Traffic light topples over on crowd at Lollapalooza

Guy climbs traffic light during rain delay at Lollapolooza, topples over on crowd. Luckily, nobody was hurt.

Immigrants Picket For Affordable Medications

Our Lady of Guadalupe Anglican Mission leads a march on Walgreens for affordable medications.

The purpose of the march is to engage Walgreen's, and hopefully other drug store chains, in the mission's quest to obtain organ transplants and supporting medication for several undocumented immigrants in need of life saving procedures. One liver transplant has already been performed and several other immigrants have earned a place on a waiting list. We are asking Walgreens and other pharmaceutical providers to assist Jorge Mariscal, Bernardo Manchaca, Martin Hernandez Elfego Arroyo, Lorenzo Arroyo, and Marcela Hernandez, in obtaining appropriate medication at affordable prices for these patients following their organ transplants. At the press conference, we will update the community in our ongoing efforts with community area hospitals. We are inviting the community to participate in our effort to bring hope for those with out hope.

José S. Landaverde
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_S._Landaverde
José Sigfredo Landaverde (September 2, 1971) is a community organizer, activist, and priest at Our Lady of Guadalupe Anglican Catholic Church, located in the largely Mexican neighborhood of Little Village in South Side Chicago. He is also the co-founder and former executive director of the Latino Union.

Salvadoran Priest Celebrates 5 Years in Chicago Mexican Neighborhood
http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=546717&CategoryId=23558

Taste Of Chicago 2012

Windy City Cowboys at the 2012 Chicago Pride Parade

Windy City Cowboys
~ The Cowboys were founded in January 2008, as Miller was inspired by the D.C. Cowboys' performance at the closing ceremony of the 2006 Gay Games at Wrigley Field. He thought a similar group would be a great addition to the line up of gay performance groups in Chicago—so he started the search for fellow entertaining Cowboys.

"The main goals of the group are to entertain audiences at, and keep them coming to, gay functions, including pride parades, rodeos, street festivals and fund-raising events, such as the AIDS Walk," Copple said. "We are not associated with any specific charity, and that is not our mission or goal. We have, however, donated to a few charities after we have held fundraisers for the group over the last two years. The Cowboys is mostly self-funded by its members, who pay dues for the season. Those dues pay for our rehearsal space, the truck and sound system rentals for parades, etc." ~
http://www.windycitymediagroup.com/gay/lesbian/news/ARTICLE.php?AID=28438

Free Admission Day at the Shedd Aquarium. Just get in line.

97 degrees in Chicago. The sign said 90 minutes, but it was more like two hours for some.

The Polkaholics at 6 Corners BBQ Fest - Talking with Dandy Don

The Polkaholics at 6 Corners BBQ Fest
"They said it couldn't be done" Polka on guitars!

http://chicagopolkaholics.com/
Jolly James Wallace on bass and vocals, Dandy Don Hedeker on guitar and vocals, and Stylin' Steve Glover on drums and vocals

The Polkaholics featured on Centerstage Chicago
http://www.centerstagechicago.com/music/whoswho/ThePolkaholics%AE.html
~ The band puts the oomph back in oom-pah and a punk edge on polka. Guitarist 'Dandy Don' Hedeker formed the Polkaholics in '97 by fusing his two main influences: the polka standards of Windy City polka king Lil' Wally and the '70s punk explosion of late guitar god Johnny Thunders (of New York Dolls). What began as a crash-course cover of the traditional 'Beer Barrel Polka' grew into a deep respect for Windy City polka forerunners like The Pala Brothers, The Naturals and Eddie Zima. Punk and polka was an unlikely mixture, but Dandy Don made it work ~

All song used with permission of the artists.

Water Taxi up the Chicago River - Raw Unedited

New CTA Green Line Station at Morgan Street

CTA Morgan Street Station
ARCHITECT: Ross Barney Architects
http://www.r-barc.com/places/?name=CTA+Morgan+Street+Station
CLIENT Chicago Department of Transportation
PROGRAM New Transit Station; Green Line
COST $30.5 million
STATUS Complete 2012

The $38 million station, which Mayor Rahm Emanuel formally opened Thursday, serves the Pink and Green lines and can be found at Lake and Morgan streets, about half a mile west of the Ogilvie Transportation Center. But you're bound to see it before you get there.

