatures collected in every single Wisconsin county tomorrow,” said state Democratic Party Chairman Mike Tate, adding that he hoped to collect at least 600,000 signatures by the January 17, 2012 deadline. 540,000 names are required to trigger the election.

“We’ve made a lot of progress,” muttered the increasingly hapless-looking, politically tone-deaf Walker. “It’s a new day in Wisconsin.”

It’ll be a new day in Wisconsin when Gray Davis is buying you a beer, asshole!

Donate to the Recall Walker effort via ActBlue.