Links Round Up
Posted on May 12, 2011 11:26am
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Thousands Protest Expected Budget Cuts in Lower Manhattan
By Olivia Scheck, DNAinfo, LOWER MANHATTAN — Thousands gathered in Lower Manhattan Thursday to protest the mayor's proposed budget cuts, calling on the city to spare social programs and "make big banks and millionaires pay." The crowd, which included activists from education, housing, transportation and several other industries that would be affected by the budget cuts, was estimated to have reached 20,000, according to organizer Dan Levitan. Participants convened in eight meeting places around Lower Manhattan and began marching towards Wall and Water streets in the Financial District about 4:30 p.m.
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Massive Wall Street Protest Draws Over 20,000
By: Allison Kilkenny, The Nation, More than 20,000 protesters descended upon Wall Street Thursday to demand an end to Mayor Bloomberg’s draconian education cuts and his soft touch approach to billion-dollar companies. Those in attendance included Reverend Al Sharpton, the United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew, and various members of the City Council. The On May 12 event began as a series of splinter cell protests in the radius surrounding Wall Street that ultimately converged on the financial district. At the education protest, teachers came out in droves to protest Bloomberg’s recent decision to lay off thousands of teachers. Additionally, educators were demanding Bloomberg ask his rich friends on Wall Street to sacrifice along with everyone else.
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Contra la protección a los ricos
Partial Translation from Spanish: Against the Protection of the Rich
By: Zaira Cortés, El Diario, In the afternoon, various groups held meet-ups in eight areas of Lower Manhattan. At the end, went to the Financial District where they implemented the concept "school without walls", which was aimed at Wall Street and educating New Yorkers about what it takes to rebuild this economy.
Por Zaira Cortés, El Diario, Al ritmo de "El matador" y portando pancartas con leyendas como "Bloomberg, no más regalos para Wall Street" y "Alto a los recortes, devuelve los empleos", miles de manifestantes hicieron escuchar su voz entre tambores y gritos. Mireya Santamaría, de 65 años, expresó: "Mi centro de cuidado para adultos mayores en El Bronx pronto cerrará sus puertas. Quiero que ‘Bloomy’ regrese todo ese dinero que nos quitó. Quiero volver a tener un lugar digno donde pasar mis últimos días".
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Union protesters put fat cats up against the Wall
By: Sally Glodenberg, NY Post, Hundreds of union members and their supporters marched from City Hall to Wall Street yesterday to protest Mayor Bloomberg's proposed budget cuts -- including 4,100 teacher layoffs. They also targeted the financial industry for its role in the recession. "I wanted to march today with the teachers, with union workers, to say to Wall Street that the battle has to come to you," said the Rev. Al Sharpton. "You recovered, you have now given out more bonuses than many of our schools have budgets for." Labor leaders and other advocates are pushing to hike taxes on the wealthy to stave off budget cuts.
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March On Wall Street: Thousands Of Teachers, Advocates Rally Against Bloomberg Cuts
By: Matt Sledge, Huffington Post, Thousands of teachers, social workers, union members and more took part in a march Thursday against Mayor Michael Bloomberg's plans for wide-ranging budget cuts -- and against the Wall Street bankers they blame for the city's budget woes. Activists reported that the NYPD had arrested several marchers, but the demonstration took on a mostly joyful cast, with colorful signs, raucous chants and even a stilt-walker. The May 12 Coalition's organizers promised a big turnout of more than 10,000 marchers, and while immediately pinning down the crowd's size proved difficult, at least that number turned out. Demonstrators from the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) alone, which faces more than 4,000 teacher cuts if Bloomberg's budget is enacted as is, numbered in the thousands.
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Photos: War on Wall Street May 12
By: Emily Ann Epstein, Metro NY Thousands descended on the Financial District yesterday to protest the $400 million Mayor Michael Bloomberg plans to cut from the city’s budget. A coalition of more than three dozen labor and community groups organized the march that calls for big banks to pay, not civic workers. "I've been so angry for so long," said Upper West Side resident Ilze Thielmann, 45, who marched alongside her 12-year-old son Malcom Thompson. "I think it's unfair schools can't afford teachers," said Thompson. Shouting “Our city, our streets!” some of the protesters tried to stage a sit in at the intersection of Wall and Water Street. Police restrained the protesters and no arrests were made.
