Occupy Wall Street Isn't Going Anywhere

By Adrian Chen

Believe it or not, Mayor Michael Bloomberg's para-military crackdown on Zuccotti Park earlier this week only energized the movement, as yesterday's massive day of action proved. Now there's tons of dramatic footage, public outrage, and a new sense of momentum for the 99%.

As has been stated many times, the nationwide crackdown on Occupy Wall Street encampments has been incalculably good for the protesters. Instead of an endless stream of stories about the various body fluids and odors wafting around their camps, everyone's talking about cops arresting protesters and journalists. There's this insane picture of a riot cop in Portland blasting a girl in the face with a comically large stream of pepper spray. (It really has to be the diameter of a toddler's arm? Is that pepper spray for subduing rhinoceroses?) For the moment, Occupy's turned into as much an anti-police state protest as anything. And everyone hates cops!

And now the day of action has dumped a confetti of triumphant images into our Twitter feeds. We have pictures of Anne Hathway—who knows something about the depravities of the one percent—with her nice sign. There's a burger named after Occupy Wall Street, too, and they don't just name burgers after anything. We can forgive the incredibly awkward video of protesters "occupying the subway" by screaming at harried commuters, because they also made this badass bat-signal, projected out of the window of a donated apartment in the projects, over the Brooklyn bridge full of 20,000 marchers.

So, Occupy Wall Street definitely has momentum. Some are speculating this is less the beginning of a second wind, and more of a last hurrah. They point to declining public support in polls, and the near-impossibility of camping out in Zuccotti Park, now that tarps, tents and sleeping bags have been banned. Fuck polls—polls also said Herman Cain is gonna win the Republican nomination. And fuck Zuccotti Park. I think even the movement's staunchest supporters are sick of reading stories about the kitchen crew and the People's Mic. Occupy's got an office now, anyway.

[Image via AP]