Occupy Wall Street is outperforming the Red Cross and FEMA in their response to hurricane Sandy. They've been fast, scarily competent, and flexible, and gone to the hardest hit areas FEMA has ignored.

They receive high praise, and in the hard hit areas like Rockaways, volunteers from Occupy are the only help they've seen. Occupy members say that ( Read more... )

Cleaning the stupa with Pockets* from Occupy last weekend:

( Whoa, these pics are bigger than I thought! Sorry, flisters. )

Last week I told Ani Drolkar ( you'll recall the meandering way I found out she was in charge) that I'd heard the DC Occupy group had tapered off,* so I wanted to focus more on our food bank. Buying canned goods is cheaper than buying supplies for sandwiches, for one thing. Plus we have a couple of families relying on it.

Well, guess what?

Come’n ( Read more... )

Well, that was ridiculously complicated.So Thursday's the day I make sandwiches. A lot of sandwiches. 50? 60? I make towers of them while I chat with Ani Samla or John. They get taken to the OccupyDC folks and any extra get shared among the homeless ( Read more... )

Okay, off to the temple to make food for the Occupy DC folks.

They've combined the two camps (Freedom Plaza and McPhearson Square) but I'm not sure how well that'll go.

The Freedom Plaza guys were a older, more mainstream. The McPhearson Square guys were young, tattooed, pierced, and as wild as Burning Man celebrants ( Read more... )

Churches, including my temple, have been bringing food to the Occupy movement in DC. The Occupiers have stood fast despite the Superbowl weekend raid ( Read more... )

Occupy DC Violently dispersed, protesters forced against fence with batons.The National Park Service has been concerned about first amendment rights ( Read more... )