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The Warning Occupy Wall Street Has for President Obama
On Wednesday afternoon, we marched out of Zuccotti Park, where the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators have bedded down for the duration. Drums were pounding and shouts of “Whose streets? Our streets!” “All day, all week, occupy Wall Street,” and “This is what democracy looks like, that is what hypocrisy looks like!” rang out as we headed directly into New York City’s version of a police state. The helicopters with the high-tech sensors and high-resolution cameras hovered in the distant sky, the security cams peered down from walls, the barriers the police had set up hemmed us in -- no street, just sidewalk for these demonstrators -- and the cops, scores of flexi-cuffs looped at their belts, were lined up all along the way, while empty buses wheeled past ready for future arrestees. 
(photo: Ianqui Doodle)
This was not exactly a shining Big Apple example of the “freedom” to demonstrate. It was demonstration as imprisonment and at certain moments, at least for this 67-year-old, it was claustrophobic. This is the way the state treats 15,000 terrorist suspects, not its own citizens.
Still, the energy and high spirits were staggering. The unions were out -- nurses, teachers, construction workers -- the bands were lively (“… down by the riverside, ain’t gonna study war no more…”), and hand-made signs were everywhere and about everything under the sun: “Crime does pay in the USA -- on Wall Street,” “When did the common good become a bad idea,” “4 years in college, $100,000 in debt, for a hostess job,” “Eat the rich,” “Arab Spring to Wall Street Fall” (with the final “L” in “Fall” slipping off the sign), “We are the 99%,” “Legalize online poker, occupy Wall St.”
Amid the kaleidoscopic range of topics on those signs and in those chants and cries, one thing, one name, was largely missing: the president's. In those hours marching and at Foley Square amid the din of so many thousands of massed people, I saw one sign that said “Obama = Bush” and another that went something like “The Barack Obama we elected would be out here with us.” That was it. Sayonara.
It’s as if the spreading movement, made up of kids who might once have turned out for presidential candidate Obama, had left him and his administration in the dust. Like big labor, the left, and the media, the administration that loved its bankers to death (and got little enough in return for that embrace) is now playing catch-up with a ragtag bunch of protesters it wouldn’t have thought twice about if they hadn't somehow caught the zeitgeist of this moment. (Don’t forget that the Obama administration was similarly left scrambling and desperately behind events when it came to the demonstrators in Tahrir Square in Cairo last January.)
The best Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner could say a few days ago, when asked about his sympathies for the Occupy Wall Street movement, was: "I feel a lot of sympathy for what you might describe as a general sense among Americans that we've lost a sense of possibility." Really? White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley didn’t know if the movement was exactly “helpful” for the White House agenda. Truly? And White House press spokesman Jay Carney commented blandly, “I would simply say that, to the extent that people are frustrated with the economic situation, we understand.” Do you?
Suddenly, last Thursday, with news about the anti-Wall Street movement whipping up a storm, the Obama administration found itself out of breath and running hard to reposition itself. Vice President Joe Biden said, “The core is the bargain has been breached with the American people,” while at his news conference addressing questions about the movement the president added, “I think it expresses the frustrations that the American people feel... [T]he protesters are giving voice to a more broad-based frustration about how our financial system works.”
Still, those signs with everything but Barack Obama on them should be considered a warning. Recently, Ariel Dorfman, the Chilean writer and activist, penned a message from a man who died in the attacks of September 11th. His name was Salvador Allende, he was the elected president of Chile, and the “terrorists” on that day in 1973 were the Chilean military backed by the CIA. (Strangely enough, afterwards no one declared a global war on anyone.)
Dorfman, author most recently of Feeding on Dreams: Confessions of an Unrepentant Exile, channels warning words from “the dead” to Barack Obama. But mark my words, Allende’s isn’t the only warning to the president at this moment. Those kids in downtown Manhattan (and increasingly across the country and the world) are offering their own warning, and theirs, after a fashion, comes from the future, one in which Obama’s presidency could someday be seen as little but an irrelevancy.
