Two video photographers capturing a moment in history. Have no idea what the plans are for their footage.

Just received this morning from “Dont Suppress OWS” working group a notice of a conference call for 9 p.m.

RE: Comments/Agenda:There’s 22 days to build for the day of mass action against the suppression of occupy and tens of thousands of people who support the occupy movement who need to know about the rally and march on Tuesday February 28 at 4pm and why they need to be there. There needs to be creative ambitious plans to get this out in a major way, reach a lot of people, and work with them to make this a powerful action, so let’s develop a strategy and some plans.

Discussion going on about the proposal from the adhoc working group on the suppression of OSW. Notice the multicolored hat at the top left of the picture (image partially blocked by video camera)..

Have no idea who she was. Definitely opposed to the proposal. Her objection made little sense but it was respected out of the protocol of OSW General Assembly. Kept barking at me to stop taking her picture and at first I did stop until I noticed that she said nothing to the videographers and others shooting away.

CASABLANCA — In a packed courtroom, Mouad Belrhouat, 24, an anti-monarchist rapper who performs as El-Haqed, or The Spiteful, was convicted last Thursday of assault and sentenced to prison and a fine.

Article by Aida Alami 

Pat Buchanan spoke out for the first time about his absence from MSNBC on a Monday radio show.
Speaking to conservative host Hugh Hewitt, Buchanan denied reports that he has been officially suspended from the network following the release of a controversial book, “Suicide of a Superpower,” which claims that America’s European values are being drowned by waves of immigration. Buchanan has not been seen on MSNBC since Oct. 22.

Gabriel Rey-Goodlatte of ColorOfChange.org reports in an email today:

Pat Buchanan and his white supremacist ideology will no longer be on TV, thanks to ColorOfChange.org and CREDO Action members.

Buchanan hasn’t appeared on MSNBC since we launched our campaign, and MSNBC President Phil Griffin just confirmed that Buchanan is suspended indefinitely1,2 because some of his ideas aren’t “appropriate for national dialogue on MSNBC.”3 While Griffin said he hasn’t decided whether Buchanan will return, media analysts say it’s very unlikely he will be allowed back.4 This is a huge victoryfor everyone who cares about keeping hateful, racially divisive rhetoric and misinformation out of the mainstream media.

Read Huffington Post story here.

Dear Professor Morris,

It’s embarrassing that I have to get to this point for any class, but unfortunately, here we are. It’s time to man up or shut up.

As you are well aware, I have been absent for more than half the class this semester. At this point in time in my life, I’m in a scenario where I have to reorganize my priorities, and this class is unfortunately an obstruction for me.

Unlike other students who have dropped this class, I’m not backing out because of the course material or your teaching. Quite the contrary, when the semester started, I was excited to take a legitimately HARD journalism course. Unfortunately, it also happened to be my 5th class, and when coupled with my current (sometimes never ending) job quest, It’s just turned out to be too much.

Therefore, as unfortunate as it is, I will be drafting up the materials to Withdraw from this class with a W, and will be coming by your office during your Monday hours for signatures (so that I may properly turn in all the paperwork by the Wednesday, Nov. 17th Deadline)

As much s**t as you took/take from the other students in the class at times, I want to let you know that I appreciated your academic style and the course setup.

It’s just a shame my work and attendance ethic could not meet up to the standards I held the class in. For that, I apologize.

Thank you for your patience, attention(!) and assistance(!) through this phase of my life, and hopefully in the future we can meet/teach under better circumstances.

-With Regret,
-[Name Withheld of Course]

As of this date, there are four students still enrolled.

So, what is this about? Read on.

Truth can wither in the throes of too much self-aggrandizement.

For the record: Casavant, with her mentor’s considerable support and help, was selected for a Chips Quinn Scholar but she never represented the WORD in that matter (as well as manner) as she alleged in her post. But that’s a minor quibble. She was blocked from the Hunter WORD facebook page for lying and deceit and for calling, absurdly, for a boycott of the publication because facebook friends didn’t agree with her reasoning. [They were a lot more tolerant of her than I was but they didn't know she was lying. I did.]

