Many of us have been frustrated with the seemingly unorganized and sometimes incoherent nature of the Occupy movement. It also happens to be a sorce of strength. People trying to find the message and the purpose tend to project their aspirations onto it, and thus make it their own.
A few months ago I came upon the 99% Declaration, a workgroup of the NYC General Assembly.
The purpose was to petition the government with a list of grievances for redress.
This was perfectly in line with OWS.
But the 99D's plan was to elect representitives, and if necessary, run candidates.
This is contrary to OWS's philosophy. It will neither endorse candidates nor abide representative democracy.
The problem then, was to find a way represent the grievances of the 99% while remaining within the spirit of OWS.
I labored hard to make this happen, and attended workgroups of the 99D and argued in favor of unity on the nycga.net forums.
The founder of the 99D is a lawyer and his character makes him very disinclined to find a compromise with OWS.
I thought we should drop the plan to elect candidates for public office, and reexamine how the list of grievances would be written.
This was not to be.
As the 99D's deadline approaches, national media is starting to pick up on the welcome message that OWS is formulating a group of candidates to represent the 99%. This is false.
There is now a rift within the 99D and a new group forming apart from the taint of the founder's tactics to leverage the name of OWS for the 99D's political plans.
The group is re-forming as 99 Solutions on FaceBook, and
99Solutions.org
I'm in favor of creating a well written list of grievances, from the real grievances of the 99%, but the 99D group seems to have lost faith among the hopeful.