Posted in Activism, Election 2012, Insanity, Jobs & The Economy, Social Justice, Terrorism/War on Terror

A Bombing at Occupy Maine

   October 24, 2011

Someone threw a chemical bomb at the Occupy Maine encampment in Portland last night.  Fortunately, nobody was seriously hurt.  I wonder how much more of this we’re going to see as the Occupy movement gains momentum and popular support?

I’m always amazed at the lengths the reactionary right will go to suppress ideas they can’t abide.

Police are looking for the person they say threw a chemical bomb at the Occupy Maine encampment in Portland.
Police responded around 4 a.m. Sunday morning to an explosion in Lincoln Park at Congress and Pearl Streets.

Nobody was injured in the incident, reports CBS Affiliate WGME, but the homemade bomb – made up of chemicals poured into a plastic Gatorade container – could have caused serious injury.

The Occupy movement has been nothing but peaceful but they’ve experienced violence from both the police and the reactionary right for expressing themselves in a constitutionally protected manner.  It’s shameful that America has come to this.

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45 thoughts on “A Bombing at Occupy Maine”

  1. I have long predicted that things are going to get violent before this movement is through. Furthermore, it will not only be the opponents of OWS who get violent; factions sprouting from the movement will convince themselves violence is justified.

    I wish it weren’t so.

    1. Yeah… Right. Just like and the other RWNJs predicted that #WIUnion would get violent? Piss off…

  2. SuzyMetta4TheRushLimbaughShow said: “I have long predicted that things are going to get violent before this movement is through. Furthermore, it will not only be the opponents of OWS who get violent; factions sprouting from the movement will convince themselves violence is justified.”

    So, YOU have LONG predicted OWS will get violent, huh?

    Uh huh. You and Rush Limbaugh and Karl Rove and the Koch Brothers and Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan and. . .

    Look, take your fictional rightwing propaganda, “speculation” clearly intended to diminish OWS, and stick it where the sun doesn’t shine.

    The reality is that the only violence you can point to HASN’T come from OWS.

    Do realize just how transparent you are, troll?

    1. One thing has really surprised me about this blog site in general. I find it amazing that when someone expresses the opposing viewpoint, many of you go almost immediately into name calling and insulting. It is utterly shocking to me how many of you do not possess the ability to express yourself as adults, state your comments and let it go at that. Is this what the left has become??????

      1. THAT was a reply to what I said? (*laughing*)

        I think that either you’re confusing THIS website with all of the rightwing echo chambers in which I suspect you spend most of your time or you’re just trotting out more of that fake outrage that rightwingers love to put on display.

        I couldn’t help but note that you failed to offer anything of substance in your comment, another common failing of the rightwingers, like you, who visit here.

        In any event, Fed Up, the term “troll” as it has been used here, isn’t so much perjorative as it is simply descriptive. As the progressive argument/analysis here goes, the context, timing and content of SuzyMetta4’s comment suggests that the comment is a cynical and disingenuous manipulation by a rightwinger posing as someone left-leaning and sympathetic to OWS.

        “Is this what the left has become??????”

        (*laughing*)

        Your “histrionics” aside, all that you’ve seen here is the exercise of common sense.

        Now, go back to listening to Rush excoriate President Obama for sending troops to Africa to protect innocents from a militia for no better reason than because the name of the militia has the word “Lord” in it, and he wants everyone to believe that Obama is therefore sending the troops over there to kill Christians.

        In closing, Fed Up, just a head’s up (no charge for the rhyme), you’d think a lot more clearly about things if you stopped listening to wingnut radio and/or watching Faux News, and gave the fog a chance to lift.

        1. Fed Up speaks some truth. ZB you just exactly proved it.

          You’re becoming a parody of yourself. Does every single comment that’s not written from a lockstep progressive perspective really deserve a 10 paragraph diatribe on wingnutia and faux news and other name calling? I love ya man, and to each his own, but I don’t know…just damn, man. You seriously make Sarah Palin look like she’s got teflon skin.

          That is all.

          1. Regrettably, JCG, you seem to have a bug up your butt about what I write. So be it.

            I write what’s on my mind, JCG. If you don’t like it, just move on to the next commenter, and leave what I write to the people who appreciate it.

            In any event, Fed Up had it coming.

            But I’m sure he’ll appreciate your support.

