If you have been following the news on the various Occupy movements around the country, you have probably seen the footage of police crackdowns on peaceful protesters in many places. Probably the harshest recent crackdown was in Oakland, California where tear gas canisters, bean bag rounds, rubber bullets, and flash-bang grenades were fired into crowds in an effort to clear out the Occupy Oakland encampment. An Iraq veteran marine named Scott Olsen was critically wounded by a police projectile that hit him in the head, fracturing his skull. He is still in the hospital, unable to speak.
The General Assembly of Occupy Oakland has passed a resolution calling for a General Strike to shut down Oakland in protest of police brutality, corporate oppression and economic injustice. They are asking all people in Oakland to, instead of going to work or to school, instead come to Oscar Grant Plaza and join the Occupy group. They are demanding that financial institutions close that day, or they will march there and close them down. They are planning to march to the Port of Oakland and shut it down.
They are asking everyone in Oakland to Occupy Everywhere. Perhaps those who support the Occupy movement or even just support free speech and the right to assemble and protest, and those who are appalled by police violence against unarmed, peaceful protesters but who do NOT live in Oakland, should take it upon themselves to spread the General Strike. Stay away from work or school that day and gather together to Occupy Everywhere. If the 99% are to show their economic impact, a successful general strike would be a powerful way to do it.