Tom Engelhardt, co-founder of the American Empire Project, runs the Nation Institute's TomDispatch.com. His latest book, co-authored with Nick Turse, is Terminator Planet: The First History of Drone Warfare, 2001-2050. His other most recent book is The United States of Fear (Haymarket Books). Previous books include: The End of Victory Culture: a History of the Cold War and Beyond, The American Way of War: How Bush's Wars Became Obama's, as well as of a novel, The Last Days of Publishing. To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com here.
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Show AllAnyone who thinks that there are two parties in America is dreaming. Both parties, when threatened, will unite against their common enemy – the working class. Eliminating the unions with 2 tier hiring, outsourcing and importing jobs, creating corporate citizenship and slashing the budgets for public health and education is disseminating the working class. The empire is making room for the new mercenary class that will be their buffer from the poor.
Hoa binh
As Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis told us during the 1920s "You can have great concentrations of wealth, or you can have democracy, but you can't have both".
As long as the primary mission of the Democratic Party continues to be to get more corporate contributions than the GOP, the Democratic Party is not salvagable.
Yes! It is abundantly clear that both the corporate parties are united against the working class. For years the discussion has been. "Which is the lesser evil?" It is clear they are both evil from the point of view of the working people. Only hedge fund managers think they are both terrific!
The new movement of the 99% must BEWARE OF THE DEMOCRATS! The Democrats are where movements go to die. Once the Populists gathered under the big tent of the Democrats they died. Same thing happened to the labor movement of the 30's, and the Civil Rights movement of the 60's and the anti war/peace groups of war after war. When a movement is taken over by the Democrats is is the END OF THE MOVEMENT. It disgusts me to hear that Nancy Pelosi says she supports the demonstrators on Wall St. She voted for all the things that the people are protesting!! THey are protesting what she has done. Her 'support' has NO VALUE to the movement but is only a ploy to get the people to trust and stick with the Democrats. Don't fall for that!!
I hope we still have some chance to get some democracy in our nation. I hope that we can get a government that heeds the voice of the people. We sure as hell don't have that now!! 99% say END THE WARS! TAX THE RICH! CARE FOR THE PEOPLE! PROTECT THE ENVIRONMENT! but no one in Congress is saying that. No! they vote for more war. They vote tax cuts for the rich. They will not even vote on Medicare for All, Single Payer---no, that is 'off the table'. And as far as protecting the environment, they want to lessen environmental regulation because these regulations cost the corporations some profits!!
We must clearly tell our Representative how we want them to vote, and if they do not heed us, we need to threaten their job security. We need to wave a pink slip in their faces. You vote how we say or you are gone. We don't have to put up another candidate. We need to kick out the corrupt. The next Representative may be as bad or worse - but then we kick that person out. For decades we have been voting for the lesser evil as the whole democracy slides downhill and is eaten alive by corruption. Get over that idea of one being not as bad as the other. Evil is evil. Kick them out. There must be some decent honest person with ethics in your congressional district. Stop voting for someone you know has sold their soul for some corporate cash.
I think we need a pink slip movement. If our representative doesn't really represent us, give him/her a PINK SLIP! Let them join the unemployed. Only then will we have real democracy where our Representatives represent the constituents rather than the contributors.
I'm sorry if I'm missing the point. But we have the president you all voted for! HOPE & CHANGE and all that nonsense! I voted for Nader, not the empty suit on the left! or the empty suit on the right!
I certinally didn't vote for the congress crimonal Pelosi! but you must have as she got re-elected! I have ben voting not for the lessor evil.. But for NO EVIL!