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#LivingWageNYC Hearing Takes Place #OnMay12
By: Celeste Katz, NY Daily News, Daily Politics It's a sign of the times that I can even try to sum up a slew of news with two Twitter hashtags, but in this case, it's kind of effective. As we speak, there's a City Council hearing -- and a wide variety of protests and demonstrations -- going on in NYC, focused on the hot-button legislation that would require employers on larger city-funded projects to pay workers more than the minimum wage. City Council members Brad Lander and Melissa Mark Viverito are livetweeting the hearing. Demonstrators who back the legislation swarmed City Hall Park in advance of the hearing.
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Protesting Many Issues, buy Aiming at One Target
By: Javier Hernandez, New York TimesThey marched to Wall Street to protest issues as varied as the war in Afghanistan, bonuses for bankers and budget cuts. But many of them directed their unhappiness in the same direction: at Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. To the thousands of protesters who inundated Lower Manhattan on Thursday, New York’s billionaire mayor seemed a fitting symbol of much that they found wrong with society, including the wide gap between rich and poor and the call to lay off teachers.
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Thousands Protest Teacher Layoffs, Tax Loopholes
By: Victoria Cavaliere, NBC NY
Thousands of people marched from City Hall to Wall Street Thursday to protest tax breaks for big banks and Mayor Bloomberg’s planned budget cuts that will eliminate thousands of teacher jobs. The protest was organized by labor leaders and community groups who want Bloomberg to close tax loopholes and more closely regulate financial practices of big businesses. Holding signs that read “Makes Bank Pay” and “No Cuts,” protesters gathered at eight spots around downtown Manhattan Thursday afternoon before converging at City Hall and then marching to Wall Street.
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Teachers, students protest Mayor's budget
DaveEvans, WABC
NEW YORK (WABC) -- The rally started just after 4:00 p.m. with teachers and parents demanding a better budget from the mayor. They're angry the mayor's budget will cut 6,000 teachers and lead to 20 fire companies closing. "It seems as if our teachers, our cops and our firefighters are being blamed for our ongoing financial problems, and that's essentially what this rally is about," said John Liu, (D) NYC Comptroller.
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Marchers Protest Budget Cuts in Financial District
NY1
Thousands of New Yorkers continue to march downtown to protest the city's proposed budget cuts, which include cuts to over 4,000 teachers. Protestors are also targeting Wall Street's role in causing the recession, as well as the bonuses and tax breaks that banks received over the last few years. The march goes from Wall Street to Water Street and is ending in Battery Park for a final rally. "I wanted to march today with the teachers, with union workers, to say to Wall Street that the battle has to come to you. You recovered, you have now given out more bonuses than many of our schools have budgets for," said the Reverend Al Sharpton,
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Why NY Lawmakers are Marching Against Wall Street
5/12/11
Here’s a 2-minute video featuring Councilwoman Tish James of Brooklyn and others explaining why they are rallying against Wall Street today and pushing the mayor to roll back service cuts he proposed in his budget. “It’s time that we march on Wall Street,” said James, who referred to them as “the people who were responsible for this recession.” Councilwoman Debi Rose said, “We are not going to allow the mayor to break the unions,” and “they are going to feel the wrath of working people in New York City.” Expected to march from City Hall to Wall Street today are Reverend Al Sharpton, Public Advocate Bil de Blasio, Comptroller John Liu, UFT President Michael Mulgrew and others. In the past, Mayor Bloomberg has criticized New York lawmakers who bash Wall Street, saying it’s hurtful and not the kind of treatment you’d expect to see. He equated it with the way Michigan lawmakers defend the auto industry, and Texas lawmakers defend the oil industry
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How to Cover a Protest (Starting Today)
By: Sally Cohen, Mediaite 5/12/11 This week, thousands of Americans are descending on Wall Street to protest the fact that local and state governments (including New York) are cutting social services and firing teachers while failing to go after tax dodging by big banks and other corporations. This offers a perfect opportunity to educate the news media about how to appropriately cover such political actions and confrontations — not just abroad but right here, in our own backyards. Read More
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Why Sharpton is Marching
By: Liz Benjamin, Capital Tonight 5/12/11 Organizers of this union-backed event have posted a series of videos on-line that feature participants explaining why they’re marching today. The current featured video on the site is the Rev. Al Sharpton, who says “working class people have become the sacrificial lamb of the wealthy, who manipulate the government; I march because we must stand up; I march because we must fight back.”