The station's spectral stair towers and glass-sheathed transfer bridge rise airily above the hard-edged warehouses and cold meat lockers of the West Loop, also home to trendy restaurants and galleries. The area, it's been said, is in transition from slaughterhouses to art houses.
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-05-29/news/ct-met-kamin-morgan-0528-20120529_1_cta-project-station-red-line

Chicago Blues Festival 2012 ~ Lil' Ed & The Blues Imperials and others

The 29th Annual Chicago Blues Festival
 Lil' Ed & The Blues Imperials
With Mary Lane and the No Static Blues Band

Wage Theft In Chicago's Little Village (English & Spanish)

ARISE Chicago Worker Center member Noemi Hernandez was not paid the Illinois sate mandated minimum wage and was denied overtime while employed at the Gislex Bridal stall at the Discount Mall in Chicago's Little Village neighborhood. When she complained to owner Maribel Flores, Noemi was promptly fired and denied back pay that was owed to her.

Furthermore, Flores told other employees not to befriend Noemi under threat that they would have their legal status investigated by authorities, thus revealing that Flores knowingly employs and exploits undocumented workers at the Discount Mall. Hernandez is, in fact, an American citizen and immune to such threats, however this had a chilling effect on support by her fellow employees, regardless of their status.

ARISE Chicago representatives attempted on numerous occasions to contact Flores and negotiate on behalf Fernandez, but to no avail. Finally lawyers for Flores offered Hernandez $500, representing 5% of what ARISE was able to determine that Noemi is owed under the current rate of $8.50 and hour, the Illinois legal minimum wage.

http://www.arisechicago.org

Chicago Police clash with NATO protesters. May 20, 2012

May 20, 2012 ~ NATO Summit Protest
At the corner of Michigan Avenue and Cermack in Chicago. A half mile from the NATO Summit at McCormick Place. Five minutes after the end of a peaceful march and rally to protest NATO.

Chicago Police and Cook Country Sheriff's Police surround and advance on the crowd. Even though Supt. McCarthy was on hand to directly command the police detail, no order to disperse was given to the crowd. Front ranks simply began to slowly advance into the crowd, who up until this point had given no sign of resistance. Finally, a column of protesters is seen here preparing to resist the advancing police phalanx.

NATO Protests - Occupy Demonstrators "Kettled" at Jackson and LaSalle

Occupy demonstrators stop and rally at Jackson and LaSalle streets at the end of a day of marches and violence at the hands of Chicago Police. In this video you can hear organizers telling everyone to "go home".

Suddenly, a phalanx Chicago Police wearing riot helmets and carrying batons advanced at a trot west on Jackson and formed a menacing line anchored at the corner of the Board of Trade Building.

No order to disperse was given. You can hear me asking repeatedly if we were being detained or if we were free to leave. I received no answer at any time.

Chicago Police Superintendent McCarthy arrived on scene and conferred with his commanders. Shortly after this last clip ended, the police moved aside and let the demonstrators proceed west on Jackson in an attempt to disperse.

It was only minutes after these events that a police van struck several demonstrators without warning, injuring one who was transported to the hospital.

NATO Protests - Occupy takes to the streets

Occupy holds it's first "un-permitted" march during the NATO Summit in Chicago

May Day 2012 ~ Occupy Chicago Takes The Streets

May Day 2012
Occupy Chicago makes it's way to Union Park

NATO Protests - Tom Morello plays in Chicago

Tom Morello plays The Night Watchman at a rally for National Nurses United.

Tom Morello Gets Fired Up at Chicago Nurses Rally - The Rolling Stone
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/tom-morello-gets-fired-up-at-chicago-nurses-rally-20120518#ixzz1vKVuixTq
"The crowd consisted largely of Occupy Chicago supporters and nurses wearing red scrubs and green "Robin Hood" hats, in a nod to the Robin Hood tax that would essentially tax financial institutions a minimal percentage for transactions. The rally was originally supposed to coincide with the G8 summit in Chicago this week, but it was rescheduled around this weekend's NATO conference after the summit was moved to Camp David."