I wonder where the rest of you were. At the Obama Party?!?! What I'm trying to put forward is we have all democracy we can stand! If you can't find something to vote for DON'T VOTE!! >^^<
Today a statistic was released which, in my opinion, shows that the shenanigans of "Wall Street" and even the Big Banks were not the major causes of the recession/depression/joblessness. The statistic shows that average household incomes adjusted for inflation decreased by about 10% since 2000. The real picture is even bleaker because these incomes already began to decline in the late 1970's. A decline of 10% of average household income can be absorbed by our economy for a few years but not forever and I do not need the philosophy of Hegel to understand that. It is, in fact, an economic disaster writ large. The crash of 2008 was primarily due to the decline of average household incomes. What has been the main reason for that decline? Once again in my opinion it has been due to the big corporation pitting workers and regulators in the so-called Third World against workers and regulators of our nation. An age-old strategy. And who is Obama's job Czar? Yes, the boss of GE who does not hide the fact that the interest of his company trumps the well-being of our nation. And who is Obama's military Czar? Yes, Mr. Panetta who hollers for him that the DOD budget cannot be decreased by one cent and, in fact, should be increased. The demonstrators are in the wrong place. They should be on the steps of Congress and in front of the headquarters of the big "global" corporations. Solidarity with the insurgents of Egypt is fine but useless. The solidarity should extend to the workers of Brazil, India, and China reminding them that they will be screwed the moment they start making demands on GE et al. because GE will then move either back to us or to some poorer countries and that we will then stand with them. Given the statistic released today there is only one long-term palliative that the Federal Government has to save capitalism from itself which is to reduce every year the taxes on every household whose income is below, say, $ 250,000 by a percentage sufficient to offset the decrease of household income. The decrease of revenue must then be made good 1/2 from the DOD budget and 1/2 by raising the tax rate of wealthy individuals and corporations. Once the tax rate for all households below $250,000 is zero, the jug is up. RIP US capitalism. The rest of Obama's "job plan" is diddling at the fringes for a very short period. Since the annual compensation by tax decreases will never happen the goose of capitalism is cooked. Unfortunately it will not fall voluntarily but in an even more ugly crash than the recent one.
First, in order to confront the inevitable arguments and complaints from the plutocrats about such changes in policy, we must convince the majority that it is better for everyone to be poor than for a few to be rich and the rest to be poor. When a few are rich, they will bully, abuse, and control the many poor, even virtually enslaving them, in large part through assuming control over the government, making the lives of the poor far more bitter and painful than they would be if everyone were poor.
The banks and Wall Street are more to blame than the corporations. The banks and Wall Street's move to debt/liability finance/trading in amounts their assets could only cover a fraction when they lost is what threw the country into the most recent recession. They together with ratings agencies propped up a housing bubble that stole from regular people, and then profited off the collapse with short selling/CDOs profited off the whole scam. Then they were handed an economy sized bucket full of cash that will be paid for by the same people they threw into debt. The trading industry itself is a bubble, one the "leaders" of the US and Europe are desperately trying to prevent by creating more debt, and throwing it at the problem. The only solution is to let the entire thing meltdown, reset, change monetary policy, and build again. The sooner, the better for everyone. We just have to make sure to not let the government scapegoat the banks only, and hold our government officials accountable. The people will need to take the power back and build a more safe, sustainable future for the people of the US.
The banks and the institutions who are referred to under the shorthand rubric "Wall Street" are corporations. The large banks are, perhaps more so than some other large corporations, criminal conspiracies. The RICO laws ought to be used to bust their senior administrators and majority stockholders, but that is unlikely to happen.
"The only solution is to let the entire thing meltdown, reset, change monetary policy, and build again." That may be exactly what happens, but I don't think that's a "solution" because if things melt down that bad, millions of people will be reduced to the status of refugees as the safety net, such as it is, is defunded with nothing to replace it.
"The people will need to take the power back and build a more safe, sustainable future for the people of the US." I'm not sure about taking the power "back." I'm not sure people had it to begin with. But this post is right in that people need to figure out how to get political power that actually works to rein in the elites.
