How The Banks Plan To Take-Down #OccupyWallStreet

When you’re serious about protecting your interests, you do whatever you need to in order to take down a threat. A DC lobbyist with links to the financial industry has proposed an $850,000 plan to take on Occupy Wall Street and politicians who might express sympathy for the protests, according to a memo.

Watch MSNBC’s report on the story here – and enjoy some classic quotes from the memo:

• “However the bigger concern should be that Republicans will no longer defend Wall Street companies – and might start running against them.”
• “The cost and reach of [paid advertising] makes it a strategic advantage for [the banks] in a message war against a grassroots movement like OWS.”
• “If vilifying the leading companies of [the financial sector] is allowed to become an unchallenged centerpiece of a coordinated Democratic campaign, it has the potential to have very long-lasting political, policy and financial impacts on the companies in the center of the bulls-eye.”

Link Living 22.11.11

• The UC Davis English Department are awesome.
• Tory women: why “female” and “feminist” aren’t interchangeable. Alyson Macdonald.
• Occupy The Future.
• What does Love In The Time Of Climate Change look like?
• The terrifying intentions of Eurozone technocrats. Ann Pettifor.
• A great metric for determining whether your idea is world-changing or not. Natalya Sverjensky.
• Paul Polman, Unilever CEO, has some sensible things to say.
• Let’s Work Together – a chart topper for striking workers?

The Revolution Is Love

Link Loving 21.11.11

• A better version of Coke, or no Coke at all? Stephen King.

Link Loving 20.11.11

• Hilariously cynical ‘Devil’s Dictionary’ from 1911. Ambrose Bierce.
• Beautiful (!) climate impacts website from Wisconsin (of all places). h/t Rich Hawkins.
• Daniel Kahneman single-handedly destroys the assumptions we hold around bankers and the reasons for their success. Natalya Sverjensky.
• The future is here: Angola offers help to struggling Portugal. Joshua Keating.
• How exactly does energy efficiency investment create jobs? Casey Bell.
• Joshua Kahn Russell and Hilary Moore have put together a super booklet for activists who don’t come from front-line communities but want to be part of a powerful climate justice movement.
• Seth Godin says no.

What A Speech

Listen to this. Fantastic stuff from Michael D Higgin. (Get’s going after 2-3 minutes.)

Link Loving 19.11.11

• Have you been mic-checked? Michelle Bachman, Karl Rove, Scott Brown, even the Vermont Democratic Party have.
• Fascinating snippet-look at what is happening on the tech/social change front in Romania. Antonella Napolitano.
• Terry Border imagines everyday objects in romantic and risqué scenarios – hilarious little sculptures. Maria Popova.
• Justice for whom? The protestors who facilitated meetings in Fortnum and Mason’s in March are found guilty. Adam Ramsay.
• 10 reasons why Obama will win in 2012. David Rothkopf.
• At least ten times as many women are now trafficked into brothels annually as African slaves were transported to the New World in the peak years of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Nicolas Kristoff.
• A wonderful short video bio of Fritz Schumacher – economist and author of Small Is Beautiful.

Corporate Income Tax As A Share Of Corporate Profits

It isn’t pretty.

Link Loving 18.11.11

• My new favourite older lady – Dorli Rainey, an octogenarian activist speaking about Occupy Seattle after being pepper-sprayed by the police.
• Switzerland fact of the day. Tyler Cowen.
• A 101 to UN Security Council politics. David Bosco.
• You know the world is truly screwed with article titles like ‘Love Your Business More Than Your Family’. Thanks Entrepreneur magazine.
• A better way to Occupy Wall Street. John Gapper.
• One Society is recruiting a (paid, part-time) campaign intern.
• Is 3D printing a step towards ending our throw-away culture? Charlotte Ricca-Smith.
• Is It Time to Hold a Constitutional Convention? Alesh Houdek.

Personal Stories In A Newsletter

Great work from the new economics foundation:

• clear relationship between personal experience of inequality and report
• photo – smiling, looking into the camera
• immediate introduction, ‘hello – my name’s Faiza’

Similar learning in the Rockwood newsletter:

• humour, showing personality
• sharing humanity of not knowing