Declaration of Occupy Wall Street

[jillio]

What part of "the character that defines a movement matters" do you disagree with?

By the way, if you want to see some substantive discussion on their grievances, here you go.

Income inequality- This only matters if the economy is a zero-sum game (i.e. when one person gets rich, it means someone else has to get poorer). With few exceptions, it is not a zero-sum gain. A person can only get rich by enriching others. If we acknowledge that truth, then it's downright ungrateful to whine about income inequality. This is a system that has delivered the most material comforts the world has ever known. When even the poor are well fed (overly so, actually) and often have cars, AC, and cell phones in a bad recession, it's pretty grating to hear complaints that someone else has more.

Crony capitalism- Agreed, but their solution is to increase the power of government to crack down on corporations. That's the best way to make the problem worse. A more powerful government attracts more special interests, including corporations, looking for favorable treatment. The solution is to cut back on Washington's power.

Wall Street malfeasance- I agree we should prosecute anyone guilty of wrongdoing. Nobody disagrees with that, but it's not like there's a lack of desire to go after Wall Street. Does anyone really think the DOJ wouldn't love the publicity from taking on Wall Street? We can't just throw people in prison when there's no proof of wrongdoing.

These are just a few of their points, of course.

Read the link I just provided if you want to see the "Character defining the movement."

 

[deafskeptic]

I think you are forgetting that everyone elected to public office is first a person. Just because they affiliate with a party does not mean they will always vote to party line. The better politicians (the ones that seem to care more about their constituents are the ones that vote based on their humanity not on their political party. The only reason these guys do not become independents is because most of the voting public is too ignorant and biased towards or against a party to vote in an independent.

Also, good legislation takes time and discussion. Let's discuss the issues and what brought us to this point so we can figure out how to move past it.

I fully support the OWS protest. I support their right to protest (peacefully and respectfully). I realize that this protest is really a collage of anger and built up frustration. I was driving home from vacation last week and drove past an OWS protest in S.C. One guy held a sign that said something like "The banks got theirs, when will you get yours?" This just shows the ignorance and frustration that is bound up in this protest. It's like a stew with everything thrown in and no one can decide what kind of stew it's supposed to be.

So let's talk about how we got here.

As I understand it, the federal government pushed to get more low income people into homes really kicked of a surge in home prices then the housing bubble popped and we are stuck with a mess of mortgages that people cannot afford and banks cannot recover because the house values have fallen way below what folks owe on those houses.

I was speaking of the Democratic party in general - not specific members.

When I said that the democratic party became the Republican lite, I was referring to the fact that they no longer support things like unions (because the unions have become weak) and I am referring to things like Clintion's supports NAFTA and his role regarding the Glass-Stegall act. They helped increase the offshoring of job and his repeal of Glass-Stegall act helped lead to to the Wall Street disasters.

I will give Clinton credit for his regrets in his roles. That's more than I can say for the Republicans. Bush didn't help matters any either with his costly and irresponsible wars and taxes. Free market fundamentalism didn't help either.

Since Republicans have not been very responsive to the 99%, it's probable they may go the way of the Whigs in the 19th century if they don't clean up their act.

 

[saywhatkid]

What part of "the character that defines a movement matters" do you disagree with?
So, if an individual act can accurately reflect a group and its' movement, what about those Conservatives that cheer the rape of a deaf man, mocked others with racially loaded jargon, and jeer the protestors that have followed all laws and regulations related to their right to assemble?

By the way, if you want to see some substantive discussion on their grievances, here you go.

Income inequality- This only matters if the economy is a zero-sum game (i.e. when one person gets rich, it means someone else has to get poorer). With few exceptions, it is not a zero-sum gain. A person can only get rich by enriching others. If we acknowledge that truth, then it's downright ungrateful to whine about income inequality. This is a system that has delivered the most material comforts the world has ever known. When even the poor are well fed (overly so, actually) and often have cars, AC, and cell phones in a bad recession, it's pretty grating to hear complaints that someone else has more.
If you mean taking (taxing) from a working person and giving to someone that is not working, despite that person making every effort to find work, then I disagree. If you mean taking (taxing) from a working person and giving to a jobless person that has no reason to not work, other than lack of motivation, I agree.
Crony capitalism- Agreed, but their solution is to increase the power of government to crack down on corporations. That's the best way to make the problem worse. A more powerful government attracts more special interests, including corporations, looking for favorable treatment. The solution is to cut back on Washington's power.
So, you think we should "let the businesses work stuff out for themselves" now that we are in this mess? Pardon me while I start burying canned food.

Wall Street malfeasance- I agree we should prosecute anyone guilty of wrongdoing. Nobody disagrees with that, but it's not like there's a lack of desire to go after Wall Street. Does anyone really think the DOJ wouldn't love the publicity from taking on Wall Street? We can't just throw people in prison when there's no proof of wrongdoing.