The Wildest Chicago Cubs Tradition - Gen. Sheridan's Horse

In Baseball, when a National League team plays it's first away game in Chicago, it is traditional for the rookie players to be sent out into the night with a paint can, a brush and a map to the corner of Belmont and Sheridan Road, about a mile east of Wrigley Field. There they paint their team colors on the testicles of Sheridan's famous stud, Winchester.

http://bluebattinghelmet.wordpress.com/2012/01/15/a-rude-baseball-tradition/
A baseball tradition that you've never heard about

http://www.si.edu/Encyclopedia_SI/nmah/horse.htm
"Winchester," General Philip H. Sheridan's War Horse
Stuffed and on display at the Smithsonian museum of the Military Service Governors Island, New York.

http://www.sonofthesouth.net/union-generals/sheridan/poem-sheridans-ride.htm
Sheridan's Ride by Thomas Buchanan Read

May Day 2012 ~ Frente Autentico de Trabajo mounting a plaque at the Haym...

Benedicto Martinez Orozco, a leader of the Mexican union federation Frente Autentico de Trabajo, mounting a plaque from our Mexican brothers and sisters in the FAT.

Illinois Labor History Society
http://www.illinoislaborhistory.org/component/content/article/65-labor-slides/326-may-day-2012.html

Syrian's in Chicago Call For "No-Fly-Zone" - Rally & March

Chicagoan's join the Syrian-American community - and others worldwide via the Internet - in a rally and march to show support the Syrian Revolution. Internet bloggers set out live-streamed video that reportedly was simulcast on television news in the Middle East and seen in Damascus and Beirut.

"Sarah Palin Tea Parody" Art Cooker

J. Taylor Wallace brought his ornamental metal "art cooker" - Sarah Palin Tea Parody - to the Bridgeport Art Center in Chicago, Illinois, from the National Ornamental Metal Museum Cooking Extravaganza in Memphis, Tennessee

http://www.jtaylorwallace.com

Sarah Palin statue finds a home in Chicago
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/culture/la-et-cm-sarah-palin-statue-20120418,0,295442.story

Sarah Palin Sculpture To Roast A Pig At Bridgeport Arts Complex
http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2012/04/20/sarah-palin-sculpture-to-roast-a-pig-at-bridgeport-arts-complex/#photo-1

Lisa Fithian on Black Bloc Tractics

Activist and organizer Lisa Fithian addresses Black Bloc tactics during a training session with Occupy Chicago in preparation for the spring NATO Summit.

Lisa worked with Abbie Hoffman at Save the River in Clayton NY on the St. Lawrence River in the 1980's. In 1987 she helped Shut Down of the CIA Headquarters in Langley, VA where over 600 people were arrested.  1990 action at the White House commemorating the assassination of Archbishop Romero where over 500 were arrested. During seven years as coordinator of the Washington Peace Center, Lisa organized hundreds of actions on a range of issues both locally and nationally, including the first Gulf War and Palestinian Intifada. She also helped lead an extensive seven year anti-racist process that successfully transformed the Peace Center into a truly multicultural organization.
http://organizingforpower.wordpress.com/movement-history/about-lisa/


~ Black Bloc ~
'A black bloc is a tactic for protests and marches, whereby individuals wear black clothing, scarves, ski masks, motorcycle helmets with padding, or other face-concealing items.[...] The clothing is used to avoid being identified, and to, theoretically, appear as one large mass, promoting solidarity.

Black Bloc protests first came about in the 80s in Europe and were a part of the anti-World Trade Organization demonstrations in Seattle in 1999. Protest techniques are disruptive and volatile. They include rioting, vandalism and fighting as well as assistance to fellow protesters in fleeing police. These techniques are probably why many who casually mention Black Bloc protests online often include the word, "anarchists."

