They’re ba-ack!

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Daily Beast:

It’s mere days from what Occupy Wall Street organizers say will be one of their biggest protests yet, and the people down in Zuccotti Park in Manhattan’s Financial District are hopping mad. Well, at least they’re hopping.

On the afternoon of April 27 in the park, one Occupier called out a signal, and the 100 or so demonstrators-in-training began jumping up and down and converging around a single protester—a tactic intended to keep marchers together in the event of police action. It was the seventh in a series of “Spring Training” protest refresher courses held by Occupy Wall Street in preparation for May 1, a day rich with progressive significance: May Day is celebrated internationally as a day to recognize workers and labor.

OWS organizers say protests scheduled for that day will involve thousands and perhaps tens of thousands of protesters in Manhattan, the cradle of Occupy, and additional protests in other major cities, most notably Los Angeles, where organizers have called for a general strike.

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They’ve got their new spring wardrobes on and their smart phones are charged up! Look out you evil 1%ers, the Occupiers are coming for YOU! (There’s a free concert at Union Square afterwards.)

Check out this ‘graf:

Mark Bray, a 29-year-old history Ph.D. candidate at Rutgers University, said he’s been involved in planning for May Day on OWS’s side since January. A core group of about 60 or so people has been meeting at a variety of locations, Bray said, including at a Greenwich Village church, at the offices of SEIU Local 1199, and in an artist’s space near Wall Street.

(my emphasis)

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Let’s connect the dots. Whenever OWS needs to pump up their numbers they join forces with SEIU. No union is more closely identified with Barack Obama than SEIU. But OWS has nothing to do with Barack Obama.

A number of unions around the country are planning on demonstrating tomorrow. From what I have seen most of them are government or quasi-government employees.

So place your bets. Will tomorrow be the beginning of an “Occupy Spring” or a pathetic last-ditch effort by the OWS movement to seem relevant?

Here’s a hint:

UC Berkeley taking hands-off approach to new Occupy camp

UC Berkeley plans to use words instead of police power to remove about 50 Occupy members who on Sunday started farming a plot of university land in Albany called the Gill Tract, a spokesman said Tuesday.

“There’s dialogue going on and discussion going on so we can bring it to a peaceful conclusion,” said UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof. “Discussion may lead to a better outcome.”

The land near San Pablo Avenue and Buchanan Street is currently used for agricultural research, Mogulof said. A separate parcel of land just south of where the Occupy farmers have set up is slated for commercial development, including a Whole Foods and a seniors housing complex.

Mogulof said UC Berkeley police are administering daily admonishments to the group about trespassing, but the university has not issued a deadline for them to leave.

Occupy the Farm to Take Back the Gill Tract member Gopal Dayaneni said the university cut off water to the area, so the farmers are bringing in their own and hand watering 15,000 seedlings they planted to grow beans, chard, squash, broccoli and other edible items.

He also said the group has one “completely closed” composting toilet for farmers and two portable toilets.

“Our primary purpose isn’t to camp, it’s to farm” Dayaneni said Tuesday, although people are camping overnight.

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To understand how stupid this occupation is you really need to see Zombie’s post:

Before the Occupation, the Gill Tract was an agricultural research farm where twenty-somethings getting their PhDs would work the fields to grow crops, as they researched biology or how to raise better, healthier plants. But now, after this incredible revolution by Occupy, the Gill Tract has been utterly transformed into a farm where twenty-somethings work the fields to grow crops. The only difference is that before, the farm served a scientific function to improve society, and was managed by experts and hard-working students doing meaningful research; but now, it’s run by a bunch of smug amateurs and dropouts who plant store-bought seedlings in the middle of what once was a controlled research environment. Meet the new farm — same as the old farm, except worse.

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But I had to laugh at this part:

Dayaneni said the group hopes to avoid an Occupy situation where the site attracts criminals and substance abusers by imposing a rule that anyone who shows up must work.

“We’re super clear about the fact that this is a farm,” Dayaneni said. “Those who do the work make the decisions.”

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They are starting to sound like Republicans.

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