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How about Scott Olsen Plaza?

10.27.11 - 1:52 pm | Tim Redmond |
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Fighting redevelopment in the 1960s

Occupy Oakland changed the name of Frank Ogawa Plaza; it's time for OccupySF to do the same.

The place where the protesters are gathered is named for Justin Herman, the notorious director of San Francisco's Redevelopment Agency in the terrible days of the 1950s and 1960s, when "redevelopment" meant removing black people from the Western Addition and removing poor people, particularly Filipinos, from South of Market and later the International Hotel. Herman once famously said that the SOMA land where he wanted to build hotels was "too valuable to permit poor people to park on it."

In the 1960s, the battle against redevelopment was one of the defining political struggles in San Francisco, bringing Asians, African Americans, white progressives, young community organizers, affordable housing and tenant activists, poverty and civil rights lawyers ... just about the whole spectrum of the city's left. It's been the subject of books and movies. The people who fought Justin Herman are part of a long political thread in San Francisco -- as is OccupySF today.

I've always thought it was an abomination to have a downtown plaza named after a guy who did so much to destroy San Francisco. Maybe from now on we should all call it Scott Olsen Plaza.

Comments

Better yet

"The Starbucks National Plaza brought to you in cooperation with General Electric and Don King Productions." Sure it's a little wordy, but the occupiers have plenty of time to read stuff.

Posted by Chromefields on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 10:48 am
how about

"The iphone people's studies and workshop campground and Che park"

Posted by meatsack on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 11:56 am
I'm calling for a surrender

I'm calling for a surrender of the cowardly cop who threw the cannister at Scott Olsen. SURRENDER YOURSELF.

Posted by guest one on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 11:04 am
Surrender to The People!

Let's gather a People's Tribunal and met out our own kind of justice to this pig! A justice free from corporate control! People's justice!!!

Posted by Guest on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 11:22 am
No, Let's not...

Advocating a lynching? How is that progressive and nonviolent?

You are either a provocateur or a fool.

Keep your petty violence out of the movement.

Posted by Aragorn on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 11:51 am
Provacateur.

And asshole.
Same dipshit that never backs up his arguments with a single fact and repeats himself endlessly.

There's only about two of these morons on here, but they try to pretend there's more.

Posted by Guest on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 12:44 pm
A fine idea! :)

A fine idea! :)

Posted by Yael on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 11:07 am
SF's finest?

Who shot those cannisters anyway? Was that the SF Sheriff's Department at the barricades?

Great idea for Scott Olsen Plaza!

Posted by Guest on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 11:21 am
Don't forget the SF "Public

Don't forget the SF "Public Safety" Officer P******a, who is reported to have told a protestor in SF that, "I can't for a chance to beat your faces in".

Posted by Patrick Monk. RN on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 11:31 am
Scott Olsen for CD8 in 2012.

How about Scott Olsen for Congress!?! The 8th CD is vacant. Has been for a very long time.

The device that was thrown at Olsen while he was on the ground was a concussive "flash bang" grenade and not a tear gas canister. They are used to disorient potentially dangerous suspects before the police move into make an arrests. They can cause brain trauma. Many Iraq and Afghanistan war vets with closed head injuries are injured not be shrapnel but by the concussive impact of the explosives.

I suspect he was initially hit with either a bean bag or a rubber slug. Both of these type of projectiles are launched out of regular 12g shotguns at an average velocity of 300 fps. Just like the shells seen on the side of the shotgun being fired with glee by the OPD officer in this photo originally published by Daily Koss. http://tinyurl.com/officerfriendly. If you zoom the photo you will see that the officer's knuckle is bent on his index finger which means he has finger on the trigger and has probably just shot a round. Otherwise, his index finger would be extended and lying flat against the frame if he received proper firearms training.

Posted by Nick Hentoff @RuleofWolves on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 12:21 pm
WAKE UP, MARINES!

Read U.S. Marine General S. Butler's book:
"WAR IS A RACKET"

http://www.amazon.com/War-Racket-Profit-Motive-Warfare/dp/1434407004/ref...

By the end of his career, he had received 16 medals, five for heroism. He is one of 19 men to twice receive the Medal of Honor, one of three to be awarded both the Marine Corps Brevet Medal and the Medal of Honor, and the only man to be awarded the Brevet Medal and two Medals of Honor, all for separate actions.

Semper Fi, but to what?

Posted by Guest on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 10:20 pm
WAKE UP, MARINES!

Read U.S. Marine General S. Butler's book:
"WAR IS A RACKET"

http://www.amazon.com/War-Racket-Profit-Motive-Warfare/dp/1434407004/ref...

By the end of his career, he had received 16 medals, five for heroism. He is one of 19 men to twice receive the Medal of Honor, one of three to be awarded both the Marine Corps Brevet Medal and the Medal of Honor, and the only man to be awarded the Brevet Medal and two Medals of Honor, all for separate actions.

Semper Fi, but to what?

Posted by Guest on Oct. 28, 2011 @ 10:20 pm
www.ScottOlsen.org

www.ScottOlsen.org

Help with Scott's medical bills (via IVAW's Scott Olsen Support Fund)
See pictures from the Occupy Oakland.
Get Scott Updates.

Posted by Scott Olsen on Oct. 29, 2011 @ 7:53 am
Cue the People's Mic

"I've always thought it was an abomination to have a downtown plaza named after a guy who did so much to destroy San Francisco. Maybe from now on we should all call it Scott Olsen Plaza."

Amen, Tim! Great idea :-)

Posted by Lisa on Oct. 29, 2011 @ 4:05 pm