The Spokes Council

Posted on | November 6, 2011 | 31 Comments

by Smitty

On Sunday, October 23, a meeting was held at 60 Wall Street. Six leaders discussed what to do with the half-million dollars that had been donated to their organization, since, in their estimation, the organization was incapable of making sound financial decisions. The proposed solution was not to spend the money educating their co-workers or stimulating more active participation by improving the organization’s structures and tactics. Instead, those present discussed how they could commandeer the $500,000 for their new, more exclusive organization. No, this was not the meeting of any traditional influence on Wall Street. These were six of the leaders of Occupy Wall Street (OWS).
Occupy Wall Street’s Structure Working Group (WG) has created a new organization called the Spokes Council. “Teach-ins” were held to workshop and promote the Spokes Council throughout the week of October 22-28. I attended the teach-in on Sunday the 23rd.

And, toward the end:

When my turn came to speak, I brought up the plans of “the leaders of the allegedly leaderless movement” to commandeer the half-million dollars sent to the General Assembly for their new, exclusive, undemocratic, representational organization. Before I could finish, the facilitators and other members of the OWS inner circle started shouting over me. Amidst the confusion, the human mic stopped projecting what I, or anybody was saying. Because silence was what they were after, the leaders won.
Eventually one of the facilitators regained control of the crowd and explained that I was speaking “opinions, not facts,” which is why I would not be allowed to continue. He also asserted untruthfully that I had gone over my allotted minute. Notably, the facilitators and members of the OWS inner circle regularly ignore time restrictions.
This reaction shouldn’t surprise anyone. It is reasonable to expect any undemocratic organization to be co-opted eventually by a vocal minority or charismatic individual. On Friday, October 29, the proposal to create the Spokes Council was put to the NYC-GA for a fifth time, and finally received a 90% majority. The facilitators assisted the process by denying two vocal critics of the Spokes Council their allotted time to speak against it.
Sometimes it snows before the leaves have fallen.

Read the whole thing.

Thus, it appears the Left’s dying (?) gasp is rooted in trying to reprise the French Revolution within the United States. The two reason I expect this sad effort to fail are:

We’re paying attention. For the effort sanctioned by #OccupyResoluteDesk to succeed, We The People would have to have our attention focused more fully elsewhere. Three years of political decay, like a cockroach infestation, have had the opposite effect. People know it’s time to clean up our political Zuccotti Park, and that anyone on the Left is at least a tacit abetter of the #OWS idiots, if not a direct crapflooder.
The Left’s media control is too far from absolute. Totalitarian regimes across time and the planet go after media control. Sure, the Left can have their media poodles crank the #OWS coverage up and down at the drop of a hat. Sure, they can have the FCC attempt to usurp the U.S. Congress. Will it work in this Army of Davids era?

Being put in the position of fighting the patriotic, Constitutional fight is something I would have considered unfathomable a decade ago. Yet here we are. Lord have mercy on these peddlers of evil and their Useful Idiot minions.

Update: linked at Da Tech Guy.

Update II: Linked at The Conservative Hideout.

via Memeorandum

Category: Progressivism

Comments

31 Responses to “The Spokes Council”

ThePaganTemple
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:15 am

I think this year’s festivities are nothing but a dry run for next year’s when the goal will be to disrupt the election. More than likely you’ll see this focused on mainly Republican districts in swing states. Look at what’s going on in some of those states now and you will probably see a union presence, maybe not a strong one, but there nevertheless.

Of course there’s always a chance they could wreak havoc all across the board, which naturally would give Obama a possible excuse to suspend the election.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:26 am

Smitty, I still say you’re too optimistic about the death of Progressivism or the Left. But it is somewhat amusing to watch them re-enact the history of participatory and representative democracy. I extend this to not only the morons in the park, but the more general leftish pundits and MSM who love to talk about how the system doesn’t work.

Even among this small group of nuts, they cannot agree on many things. Of course, this is normal and natural, and anything different would shock serious thinkers or students of history. They claim to want lots of democracy, dialog, etc, but only so long as those voting and talking agree with them.

Once they get opposition, it must be illegitimized, because clearly they themselves are the righteous and know the True Path of Good. At least they’re close to getting the politburo they asked for.
Reckless
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:30 am

The G8 is comming to Chicago in May. You can bet there will be an Obamaville there to destroy property and disrupt the productive class.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:35 am

Smitty, this is a familiar process. What is happening with OWS is much like what happened with SNCC and SDS in the 1960s: The leadership has its own agenda and its own ambitions, which are a thing apart from the broad goals of the rank-and-file of the movement. Schisms inevitably occur. The leadership cadre becomes professionalized. The more cynical and savvy of them seek to leverage their radical experience to gain access to positions within mainstream institutions.

Tom Hayden, Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn are examples of this process. Many millions of students took part in the anti-war movement of the 1960s, but a comparative handful of the leaders of that movement were able to parlay their radicalism into careers. Ditto the civil rights movement, which became the career springboard for Jesse Jackson.