These are just a few of their points, of course.

There are a lot of people in this protest that are there for reasons other than the protest issues. When the cold winds of December howl down Wall Street, those people will be gone. Just as the Tea Party is a group of frustrated voters, so is the OWS movement. Different ends of the financial spectrum, but with the same fervor to be heard.

 

[TWA]

What part of "the character that defines a movement matters" do you disagree with?

By the way, if you want to see some substantive discussion on their grievances, here you go.

Income inequality- This only matters if the economy is a zero-sum game (i.e. when one person gets rich, it means someone else has to get poorer). With few exceptions, it is not a zero-sum gain. A person can only get rich by enriching others. If we acknowledge that truth, then it's downright ungrateful to whine about income inequality. This is a system that has delivered the most material comforts the world has ever known. When even the poor are well fed (overly so, actually) and often have cars, AC, and cell phones in a bad recession, it's pretty grating to hear complaints that someone else has more.

Have you been reading Ayn Rand like Golfer lately?

I would agree that a capitalist system with integrity has the potential to enrich all, including the poor. Unfortunately, there is no good example in history that we can look to as a capitalistic system with integrity. In every instance of capitalism, there is always a group/s of people that are being exploited in order that another segment of the population is able to live in comfort. In pre-civil war America, it was the slaves. In industrial revolution England, it was the poor, including children.

Today, it is the multitudes of Chinese and third world workers that work for pittances and are beholden to the industry they work for. If you don't think America benefits from slave labor in the 21st century, you're very mistaken. Read Disposable Peoples.

In every instance of successful capitalism, we see two characteristics: the people at the top--the ones who own the means of production (machinery and natural resources)--put in very little work in terms of man-hours, while the people at the bottom bear the brunt of production and creation of wealth in the form of man-hours converted into physical products.

Capitalism is an unsupportable system because it requires consumption and inequality. That is the nature of making a profit. You cannot make profit on a sustainable system. Communism was meant to be the antithesis of capitalism, but just like capitalism, the world has never seen a pure form of it--a communist system with integrity. The fact is, human beings do not have integrity. Therefore, you can never have a system with integrity.

 

[Steinhauer]

What part of "the character that defines a movement matters" do you disagree with?

By the way, if you want to see some substantive discussion on their grievances, here you go.

Income inequality- This only matters if the economy is a zero-sum game (i.e. when one person gets rich, it means someone else has to get poorer). With few exceptions, it is not a zero-sum gain. A person can only get rich by enriching others. If we acknowledge that truth, then it's downright ungrateful to whine about income inequality. This is a system that has delivered the most material comforts the world has ever known. When even the poor are well fed (overly so, actually) and often have cars, AC, and cell phones in a bad recession, it's pretty grating to hear complaints that someone else has more.

Crony capitalism- Agreed, but their solution is to increase the power of government to crack down on corporations. That's the best way to make the problem worse. A more powerful government attracts more special interests, including corporations, looking for favorable treatment. The solution is to cut back on Washington's power.

Wall Street malfeasance- I agree we should prosecute anyone guilty of wrongdoing. Nobody disagrees with that, but it's not like there's a lack of desire to go after Wall Street. Does anyone really think the DOJ wouldn't love the publicity from taking on Wall Street? We can't just throw people in prison when there's no proof of wrongdoing.

These are just a few of their points, of course.

Then they should be occupying DC - Obama bailed Wall Street out ...


Oh wait ... the Tea Party is doing that

 

[jillio]

Then they should be occupying DC - Obama bailed Wall Street out ...


Oh wait ... the Tea Party is doing that

The Tea Partiers are home dozing in front of their TV waiting on their SS checks and Medicare pamphlet.:P

 

[saywhatkid]

Then they should be occupying DC - Obama bailed Wall Street out ...


Oh wait ... the Tea Party is doing that

I would certainly hope you are an active Tea Party member. Don't leave your agenda in the hands of others.

 

[saywhatkid]

The Tea Partiers are home dozing in front of their TV waiting on their SS checks and Medicare pamphlet.:P

Today is payday! Every day is payday! No work on payday!

 

[deafskeptic]

Then they should be occupying DC - Obama bailed Wall Street out ...


Oh wait ... the Tea Party is doing that

I think the ows protesters know where the real power lies.

Here's a quick quick question for you: Do you know what the Scotus decisions is regarding corporations spending on political spending regarding candidate elections? Who helped fund Obama's election funds? I have no doubt he's not only one who's funded by corporations. The corporations have deeper pockets than the average individual American.

 

[deafskeptic]

I would certainly hope you are an active Tea Party member. Don't leave your agenda in the hands of others.

It's clear he's not at the White House protesting. Maybe he's collecting his check and sitting in front of the tv and the computer.

