First, yesterday on my way to take the much depleted boxes of PM wares back to SAJE, I passed hundreds, if not thousands of people on motorcycles, most of them Harleys. It was an incredibly impressive sight, a massive line of bikes two by two, broken up only by the traffic lights. I asked one of the guys what they were there for, assuming it was a funeral, but they were all off to deliver toys for a toy drive. Which I thought was a beautiful thing, The noise, however, was incredible.

And what is happening in Greece is a beautiful thing as well, popular insurrection! It is NOT rioting and NOT just anarchists running around causing trouble for everyone and NOT looting, it is a spontaneous rising of a broad segment of the population against low wages, unjust conditions, police brutality, and government impunity…There are actions going on at Greek embassies around the country and the world, take a minute to find out what is really happening, it is an exciting and hopeful time.

Below is an update from the liberated City Hall of Ag. Demetrios, taken over on Thursday:

AGAINST PROSECUTIONS AND DETENTIONS <http://katadimadim.blogspot.com/2008/12/blog-post_15.html>
SOLIDARITY WITH ALL WHO HAVE BEEN ARRESTED AND ARE PROSECUTED FOR THEIR PARTICIPATION IN THE POPULAR INSURRECTION

The events that have taken place so far, both inside and outside of Greece,
following the murder of 16-year old Alexandros Grigoropoulos from the
special guard Epaminondas Korkoneas, show clearly that we are in the midst
of a popular insurrection. Ever growing segments of society (high school and
university students, workers, unemployed, immigrants, detainees, poor)
decide to come out in the streets and transform their rage for whatever
oppresses them in every expression of their lives into action (dynamic
mobilizations during which there are mass clashes with the forces of
repression and attacks on government and capitalist targets, occupations of
public buildings, open assemblies, counterinformation actions).

Within the frame of this insurrection, the City Hall of Aghios Dimitrios has
been occupied since the morning of Thursday Dec. 11, so that it may become a
place of counter-information, meeting, and self-organizing of the residents
of the wider region and for the collective formation and implementation of
actions. A main component of this occupation is the daily popular assembly
with participation of up to 300 people, a process that functions in contrast
to the entrusting of the management of our demands as well as of our
struggles to whichever “representatives,” elected or not. A process that
tends to be implanted deeply into the consciousness of its participants on
their role as political beings.

Without a doubt, this popular insurrection is clearly turning against the
very structure of the current regime. Therefore, it follows that the
subjects of this insurrection will face the repressive fury of the defenders
of the system (the state, the businesses, the comfortable). Already
there have been about 200 arrests around the country (often accompanied by
violence and trumped up charges). Some of the charges, misdemeanors as well
as felonies are: resisting arrest, disobedience, disturbing the peace,
attempting to free detainees, use and possession of tools and explosives,
attempt to inflict serious bodily harm, etc. In some instances, the state
has prosecuted minors under anti-terrorist statutes (Larissa). Nevertheless,
for us it is obvious that all these charges are political in nature. And of
course the “not at all” predatory state (in conjunction with the “not at
all” profiteering business people) has the audacity to prosecute so-called
“looters”.

By participating in the popular insurrection both inside and outside of the
now liberated City Hall of Ag. Dimitrios, we express with our deeds our
solidarity with those arrested and procecuted for their actions in this
social struggle. The struggle for their release and the cessation of
prosecutions is absolutely connected with the very insurrection and must
constitute a main demand.

A few lines above there was a reference to the defenders of the system.
Unfortunately this category also includes those segments of society, which,
while objectively belong on the side of the oppressed, whether by their
opposition to the social struggle or whether by their silence (a result as
much of the brainwashing from mass media as from the growing tendency to
abandon collective claims and pursue individual solutions) end up playing
the game of their oppressors. It is necessary that we realize what is the
source of our problems and that all of us “below” are already on the
crosshairs of the system, therefore it is to our advantage to join this
insurrection.

DROP ALL CHARGES FOR THE EVENTS OF THE LAST SEVERAL DAYS

IMMEDIATE RELEASE OFF ALL DETAINEES

THE SOCIAL STRUGGLES ARE NEITHER LEGAL NOR ILLEGAL, THEY ARE JUST.

RALLY & MARCH

Tuesday December 16, 2008, 7:00pm

at the liberated City Hall of Ag. Dimitrios