This take-the-money-and-run move by OWS leadership is certainly not unprecedented. After all, Lenin led only a small faction of the Russian socialists when, with enormous cynicism, he dubbed his own followers the “majority” (bolshevik) party and denounced those who resisted his claim to leadershi as the “minority” (menshevik).
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:16 am

I always thought Animal Farm was a warning, not a how-to manual.

That whole article is about a few manufacturing “consensus” – and succeeding – to create their “Spokes Council”. And it’s structure is straight out of Alinsky and Obama community organizing: an ostensible leader in the “spokesperson” – who has to change regularly and is often chosen for the image they present; and the unelected “facilitator” – whose job is to mold the consensus of the group to what the consensus of the other facilitators is. And if you go off the reservation, you’re not dealing in “facts” and therefore you become a non-person.
Patrick Curley
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:25 am

Take any information you get from globalresearch.ca with more than a grain of salt; that’s a kook site founded by a 9-11 Truther.
smitty
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:34 am

Again, with all eyes on target, the chance of mayors and governors being tolerant of this noise for the election is at least less likely, if not slim.
smitty
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:38 am

Right, but the internet is doing to politics what it’s done to business: getting rid of cruft in the middle layer.
smitty
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:39 am

So, we ‘trust but verify’, as we always should. Wait for the story to unfold.
ThomasD
November 6th, 2011 @ 10:56 am

Yep, they’ll settle for a single party approach dominated by secretly named insiders.

Guillotines and tumbrels having a way of not making for good press.
ThomasD
November 6th, 2011 @ 11:02 am

Good point, and especially true as relates to any factual information.

In this case, whether the authors assertions are true or not, it still indicates a schism and a struggle for control within the organization.

Given the author’s freely asserted politics, and more importantly the seemingly natural and well versed way he presented them, I’m inclined to think he is authentic, if not necessarily entirely honest.

I do accept that there is roughly $500k in play here, and would be interested to know where it finally ends up.
Dave
November 6th, 2011 @ 11:05 am

“And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, limp up to explain it once more”

What we are seeing here is an age old struggle of mob rule versus individual rights. It’s the philosophies of Rousseau vs Locke, live on pay per view. The problem is that the Rousseauian forces usually steal a march on those of us comfortable in our prosperous, peaceful Lockean world. Will America wake up in time to lance this boil before it swells, or will Joe Six Pack find himself, bewildered, living in a quasi-totalitarian America with “no idea how this could have happened here”?

I’ll end with two quotes, one from RR, and with more of the Kipling I opened with:

“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.
We didn’t pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. It must be
fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day
we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s
children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.” – Ronald Reagan, “A Time For Choosing”, 1964

“As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began. That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!”
-Rudyard Kipling, “The Gods of the Copybook Headings”, 1919
DaveO
November 6th, 2011 @ 11:29 am

Essentially, a very small group of people just heisted $500,000 (6 dollars Canadian, or 2 Yuan) just for themselves – that small, more exclusive group.

Heh!
Edward
November 6th, 2011 @ 11:44 am

No actually I think you’re wrong on this.

The situation wouldn’t be in strong Republican areas. Instead it would be in mid to strong Democrat areas or at least in areas controlled by Democrats who have leadership roles over the police.

Consider the New Black Panthers and what they did in the polling station in Philly. Consider that they did so without any jail time or fine. Consider that Eric Holder and Obama still control the DOJ. So it is extremely unlikely that the DOJ, on Election Day, would intervene in any polling station disruptions. So response to polling station disruptions would have to be at the state, county and/or local level. Probably at the local level especially if it is widespread.

I think we have to keep in mind that many national elections occur on a state wide basis and not by local districts. This specifically addresses the Senate and the White House. I believe that the Democrats would be willing to abandon control of the House if they can continue control over the Senate and White House.

So let’s posit a scenario. Election Day and a small crowd of “occupiers” and union goons, shows up at every polling station in areas largely controlled by Democrats. Their purpose is to intimidate and prevent Republicans from voting by their presence and numbers. Frankly they could pretty much do this just by standing in the doorways. Unless the local police are allowed to do something, would they? If the Democrats in charge order the police to not interfere, would they disobey? And if they did follow orders to not interfere, what would be the result?

You can argue that the voting on Election Day would be corrupted. That we would have to vote all over again. But is there actually a legal method for doing this? Is there actually a Constitutional method for doing this? How difficult would it be to get all 50 states to redo Election Day? What about the Democrat controlled states that may refuse?

Sure you can say that this would go to SCOTUS. But so what? Election Day is over. Votes are in and are counted and, amazingly enough, the Democrats still control the Senate and the White House. And Eric Holder & Obama still control the DOJ.

Is it a far-fetched scenario? I sure as hell hope so. But then again if someone told me that the DOJ would conspire with other federal agencies to spread easily traceable firearms across North & Central America in order to provide a fallacious argument for gun control I would have thought “tinfoil hat time!”.

Yet that is precisely what has happened.
Dianna Deeley
November 6th, 2011 @ 12:16 pm

I keep citing this poem as well; Zucotti Park is a perfect example.