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Welcome to On May 12
By: James Boyce, Daily Kos 5/12/11 Today's the day. It's May 12, 2011 and enough is enough. If you are tired of watching as the banks and the people who caused our financial crisis not only get away with their crimes but get rewarded with tax breaks and government handouts, today is your day. If you are fed up with schools being closed, teachers being laid off and public services being slashed while major financial institutions get hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money, today is your day. Read More
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Don't Let Go of the Anger
By: William Cohen, New York Times Opinionator Blog 5/11/11 One of the most frustrating facts of the recently abated financial crisis is that those who might have been partly responsible for it have got off scot-free. The only two people prosecuted criminally — the Bear Stearns hedge fund managers Ralph Cioffi and Matthew Tannin — were found not guilty by a jury in Brooklyn. Other potential culprits — Angelo Mozilo, chief executive of Countrywide Financial, Joseph Cassano, chief executive of AIG Financial Products, and Dick Fuld, the chief executive of Lehman Brothers — were either slapped with a small civil penalty, in the case of Mozilo, or the Justice Department made the decision not to prosecute after months of investigation. Read More
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Bringing Wisconsin on Wall Street
By: Deyanira Del Rio, Associate Director, NEDAP, via Huffington Post The May 12 Coalition has issued a report describing how the city can equitably close the budget shortfall, including by ending tax breaks and subsidies to Wall Street that have cost New York City $1.5 billion. As the report points out, the nation's six largest banks -- JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley -- are now raking in $199 million per day in profits, and hardly need help from the city. Nor have the banks fulfilled their promises to create jobs in exchange for subsidies. JPMorgan Chase alone owes New York City 4,857 jobs, or $211.8 million in subsidies, according to the report. Read More
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New York City Teachers Union Protests Education Cutbacks, Joins May 12 ‘Mobilization’
By Akito Yoshikane, In These Times 5/11/11 The beginning of May marked Teachers Appreciation Week. But that didn’t stop cities from announcing plans to give pink slips to its educators. In New York, the union representing local teachers will rally Thursday against a proposal to eliminate more than 6,100 education jobs, the first layoffs of city public school teachers in decades. The United Federation of Teachers (UFT), which has 200,000 members in various education sectors, will join community groups and other unions at City Hall to protest a budget that sparked a wave of criticism from city officials and educators. "Mr. Mayor, it’s not going to happen, and enough is enough!", Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers, said this Saturday at the UFT’s spring conference in Manhattan. Read More
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Payback: Could New York City Squeeze Big Banks For $120 Million?
By: Matt Sledge, Huffington Post 5/11/11 A coalition of groups planning a coming rally against Wall Street bankers has hit upon an straightforward, if perhaps overly optimistic, solution for a sizable slice the city's budget shortfall. Just force the big banks to take 20 percent cut on city contracts and New York can save big, they say. The city stands to gain up to $120 million, based on the estimated $600 million in deals it has with JPMorgan, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and other corporations to perform tasks like disbursing child support payments and managing income tax remittances. Read More
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NY's 'On May 12' Actions
By: Dave Johnson, Campaign for America's Future 5/11/11 The On May 12 Coalition is holding actions in New York City tomorrow to hold big banks and corporations accountable for crashing our economy and asking them to pay their fair share to help get the country back on track. Mayor Bloomberg is asking for terrible budget cuts, while the big Wall Street firms and the big banks pay big bonuses. On May 12 has a report on the impact Bloomberg’s cuts will have, and ways the big banks can help out. Read More
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On May 12th Where Will You Be?
James Boyce, Daily Kos 5/6/11 This morning in New York City, Mayor Michael Bloomberg will propose a new budget for New York City. It will resemble many of the state budgets that we have seen proposed throughout the country, as well as the federal budget proposal drafted by Rep. Paul Ryan. They all share the same theme – the only way to fix our economy is to force-feed Americans this absurd notion of austerity. The Bloomberg plan is particularly outrageous – in addition to cuts to schools, fire houses, police precincts, and hospitals, the plan directly targets programs relied upon by the most vulnerable New Yorkers: senior centers will be closed, medical and housing services slashed for people with HIV/AIDS, homeless shelters shuttered, and tens of thousands of child care slots for the working poor will be eliminated. Read More
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Why They’re Marching
Liz Benjamin, Capitol Tonight 5/6/11 In the wake of Mayor Bloomberg’s bad news budget announcement, the labor-led coalition planning a week of action that culminates with a march on Wall Street on May 12 has released a collection of Web videos featuring march participants explaining why they decided to get involved. The video that appears below stars Mike Kink, who departed his post with the Senate Democrats not long ago to head up the Strong Economy For All Coalition. Kink and the May 12 Coalition are calling for the city to “make millionaires pay their fair share” – a push that echoes the failed effort to extend the three-year PIT increase scheduled to sunset at the end of the year. Read More