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I’m going to do a more thorough post and writeup of the events last night soon. Right now I’m exhausted and a bit demoralized, so I’ll probably get some backburner ZRC stuff going instead.
Basically, last night went down like this:
–Assembly Republicans used a sneaky and possibly illegal technical move to push the Walker bill through under literal cover of darkness at about 1 am.
–The Capitol went nuts, but the organizers and average people there managed to calm things down
–It was a long and sleepless night for me, hard to find any place to sit down, could never get any real rest.
–Wisconsin cops are eerily polite, even when asking you to move and such. In Indiana I think they’d just taze you.
More on last night and an official ZRC statement later.
Lots to see here at the Flickr set for today, but I have to get going downtown to spend the night at the Capitol, so I’ll just put up a few choice shots.
So to reiterate: our Governor seriously entertained the thought of using secret saboteurs to infiltrate the crowd and cause some sort of riot.
A crowd full of the elderly, the infirm, small children and, above all else, PEACEFUL PROTESTERS.
This man deserves a prison cell. Period.
In brighter news, the New York teachers unions sent us bagels from the only real NYC-style bagel place in town:
A cop actually took this picture for me since my hands were shaky from not eating yet in the day:
A Predator says that Walker is bad for Wisconsin:
Finally I took part in a rally off the square against lobbyists for Koch Industries, the very people who Scott Walker is so chummy with he’ll discuss his crimes over the phone:
The people in the office building watched us, and sometimes took pictures themselves.
Well, that’s about it for the day. I’m off to spend the night at the Capitol.
I’m still downtown, refueling a bit. I hit Ian’s and had a couple of slices (thanks to all the donors out there!) and then went down the block a bit to the Espresso Royale Cafe, which has good wifi and takes cards, so I could grab a chai.
Iced chai. I’m roasting in all this winter gear.
So how goes it? Pretty good! Lots of people, lots of protesters, people love the sign, some really like Zombies.
I get to chill here for another 20 minutes or so, then I have to book it to hit the Koch protest.
Got the laptop mostly charged up at a station downstairs; I have to question the wisdom of putting charging stations on the ground floor with all the crowds and limited space, but I made it work.
The wifi is a bit better today; I think it grants priority to people who’ve gotten on earlier in the day.
The firefighters came through here not long ago, had their bagpipers play a few songs. The crowd is incredibly loud and active. The unions are out all over the place. I’ve seen teamsters, laborers, pipetrade people, public sector unions obviously, I can see a longshoreman from where I’m sitting.
If Walker thinks this is going away he’s just nuts. I’ve probably seen enough people just demonstrating at the Capitol this past week to get halfway to a Walker recall. Maybe closer.
Update: The Assembly Dems came out on a catwalk above the Rotunda a couple of minutes ago. The applause was deafening.
Hey all, ZRC President John Sears here, reporting as live as a blog can be from the Wisconsin Capitol and its laughably unstable wifi.
We’re set for the long haul today. The rumor is that they’ll close the session and the Capitol tonight, but the Sierra Club is calling for a sleep-in tonight. If at all possible, I intend to join them for that. I brought blankets, a pillow, disposable toothbrush and medicine, so I should be set.
Update: I’m not actually clear if it’s the Sierra Club; the sleep-in is being run by environmental supporters at least. I’m sorry if we provided any misinformation on the ZRC blog.
I wrote previously here on the ZRC blog about Jon Stewart’s pathetic attempts to put down the Madison protests as being too ‘chanty’, and comparisons to Egypt as being outrageous, even when actual Egyptian labor leaders make them.
I wasn’t the only one to think his tiresome ‘I’m the wise man in the middle’ routine went too far:
I’m sure you were just dying for some old fashioned he said/she said punditry on Wisconsin so look no further than Jon Stewart, who is now in the process of becoming an iconic representative of the genre. It started off well, calling out the Governor on his union breaking goals. But then he turned on the Democratic Senators implying that they were being wimps instead of strategists playing for time and proceeded to denigrate the protesters as fools, taking them and the media to task for comparing these silly hippie protests with the Egyptian uprising. (Nobody’s been killed fergawdsake!) He finally took Rick Santelli to task for comparing it to 9/11 after which he went after MSNBC and Fox for being hypocrites etc, etc, etc., ending up calling the Wisconsin protests the Bizarro Tea Party.