          2. @ JCG

            Me: After initially responding to your comment as I did just above, I sat back and gave it some time to “marinate”. I mean, up to this point, I have always respected and appreciated your point of view. I figured, why not kick back and see if any of it “resonated”.

            So, you ask, did any of it “resonate”?

            No, JCG. Your comment was pure crap.

            JCG: “Fed Up speaks some truth.”

            Me: Bullshit.

            JCG: “ZB [sic] you just exactly proved it.”

            Me: Again, bullshit.

            JCG: “Does every single comment that’s not written from a lockstep progressive perspective really deserve a 10 paragraph diatribe on wingnutia and faux news and other name calling?”

            Me: No, JCG, it doesn’t, and the totality of my comments reflect that it doesn’t.

            Unfortunately, in this instance FedUp was factually wrong. There’s nothing wrong with me pointing that out, or with me poking fun at someone whom I perceived to be a disingenuous rightwing troll speaking up in defense of someone else that I perceived to be a disingenuous rightwing troll or with me poking fun at rightwingers/wingnuts, in general.

            Whether it takes me 10 paragraphs or 5 or 8 or 12 or 2 is fundamentally irrelevant. I compose as I type based upon what my instincts and my intellect are telling me. Like it or don’t. I don’t really care. I’m writing to express my point of view, not to make you or people like Fed Up happy with me or with progressives, in general.

            In any event, FedUp had it coming, regardless of how you feel about it.

            JCG: “I love ya man, and to each his own, but I don’t know…just damn, man. You seriously make Sarah Palin look like she’s got teflon skin.

            That is all.”

            Me: Parody of myself?! I “seriously make Sarah Palin look like she has teflon skin”?!

            Absolute bullshit.

            Look, JCG, ask Jan Tessier or anyone else here about what they think about the way that I write. Ask yourself why you’ve been so silent, up to the time that you posted your comment just above, about my writing in all of the months that I have been posting comments at Blogging Blue if you thought that there were problems with it. It’s not like my style has changed since I first started posting them. And, while you’re at it, ask Zach why he asked me to become a contributor here if any of what you wrote was true.

            I love ya man, and to each his own, but I don’t know. . .but just damn, man, you’re acting like a [self-loathing progressive] douche.

            That is all.

          3. JCG, I forgot to mention that the mean progressives are beating up on Fed Up over on “How Will Scott Walker Pay for His Pension Premiums.”

            There are insults, like “idiot”, being used, so you’d better hurry.

            JCG, FedUp clearly comes from a rightwing perspective. I don’t begrudge him that. I do, however, begrudge him his insincerity, his faux outrage, and his disingenuousness.

            That was at the heart of the “diatribe” over which you so oddly had “the vapors”.

            I’m genuinely surprised that you didn’t “get” that.

            I expected more of you than that.

            And, instead, you gave aid and comfort to an undeserving wingnut, and attacked someone whose back you should have had. Regrettable.

              1. It’s over, Zach.

                JCG had his say. Now, I’ve had mine. Your input wasn’t really needed.

                2. LOL

                  You really crack me up.

                  You’re not the arbiter of when my input is or isn’t needed; I’ll decide that for myself.

                  1. Well, Zach, I figured that you’d say something like that. What I wrote was intended to see if you would respond as you did. I was hoping that I wouldn’t see it, but I figured that I would.

                    You unnecessarily insinuated yourself into a little contretemps which was really just between JCG and me. The reality is that your arrogant, self-indulgent, “this is MY blog”, Fred Drooley-esque input on everything just isn’t “necessary” all the time, Zach.

                    You’ve become a sanctimonious, hypocritical, myopic little Nazi, Zach. It’s truly regrettable just how much like Fred you’ve become.

                    Well, anyway, Zach, do me a favor, and just. . .fuck. . .off.

                    2. I know you’re trying your best to get under my skin, but all you’ve done with your cute little tirade is prove how utterly unreasonable and irrational you are.

                      I’ve given you a lot of leeway during your time here, and while you’ve been critical of me for tolerating folks like ray and notalib and their idiocy, you’ve proven to me that you’re nothing more than the progressive/liberal version of them.

                      Having said that, I’m done with you and you’re done with this blog.

                    3. Just for the record, I don’t think you’re responsible for the genocide of millions of Jews, Zach.

                      But reasonable people apparently might disagree.

