Cairo on the Hudson

If America is to follow the example of Egypt, Spain, and Greece, the protest has to go to Wall Street, not Washington.

So says a collection of mostly young organizers planning a Tahrir-Square-style occupation of the New York Financial District, starting on September 17 – and lasting months.

They are talking thousands of people, tents, food services – the whole Arab Spring treatment.

In the US? Really?

The left was nearly absent during the initial turmoil of the ’08 crash and TARP rage – leaving reaction to the TEA Party. But budget cuts – Federal, State and City – have fired up a swath of angry Gothamites.

Canadian magazine Adbusters issued the initial call for the occupation, but has been rather silent since

Instead, the energy has gone to a collection of New Yorkers who first got going during “Bloombergville” – a protest camp set up during the city’s volatile budget debates

Organizers for the new occupation met for the first time yesterday in Bowling Green Park – perhaps fittingly behind the famous charging bronze bull, which flashed them its privates.

Coherent it was not. The gathering – billed as a “general assembly” – began as an old-fashioned rally.

“People started with stump speeches,” said an organizer named Conor (he asked not to publish his last name). “It’s political muscle memory.”

The kickoff, by Larry Hales of New Yorkers Against Budget Cuts (the dominant group there) was filled with phrases such as “fighting back by any means necessary.”

Another speaker made a comparison to Hitler – threatening to invoke Godwin’s Law that a conversation will eventually fall apart by turning to the infamous Austrian. And that was in the first ten minutes.

But then the students took charge, forming a sit-down conversation circle behind the main rally that eventually drew most of the folks into a quieter dialog.

More pragmatic, (generally) less dramatic, the Millennial-age organizers got down to details after most of the 60s- and 70s-era speakers had melted away.

But pragmatism and radical consensus are a tough pairing. The biggest topic of discussion – in chunks that added up to nearly an hour – was simply where and when the next meeting would be.

Said organizer Isham Christie with a sigh and a faint smile, “Democracy is a long meeting.”