…
I’m so glad we have Jon Stewart around to reduce all political activities of ordinary people into a clown show. It makes it much easier to maintain our ironic distance. Silly people making noises in public is really beneath all smart liberals like ourselves — the only respectable way for people to engage in politics is to let Jon Stewart explain it all to us in our special coded hipster humor, as he did in the next segment:
It gets worse, however, than I thought after watching his vomitous little hatchet job.
As it turns out, The Daily Show wanted to really, really rub our noses in their scorn for our protests here in Madison, and any foolish comparisons to Cairo (even those made by Egyptian labor leadership). So they went for an over-the-top stunt to ‘illustrate’ their point:
They brought in a camel. To Madison. In the bitter winter cold and slush and ice and snow.
“The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” has come under fire after a video taken by an onlooker was posted on YouTube this week, showing a camel – apparently brought in for a skit on the Comedy Central show – suffering alleged abuse from his handlers while shooting in the snow and sleet-filled streets of Madison, Wisconsin.
The video shows the camel being jabbed in the neck and marched around a small fence, before becoming stuck between the metal bars.
The frightened animal is then aggressively yanked forward until it slips and falls in the ice while the fence falls down. Despite the animal cowering down, handlers still try to forcefully pull up the camel.
At one point, “Daily Show” correspondent John Oliver walks in front of the camera and instructs the shooter to turn it off.
Yes, I know that’s from Fox. It’s easily verified though, since the whole thing is up on Youtube:
Jon Stewart isn’t just a despicable snob, bashing people out fighting for, yes, democracy in the face of, yes, tyranny. He’s also an animal abuser who thinks it’s appropriate to haul a big flat-footed creature out in the miserable and treacherous Madison winter to produce a snide put-down of actual populism, because he thinks it’s *rude* to raise our voices.
The ZRC is definitely boycotting The Daily Show as of *now*. Even John Oliver got in on the act, trying to cover up citizen journalism when it was inconveniently documenting his paid gig going awry. He’s a tremendous disappointment to me.
Oh, and one final point, Jon? Those firefighters who helped pull your butt out of a sling when you almost maimed an animal to ‘prove’ your point? They were carrying picket signs. Yes, that’s right; they were the same ‘chanty’ individuals you hold in so little esteem.
Just a quick update on non-protest matters to talk about this so-called ‘Whimsy Print’ for ‘Dawn of the Dead’, created by artist Dave Perillo:
What if George Romero’s classic Dawn of the Dead was a Disney animated film? Well, luckily you don’t have to worry about that happening, but this original illustration by cartoonist Dave Perillo has a certain vintage Disney quality to it – but with an underlying note of menace.
The only menace I see in ‘Dawn of the Dead’ is toward the poor Zombies, oppressed and segregated, shut out of the major economic activities of their hometown solely on the basis of Living Supremacy, then attacked by vicious cops, yuppies and eventually Tom Savini himself.
As for the print itself: while it certainly is interesting, transforming the image of the Romero Zombie in this fashion into classic cartoon styling, the art itself conveys harmful stereotypes about Zombies (brain shopping) while minimizing the suffering and Anti-Zombie violence from the film itself. Basically, it’s insensitive to the plight of the Differently Animated, and helping to whitewash this particular cultural milestone’s negative impact out of existence while pushing more modern, and irrelevant, Anti-Zombie prejudice itself.
For example: the brain-eating thing originates, at least in terms of widespread popularity, from ‘Return of the Living Dead’, a much later movie not made by George Romero; it is not present in ‘Dawn of the Dead’. At all.
Romero himself has stated emphatically that his ‘Zombies’ do not hunger for brains:
brains. What is it about being undead that makes somebody so ravenous?
First of all, why does everybody say that zombies eat brains?
Because… it’s true?
I’ve never had a zombie eat a brain! I don’t know where that comes from. Who says zombies eat brains?
I remember brains being a big zombie menu item in Return of the Living Dead back in the mid-80s, but I’m not sure if that’s where it started.