  3. I was tuning in here to say that I wondered how Orlin would spin this. . . guess I didn’t have to wonder too long.

    1. Well, unless Orlin figured out how to move his/her static IP address from Oconto Falls to Madison, it’s not Orlin.

      As to Suzy’s comments, I don’t consider him/her to be off base. There are fringe elements within any movement, and it wouldn’t shock me if some radical element within the OWS movement did resort to violence.

      Does that make me a troll?

      1. Zach, I would consider it outrageous speculation, given the history of the movement of absolute restraint from any sort of violence. You see, it is such speculation by Chiefs of Police and by other powers that be that result in brutal arrests, macings, etc. So far, such speculation has been completely unfounded, in demonstrations across the country and the world and involving probably hundreds of thousands of people.

        The amazing thing is that people speculate about OWS but not about other groups such as the Tea Partiers, even though there were guns being carried by some of the Tea Partiers. How many macings of Tea Partiers do you remember reading about?

        And, no, I didn’t think Suzy was Orlin, but that she made a comment like he would have, turning blame or fear back onto the peaceful protestors, even though they have done nothing to merit it. Myself, I’ll wait until they vbecome violent to start with the speculating. I can already comment about a lot of violence done by police, a lot of rights violated, a lot of intolerance made real.

      2. It’s akin to asking someone if they’ve stopped beating their wife yet. It presumes a circumstance that has yet to be proven. It’s a classic trolling technique…

    2. SuzyMetta4RushLimbaugh is a cynical, propagandistic troll, but what she wrote was, at least, coherent. Orlin couldn’t write like that if his life depended on it.

  4. Don’t forget history so soon…look at the movements of the 1960s that were predominating peaceful yet included police brutality, Kent State, red neck attacks on peace protesters, Weatherman, Days of Rage…and I didn’t even touch on the Civil Rights movement.

    Once a movement starts to get some traction, the opposition will find quick, dirty and sometimes violent means in an effort to dissolve it. That just polarizes the movement into the peaceful resistors and those who retaliate…eventually the peaceful will prevail and I hope that proves true once again.

    1. This is exactly the kind of movement that creates true and lasting change.

      The rightwing naysayers can have their little “moment in the sun” during which the future of the movement can be abstractly considered uncertain [it is after all only 40 days old]. The reality is that protests like this one ended the Vietnam War, ended apartheid in South Africa, advanced the cause of equality here in America, and the list goes on.

      The fundamental sense of what is right and what is wrong will sustain OWS, just as it did these other movements. Change is going to come, and the 1% and their Congressional shills and teabagger puppets will be unable to stop it.

      I don’t agree with Zach’s willingness to so readily embrace the prospect of violence from the left, to so easily accept the troll’s premise, and, as a consequence, its anti-progressive subtext.

      Suzy’s a troll, Zach. What she wrote is part and parcel of the rightwing mantras regarding OWS. “Bunch of dirty, unemployed, communist, anti-capitalist, “screw the rich” hippies, just a heartbeat away from turning violent.” Rush Limbaugh went so far as to call them, “human debris”.

      Honestly, Zach, you need to resist your “open-minded” acceptance of the notion that SuzyMetta4RushLimbaugh’s writing about the abstract possibility of violence from OWS was an honest and sincere act just because of the kind of abstract, theoretical possibilities that exist with respect to anything that one might talk about obviously exist here.

      In the abstract, there’s a possibility that I’ll become a teabagger tomorrow, isn’t there? Think it’s actually going to happen?!

      Anyway, what you wrote obviously doesn’t make YOU a troll, Zach. The fact that you’re not a troll, however, doesn’t mean that SuzyMetta4RushLImbaugh isn’t one. She very clearly is. Phil’s right. She employed a common [rightwing] troll technique. Her timing was pretty telling, as well. Who but the rightwing is suggesting such “possibilities” right now?

      1. I suppose there is the abstract possibility that Paul Ryan will have citizens arrested at his “listening sessions,” an abstract possibility far less abstract that OWS becoming violent.

        The plain fact is that it is hard to characterize OWS as “leftist,” at least in the modern sense of the term. They seem to embody a wide range of Americans. I daresay some former Tea Partiers have joined the movement. To then imagine “leftist inspired violence” is a stretch. A big stretch. So far all we’ve seen is police violence.

      2. I didn’t “readily embrace” the prospect of violence; I simply stated that it wouldn’t surprise me. That being said, not much really surprises me these days.

