Monday, November 14, 2011

Occupy Honolulu: Hawaiian Musician Makana Performs Protest Song to World Leaders at APEC Summit / Democracy Now


Occupy Honolulu: Hawaiian Musician Makana Performs Protest Song to World Leaders at APEC Summit

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As President Obama met with world leaders this weekend at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Hawaii to discuss how to bolster global trade, activists with the group Occupy Honolulu protested economic inequity that they say would result from new trade agreements. Meanwhile, within the heavily guarded compound where the summit took place, renowned Hawaiian musician and guitarist Makana carried out his own act of protest. Makana had been invited to play instrumental music at the gala dinner Saturday night. At the dinner, Makana opened his jacket to reveal a t-shirt which read, "Occupy with Aloha." Then, instead of performing the background instrumental he was scheduled to play, he started to sing a protest song he had released earlier that day. As world leaders including Obama and Chinese Premier Hu Jintao sat in the audience, Makana sang his new song inspired by the Occupy Wall Street movement, "We are the Many." "I started out very subtlety and subliminally, and I was like, 'Ye come here, gather on stage. The time has come for us to voice our rage,'" Makana says. "Then I realized that, 'Wow! I didn't get in trouble!’ So I played it again." [Rush transcript to come. Check back soon.]

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