In some instances Black Bloc protesters may actually be cops, as demonstrated by the Quebec police who went undercover during protests there in 2007.'
http://www.observer.com/2012/01/occupy-wall-streets-solidarity-sunday-what-are-black-bloc-protesters/

The term "autonomist" is used here to designate a dominant, though by no means the only, characteristic of this particular tradition: the emphasis on the autonomy of the working class in its struggle against capital as well as on the autonomy of various groups of workers vis ˆ vis others of their class. In an earlier incarnation this course was labeled "social capital theory," a title which evokes another aspect of this tradition: the explicit recognition of the systematic extension of capitalist domination and of class struggle throughout the social fabric of the 20th Century, of the emergence of the "social factory" and of the struggles to destroy and escape it. There are many other titles which might be used. None have gained currency either among the practitioners of this tradition or among their opponents, at least not in the English speaking world. In Italy, Germany, and France, where some of the most interesting developments in this tradition have taken place, the general political "space," as the Italians say, occupied by this tradition is called Autonomy or Workers' Autonomy. Autonomist Marxism is thus an adaptation of that designation.
https://webspace.utexas.edu/hcleaver/www/387Lautonomistmarxism.html

"Chris Drew Way" dedicated by Occupy Rogers Park, Chicago

Chris Drew is an artist and an activist. In 2009 Mr. Drew was arrested while challenging peddlers licencing laws in Chicago. While in lock-up, police discovered that Mr. Drew had been carrying an audio recorder. Cook County Attorney General Anita Alverez prosecuted Mr. Drew under Illinois Electronic Eavesdropping law.
http://www.americanpressassociation.com/a_chris_drew.php


The Illinois legislature fell short of changing the twice declared unconstitutional eavesdropping law on Thursday, March 22, 2012.
http://chicagoist.com/2012/03/22/illinois_house_kills_eavesdropping.php

As a person charged under this law and still facing up to 15 years in prison for audio recording my own public arrest for the misdemeanor of selling art for $1 on State Street, I have an opinion about this. This law is used to protect corruption in Illinois.
What I did on State Street in December, 2009, is totally legal in 47 other states in America! Why is it not legal in Illinois? From my research it appears that in 1994, in order to shield police and other public officials from being captured in public with their pants down, the Illinois legislature changed the eavesdropping law. They took the law that was meant to protect our private conversations, largely from government intrusion, and turned it upside down to protect public employees (government) from public embarrassment by its citizens. This turned the recording of public conversations of government into secrets illegal to be reported by solid evidence. They did this by changing the very definition of eavesdropping from the recording of a private conversation to being defined as the recording of a private or a public conversation. This defies logic!
http://www.c-drew.com/blog/

A personal message from Chris Drew

I looked up from my camera and Chris Drew was crossing the street. Where was the wheelchair? He walked right passed the crowd in front of the galley to the corner where I stood alone. I could see he didn't have his oxygen tank. "Let's do this now while I'm still here" he said and glowered into the lens like Churchill.

Chris Drew is an artist and an activist. In 2009 Mr. Drew was arrested while challenging peddlers licencing laws in Chicago. While in lock-up, police discovered that Mr. Drew had been carrying an audio recorder. Cook County Attorney General Anita Alverez prosecuted Mr. Drew under Illinois Electronic Eavesdropping law.
http://www.americanpressassociation.com/a_chris_drew.php


The Illinois legislature fell short of changing the twice declared unconstitutional eavesdropping law on Thursday, March 22, 2012.
http://chicagoist.com/2012/03/22/illinois_house_kills_eavesdropping.php

As a person charged under this law and still facing up to 15 years in prison for audio recording my own public arrest for the misdemeanor of selling art for $1 on State Street, I have an opinion about this. This law is used to protect corruption in Illinois.
What I did on State Street in December, 2009, is totally legal in 47 other states in America! Why is it not legal in Illinois? From my research it appears that in 1994, in order to shield police and other public officials from being captured in public with their pants down, the Illinois legislature changed the eavesdropping law. They took the law that was meant to protect our private conversations, largely from government intrusion, and turned it upside down to protect public employees (government) from public embarrassment by its citizens. This turned the recording of public conversations of government into secrets illegal to be reported by solid evidence. They did this by changing the very definition of eavesdropping from the recording of a private conversation to being defined as the recording of a private or a public conversation. This defies logic!
http://www.c-drew.com/blog/

Occupy Chicago Adopts the "Chicago Principles" of Non-Violence

The Chicago Principles

• Our solidarity will be based on respect for a political diversity within the struggle for social, economic and environmental justice. As individuals and groups, we may choose to engage in a diversity of tactics and plans of
action but are committed to treating each other with respect and working towards a common goal of peace and justice.