Point taken about Wall Street consisting of corporations. I was merely responding to the original poster's thoughts of the manufacturing industries moving overseas being the main source of the US' recession. I've also thought of RICO's need to be applied to the fraudulent financial institutions of the country. I'd love for politicians to be included as there has to be way for "lobbying" money to be applied to tie in our politicians as well. Where's Jack McCoy when you need him? He'd be bold enough to take on such a case.
Although allowing the whole economy to melt is not a "solution" per se, it's the only option left. More bailouts are on the horizon, and with it, will come more reductions in the safety net as well. The people will be sacrificed in order to keep the financial ponzi scheme afloat. It will eventually break, I just think it'd be better to get it over with now.
You may be right about the people never having the power. To get the political power to actually rein in the elites, I suggest we follow the Iceland model. Iceland put civilians in office and reined in all the corrupt bankers. Their economy plummeted, but after three years has began it's recovery.
DOCTOR N: Right on! So it's curious that Crowsnest would invert the matter instead, into one speaking of a net 10% loss of collective income. At best, it would make sense to integrate BOTH issues into a complementary logic, as opposed to using his statistic in an apparent attempt to muddy the truth about the ferocious undermining of citizens' net worths by Wall Street's felonious* financial instruments.
(*Just as the unlawful, in such items as torture, is presented AS legal; or war based on false trumped-up evidence, passed off as legal... Wall Street hucksters' invisible products--like the Emperor's New Clothes--have been taken for precisely what they are not: things of alleged value. A regulated financial industry would never have been allowed to get away with this graft and corruption, i.e. what ought not be taken for legal.)
The collpase of the US economy has a number of factors, but key among them are:
1. The financial manipulation of the economy in a fashion that conflates real product & labor (including nature's assets, i.e. Natural Capital) with fictitious monetary products
2. The offshoring of jobs in great numbers & shuttering of factories
3. The purchase of politicians to lower the bar on labor standards, union rights, and control of corporate plunder
4. Tax policies that have allowed larger and larger amounts of $ to stay collected (and held) at the top of the fiscal pyramid
5. Efforts to dumb the population down, use a number of "Roman Arena" devices to deflect the understanding of what's taking place, and otherwise render citizens into a virtual state of hypnosis in order to manufacture consent for objectionabe policies.
The -10% figure is with the fake cost of living increases the govt puts out.
As a Social Security recipient, I agree with an economist who said , about 3 years ago, that our buying power had decreased by 40% in the last 10 years.
With the recent jump in some food prices in the last 2 years and zero Soc Security increase in 2 years I figure I've lost an additional 15-20%.
My bread went up 20% in 08, my goat cheese went from 3.29 to 3.89 (cant tolerate cow's dairy products). My basic wine went up $1 in one step along w others in the same category (OK I could do without it) but bread is my staple and I remember paying 59c in 1979).
Arabica Coffee in the US is now more expensive than the most expensive pre-packaged (vacuum-packed) ground coffee in France!
remember how much electricity gas and GASOLINE Cost in 2000?
Gasoline prices went up 2-3% in France from the January low ; how about here?
Oil companies have been gauging us for at least 25 years. They started slowly, claiming to just PASS-ON cost of crude increases but WE know it's not true or their profits would be stable or increase slowly, which is FAR from being the case (Check EXXON!).
WE MUST investigate OIL companies and force them to refund at the pump as the Carter administration did - finding them guilty in 78. That's aFACT; Chevron was the biggest offender at that time.
>>“I think it expresses the frustrations that the American people feel... [T]he protesters are giving voice to a more broad-based frustration about how our financial system works.”<<
It's beyond frustration you mealy mouthed asshole. Our "financial system" is criminal, and operated by criminals. Fractional reserve banking is the epitome of fraud, and it gets worse from there. "Wealth" being created simply by trading paper does not produce anything of value and leads only to inflation.
That's what I'm talkin' about. We never truly evolved. Paper represents diamonds and gold. We still kill and enslave people over shiny rocks. AND we are slaves if we only work for food shelter and second hand clothes.
