Comments on: Paradise defiled: Occupy Charlottesville seeks rape whistle donations

By: Beach Bum

Beach Bum — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 18:11:55 +0000

Bleach, please.

By: Agnes Cross-White

Agnes Cross-White — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 03:30:19 +0000

Those people are vermin in need of de-lousing. They have no plans, no agenda, except to sponge off society.They are a bunch of whiners who think someone owes them a living. Newt is right, "get a bath and get a job." Tea Party events are not crime-ridden and filthy. A little soap and water, PLEASE.

By: Blair Hawkins

Blair Hawkins — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 23:51:28 +0000

@Harrison – IMO there’s nothing Unconstitutional about a locality deciding to provide for social services, that is between them and their voters.

Not all social services- a park or road is a Constitutional social service. Think of welfare- my friends and I can’t get together and force you to contribute to a fund to help poor people. Rule of law means, with few exceptions, citizens working for govt follow the same laws as those who pay taxes. So how can the govt hire citizens to tax for welfare? That’s the basic Constitutional argument that needs repeating from time to time. There’s no sovereign immunity in USA. Voluntary charities are the way to go. To take from one to directly benefit another, we have due process (restitution, enforcement of contracts). For the benefit of everyone, we have eminent domain. The problem is not capitalism. Problem’s crony capitalism- govt workers using govt to benefit individuals or individual corporations. This is more a Tea party idea than Occupy.

By: Cville Eye

Cville Eye — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 05:43:17 +0000

Is the park safe? http://www.nbc29.com/story/15972385/homeless-man-arrested-for-attempted-arson-in-lee-park

By: Ken

Ken — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 03:13:06 +0000

Harrison, why did the Boston Tea Partiers have anyone to compensate in the first place? Because they’d broken the law. Occupy Charlottesville likewise broke the law before it was given permits. Occupy Charlottesville’s name “implies illegitimate possession or control,” you say. Likewise, the Boston group took illegitimate possession and control. That fact remains regardless of whether OC reimburses the city for expenses, and that fact is what I was pointing to.

Beyond that, your question suggests that OC has an ethical obligation to reimburse the city. Why? As American citizens they have a Constitutional right to protest. As taxpayers, they pay the salaries of police officers; they pay for city and county government expenses. As I said, civil disobedience is a long and honorable American tradition. Think back to the civil rights movement and all those marches. Did the marchers owe local jurisdictions compensation for all the extra cops needed to patrol protect (or sometimes not protect) them?

Oh, but these protesters don’t have a similarly worthy cause, you say. Well sorry, they have the same rights.

And I don’t usually correct people’s grammar, and I never correct it to be snarky. But I don’t think that people who use the English language in egregiously sloppy ways should set themselves up as a community watchdogs and ethical lights.

By: Harrison

Harrison — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 01:47:45 +0000

Ken,

“but the original occupation was a form of civil disobedience, which is a long and honorable American tradition, going back to the Boston Tea Party. The occupation is now legal. ”

Please check the facts about the Boston Tea Party. The Boston Tea Partiers compensated the merchants who would have been harmed by their act. It was required.

If they are operating in the “long and honorable tradition” of the Boston Tea Party, are the Occupiers going to compensate the City of Charlottesville for the harm in the form of unexpected expenses, the increased Police presence, electric power and porto-potties and who knows what else?

If they continue to liken themselves to the Boston Tea Party they will be asked to compensate for the expenses they’ve caused the city.

They’re using the dysfunctional situation resulting from government involvement in the free market, to take down the free market. Neither government nor the free market need taking down (beat it anarchists), they need to be made independent of each other again.

okay now, go ahead and correct my grammar!

By: Cville Eye

Cville Eye — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 20:24:00 +0000

@Evan “waaaaaaaaaaa……. the occupiers are helping homeless people!!!!!! waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa……” How are you helping the homeless? Providing them with a place to drink is helping them? Are you helping them as much as The Haven, PACEM and the Hope Center? Are you paying their medical and dental bills? Are you providing with housing? Education? Employment? Transportation even? As far anybody can tell you are not helping the homeless with anything.
@Ed Zavada “Ken, actually much of our food, blankets and warm clothing go to the homeless, who very much appreciate being able to camp in the park. Some of them have gone from belligerent drunkenness to relative sobriety and are now helping us with security in the park.” Maybe this is what Evan meant as “helping.” Homeless people get all of those things from the three agencies I named above and the Salvation Army, too. Also, why do you people need security, security from whom?
“The situation there is complex, as you might expect when a bunch of middle class protesters are confronted head on with the hard reality of the social injustice we are protesting.” How do you know the homeless “sharing the park with you” are not also middle class? Maybe they are just not middle income. What social injustice have they experienced.
“We are trying very hard to strike a balance between conducting or occupation and sharing the park with the homeless, some of whom have been completely abandoned by society and are drug or alcohol abusers, prone to violence or mentally ill.” They have chosen to abandon society. How are you helping those “drug or alcohol abusers, prone to violence or mentally ill?” You are not. You do not know how to. Are you transporting them to Region Ten?
I am curious. why do you not include the homeless in your group. Are they not helping you to Occupy the park?
Also, is not your abandoning your occupation during the winter for your warm digs inside also abandoning the same people you say society has abandoned? Will you take your comrades home with you to provide them shelter, unlike this callous society? If not, are you planning to declare them a part of your group so that they can continue to sleep in the park with the politically correct Council’s permission. Will you leave them your tents? Your winter abandonment is what part of social justice? Your group seem to operate with a great deal of delusion. Rather than face the truth I am sure neither of you will attempt to answer my questions because it will cause you to have to take a painful look in the mirror.

By: Cville Eye

Cville Eye — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 06:08:19 +0000

Emerging womanhood.

By: Kenneth A. Martin

Kenneth A. Martin — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 05:39:56 +0000

Does anyone know if Councilors have visited the site?

By: Cville Eye

Cville Eye — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 05:22:23 +0000

I agree with Michael A. Farruggio. Jamie Dyer you can not effect meaningful change until you understand exactly what it is you wish to change. Nobody in the public has any understanding of what your mission is. So far it looks like a bunch of people with nothing better to do than hang out in the park asking people for things like food, blankets and clothing. That's exactly what the homeless people do.

By: Cville Eye

Cville Eye — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 02:36:29 +0000

These people are delusional. It has been said about half of the people are homeless and half are Occupiers. That means there are about 25 Occupiers there everyday. The homeless are not trying to change anything. They have shunned their families and friends, their community institutions and have chosen to live on the street. They only socialize with others when they want something. That’s the life of what we used to call hobos. We recognized that they had chosen a solitary life so we left them alone.
As far as the Occupiers’ being successful, there is only 25 people out of the hundreds of thousands that live in Buckingham, Augusta, Orange, Madison, Fluvanna, Louisa, Albemarle, Nelson and Greene counties. It doesn’t seem they are winning the hearts and minds of many people. Then again they have that of the anarchists on Council during this election season so they will continue to play and have slumber parties.

By: Ken

Ken — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 01:18:32 +0000

I haven’t been able to go out at night and walk my dog without fear of one of these miscreants defiling my dog.

It’s nasty, irrational attitudes like that make for political polarization.