Occupy LA watches Oakland

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The camp-in at Los Angeles' City Hall is moving into its second month of action, and Occupy LA is watching carefully what's going on in Oakland. Last night saw another round of violence there as protesters shut down the Port of Oakland, the nation's fifth-largest port. Riot police used tear-gas, rubber bullets, and flash-bang grenades against Occupy Oakland demonstrators, who the police claim lobbed rocks at them and broke windows of shop-windows. Eighty protesters were arrested.

Today, many of the Occupy Oakland supporters are criticizing those who provoked the violence.

Here in Los Angeles, there have been no signs of this tension. All was quiet at City Hall today, except for the sound of helicopters hovering overhead. It's unknown whether these were police, news, or traffic 'copters.

One Occupy LAer thought that the Oakland protesters' outrage at the violent police response is justified: "Oakland has a real right to be upset -- about the city, about how they [police] behaved...whatever happened was escalated by the police." This, protester, a former Marine, declined to give his name.

Occupy LA organizer Magda Rad said, "I haven't really looked at their website. I've been looking at their Twitter and their Facebook, and I was watching the livestream until three in the morning last night, watching what was happening there, so -- I mean, it's like watching a war in action."

The memory of the police shooting of Oscar Grant at an Oakland subway station almost two years ago hovers over the Oakland events. Ironically, here in LA, the Rodney King riots have influenced police behavior in a completely different way, by making the police more sensitive to the public effects of their responses to protests. Says Rad, "As far as I'm concerned, it's a love-fest with the LAPD for the time being, and we're grateful for that." Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has ordered the police to protect, not criminalize, protesters.

Occupy LAers are aware that that accord could end. They say they're prepared, and that if violence does break out, it won't be because they've provoked it. According to the unnamed protester above, Occupy LA is the only Occupy movement that worked with local city government before starting the live-in protest. This may have contributed to the tolerance shown by the city to the protesters so far, although protesters may be asked to move soon to preserve the grass, which is rapidly dying off. Organizers are working on a plan for sustainable plantings that would allow them to remain and greenery to be returned to City Hall.

Occupy LA remains committed to a peaceful protest, and is hopeful that Oakland-style confrontations won't be necessary here.