Can someone please explain to me why these people are allowed to go on with their open-ended occupation of public spaces, without the authorities calling time? Everyone has the right to protest and demonstrate; to stop this pathetic rabble from doing so would be an outrage, and, up to a point, unconstitutional. But surely there is a limit? How long are they entitled to get in the way, foul up public spaces, and generally make a nuisance of themselves? The answer seems to be that in the US, from what I can gather, some of the civic authorities are too timorous to stop the “occupations”, and the rest positively encourage them.

It’s one thing for private enterprise to suck up these self-indulgent idiots, mendaciously and in the hope of gain; it’s quite another for civic authorities to do so.

In Australia’s two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, the “occupists” were given weeks to make their point in busy public spaces. Their dirty campsites were tolerated, their right to protest respected. When the mayor of Sydney foolishly visited them and made vaguely sympathetic noises, they responded with an absurd series of demands – free wifi, free food and – get this – free car parking in the city so they could come and go as they pleased! Eventually, with businesses being seriously affected and the public inconvenienced, they were first warned and then dispersed by police, with scuffles and arrests but nothing more serious – and the wider public couldn’t care less.

Indulging these brutes emboldens them, and leads only to what happened in Oakland.