LA had a big movement recently and the movement here in NYC is still going strong. Jackson Browne was at Zuccotti Park performing and mentioned the movement and should full support. I don't know why that's relevant.
Problem is, no one gives a shit about the plight of the white middle class. Seriously, who gives a fuck? Civil rights? Sure. Equality? Sure. I had to trade in my Lexus for a used Toyota Civic? Go fuck yourself.
Plus, the irony of pro-Obama supporters protesting the bankers Obama bailed out. And was finacially supported by during his campaign. And will bail out again if need be. So, it's like the protesters are protesting against themselves.
I think you will find that most of the hardcore OWSers are pretty critical of Obama. They are probably the ones responsible for his disapproval rating from the left. The reason it is OWS and not ODC is exactly because they feel betrayed by the administration and rightly so.
I accept that they're critical of Obama, but I also feel that they will vote for Obama again. No chance these left leaning OWS'ers will vote republican.
Which to me seems insane, to protest a bail out given by a president that they'll vote in again.
How exactly this is achieved varies from country to country. In the US the role of lobbyists and political financing must be high on the agenda.
Campaign reform, it's the only way. Predicted estimate for this election will be over a billion in campaign contribution FOR EACH CANDIDATE. Where does that money come from? What does that money buy people? How can there NOT BE corporate influence when a presidential campaign requires billions in contribution?
How right is it to complain that they wont give Republicans a chance when that would lead to an exasperation of the problems they are protesting about
Ron Paul
You also should remember that while Obama voted for the bail out, he did so in the oft lauded spirit of "bipartisanship".
He did so because that's who were his main campaign contributers. The financial system knew what they were facing and knew which president to back in 08 that would support the bailout.
Many will likely hold their noses and do it again just like those on the right are going to do for Gingrich or Romney.
Why do you think we wouldn't get bailouts under a Paul administration?
A few reasons:
He hasn't accepted campaign contributions from them, esp. not the large majority of his campaign money. So he doesn't owe them.
He has expressed the fact that he didn't/doesn't support the bailout. He gave alternative ways around it.
But me mentioning him had more to do with an alternative to the typical Rep/Dem choices. Even though he is running on the republican side, we know his true colors. He is a republican that didn't support the bailout, that's what Mod was looking for.
I get your grip with him, I read it in the other thread. My libertarian side clashes with my science side, so I can't fully support him. I can't fully support any of them.
Mod asked for a Republican candidate who didn't support the bailout, Ron Paul is one.
Where's the evidence for the Wall Street banker support though? I haven't seen that.
Some corporate backing is fine. Some influence is fine. It's the enormous amount that Obama received, vs someone like Ron Paul. My point is, to solve the corporate influence, vote for a president without some much corporate backing.
However, without campaign reform we will not see that.
Fixing the way we do the electing will.
I say, not only that but, fix the way they're allowed to campaign.
But most of the occupiers I know are educated, articulate, motivated and have busy lives including, in many cases, jobs
That's very true for Occupy Wall Street as well.
From my end, a lot of comics have taken to the protesting. I don't know why, maybe because we have free time to protest.
Here's a great video by Ted Alexandro, a comic, that really shows the true nature of the protest. Older people, young people, women, men, students, workers, and except for the gay meditation cirlce, it looks safe and it is safe. Having been down there, it's like a street festival where people are nice and friendly.
I don't see Occupy as the final answer to anything in and of itself. But you have to start somewhere.
This seems to be the overall point, as Alexandro states that there is no "End Game" right now. It's just a protest to begin what they feel will be a larger movement that changes the way politics are done.
Not that I agree with them and who they're protesting against, having they themselves voted the president that helped his friends in the financial market, but I do agree with their overall point: There needs to be a change in the way corporations influence politics in America and abroad.
Surely the protesters you know are critical of the present government and president? I find it almost unbelievable that they wouldn't be.
Not so much for the president, if at all. It's mostly against the banks and their influence in politics. Not against politicians and their accepting of said influence.
As for bank bailouts - What do you think should have been done?
Not the point I'm making. The point is, the candidate who supported the bailout won the election.
The Obama marketing campaign was stronger than McCain's, backed of course by the financial institutions. It is a CLEAR example, although I'm sure there are many more, of corporate influence in politics, both during the campaign and while elected.
I'm surprised that the NY protest is not directly critical of the government given the stance being taken.
Because they still support Obama. Not to generalize but, banks represent capitalism, corporate institutions and republicanism - it seems to be the enemy.
The true enemy, IMO, is politicians who allow this too be the way government is run.
This to me suggests that the protesters are disenchanted with politicians and the way politics is done rather than just with bankers alone. But I haven't been to the NY protest so you will know better than me.
Yes, but the chants are "Lets make sure corporations don't influence our government" - rather than "Lets make sure our government doesn't get influenced by corporations."
Corporation will do what corporations do. We need to vote politicians in that, when they say Washington won't be influenced by lobbyist, they mean it. But we keep voting these corporate puppets in and blaming the corporations for being evil. It's backwards.
But governments of various leanings supported bailouts around the world. Bailouts were arguably necessary. It is the lack of reform and ongoing support of a corrupt and failed system that is the ongoing crime here.
quote:Thanks to Bloomberg investigators and facts obtained through the freedom of information act it has come to light that 26 Trillion (not billion) in bailout money was given out by the Federal Reserve without any oversight or knowledge of details given to the US population that ultimately would have paid the price if anything had gone wrong. This was all accomplished by the Federal Reserve without any authorizations of Congress!
