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Late yesterday afternoon, the word was that Occupy Oakland might be facing another raid Nov. 9. As things happened, there was a clash between police and protesters in the East Bay yesterday -- but not in Oakland. Campus police brought heat to neighboring Berkeley instead, where protesters angered by income inequality and the rising costs of higher education have launched Occupy Cal, a student-led occupation on the University of California Berkeley campus.

The Daily Californian has produced excellent coverage of Wednesday's events, including video that shows the police confrontation from multiple angles, a live blog with the blow-by-blow, and a Twitter feed that is getting updated just about every three minutes.

Day one of Occupy Cal featured a series of teach-ins beginning at 8 a.m., a rally at noon, and a march to the Bank of America. Later in the afternoon, when student protesters set up tents in front of Sproul Hall, University of California police clad in riot gear descended upon the encampment and were met by a line of protesters who resisted with arms linked. By the end of the day, according to the Daily Cal, "the protest’s hashtag #occupycal … trended worldwide on Twitter."

Police returned to Sproul Plaza once again after 10 p.m., and another standoff occurred. A total of 39 arrests were made -- seven earlier in the afternoon, and 32 in the second round of clashes. Charges included resisting and delaying a police officer in the performance of their duties, and failure to disperse when given a dispersal order.

Some 2,000 people gathered at Sproul Plaza following the second police raid, and the mood turned from tense to energized as a General Assembly was convened. At 1:29 a.m., the Daily Cal's live blog reported:

"Occupy Cal participants have voted to strike — theoretically in solidarity with demonstrators across the UC system — on Tuesday. The vote passed by a count of 569 yeses, 31 noes and 29 abstentions. General assembly meetings are to occur every day in Sproul Plaza at 6 p.m. to plan for the strike."

According to sources at Occupy Oakland, there is a great deal of crossover and support between Occupy Cal and Occupy Oakland. The encampment at Frank Ogawa Plaza (renamed Oscar Grant Plaza by activists) plans to hold a 10 p.m. "community solidarity vigil" this evening, Nov. 10, according to an update from a text alert system maintained by the occupiers.

Meanwhile, drama between protesters and city government appears to building yet again in Oakland.
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Berkeley City Council voted that the Berkeley Police Department should not to enter into mutual aid agreements with UC police or Oakland, citing excessive force and free speech violations by police during protests in Oakland and at UC Berkeley. http://www.sfbg.com/politics/2011/11/10/occupy-cal-makes-its-dramatic-
entrance least Berserkeley City Council has more brains than Oakland, but it'll probably end up the same eventually. Although Berserkeley's police force doesn't have anything LIKE the bad attitude Oakland's does. We shall see.

But my point is, you're not hearing about any of this, so I assume you're not hearing about a lot more as well that's going on around the country. The only articles I could find on the Occupy Cal situation were on local news. Even those are reporting far smaller numbers that those of our group who were there have said.

Tho' I have to admit, I found some of the reports amusing. They complain of the "violent" tactics by the Berserkeley police, which, in comparison to what's been happening in Oakland, is laughable. They've been jabbing people with batons--definitely unpleasant, but I've seen videos, and they're being downright POLITE compared to Oakland!

Stephen Colbert had fun with it:
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/402024/november
-10-2011/occupy-u-c--berkeley

The clip he shows is pretty much what happened; the students linked, the cops "nudged", and that was about it. Compared to Oakland? Hah!

Nonetheless, it's pretty obvious that the media is downplaying what's happening by not reporting on a lot of it. There is daily activity in the Big Three of the Bay Area: Oakland, San Jose, San Francisco, and now Berserkeley's joined the scuffle...and how much are we hearing about it on the media? Wasn't someone complaining about the coverage OWS is getting in comparison to that of the Tea Party, and the unfairness of it? The only unfairness I'm seeing is LACK of coverage of OWS, and they're doing a pretty good job of it.

Media coverage or no, we're still here, we're still growing and we'll be heard eventually.

OccupyCal has called for a strike next Tuesday...should be interesting.

I know what the responses to this post will be from one corner of the "room", and it'll make me smile. Something about ignoring a bunch of ruffians (tho' I'm sure the terminology will be much more inventive) because there are so many more important thing in the news...like the idiots on the debate stages we should all be paying attention to, and how America is bored with OWS by now, etc. Time will tell the tale; we've only just begun.