Whenever I sign autographs, they always ask me, “Write ‘Eat Brains’!” I don’t understand what that means. I’ve never had a zombie eat a brain. But it’s become this landmark thing.
(Romero in bold, taken from Vanity Fair interview here, previously discussed on the ZRC blog here)
It’s also worth noting that ‘Dawn of the Dead’ Zombies were a light powdery blue-grey, not green:
Why can’t the blue-grey Zombies get any respect? The ZRC cares about all the Differently Animated, regardless of skin coloration. We’d like the rest of the world to acknowledge the plight of the Blue-Grey Zombie just as much as the Green Zombie, the Greyish Zombie, the Mostly Flesh-Toned Zombie.
We’re very inclusive here.
So in the end we have to rate this print a firm Anti-Zombie, for downplaying the plight of Zombies in the name of pop art and humor, while pushing outmoded, yet strangely anachronistic, stereotypes about the Differently Animated:
Well, we had a very fulfilling day protesting down at the Capitol yesterday, then it all turned to custard when the site’s database had some sort of fit last night, just as we were getting spammed by fans of Aussie car modification shows.
Great, *another* attack from the cyber-mob. We’re a bit busy here guys, bear with us. Democracy at work and all that.
Then there’s this amazing video I got (you can see all our videos at the ZRC’s Youtube channel here)
Beautiful. Solidarity forever, folks! The Zombies are with you, in the hopes that one day it will be widely recognized that when Zombies work together it’s not a ‘horde’ -it’s a union.
Hey, ZRC fans. I’m reporting to you live from the second floor of the Capitol building; the crowds here are considerably larger than yesterday, and the unions are out in force.
Meanwhile, as we speak, the Assembly session is being broadcast live over the PA system; Rep. Tamara Grigsby is actually leading the crowd in chants over the live video feed. We’re so loud that she can hear us from inside the Assembly.
Seriously.
To Jon Stewart: somethings you have to be ‘chanty’ to be heard.
More updates to come.
Update #1: A rep is on now, don’t know his name, talking about how Walker’s incredibly bad performance is scaring businesses *away* from Wisconsin. Basically: businesses don’t want to spend money or expand in a state whose government is falling into chaos and whose taxpayers are out in the streets every single day.
It looks kind of… risky, you know? Illinois doesn’t have thousands of people occupying its Capitol, so far as I know. Why not stay on their side of the line?
Update #2: People talking about how if you cut state worker’s pay sharply, they cut spending and businesses go under. Gee, you think? Austerity’s killing the UK. It’s bad for everyone, Zombies included.
Remember; Zombies like to spend money. Zombies like to go out to eat. But if all the good restaurants close, where will they do so?
Update #3: Now a rep is talking about how Walker’s trying to turn Wisconsin into Mississippi; low wage, low skill, lousy schools.
Won’t someone think of the Zombie kids who need good schools?
Update #4: Now a Dem rep is talking about how the Republicans are hiding from their own constituents here in the Capitol, won’t meet them, even in private, even with the building full of cops.
Cowards. They’re as cowardly as a sheriff in a Romero movie.
Update #5: Now the national aspect of this is being brought up, how it’s happening in so many states at once, isn’t a coincidence. Talking about how some of the Republicans are or were union members themselves.
Update #6: And now mentioning how every major advance in social justice came over Conservative objection! Outstanding. To be expected from a Conservative ideology, which by definition ‘conserves’ though. Walker’s not a Conservative; he’s a Radical. Also mentioning the inevitable brain-drain when you turn highly skilled state workers into serfs. Amazing!
Gov. Walker: To speak directly to the people
2/21/2011
…
Madison—Tomorrow night at 6 pm central Governor Walker will directly address the residents of Wisconsin to discuss our current fiscal year challenges, the divisions which have arisen over the past week and his positive vision for moving Wisconsin forward.
Media outlets interested in covering this fireside chat with Governor Walker should contact WisconsinEye to obtain the live TV feed.
The fact that this clown wants to advocate busting unions in a ‘fireside chat’ makes me want to vomit. The fact that he’s so incredibly cowardly that he won’t speak to the workers who run his state or the people who’ve come to his own Capitol to protest this policy makes me sad.
The knowledge that he’s losing this badly, and that it shows this obviously, makes me very, very happy.