If that wasn’t bad enough this was the first time in history that the Federal Reserve played favorites and just decided to give the money to one institution over another and they also generously offered all this money at nearly a zero percent interest rate. Just to put things into perspective 26 Trillion is an amount of money which is approximately equal to all the goods and services that the entire USA produces in a year!
Ron Paul is hardly an option at this time (he's not definitely on any ballots for national power at this time).
He's the only one making sense concerning economic issues and foreign policy. The media however has tried to stiffle him.
If he runs on a Republican Ticket, he'll be presiding over a government that supports the bailouts.
I don't know what you mean by that. Mc Cain did NOT support the bailout, Romney did not support the auto bailout, and given the facts of the bailout many politicians ON BOTH SIDES have stated they wouldn't have supported the bailout.
One camp for sure did, which was the camp getting a mojority of their campaign money from the financial institutions - Obama.
I'm not sure the OWS guys support for instance, eradicating Federal spending on education
But his argument on why is sound, and should be, if it's not already, a focus for the OWS people. He is against the No Child Left Behind policy that was federally funded.
As he said in April 2011:
quote:Not too many years ago, however, the Republican Party platform argued for getting rid of the Department of Education. This pretense was removed with the election of George W. Bush in the year 2000. With both Democratic and Republican support, he massively increased the Department of Education with the disastrous No Child Left Behind program. Now national control of all public schools is firmly a bipartisan effort. It doesn't seem to matter that students, parents, administrators, and teachers generally disapprove of No Child Left Behind. Once an institution is hooked on federal financing, it's virtually impossible to stop the bureaucratic regulations and mandates that routinely follow subsidies.
Furthermore, he has social policies that are generally abhorent to the liberals and independents such as 'Life begins at conception' which not only would seek to outlaw abortion but also if taken literally, would outlaw the pill.
That's a fair point. But he has also stated that it's not the job of the federal government to legalize or ban abortion. Instead, it is up to the individual states to prohibit abortion.
So I don't see how his personal views on abortion could become an issue.
quote:Government assistance to the banking system should be based solely on preventing systemic risk that would endanger the entire financial system and the economy,
His vote of the bailout, when he did finally vote for it, also came with a clause:
First, there must be greater accountability included in the bill. I have suggested a bipartisan board to provide oversight for the rescue. We will not solve a problem caused by poor oversight with a plan that has no oversight. Never before in the history of our nation has so much power and money been concentrated in the hands of one person, and there must be protections and oversight in place. Second, as a part of that oversight, there must be a path for taxpayers to recover the money that is put into this fund. One trillion dollars is an unprecedented sum. We are talking about ten thousand dollars per household, and that money cannot simply go into a black hole of bad debt with no means of recovering any of the funds. Third, there must be complete transparency in the review of this legislation and in the implementation of any legislation. This cannot be cobbled together behind closed doors. The American people have the right to know which businesses will be helped, what that selection will be based on and how much that help will cost. All the details should all be made available online and elsewhere for open public scrutiny. Fourth, no Wall Street executives should profit from taxpayer dollars. It is wrong to ask teachers and farmers and small business owners to fill the gas tanks of the helicopters of Wall Street tycoons. The senior leaders of any firm that is bailed out should not be making more than the highest paid government official. Fifth and finally, it is completely unacceptable for any kind of earmarks to be included in this bill. It would be outrageous for legislators and lobbyists to pack this rescue plan with taxpayer money for favored companies. This simply cannot happen. Let me restate that inaction is not an option. The American people are watching. History will be our judge, and it will judge us harshly if we do not put our country first in this crisis.
As you can see, what I highlighted was never done. Had he known, as many law makers have now stated, the way the bill would play out, he along with many others, would not have voted for it.
So it's not fair to point out that he voted yes, when he specifically laid out the condition for it. He, along with the American public, was lied to. Same thing that happened with the invasion of Iraq. In an effort for bipartisanship he voted Yea, but it was conditional.
1. Campaign reform.
It's hard to get a politician to support this.
2. Strictly enforced regulations of the financial sector to help prevent the public being held as financial hostages in the future.
That's precisely what Mc Cain wanted to do - see quote.
3. Reinstatement of high taxes for the particularly wealthy.
Mc Cain cut taxes during the Regan Admin.
quote:When I first came to Congress, we were in the middle of the Reagan revolution, and I was proud to be a foot soldier in that revolution. And we cut taxes. But we cut spending. And Ronald Reagan insisted that we cut spending, because he knew that it was vital, if we were going to keep the deficit down and not have the fiscal difficulties we have today, we had to cut spending. I’m proud to have supported those tax cuts. And I believe that if we had done what I wanted to do--cut taxes and, at the same time, cut spending--we’d be talking about more tax cuts today. But we let spending get out of control. Unfortunately, we betrayed one of the principles of the Republican Party. I’m in favor of tax cuts. We’ll do them. But we’ll cut spending when I’m president.
4. In case of crisis, bailout the people, not the banks. If banks must be bailed out, they become the property of the people.
That is presicely what Mc Cain wanted - see quote.
The OWS people should have supported Mc Cain in hindsight.
It's a picture of a bishop getting arrested. My buddy who also got arrested that day (sitting with the skully on, bottom right) with the bishop, and 50 others, said they were organizing in the cell and conducting meetings there. These aren't homeless people, or criminals getting arrested.
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