Free Republic

With the fiscal cliff looming, the deficit ballooning and the economy far from booming, the ongoing debate over how best to address the nation’s economic woes remains unsettled. Now, labor leaders and Occupy networks are agitating for what may be the fix: higher wages. This Black Friday, workers at Walmart and other big box stores in 47 states began unprecedented demonstrations calling for higher wages and benefits. Although widespread and formally organized strikes have yet to be seen, the growing movement is likely to drive a larger national conversation about the way tens of millions of American workers are compensated....

It was with great interest that I watched Facebook catch fire with support of the calls for picketing and sick-outs at Wal-Mart stores across the country on Black Friday. From what I could tell, most of those supporting the calls were liberals who attacked the company with claims that it doesn’t pay “a living wage”, “exploits” its workers, or owes its workers health care. I even saw one fantastical claim that a majority of Wal-Mart employees are on food stamps. The suggestion was that Wal-Mart should be forced (via government itself or indirectly via unions) to change completely how it...

One of the five self-described anarchists arrested last week for attempting to blow up a local bridge signed the lease for a West Side warehouse where about a dozen members of the Occupy Cleveland group live. In a one-hour recording of a Friday evening general assembly meeting of the group posted on its website, occupy leaders expressed concern about Anthony Hayne's name being on the lease, which strengthens his link to the group.... "If this gets into the media, it would be a disaster."

A doctor charged Saturday with possessing a large quantity of chemicals used in bomb-making spent 15 years on the staff of a Manhattan hospital until he was fired in 2006 for refusing to submit to a psychiatric evaluation when a nurse accused him of stalking her, court records show. Roberto Rivera, 60, was charged with recklessly creating a risk of widespread injury or damage after federal and local authorities found precursor chemicals used in the making of explosives in the basement of a Ridgewood house, Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli said in a release Saturday afternoon. Rivera was being held...

When hacktivist Jeremy Hammond was arrested last week in Chicago as a part of a wide government investigation in the online group Anonymous, his mother, Rose Collins, called him a genius without any wisdom. “Again?” she asked when informed by the Chicago Tribune that her son had been arrested for hacking. “I love my son, but he is a genius with no brain. He has a 168 IQ, but he has no wisdom.”  In an attempt to educate the world at-large about the dangers of Anonymous, Rose Collins reached out to Townhall Finance and spoke about Jeremy and Anonymous. She ended by asking a...

Large amounts of chemicals commonly used to make bombs were found in the basement of a New Jersey doctor, along with assault rifles and a stun gun, prosecutors said today. Dr. Roberto Rivera, 60, who was said to have been an active member in the Occupy Wall Street movement last year, was arrested following a Friday night raid on his Ridgewood, N.J., home

How do you know when government is broken and rife with incompetence? A good indicator could be when Federally managed workers with the Federal Emergency Management Agency are lining up for food handed out by an offshoot of the Occupy Wall Street movement, Occupy Sandy. Last week, FEMA shut down its New York centers set up to respond the devastation caused by superstorm Sandy because of… bad weather. This left a disaster aid void that was filled by independent volunteer groups, including Occupy Sandy. Many residents in the region reported feeling abandoned by the Federal helpers sent to aid them....

From the top of their website: ------------------------------------ A bailout of the people by the people Rolling Jubilee is a Strike Debt project that buys debt for pennies on the dollar, but instead of collecting it, abolishes it. Together we can liberate debtors at random through a campaign of mutual support, good will, and collective refusal. Debt resistance is just the beginning. Join us as we imagine and create a new world based on the common good, not Wall Street profits. -------------------------------------

For a few moments last fall, West Oakland businessman Chris Hollis was filled with idealism as he attended Occupy Oakland's first gathering outside City Hall to protest an economic system he felt benefited the few to the detriment of the many. But within minutes, amid a mix of families and students, Hollis witnessed some participants stray from the focus on Wall Street and hurl vitriol at police. And within weeks, others would riot through downtown - and then justify their violence. "In an insanely short amount of time, they managed to turn what was basically a great movement for everybody...

Trinity Church is cancelling its annual Halloween celebration. A post on the church’s website says the “decision was made out of an abundance of caution as we continue to face safety issues arising from the sidewalk camp in front of Trinity Church.” A group called “Occupy Trinity Wall Street Church” –which labels itself as “An action of Occupy Wall Street” – set up a makeshift camp on the sidewalk in front of the church. -snip The church said some 1,200 people attended last year’s Halloween celebration and that it’s been held for the last eight years. “It’s a popular event...

