The streets of Boston’s financial district are usually empty and silent on Saturday night. But this weekend, Dewey Square Park, a plot of greenery in the shadow of the Boston Federal Reserve and the State Street Bank headquarters, has turned into a small city in less than two days, filled by 75 tents and hundreds of people. Mobilizing in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street protesters, hundreds of Americans have assembled in the heart of downtown Boston to reclaim the American dream from the richest one percent, who control over 40 percent of the nation’s wealth.

In a video interview with ThinkProgress, one of the protesters staying in the Occupy Boston encampment, Ryan Cahill, explained why he is part of the Occupy Together movement. Cahill served in the U.S. Army as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2005 and 2006, and is now a sophomore at Bunker Hill Community College. He explained that he opposes the top one percent using their “wealth to circumvent the democratic process” and is concerned that he and his fellow veterans are having trouble finding jobs commensurate with their skills. “I can get a job waiting tables,” he said, but he’s looking for something more in his future. Asked his message for other Americans, Cahill asked for their participation:

Get involved. OccupyTogether.com. There’s occupations going on all over the country right now. This is your future at stake. It’s not going to fix itself. I think that’s pretty clear.

Watch the interview, shot after 11 pm on Saturday night:

The Boston occupation, begun Friday afternoon after an earlier protest of 3,000 people led by foreclosed homeowners at Bank of America, had a core of about 150 people last night staying indefinitely in the park. The occupiers, like those at Zuccati Park in New York City and in the other cities where occupations are taking place, hold General Assemblies to disseminate information and come to consensus on their goals, with reports from committees such as Media, Medical, Spirituality, Food, Tactics, and Outreach. The occupations are a remarkable combination of high-tech social media organization, as Micah Sifry explains, and face-to-face assemblies using hand signals and call-and-response to ensure horizontal democracy.

A Ron Paul supporter, Cahill expressed great pride in the diverse community that had quickly arisen in Dewey Square Park across the street from the Federal Reserve, and was grateful for the way the local government workers and officials have treated the occupiers, helping them build a safe space for protest amid the city’s economic elite.

A police officer interviewed by ThinkProgress said the goal of the Boston Police is to “protect everybody’s rights,” and said that the police had no intention of making the occupiers leave unless they got orders to do so from City Hall.

On ABC’s This Week, host Christiane Amanpour confronted Herman Cain about a comment he made to ThinkProgress. “There’s this creeping attempt…to gradually ease Sharia Law and the Muslim faith into our government,” Cain told us in March.

After showing Cain his quote, Amanpour asked him to respond to Chris Christie, who has said, “This Sharia law business is crap, it’s just crazy, and I’m tired of dealing with the crazies.” Cain responded:

CAIN: Call me crazy. … Some people would infuse Sharia Law in our courts system if we allow it. I honestly believe that. So even if he calls me crazy, I am going to make sure that they don’t infuse it little by little by little. … American laws in American courts, period.

AMANPOUR: American laws are in American courts. So the people of this country should be safe for the moment.

Watch it:

In July, Cain met with a small group of Muslims and said he was “truly sorry for any comments that may have betrayed my commitment to the U.S. Constitution and the freedom of religion guaranteed by it.” It’s therefore disappointing that Cain is still clinging to his anti-Sharia rhetoric.

The “creeping Sharia” threat, as CAP explained in our report “Fear, Inc.,” is the product of a hate campaign organized by a small number of Islamophobic actors who are trying to cast suspicion on the presence of all Muslims in America. In fact, Cain’s language of “American laws in American courts” is lifted directly from a right-wing lawyer named David Yerushalmi, who has been leading an effort to pass anti-Sharia measures in roughly two dozen states.

As the ACLU has explained in a thorough legal analysis, the “creeping Sharia” rhetoric is a mythical menace and a fabricated threat:

There is no evidence that Islamic law is encroaching on our courts. On the contrary, the court cases cited by anti-Muslim groups as purportedly illustrative of this problem actually show the opposite: Courts treat lawsuits that are brought by Muslims or that address the Islamic faith in the same way that they deal with similar claims brought by people of other faiths or that involve no religion at all. These cases also show that sufficient protections already exist in our legal system to ensure that courts do not become impermissibly entangled with religion or improperly consider, defer to, or apply religious law where it would violate basic principles of U.S. or state public policy.

A Center for American Progress report on Sharia explained, “It’s important to understand that adopting” the creeping Sharia rhetoric “would direct limited resources away from actual threats to the United States and bolster an anti-Muslim narrative that Islamist extremist groups find useful in recruiting.”

Recall, in 2010, Oklahoma passed a “Save our State” ballot initiative that banned Sharia in its state courts. That amendment was halted from taking effect by a federal district court. District Court Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange argued: “It would be incomprehensible if…Oklahoma could condemn the religion of its Muslim citizens, yet one of those citizens could not defend himself in court against his government’s preferment of other religious views.” The 10th Circuit court is now hearing the case.