I'm glad you fingered that quote, dkshaw, because Obama said the word "works" instead of the phrase "... our dysfunctional financial system." Obama's frame again proves he has no clue.
Uh oh. Al Sharpton coming to speak at OWS. He has that right, of course, but I wish that grandstanding weasel would just stay away and let the real leaders of OWS & real people in the streets stay in the spotlight. Al will just be a sideshow and distraction from our real demands.
I share your sentiments, but remember, OWS don't need no stinking MSM, or no DNC, or no DLC, or any self appointed star like Al.
Yes, MSNBC replaced a real firebreather with the Reverand Al, a guy that is so lost he brings rightwing idealogues on his show that without exception expose the Rev's glaring rhetorical deficiencies. Like one of the horsemasters in Lord Of The Rings said about the Hobbit in their midst " I don't doubt his heart, merely the reach of his arm."
And the sycophant Chris Matthews seems absolutey frightened that the carnival freak show that passes for governance is going to be exposed as irrelevant, and he along with it.
"Al will just be a sideshow and distraction from our real demands."
The first of many in the political class that will try to channel the protests in their more conventional directions. They aren't going to capture this ...
I remember when the war had been going on for 4 years with no end in sight. I told my teenage daughter...."in our day we would be lying on the steps of the White House demanding there be an end to the war"....I was so frustrated at our complacent society. I am now PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN due to Occupy Wall Street! Together we stand divided we fall. THere are only 10% of "Then" and 90% of us. Wake up America and claim your country back.
A recent article suggested that Wall Street is wrong to say that they represent 99% of Americans because the 90th percentile includes people who earn over $100,000 a year. That assumption misses the point. 99% of the people don't participate in the decision making processes of D.C. regardless of their financial worth. The handful of super wealthy individuals, CEO's of large, multinational corporations and their obedient, hand picked politicians make all the decisions for the general public regardless of our wants and needs. Most people want all the wars to end immediately. Most people want universal healthcare. Most people think too many Americans are rotting in jail. Most Americans want money out of politics. Yet none of these demands even get seriously discussed in D.C. because we're not part of the 1%.
The death of democracy in the U.S. crept up on most Americans in a subtle and stealthy way with complete support of the FCM (Fawning corporate media) as our meagre, social safety was slowly dismantled in the name of 'economic necessity' with the majority of Americans believing that a few smart people in washington had our best interests at heart. The faux debates, empty rhetoric and the FCM's enthusiastic coverage of the Potemkin Village we know as the electoral process, left the 99% duped into thinking that we still lived in a functioning democracy.
Occupy Wall Street protesters are under no such illusions. Wall Street bankers and more importantly the corporate government they symbolize are also under no illusions. The tactics will be the same. Agent provocateurs will be sent into the crowds to stir up trouble. The media will side with their corporate masters. Law Enforcement will relish the opportunity to prove their worth to their superiors and the prison industrial complex will salivate at the idea of mass arrests.
Obama, and every other bought and paid for politician in Washington will simply wait for instructions from the well chosen psychopaths hand picked by industry (Geithner, Immelt, etc.) on how to deal with a few, enlightened protesters.
Tom Englehardt's comparisons between Tahrir Square and Zuccotti Park are fair in one respect and absurd in another. It is a hell of a lot easier to get rid of a dictator than to replace an evil system. Mubarak never had the money and power of corporate America behind him complete with obedient news coverage and a brainwashed populace that adopted American Exceptionalism as their Holy Grail.
This protest is not a warning to Obama. This protest is a plea to put an end to all of the Obama's, Bushies, Rush Limbaugh's and Greenspan's of the world. It's a plea to keep Walmart and GE out of the political process. It's a plea to bring back democracy to America.
I wish I could express myself so eloquently. Great analysis, and very well said.
