Of all major U.S. cities with Occupy movements, LA has been by far the most calm — and the city government has been the most accommodating. The City Council voted early on to support the movement, while Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has affirmed the protesters right to assemble, as well as nodded favorably toward their cause. The city also gave the movement a lot of time to prepare for what was supposed to be a departure today from its encampment at City Hall.

But they're still there. And filing a lawsuit to stick around.

To borrow a line from "Gladiator," some people should know when they're conquered. Or, more accurately, when they're been treated with kid gloves for an exceptionally long period of time. To its credit, LA is taking the sluggishness of the Occupy departure/non-departure in stride. That's consistent with how the city has dealt with Occupy so far.

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The BLS jobs report that hit this morning was…how to put it? Demoralizing? Particularly headed into a holiday weekend that's supposed to celebrate the American worker. As some commenters have already pointed out, that fact the U.S. economy added zero — yes, zero — jobs in August is both depressing and symbolic.

Depressing because it came in well under even worst-case scenarios produced yesterday by the likes of Goldman Sachs, which had anticipated a fairly demoralizing 25,000 jobs to be added (Take that, starry eyed Goldman optimists!). I guess you could throw up your hands and say, Well, at least we didn't drop into negative territory! The national unemployment rate stayed at 9.1 percent (and presumably, the California rate will stay stuck at 12 percent, with L.A. County above that at 12.4 percent — that data will come later in the month). 

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