Also, there was no posting of 9/11 jokes in the WORD. Nor was there ever any consideration for that, only for a serious discussion in a restricted forum about what was appropriate and inappropriate. It has to be said that sometimes some facebook “friends “act like morons and have to be quickly dispatched.

More to come on this after the period ends, that is, the time I allotted  for a response from the news services regarding this writers queries and alerts. Also, here is the link to her tumblr page. It’s beginning to make sense why her tenure as a newspaper reporter probably was short: The truth can be daunting for those who prefer to engage in un-truths and deceptions.

Nevertheless, this whole matter will make for a great discussion in my journalism classes.

!

On my way home from Hunter College

Picture so much better as size gets bigger.

[Soon to be a Major Motion Picture — ]

Also, posted on Hunter-L

Attention D:F/M Colleagues Tami Gold***Ricardo Miranda***Bernard Stein***Kelly Anderson***Isabel Pinedo***Tim Portlock

OCCUPY D:F/M, Part 2
A Public Service Announcement 

As a result of Hunter Alumnus Jed Brandt – of Envoy & SLAM Ill Repute – being identified as one of the co-founders of the OCCUPY Newspaper, this came to mind: Colleagues proselytizing students to join the Z-Revolution should remind them to beware of nefarious, opportunistic, carpetbagging, ersatz Freedom Fighters posing as liberals, super-liberals and super-super-cool-liberal-radical-whatevers.

We don’t want our students exploited and mislead? We want them informed, right? Ersatz Freedom Fighters are worse than Barnacles. Would you not agree? I am considering a Beware List for students in my classes. How about you? Yet, I stand prepared to join you in a Zuccotti Tribute after we:

OCCUPY D:F/M and end the tyranny. End the flimflamming. Stop The Comatose Journalism – Comatose Media Studies Movement (TCJ-CMSM). Spare the department increasing dollops of ignominy. Provide students The Skinny they so rightfully deserve since they have to pay increasing tuition and we don’t want to stand accused of phony promises that D:F/M can’t deliver the goods, so to speak, that students need to compete for the best internships and grad schools.

 Remember: True Democracy Begins at Home. OCCUPY D:F/M

G Morris
D:F/M

— “Need to Know the Skinny” and “True Liberation Begins at Home” and “The Bard Had It Wrong,  But We Can Get It Right: Out with the Barnacles” posters and T-shirts could be soon in the making.

Writer’s Note: This post contains minor corrections and slight changes not included in the original post on Hunter-L.

[Soon to be a Major Motion Picture — ]

The following screed was posted on Hunter-L, a Hunter College listserv, in response to a petition posted to support OCCUPY WALL STREET. Hunter-L is used by faculty and students and staff for disseminating information and has a long history of turbulence and relevance . The petition  can be found much further down in this blog.

 >
>Democracy only can flourish if all voices are both heard and heeded …”
>

Attention D:F/M Colleagues Tami Gold***Ricardo Miranda***Bernard Stein***Kelly Anderson***Isabel Pinedo***Tim Portlock.

OCCUPY D:F/M! Part 1

A Public Service Announcement

 Yes, liberate America from those voraciously greedy, ravenously anti-Democratic, money-grabbing financiers but True Democracy begins at home. Would you not agree? For example: Who was the SlumDogVigilante who ripped down the students’ Klemente Soto Velez posters last year? Should other students be concerned about SDV stalking their projects?

OCCUPY D:F/M can address these other daunting, haunting issues as well: The cancelling last year of the Klemente Soto Velez Screening because of “hurtful” emails? Where was the Democracy in that decision? Are there more “hurtful” emails in the works? Colleagues still trying to enforce a no-flunk policy on non-tenured Colleagues: Adjuncts be wary? Allegations of Grade Appeal decisions so despicable that they can’t be posted on this listserv? There have been some lulus, right? The D:F/M Academic Freedom Mavens should have been all over this, right?

Nevertheless, together, we can address: The skeletons rattling in the closet. The ones beating on the door to get in? Should some Colleagues be concerned about their public personas going the way of the Dodo?

God(s) forbid!

Democracy begins at home. OCCUPY D:F/M! Bring Democracy home.