ANIMAL rights activists face trial on terrorism charges in America next month for their campaign against a British research centre. The seven members of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (Shac) are all from America, but at least one trained as an activist in Britain. They were arrested in FBI raids across four states over their alleged activities against Huntingdon Life Sciences. The company’s headquarters are in Cambridgeshire, but it has a laboratory in New Jersey. The seven, who face trial in New Jersey, are charged with conspiring to commit animal enterprise terrorism. If convicted they face heavy fines and up to...

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has lost another high-profile supporter as Anonymous, the hacking collective, said the whistleblowing site had been “ruined by egos”. Anonymous, a loose group of internet “hacktivists”, has been one of WikiLeaks’ closest allies during the past two years, launching cyber attacks against the site’s opponents and, some claim, becoming a source of its material. ...But leading Anonymous accounts on Twitter, which rallied behind WikiLeaks and Mr Assange despite his legal and financial woes, have now withdrawn their support, decrying the freedom-of-information project as a “One Man Julian Assange show”. Calling the split “the end of an...

Woman claims money her friend gave her was a gift, not a loan. Watch to the end, so funny! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00Cc97wWfuk&feature=endscreen&NR=1

The “Occupy Wall Street” protests and former White House “green jobs czar” Van Jones are the beginning of an “American Fall,” according to Rep. John Larson, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus. In Tuesday evening remarks before a group of visiting activists and journalists from Egypt and Tunisia, Larson said the United States has drawn inspiration from revolutions in those countries and, as a result, is experiencing its own “Arab Spring, if you will.” In an exclusive interview with The Daily Caller following his speech, Larson said left-wing activists with “the right morals” are pushing America’s democracy to “evolve.”

The University of California will pay damages of $30,000 to each of the 21 UC Davis students and alumni who were pepper-sprayed by campus police during an otherwise peaceful protest 10 months ago, the university system announced Wednesday. The agreement, which must still be approved in federal court, also calls for UC to pay a total of $250,000 to the plaintiffs’ attorneys and set aside a maximum of $100,000 to pay up to $20,000 to any other individuals who join the class-action lawsuit by proving they were either arrested or directly pepper-sprayed, a university statement said. A video released online,...

SAN FRANCISCO – The University of California has agreed to pay $1 million to settle a lawsuit filed by demonstrators who were pepper-sprayed during an Occupy protest at UC Davis last fall, according to a preliminary settlement filed Wednesday. The Nov. 18, 2011, incident prompted national outrage, angry campus protests and calls for the resignation of Chancellor Linda Katehi after online videos shot by witnesses went viral.

A report today in an official outlet of the Iranian regime claims that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran, will meet with members of the Occupy Wall Street movement. Ahmadinejad is currently in New York City for the United Nations General Assembly, where these reported meetings will take place. "Ahmadinejad is also set to meet American university students, artists, intellectuals and elites, including Occupy Wall Street anti-capitalist protestors, despite the ongoing efforts made by the pro-Zionist lobbies to prevent direct link between American people and the Iranian president," the Iranian organ Fars News reports. Earlier this year American professors gathered...

Former Amalgamated Transit Union local 689 president Mike Golash, now an “Occupy” movement organizer, was caught on tape Sunday revealing his political goals: overthrowing capitalism in the United States and instituting a communist government.

'Occupy Unmasked' Trumps MSM, Scores Big in Limited Releaseby Breitbart News 23 Sep 2012, 12:58 PM PDT The mainstream media did all it could to white wash the violence swirling around the Occupy Wall Street movement as well as its anti-capitalist support system. Enter "Occupy Unmasked," the new documentary which did the work most journalists refused to do. And the people were clearly eager to hear the truth behind the movement. The film earned an impressive per-screen average of $11,000 on four screens over the weekend, the third highest average of any film in release, and those numbers could rise...

The Occupy Wall Street movement’s dark underbelly is on full display in an explosive new documentary set for release later this month. "Occupy Unmasked," produced by the non-profit group Citizens United and the late Andrew Breitbart, in one of his last projects before his death last March, examines the movement and its possible links to organized labor and leftist groups. Its premiere in theaters on Sept. 21 follows the release of the documentary "2016: Obama's America," providing more cinematic fodder for the president’s critics ahead of the Nov. 6 election. FoxNews.com was given an advanced screening of the 70-plus minute...