What is succinctly indicative of the sanity of the OWS movement, is indeed the absence of any demand of Obama, for that would be internally inconsistent with philosophical underpinnings of this movement which are simple…it is now a system that is of the 1%, by the 1%, and for the 1%, which is exceedingly unfair, and anathema to anything close to a functioning democracy.
Yes ! Yes ! Yes ! We, the Occupy Wallstreeters are fighting for a "CLIMATIC" change to our economic, political and social status quo. We need an entirely new philosopical underpinning to our national entity. We do not ask Obama or anyone from the power oligarchy to send a plane up into the cloud to seed it so as to bring us some temporary rainfall. We want to STOP the "climatic change" already wrought by the capitalist system before it worsen further, before it destroy all life on Earth.
SPACE: Well done. Wise analysis.
This is the birth of a new politics, Rorschach Politics. The political class hates it because it is, by definition, fluid, held together by the idea of the Common Good.
Good points awesome.
Another reason the political class and their psychophants in the whore MSM, hate #OWS is they are having so far--a difficult time demonizing the protests. Yes, some like Cain ( who was against raising the minimum wage) have demonized and called the protesters " un-American " ( I guess by those standards 99% of us are un-Americans and the 1% are the true Americans! ) . Bloomberg said the #OWS protests were hurting the economy ( that statement, only an insane billionaire would make in the present economy ). What makes it difficult for the politically powerful elite, is unlike the anti-war movement, where the elite had a field day demonizing the protesters as " traitors to America " " treasonous for not supporting the troops during war time" among other pejoratives, the #OWS are by definition, held together by the common good.
" Vice President Joe Biden said, “The core is the bargain has been breached with the American people...”
Was that the "Ignore all the crap we're doing abroad and we'll keep you fat and happy at home" deal? Is the military/industrial/pharmaceutical complex going to get a free pass?
Engelhardt sez: "This is the way the state treats 15,000 terrorist suspects, not its own citizens."
***
Citizens are the greatest existential threat to the current U.S. "state". It functions most smoothly when people behave as "subjects".
I'm sure there are signs with Obama's name on them; Englehardt just preferred to omit them as they're most likely negative--truely negative. There's a short video at the top of the OWS webpage entitled "Sign Language." Didn't see any explicitly anti-Obama signs, but there're plenty denouncing his policies, http://occupywallst.org/
re: "Obama’s presidency could someday be seen as little but an irrelevancy."
For some of us who have been watching with an operating moral compass, that day already passed many many moons ago.
Yes, indeed.
I was going to say the same thing, but you beat me to it!
Somehow, I don't think we are alone in feeling this way.
The irony is that Obama had (past tense) the opportunity to be one of the most relevant Presidents in US history -- right up there with FDR.
It happens very rarely that circumstances (crash of the economy due to wall Street corruption) -- and the American public (who have had it with rapacious robber barrons and corrupt politicians) -- align themselves the way they did for Obama.
But he threw it all away for a little "security" an "comfort".
Not ours, but his own.
He's simply too enamored with cavorting with the rich and powerful (rubbing elbows with the likes of Larry Summers, Robert Gates, General Petraeus, Lloyd Blankfein, Jamie Dimon) to take the risk of offending any of the elites.
In a very real sense, Obama traded relevancy for golf with elites.
I hope he's happy with the trade, cuz he's stuck with it.
Very nicely stated jj. I especially love, "In a very real sense, Obama traded relevancy for golf with elites."
So true!
(And what a sorry disappointment... but that's history now — onto the future!)
I agree, Obama's case was lost for me as soon as his advisers were known and banking industry people were CHOSEN and put in key positions.
I think the OWS and movements alike are a THREAT to Obama and could take him out like Mubarak: the latter was in FULL control of the press and the Internet unlike what's happening here, SO FAR...
He has no idea what to do just as Mubarak at the beginning because Mubarak thought he would never fall and Western states wouldn't abandon him but they did...
Who's going to support Obama? Poutine?
