It’ll take more than exasperated politicians and appeals to institute rudimentary sanitary practices to stop the violent, dimwitted dirtballs of Occupy DC from ruining public spaces for everybody else. And they even put out a press release about it. Isn’t that cute? They can’t clean up after themselves, but they can put out a press release justifying it…
Occupy DC Is Not Leaving McPherson Square, Will Not Cave to Mayor Gray’s Political Posturing
Mayor Gray’s call for the National Park Service to unconstitutionally evict Occupy DC is more dangerous than the problems it would purportedly solve.
As Bill Line with the National Parks Service helpfully reiterated for Mayor Gray, Occupy DC is being treated as a 24-hour vigil, which the Park Service cannot shut down. “First Amendment rights and free speech rights are what are at issue here,” Line said to WTOP.
The DC Department of Health memo that Mayor Gray has cited to justify eviction of the encampment recommends a different course of action: “working together to develop a monitoring and public education plan to reduce the risk of these concerns…” It is unclear why the Mayor’s recommendation contradicts that of a team of sanitation experts.
Occupy DC will gladly work with the city, as we have worked with the Park Service from day one, to address sanitation and health concerns while maintaining the encampment in McPherson Square. Rats and sanitation are a citywide problem, and Occupy DC will be happy to resolve them in our camp.
You could start by going home, if you have one. And doesn’t this sound like a kid whining about cleaning his room? “You don’t have to tell me, I was going to anyway!”
Forceful evictions have significantly endangered lives in other occupations, and would be completely counterproductive to ensuring the safety of occupiers, especially since the cited sanitation concerns have not harmed anyone to date. Many who call McPherson Square home rely on the food and shelter the encampment provides. Eviction would not protect them from the freezing weather, but force them to endure it without the tent, food and blankets available at Occupy DC.
The sense of entitlement just drips from every word, doesn’t it? “We don’t wanna. You can’t make us. We’re more important than anybody else who wants to use this park.”
Meanwhile, the Washington Post reports:
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, under whose jurisdiction the Park Service falls, told us Friday that he will convene a meeting next week with the head of the Park Service, U.S. Park Police and others to try to “chart a path forward” for McPherson Square and Freedom Plaza, where the Occupy protest is entering its fourth month. Most immediately, federal officials plan to undertake a joint assessment with D.C. officials of health and safety conditions at both sites…
Mr. Salazar, who said he has been to McPherson Square multiple times and receives regular reports, acknowledged increasing concern about conditions at the park: “There are reports of assaults — one a day, I was told.”
One a day, that’s all? There are assaults elsewhere in DC every day, and in all the other cities in the world, so why is he picking on the Occupiers? Etc.
Personally, I hope they stick around until at least Nov. 6. I hope they provide a stark reminder of what the last 2 years, 11 months, and 27 days have brought us. Keep stinkin’ up the place, Occupiers. Keep making the rest of us sick.
BTW: Man Ordered To Stay Away From Baby Left in Tent at Occupy DC Camp in McPherson Square
P.S. A true-life tale of a real American hero, courtesy of the NY Observer:
A Greyhound bus carrying passengers from San Diego, CA to Washington D.C. dropped off 13 of its passengers in the middle of Texas on Saturday after the driver allegedly took issue with the Occupy movement.
According to the Twitter account of Road2Congress–a group that encouraged people to take Greyhound buses to the nation’s capital for a Tuesday protest–the passengers were kicked off for political discrimination. The driver, who has been identified as Don Ainsworth, kept passengers waiting for an hour while locked in the bus at a Greyhound depot in Amarillo, Texas after unloading the bags of various Occupiers. Police were called, and 13 individuals were pointed out and taken off the bus.
Thank you, Mr. Ainsworth, for doing what needed to be done.