• As we plan our actions and tactics, we will take care to maintain appropriate separations of time and space between divergent tactics.

• We oppose any state repression of dissent, including surveillance, infiltration, disruption, limiting our action to "free speech zones," and violence, or attempts to divide our movement through the conscious creation of divisions regarding tactics, organization, strategies, and alliances.

• Any debates or criticisms will stay internal to the movement, avoiding any public or media denunciations of fellow activists and events.

MLK Day 2012 - Occupy the Dream - A celebration and public meeting

Occupy the Dream
A celebration and public meeting.

Keynote speaker: Rev. Dwight Gardner
President Northwest Indiana Federation of Interfaith Organizations

Make Wall Street Pay, Illinois Members Organization:
Chicago Coalition for the Homeless
IIRON, Illinois People's Action
Lakeview Action Coalition
National People's Action
Northside P.O.W.E.R.
S.O.U.L., IIRON Student Network,
Northern Indiana Federation of Interfaith Organizations

Occupy Chicago

Occupy Chicago Bites the "Invisible Hand" of Market Economics - Occupy t...

Chicago Police ordered Occupy to move the table - w/"Rahm-en noodle" cooker. Volunteers are seen keeping the table in motion during the hour and a half demonstration.

Chicago Teachers Union and Occupy Rally Against More School Closings

Chicago Teachers Union, Occupy Chicago Protest School Closures
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/14/chicago-teachers-union-oc_n_1148033.html?ref=chicago
Hundreds of parents, teachers and activists gathered outside Chicago Public Schools headquarters Tuesday night to protest proposed closures, phaseouts or "turnarounds" of several neighborhood schools.

Starting around 6 p.m., members of the Chicago Teachers Union and Occupy Chicago gathered outside the headquarters, 125 S. Clark St., chanting "Save our schools!" and many stayed overnight. The group wanted to make sure they were allowed inside Wednesday's Board of Education meeting -- where board members are expected to vote to open 12 new charter schools.

Rev. Billy Talen visits Occupy Chicago with Rainforest Action Network

The Most Reverend Billy Talen comes to Occupy Chicago to preach in front of the Bank of America and the Federal Reserve Bank.

Rainforest Action Network http://ran.org/
More recently, Reverend Billy has been lending his talents to the Occupy movement. According to the Rev: "We are meditating on this year's Buy Nothing Day activities, with all the Occupy Wall Street energy. Certainly surprised by the acquittal. The judge was a former prosecutor and apparent Republican. Maybe he's come over to the 99%."

The week started out with a visit to Bank of America's regional office in downtown Chicago with Reverend Billy.
http://understory.ran.org/2011/12/13/chicagos-week-of-action-against-bank-of-america/
Last week, RAN teamed up with Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization, Occupy Chicago, and Reverend Billy for a week of action against B of A highlighting the bank's $4.3 billion dollars invested in the coal industry and its impacts on local communities in Chicago.


Resurrecting mountains at Chase lobbies on Easter Sunday
http://www.revbilly.com/mud-mountain-2
"The Reverend preached to a sidewalk crowd through a white megaphone. When the Choir reached their second destination at Astor Place, three NYPD squad cars surrounded the action. Rev. Billy told the officers taping his speech that he was leaving a message for JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon in a plastic Easter egg on the peak inside the lobby. As Talen concluded his sermon, the NYPD demanded that he remove the miniature mountain from the floor of the ATM lobby, which Rev. Billy refused to do. He was subsequently arrested."