 

[saywhatkid]

It's clear he's not at the White House protesting. Maybe he's collecting his check and sitting in front of the tv and the computer.

I believe he has a job. He knows about unscrupulous sales people, among other things. "Let us govern ourselves out of this mess caused by our greed!"

 

[jillio]

It's clear he's not at the White House protesting. Maybe he's collecting his check and sitting in front of the tv and the computer.

All tuckered out from eating breakfast.

 

[saywhatkid]

All tuckered out from eating breakfast.

Or trying to find more videos of "dem bums dat be lookin fo free scratch" on YouTube.

 

[jillio]

Or trying to find more videos of "dem bums dat be lookin fo free scratch" on YouTube.

 

[darkdog]

So, if an individual act can accurately reflect a group and its' movement...

Come on. You know in this very thread I said things like:

By the way, I'm sensitive to the argument that a whole movement should not be judged based on the idiotic behavior of a few. They should be judged based on behavior that is common to the movement.

and...

I think character and behavior do matter, and I disagree, with good justification, with your premise that this uncivilized behavior is just a few bad apples. I would not have aligned myself with the Tea Party if it were anything like this.

Let's focus on what I actually say.

...what about those Conservatives that cheer the rape of a deaf man, mocked others with racially loaded jargon...

Are conservatives actually cheering the rape of a deaf man? If you can provide me a quote to that effect, I will condemn it. Same with the racially loaded jargon.

and jeer the protestors that have followed all laws and regulations related to their right to assemble?

That's just factually wrong. They have occupied public and private property for weeks on end without filing for permits and buying required insurance. They have created unsanitary and unsafe conditions. They have threatened showdowns with the police in every municipality where they were ordered to evacuate. They have taunted the police and blocked traffic. This is not the action of a fringe within the movement- this is the character of the movement.

If you mean taking (taxing) from a working person and giving to someone that is not working, despite that person making every effort to find work, then I disagree. If you mean taking (taxing) from a working person and giving to a jobless perosn that has no reason to not work, other than lack of motivation, I agree.

When people talk about reducing income inequality, they're not talking about unemployment benefits. They're talking about taxing high income earners at very high rates not to fund the legitimate functions of government (i.e. school, police, military, etc.), but to fund their social engineering efforts.

So, you think we should "let the businesses work stuff out for themselves" now that we are in this mess? Pardon me while I start burying canned food.

No. There should be rules which are relatively few, simple to understand, and strictly and evenly enforced. The problem is that there are too many laws and loopholes designed to help one industry or one company over another (usually large over small) and they are arbitrary. To expect more discretion from a government with more arbitrary power is foolishness.

 

[darkdog]

I think the ows protesters know where the real power lies.

Here's a quick quick question for you: Do you know what the Scotus decisions is regarding corporations spending on political spending regarding candidate elections? Who helped fund Obama's election funds? I have no doubt he's not only one who's funded by corporations. The corporations have deeper pockets than the average individual American.

The Citizen's United case only says that the government cannot restrict corporations or unions from making political broadcasts. Despite what the left and the President has claimed, the decision does nothing to change the laws regarding corporations donating to candidates.

 

[saywhatkid]

Come on. You know in this very thread I said things like:

and...

Let's focus on what I actually say.


Are conservatives actually cheering the rape of a deaf man? If you can provide me a quote to that effect, I will condemn it. Same with the racially loaded jargon.

That's just factually wrong. They have occupied public and private property for weeks on end without filing for permits and buying required insurance. They have created unsanitary and unsafe conditions. They have threatened showdowns with the police in every municipality where they were ordered to evacuate. They have taunted the police and blocked traffic. This is not the action of a fringe within the movement- this is the character of the movement.


When people talk about reducing income inequality, they're not talking about unemployment benefits. They're talking about taxing high income earners at very high rates not to fund the legitimate functions of government (i.e. school, police, military, etc.), but to fund their social engineering efforts.

No. There should be rules which are relatively few, simple to understand, and strictly and evenly enforced. The problem is that there are too many laws and loopholes designed to help one industry or one company over another (usually large over small) and they are arbitrary. To expect more discretion from a government with more arbitrary power is foolishness.

Not trying to pin the blame on you for the things I mention above. Notice I have much less to say to other Conservatives on this forum, basically because they tend to be biased and fail to see it. At least we can have a respectful discussion.


However, I doubt you could read the comments under these videos that Tx is posting and not feel the hate that some people have for this movement.

• "They are practicing for the Raping they will gets from the new Communo-Socialist government they are setting up"
• "this is the Obama-nation you lame brain, Obama Zombies voted for!"
• "This is the liberal utopia they've talked about . It's insane"
• "It was bound to happen, give free reign to the sickos and this is what you get. I'd say NYC needs to be a police state it's the only language these creeps understand, if they resist shoot them down."
• "Hide yo chilren, hide wives and hide yo husbands cuz day be rapin ever body up in hea."
• "Getting ass-raped by fellow OWS zombies.....Priceless!"

