I guess these folks are “stepping it up a notch” actually breaking into a bank. I just wish these youngsters weren’t so guided by their idealistic thoughts that ALL government (even LOCAL leaders) is evil. Of course, that’s if these folks really ARE Anarchists. Nowadays, who the heck knows! Could be Communist Agent Provocateurs mixed into the crowd to start the violence...
Yeah well I was there at mid-day at the Bank of England. Almost all the demonsrators are regular people. There are a few trouble makers but they are easy to spot. The police are there in bulk force and are menacing in behavior and attitude. Clearly they had orders to hem in all the demonstrators and keep them in one place all day long so there are no small gangs running around the city destroying property. Actually the police attitude and tactics are inflamatory and it would certainly be reasonable to expect a backlash from the committed anarchists.
I would estimate that by 1 pm there were probably 5000 police and 50,000 demonstrators, which diminished later in the day. The police now have trapped a core of about 4000 of the anarchist types and are not letting them leave, so they have been there for about 8 hours, and no doubt are getting grouchy about it.
One thing is for sure - this demonstration brought the heart of London to a complete halt. Streets were closed off to traffic. Most shops and businesses were closed or hardly active.
By the way the communists are indeed active in the protests - they were handing out Socialist Worker newspaper. Also the more hard line Communist Party of Great Britain was there and active too.
The thing is, the action from the US and UK governments represents national socialist communal policies dressed up as liberal democracy.
What aggravates the regular people over here to protest is that the banksters mismanaged the economy, while the government failed in regulation and oversight. Now the bail-out solution is going to line the pockets of the fraudsters who caused this and prop up rotten financial institutions, without really helping the people who are losing their jobs, savings, retirement funds, houses worth less, etc.