Still no mention of Nafta by Slick Willie Clinton. Time to educate the Occupiers
that it was Slick Willie who dismantled the Banking laws and it was Slick Willie
who gave us Nafta the deal that outsourced our industrial base to China.
It was Ross Perot who warned us re Nafta, It was Al Gore who ridiculed Ross Perot because of his stance on Nafta. It was the Democrats who layed the ground
work on this destruction of the Middle Class.
I think it was during the '90's, I had a bumper sticker that said "If the people lead, the leaders will follow."
I think that OWS is leading -- most Americans believe that the wealthy and the corporations should pay their fair share, and OWS is speaking on that issue for the great majority.
Now, all we need is for the leaders to follow.
It's probably a good thing that President Obama is not out there with them. At this point I truly don't know if he wants to be there -- the candidate was so different from the President -- but I give him the benefit of the doubt.
He is President of the United States. Since he was inaugurated, he has been focused on being everybody's president. But the Republicans will not have it. He has compromised and conceded and bent over backwards to accommodate them, but they just take and never give. And they constantly berate him for not compromising, not conceding and being rigid.
As a result of his attempts at bipartisanship, President Obama has lost the wholehearted enthusiasm of many of those who voted for him. To them, he has sold out. And he never was going to change the minds of the folks who want him out at any cost. A lose-lose situation.
I would love to see him do what Wilson and Roosevelt did -- take on his opponents, identify exactly who they are and what they are doing to all of us, and call them on it. Loud and clear.
Roosevelt: "We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace—business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.
They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.
Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me—and I welcome their hatred."
re: "men taking a dump in public."
Kinda reminds me of the content of this post
I think the 99% can handle a bit of exposure to the human body. As far as other unsanitary actions you're referring to, the movement has been clear from the beginning it supports only safe, peaceful and socially conscious behavior from those participating. What you claim is occurring is of course not endorsed by OWS... and pretty much I'd say your just making things up, feeling an irresistible need to express your rightwing indignation on a left wing site. Your right I guess.
It's dirty hippy deja vu all over again.
Next thing you know, guys with afros and tie died shirts will be desecrating the national anthem with loud, distorted electric guitar licks.
The organizers are way ahead of the critics on this point as they have their own Sanitation Committee, along with many more as noted here, http://nycga.cc/groups/ And all this sans the corpoarate support doled out to the Tea Party, which I doubt could ever hope to mount a similar demonstration. These are your neighbors and their kids, KnightsofColumbus; please see for yourself at their two websites, http://nycga.cc/ and http://occupywallst.org/
Besides being ridiculous, it's freezing out there.
Seems the current temp in NYC when you posted was about 73F.
We all know that Obama is a wholly owned subsidiary of Wall Street.
How long can the oligarchy keep oppressing the 99%?
Direct democracy
Obama's presidency irrelevant?
hmmm...
use of drones for blatant, global murder...
Deepwater Horizon...
Fukushima...
pretty relevant...and we're not done, yet...
Its nice to see that there are a few others out there that get "it". What was telling from the beginning of the Obama presidence was his cabinet choices. Tim Geithner and Robert Rubin who is the architech of this whole mess. He is the guy that got Glass-Stegal repealed. One thing that I cant figure out though is if Obama is just incompetent and has no clue as to what he is doing or if he is just bought and sold by corporate America. Oh, and hats off Space Cadet clear concise message!
Dems are all about the lip service but *do something* and impose power over their funders....not going to happen.
NYC Police have been getting funds from National Security financing and trainings from the CIA. Meanwhile, the questions raised about the President's links to the CIA have never been comprehensively evaluated and we are stuck with a clean slate narrative that simply doesn't stand up to the facts. The corporate media is certainly not looking to unveil realities that do ot fit the narrative, and they have the consolidated news media has done their best to discredit the demonstrations as a non-movement. People should be wondering about Obama and his real position in both international and domestic actions, and at least one major issue is still hanging in the air:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NquIKlMQ4U&feature=related
BARACK OBAMA is a CIA CREATION
Enough fraud!