Now tell me, are these comments being written by Liberals to paint the Conservatives in a bad light? I don't think so. Just curious, has any of the pundits on Right wing websites posted anything that does not try to paint the people involved as anything better than Liberal zealots with nothing else to do but break laws? My entire point is that these people are the focus of most of the Conservative rebuttals, and I find it boring. Same with the flow of "Obama cannot throw, golf, ride a bike, bow correctly" crap that permeated the political forum.

My point is that Liberals could easily use the same philosophy about these comments to paint the entire group of Conservatives as haters.

Anyhow, nice to see you back.

 

[darkdog]

Have you been reading Ayn Rand like Golfer lately?

I'm not a fan of Ayn Rand. I don't believe in selfishness.

I would agree that a capitalist system with integrity has the potential to enrich all, including the poor.

How many rich people had cell phones and air conditioning 100 years ago? How many poor people have that today?

Unfortunately, there is no good example in history that we can look to as a capitalistic system with integrity. In every instance of capitalism, there is always a group/s of people that are being exploited in order that another segment of the population is able to live in comfort. In pre-civil war America, it was the slaves. In industrial revolution England, it was the poor, including children.

The anti-slave north was wealthier than the south. And why is it that child labor is not even controversial in the United States any more? Why are people well off enough to not need to employ children just to survive?

Today, it is the multitudes of Chinese and third world workers that work for pittances and are beholden to the industry they work for. If you don't think America benefits from slave labor in the 21st century, you're very mistaken. Read Disposable Peoples.

Yes, the world is a nasty place and slavery still exists which forces people into deplorable situations. However, I would argue that we could get rid of all slavery in the world and it would barely make a dent in our standard of living. In fact, I would guess in the long run, it would improve our standard of living. I've seen estimates that slavery in the world is responsible for profits on the order of tens of billions of dollars. That sounds like a lot of money, but it's a mere drop in the bucket of our economy.

I wouldn't lump in all manual labor shops into slavery, where there's true coercion and no way out. There's a reason people in poor countries would take these jobs- because they pay better than anything else available. The fact is that cheap manual labor is a good way for a country to go from poor to wealthy, as long as there is also political stability and freedom. It worked in Japan and South Korea.

In every instance of successful capitalism, we see two characteristics: the people at the top--the ones who own the means of production (machinery and natural resources)--put in very little work in terms of man-hours, while the people at the bottom bear the brunt of production and creation of wealth in the form of man-hours converted into physical products.

Sounds easy. Why don't you take out a loan and build a factory? It's not like there's a shortage of people you can hire. You wouldn't be the first one to do that. Most rich people today were not born with a silver spoon in their mouth.

Capitalism is an unsupportable system because it requires consumption and inequality. That is the nature of making a profit. You cannot make profit on a sustainable system. Communism was meant to be the antithesis of capitalism, but just like capitalism, the world has never seen a pure form of it--a communist system with integrity. The fact is, human beings do not have integrity. Therefore, you can never have a system with integrity.

So we had two systems deal with imperfect human beings. One was a human rights disaster, spawned untold poverty, and eventually crashed. The other is capitalism. We're blessed to have been born in the latter.

 

[jillio]

I'm not a fan of Ayn Rand. I don't believe in selfishness.


How many rich people had cell phones and air conditioning 100 years ago? How many poor people have that today?


The anti-slave north was wealthier than the south. And why is it that child labor is not even controversial in the United States any more? Why are people well off enough to not need to employ children just to survive?


Yes, the world is a nasty place and slavery still exists which forces people into deplorable situations. However, I would argue that we could get rid of all slavery in the world and it would barely make a dent in our standard of living. In fact, I would guess in the long run, it would improve our standard of living. I've seen estimates that slavery in the world is responsible for profits on the order of tens of billions of dollars. That sounds like a lot of money, but it's a mere drop in the bucket of our economy.

I wouldn't lump in all manual labor shops into slavery, where there's true coercion and no way out. There's a reason people in poor countries would take these jobs- because they pay better than anything else available. The fact is that cheap manual labor is a good way for a country to go from poor to wealthy, as long as there is also political stability and freedom. It worked in Japan and South Korea.


Sounds easy. Why don't you take out a loan and build a factory? It's not like there's a shortage of people you can hire. You wouldn't be the first one to do that. Most rich people today were not born with a silver spoon in their mouth.


So we had two systems deal with imperfect human beings. One was a human rights disaster, spawned untold poverty, and eventually crashed. The other is capitalism. We're blessed to have been born in the latter.

The anti-slave north was industrialized.

 

[deafskeptic]

The anti-slave north was industrialized.

And that is a major reason why the South lost.