The Church of Life After Shopping http://www.revbilly.com/


The Revolujah! Will Be Performed: Reverend Billy's Reality Joke
By Nathan Schneider ~ Religion Dispatches
http://www.religiondispatches.org/archive/culture/5385/the_revolujah!_will_be_performed%3A_reverend_billy%E2%80%99s_reality_joke/
Insofar as New York City's streets are themselves a theater, Reverend Billy has been one of its stars, or star hecklers, for more than a decade. From his early preaching at the Disney Store at Times Square, to the "real" church that grew around him in the wake of 9/11, to the role he has played in giving shape to Occupy Wall Street, Billy Talen, together with his wife and partner Savitri D, have blended radical politics with prophetic preaching in a way that unsettles the usual categories of religious and secular, performance and regular life.

Occupy Chicago, faculty and students stage successful Sit-In at union-bu...

Participating members and supporters of Occupy Chicago joined students and faculty of Columbia College in Chicago during a day long sit-in during a meeting of the college's board of trustees on December 7, 2011. Faculty members of the Part-time Faculty Association, or P-FAC, an Illinois Education Association affiliate, have been in protracted labor negotiations. They demanded, and achieved by the end of the day (with Occupy Chicago's help) an agreement to host a town hall meeting involving students, faculty and administrators to discuss the issues behind the impasse.

Labor Unrest at Columbia College, Northeastern Adjuncts, unions at local schools fight for contract, job security
By Deanna Isaacs ~ Chicago Reader March 03, 2011
http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/columbia-college-northeastern-illinois-union-labor/Content?oid=3350082
Columbia, which grew from a privately owned broadcasting school, was a groundbreaker in the classroom use of working professionals, building a reputation as a gloves-off place where students learn by doing under the guidance of mentors who can give them a leg up when they enter the job market. It's taken a couple generations for the rest of academia to catch on to the financial advantages that offers over the traditional tenure system, but now universities are loading up on part-time, contract scholars, who typically work sans benefits and job security, and often for burger-flipper wages.

It's a situation ripe for the push-back a union can supply—and here again Columbia has been ahead of the curve. The school's adjuncts have had representation from the Part-time Faculty Association, or P-fac—an Illinois Education Association affiliate—for 13 years. But union president Diana Vallera says that until a new slate of officers was elected in November, it was a sleepy, sweetheart arrangement. Member interest was low and the union was relatively inactive. There wasn't even a record of any grievances having been pursued.

Pastor onThe Roof, Corey B. Brooks Welcomes Occupy Chicago

Donate to Project Hood
http://www.projecthood.org/Home_Page.html

Occupy Chicago Joins Motel Occupation ~ Gapers Block
http://gapersblock.com/mechanics/2011/12/04/occupy-chicago-occupy-the-motel/
At 7p.m. tonight, Occupy Chicago will hold its first overnight occupation on the South Side following a general assembly on property owned by New Beginnings Church. The church is hosting the event in conjunction with its own occupation of the derelict Super Motel at 6625 S. Martin Luther King Blvd, which is across the street from its main sanctuary. Its pastor, Corey B. Brooks, has been camping on the roof of the motel for a dozen days and fasting on water alone.

http://www.chicagonow.com/ndigo-chit-chat-all-that/2011/11/occupy-king-dr-a-pastors-view-from-the-roof-part-2-day-6/
It's been 15 days fasting without food, only drinking water; 6 days and counting, living on the rooftop of an abandoned motel in the cold, rain and now some snow.

This morning I was reading twitter messages and I came across a tweet by LL Cool J that expresses my sentiment, he quoted John Churton Collins, "In prosperity, our friends know us; in adversity, we know our friends."

Since I've never had to live on the roof of an abandoned motel and I've never had to raise $450,000 to get rid of a community eyesore, I don't know how to feel about where we are so far.  The only thing I can measure our commitment to the cause to is Black Friday, which yielded a total of $52 Billion dollars in sales, in just  1 one day and today, economists are expecting record sales for Cyber Monday (the beginning of online sales for Christmas).

Carbon Trading ~ Pollution As A Commodity ~ Occupy Chicago hosts Family ...

Family Farm Defenders executive director, John Peck, participated in a protest against carbon trading outside the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on Mon. Dec. 5th. He was joined by about 25- 30 others, including climate justice allies from Occupy Chicago, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, Rising Tide North America, Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), among others.
http://familyfarmers.org/

CONTACT
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PHONE/FAX: (608) 260-0900

EMAIL: familyfarmdefenders AT yahoo DOT com