End Part 1.

G Morris
D:F/M

October. 24, 2011

STATEMENT BY FACULTY MEMBERS OF HUNTER COLLEGE, CUNY,
IN SUPPORT OF THE OCCUPY WALL STREET MOVEMENT

We, the undersigned faculty and staff of Hunter College of the City University of New York, express our support as professionals and citizens for the protest movement, “Occupy Wall Street.” We see it as a new, creative awakening about the need for social justice that reflects the best traditions of American democracy and resonates with democratic protests across the globe.

This movement emerged in response to the continuing economic crisis in our country and much of the world, starting with “the economic meltdown” of September 2008.  When that crisis occurred, our governmental leaders told us that the livelihoods of all Americans were threatened if we did not respond immediately with massive taxpayer support for our country’s biggest financial institutions.  They were “too big to fail.”  Since then, the endangered big banks have recovered; corporate profits have skyrocketed; executive bonuses continue unabated; thousands of small banks have been forced out of business, and millions of Americans have been put out of work.  Yet the response by our elected leaders to the many Americans who have suffered because of the irresponsible and dangerous behavior of a few has been meager.  Since 2008, thousands of families have had their homes taken from them; students are increasingly burdened by colossal debt to pay for their college education; New York State’s governor remains intent on lowering taxes for the richest New Yorkers while cutting back on education and health care, and economic inequality has reached its greatest heights in this country since the Great Depression.  These economic and political phenomena evidence a continuing policy that regards most Americans as “too little to help.”

Democracy only can flourish if all voices are both heard and heeded and if the political order is understood.  The Occupy Wall Street movement has given voice to citizens from across the political spectrum that have been neither heard nor heeded; it has shed light on the way in which the economic and political system in our country unfairly, but really, works.  In this vein, it honors free speech, intellectual inquiry, and human well-being.  It also has found common ground with economically and politically disenfranchised persons throughout Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, Africa, Asia, and Australia–all protesting corrosive inequalities.

As civic intellectuals and professors at a great public university, we hereby declare our support for this important movement.  In so doing, we join our colleagues in colleges and universities across the nation and the world.  May it grow.

SIGNATORIES

John R. Wallach (Political Science/Human Rights)
Ros Petchesky (Political Science/Women & Gender Studies)
Tami Gold (Film & Media Studies)
Bernard Stein (Journalism, Film & Media Studies)
(continued)
Gregory Johnson (Anthropology)
Isabel Pinedo (Film & Media Studies)
Rupal Oza (Director, Women & Gender Studies)
Diana Conchado (Spanish, Romance Languages)
Ricardo Miranda
Sarah E. Chinn (English)
Tim Portlock
Cheryl Harding
Kelly Anderson

At the J Walter Thompson agency on Lexington Avenue, 46 Street today.

The nervous energy before the start of the press conference announcing the SUS campaign to help U.S. military vets and soldiers could not be denied. And then things got serious.

There wasn't a dry eye in the place by the end of the press conference.

WORD writers got an unexpected dose of real-world journalism and rose to the occasion. Lots of stories in the works.

Each day 18 current or former military personnel take their own lives. Over 2,300 active duty members of the U.S. Armed Forces have killed themselves since January, 2001.

Listen here.

[Editor's Note: For some reason yet to be understood, the mp3 connection doesn't work with Firefox. Safari works. Sorry about that.]

Click here for AftertheParade on Facebook.

SUS: Unemployment also is a problem. Click here for radio announcement.

Marine Corps News reports:”The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday, November 4, that the national unemployment rate remains mostly unchanged at 9 percent, while the jobless rate for veterans of all generations dropped to 7.7 percent in October, down from 8.1 percent in September.

But for Iraq- and Afghanistan-era veterans who left active duty since 2001, the unemployment rate for October was 12.1 percent, up from 11.7 percent in September and from an average of 10.5 percent in 2010. Read more here.

The New York Department of Housing and Urban Development calculates that there are approximately 3,500 homeless veterans in the Big Apple. NYC.gov reports that the law allows 3,100 year-round food vending permits. Do the math. Homelessness Radio Short.