Let's not get distracted. The Wall Street protest movements are not about Obama. They are about Wall Street gambling that brought down our economy, deprived millions of jobs and foreclosed on homes.
After reading this article, concerning a warning to Obama, the first post I read includes the same stubbon and dangerous misconception. The idea that there aren't "really" two parties. How can someone get something this serious, so wrong? Of course there are two parties. A political party is simply a sort of gathering spot for the defense of, the declaration of, a body of political principles. The person that wrote the post that suggested there aren't two parties, is making the mistake of assuming that the particular group of political leaders currently claiming membership in a party, is the essence of that party. Nonsense. The essence of a party is its principles, however much the leaders that currently call themselves democrats or republicans or whatever, pretend otherwise, lie to the people, betray those principles. This give the lie to Nader's famous comment, "I didn't leave the democratic party, it left me." This is a politicallly clever remark, but it's a lie. You, I, Nader, or anyone else, calling themselves a democrat, are democrats because we support, defend and stand for the principles that are the essence of our party. Sorry Nader, you can leave your party, but it can never leave you. The problem Nader had, is that he felt relatively alone in his devotion to the principles of "his" party. He knew there were others that shared his principles, but, rather than stay and fight with those few, he left the party with a higher ratio of frauds. If you want power without responsibility, joining a political party is a quick road. Simply call yourself a democrat, win elections, then sit in power, without regard for the people that you betrayed. This is even more in evidence with the so-called republicans. Of course, you can "interpret" your party principles. But the poseurs would have you bellieve that there is infinite latitude, when you're confronted with having to explain away your lies. How conservative can a democrat be, and still be a democrat? There is "some" wiggling room, but not much. The rise of the Independent party, is a godsend in this respect. If you're a wishy-washy democrat mayor, senator, or governor, because of the "district" you're in, stop the bullshit, and become an Independent, or a republican. Virtually all democratic leaders are smart enough to know when they're straying too far from basic party principles. Obama is a perfect example. Obama apologists make a fundamental error. They think they can explain any Obama subjugation to the republicans, by arguing that democrats are impatient or demading too much, etc. What tripe. The problem for Obama is a simple one. He needs to leave the democratic party. He's, at best, a "conservative" leaning Independent. The question is not, why is Obama such a disappointment to the democrats? The question is, why does Obama call himself a democrat? Let him run for a second term, with an honest declaration of his wavering principles, as an Independent.
Okay. Well-written and thought out.
But it sure LOOKS like a one-party system from where I sit.
Let's see how the Dems vote on Obama's Jobs Bill.
Two parties? Maybe. But that means lots of the Dems are Republicans.
" ... (we) are democrats because we support, defend and stand for the principles that are the essence of our party ..."
Like slave holding?
LEAVING THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY...
I have left the Democratic Party and all its candidates because of its monolithic
support for Israeli suppression of Palestinians.
I believe that Palestinians should have their OWN government, their own
administration, their own rules for all building and residence, their own
rights to defend their territory. Their own rights to WATER.
The so-called "settlers" never had any right to steal land and water from
Palestinians. They should leave poste haste. If Israel wishes to settle them all
in Tel Aviv, so be it.
Palestine should be recognized just as any other nation is recognized.
I oppse the Israeli/US occupation.Also the illegal seige and blockade.
If the so-called "settlers" should decide to live in a Palestinian state under
Palestinian law and Palestinian rules (not Israeli!), they may apply to the
independent and sovereign GOP (Government of Palestine) whose decisions
must obtain. (No "appeal" to any Israeli judicial or administrative authority
whatsoever.
The wall and discriminatory building of roads and the like must become history.
(Would Israel permit a similar wall for Palestinian "self-defence" to be built
inside of Israel and manned exclusively by troops loyal to Palestine?)