Though my initial reaction to the article is, “Congratulations, you’ve created a Central Committee, and the Politburo will be along shortly. Then you can have Democratic Centralism, followed shortly by the Party Line.”
Patrick Curley
November 6th, 2011 @ 1:27 pm

I did enjoy the article and the author’s blog has two more posts discussing the internal politics at Zoo-Cotti, which are fascinating.
Adjoran
November 6th, 2011 @ 1:57 pm

Well, if the OWS crowd is NOT there, they will have lost their last shred of credibility.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 2:02 pm

The DoJ doesn’t protect polling places, local authorities do, absent pre voting day upheaval wherein I suppose federal Marshals or whatever might be deployed.
Adjoran
November 6th, 2011 @ 2:03 pm

Seems like a nice, juicy subject for extension litigation.

I’m not even sure how the method of collecting the money was legal. A radical lefty non-profit stepped in to accept donations so they would be tax-exempt. The org takes 7% from the top, OWS (or whoever has arranged to steal their money) gets the rest.

Since when can a non-profit basically launder money to make it tax-deductible? If this is legal, why don’t we have non-profits working with all our PACs and the RNC to make political contributions deductible?

Not that the IRS will crack down under the corrupt Obama Regime, but the statute of limitations for tax fraud won’t expire before 2013.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 2:08 pm

So the best response to this would be to get knowlege of the creation of this “leadership” and their power grab to the rank and file of the Donner Party.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 2:19 pm

I believe the 500K is a matter of public record. The Alliance for Global Justice is “lending” their tax exempt status to the Donner Party, I assume that the money is in their accounts or passes through their accounts, minus their 7% cut (capitalism?). For someone who knows how to research this kind of thing following the money could be most revealing.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 3:03 pm

This excerpt from the linked post struck me.

“The participation of oppressed people in oppressive organizations is not a step towards liberation, but is the deepening of their complicity in their own domination. The unabated war on women and people of color in America, during Obama’s presidency, with Hillary Clinton as his Secretary of State, is a testament to the structural and psychological nature of oppression, and the inability for spokespeople to represent the oppressed.”

Most Americans celebrate the entry of women and minorities into the upper levels of power in our government as advances FOR the previously disadvantaged. That Fritz Tucker and I assume at least some of the other Donner Partiers believe that Hillary Clinton becoming Sec of State and I presume Obama becoming president for that matter are merely examples of oppressed people joining oppressive organizations is what I find chilling. Given the broad definition these folks have of who are and what is oppression I can’t wait to see what democracy “looks like”
Datechguy's Blog » Blog Archive » Occupy Violence, playing their last card.
November 6th, 2011 @ 3:09 pm

[…] totalitarian nature of their “masters” becoming apparent the number of cards they have is diminishing I see two […]
Edward
November 6th, 2011 @ 3:35 pm

Sure I figure local police would normally be responsible for polling stations. But in the event of a serious crisis, such as mass interference in voting efforts, then I would be very surprised if federal authorities weren’t called in.

That presupposes that the federal authorities in question would accept the call though.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 3:53 pm

That doesn’t really make much sense, though. The states are responsible for conducting elections. The Feds, I think, are really only involved with respect to Civil Rights being violated, and that’s typically an after the fact sort of thing. I suppose that in a big city, there are probably some FBI agents nearby, but seriously, what force would you expect the Feds to be able to muster as a quick reaction?

Don’t get me wrong, voting rights are mentioned in several places in the Constitution, so interest in voting by the Feds isn’t necessarily evidence of overstepping their Constitutional duty.
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 3:56 pm

Without some prior warning there isn’t time to bring them in. The DoJ’s voting rights people are all lawyers, investigator or staff supporting them.

Given that a large scale attempt would probably be coordinated on the internet there would be advanced warning but the “boots on the ground” even if coordinated by Justice would be state and local law enforcement. If Holders Justice Dept. wanted to prevent this, by no means a given, the optics of using say the National Guard for this would be too embarrassing to this administration. The only way they’d go for something like that would be if they could spin the threat as coming from the rightwing raaaaacists.

IMHO the SDs would rather let the turmoil get out of hand, hoping for a reaction from the right or perhaps even an over reaction from local authorities to use as a pretext to cancel the results or even more likely to seize the ballots.
Occupy Wall Street: Spokes Council Tries to Assume Control of Occupod’s Money » Conservative Hideout 2.0
November 6th, 2011 @ 4:23 pm

[…] far more indicative of the true nature of the occupods, as well as their future operations. Here is some coverage of this development, from Smitty at the Other McCain… This is more than a little […]
Anonymous
November 6th, 2011 @ 5:14 pm

Are all PACs taxable? Most of them claim to serve some sort of “educational” purpose.
Adjoran
November 7th, 2011 @ 12:35 am

If they give money only to promote issues and NOT in elections (including referenda), they can be a tax-exempt org, but any money goes to political candidates, the status is revoked.
Anonymous
November 7th, 2011 @ 12:56 am

Sounds like a lot of gray lines.
Bob Belvedere
November 7th, 2011 @ 11:24 am

These various Occupy groups are nothing more than Soviets.