        However, I do have to say thanks. It’s comments like yours that have helped me come to some very important conclusions about issues and concerns I’ve been wrestling with.

    2. There’s been no indication of any splinter movement from the OWS that is violent. None. When that happens, we can speculate, but until then, let’s focus on the real violence, shall we? Like the macing of the public by the police?

    3. the opposition will find quick, dirty and sometimes violent means in an effort to dissolve it.

      Not just “the opposition”. It’s a well-documented tactic of the FBI and CIA to plant people to spur dissent and division within movements like this (both left and right wing) in an attempt to neuter them.

  5. As Zuma said, it’s 40 days old…Weatherman didn’t spring from SDS or the Vietnam protests in the early days either.

  6. I think the most important question right now is whether OWS will endure. There are internal strains developing in Zucotti Park and winter is coming on.

    Beyond a set of demands and the development of some form of organized leadership, there’s the question of what comes next. Even ten thousand people encamped in public places in cities around America is not nearly enough to have any real impact on public policy, no matter how loudly they drum or sing in solidarity.

    Alleged internet trolls are the least of our worries.

  7. I don’t think this a momentary effort but will endure…with no assurance that the end point is anywhere near at hand.

    1. I agree with Ed.

      Steve C – I remember back when the anti-apartheid protests were starting at UC Berkeley. At the time, I thought, “No way that’s going to accomplish anything.”

      I also remember watching protests against the Vietnam War grow from modest proportions, thinking nothing much is going to come of that, into a movement of overwhelming power and scope, exemplified by the rally that I attended in i968 at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco where a couple of hundred thousand people spoke as one against the War.

      I learned my lesson back then about the power of advocating for what is right.

      Winter isn’t going to stop this, Steve. The rightwing can’t stop it. “The dike” has sprung a leak, and “the Dutch boy” can’t staunch the flow of water. The dike will give way, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but it will inevitably give way.

      Here’s another metaphor. The landslide has started. Movement on the surface belies the forces at work below.

      The national Zeitgeist has changed, the dike has been breached, the landslide has started, and the 1% must surely feel much like the racist South must have felt when the winds of equality and change began to blow in their direction back in the day

      Buck up, Steve. It’s all good.

      P.S. You’re right about Internet trolls

      P.P.S. How exactly did Fed Up fly under your radar? Don’t you eat guys like that for lunch? (*wink*)

  8. Wow. I mean wow.

    I can’t be arsed to read the entire stream of invective above. Let me just say I am no troll, but entirely in sympathy with OWS (and its cousins). I’m a social observer from the Vietnam era myself, and a student of psychology and of history.

    I’ve known many ardent pacifists and activists on the left, including my father still a Veteran for Peace at 86, and respect their integrity. But I’ve also made the acquaintance of people from the lunatic fringe within the anti-Vietnam War movement, including one serving hard time for bombing Safeway stores and causing at least one death. And don’t forget I live in Madison where the Sterling Hall bombing occurred with its unintended death.

    The bad actions of NYC cops were the beginning; the Oakland action will live in infamy. Scott Olsen is to this movement what Mohamed Bouazizi, the Tunisian fruitseller who self-immolated in 2010, was to the Arab Spring movement: A catalyst. A martyr. A face to oppression.

    It saddened me to see Phil blast me, right off the bat, because he’s one of the good guys. Phil, dude, you read me wrong. Peace out.

    1. Suzy, 99% of the people who jumped on you may have just read you wrong (or not – I’m not their spokesman!), but are otherwise fine upstanding doodz. The other 1% was dealt with.

      Your thoughts are welcome – contrarian or not.

      Personally, my mom has become quite the liberal in her older age, mostly because of how utterly insane the mainstream of the GOP has become, but still talks about how the “damn hippies” in the 60’s messed everything up with their sometimes violent radicalism. Agree or not (I don’t, FWIW), at the very least I don’t think having that view makes you an awful person (because my mom’s not awful – she’s the best mom evar!).

  9. And after all this discussion: cops shooting protester out of tree with rubber bullets, etc. in Occupy Denver. Sad, but there will be more of these stories. And every one just makes us stronger – more determined, more aggrieved.

    1. I saw some photos of it, it was pretty horrific because I saw a body lying in the middle of a road and beaten pretty badly. Is there any update on the person?

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