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Does the Occupy Wall Street movement represent the 99%?

Does the Occupy Wall Street movement represent the 99%?

  • Yes, they very much represent their complaints & agenda.

    Votes: 11 14.5%

  • They represent some of their complaints & agenda, but also have their own unique/radical ideas.

    Votes: 20 26.3%

  • Not really, their ideas are more represent the complaints & goals of the poor and radicals.

    Votes: 17 22.4%

  • Not at all! They only speak for a radical fringe!!

    Votes: 28 36.8%
  • Total voters
    76
  • Poll closed .
Catawba said:
Their goal is to increase public awareness and debate about the economic injustice in this country. They are succeeding in that goal without the need of a head honcho.
They are not trying to avoid prosecution, they are embracing it and using the arrests for non-violent civil disobedience as a means to increase public awareness and debate.
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Okay, I will say that I'm not aware of avoiding prosecution. It really wasn't my concern, as I said. A better phrasing would have helped there.

Are you saying that their only goal is to promote discussion? If so, they have accomplished that. My confusion is that there is a list of demands you and I have discussed. Is talking about them the extent of it? If not, how do they move forward now that discussion has been achieved?

When you and I discussed their proposed demands and when I read the D.C. chapter's proposed solution, I was still left wondering if this reflects the views as a whole.
 
Keridan said:
Okay, I will say that I'm not aware of avoiding prosecution. It really wasn't my concern, as I said. A better phrasing would have helped there.

Are you saying that their only goal is to promote discussion? If so, they have accomplished that. My confusion is that there is a list of demands you and I have discussed. Is talking about them the extent of it? If not, how do they move forward now that discussion has been achieved?

When you and I discussed their proposed demands and when I read the D.C. chapter's proposed solution, I was still left wondering if this reflects the views as a whole.
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Increasing awareness and public debate helps build the public will necessary to influence government policy. All the demands at this point are just proposed from early on, there is now strong support within the movement to not have a list of formal demands.

Public will is growing for eliminating the tax breaks for the wealthy, the American Jobs Act, for again establishing a firewall between investment banking and commercial banking, for making sure benefits aren't cut for the elderly.

Next November, people will get a chance to vote their will on these issues.
 
Catawba said:
Increasing awareness and public debate helps build the public will necessary to influence government policy. All the demands at this point are just proposed from early on, there is now strong support within the movement to not have a list of formal demands.

Public will is growing for eliminating the tax breaks for the wealthy, the American Jobs Act, for again establishing a firewall between investment banking and commercial banking, for making sure benefits aren't cut for the elderly.

Next November, people will get a chance to vote their will on these issues.
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So am I right in understanding that they are not looking to be taken as a group, but rather just to appeal to voters? Officials engaging them directly is no part of their goal? If so, I can understand that. I don't know that I think it's the best approach, but since I'm not part of the group, that probably doesn't matter much :p
 
Keridan said:
So am I right in understanding that they are not looking to be taken as a group, but rather just to appeal to voters? Officials engaging them directly is no part of their goal? If so, I can understand that. I don't know that I think it's the best approach, but since I'm not part of the group, that probably doesn't matter much :p
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"Within the movement itself, the lack of demands is a point of pride. The General Assembly of the New York City occupation has explicitly denied the Demands Working Group’s claim to speak on behalf of the movement. While the Demands Working Group has struggled to delineate a list of specific policy demands, the broader movement has firmly resisted this effort. “We are our demands. This #ows movement is about empowering communities to form their own general assemblies, to fight back against the tyranny of the 1%. Our collective struggles cannot be co-opted,” proclaims the Occupy Wall Street homepage in a statement disavowing the Demands Working Group. As one New York occupier explains, “The notion of demands connotes disempowerment, or hostage-taking. That’s not what we’re about. We’re about empowerment. The government shouldn’t need us to make ‘demands,’ because it should be of us.”

Not So Demanding: Why Occupy Wall Street Need Not Make Demands (Yet) - Brookings Institution
 
Catawba said:
"Within the movement itself, the lack of demands is a point of pride. The General Assembly of the New York City occupation has explicitly denied the Demands Working Group’s claim to speak on behalf of the movement. While the Demands Working Group has struggled to delineate a list of specific policy demands, the broader movement has firmly resisted this effort. “We are our demands. This #ows movement is about empowering communities to form their own general assemblies, to fight back against the tyranny of the 1%. Our collective struggles cannot be co-opted,” proclaims the Occupy Wall Street homepage in a statement disavowing the Demands Working Group. As one New York occupier explains, “The notion of demands connotes disempowerment, or hostage-taking. That’s not what we’re about. We’re about empowerment. The government shouldn’t need us to make ‘demands,’ because it should be of us.”

Not So Demanding: Why Occupy Wall Street Need Not Make Demands (Yet) - Brookings Institution
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Interesting reading. If you'll remember from our first discussion, demands didn't sit well with me, either. Well, I'll leave this one as another discussion settled. Thank you for taking the time to discuss it again.
 
Catawba said:
"Within the movement itself, the lack of demands is a point of pride. The General Assembly of the New York City occupation has explicitly denied the Demands Working Group’s claim to speak on behalf of the movement. While the Demands Working Group has struggled to delineate a list of specific policy demands, the broader movement has firmly resisted this effort. “We are our demands. This #ows movement is about empowering communities to form their own general assemblies, to fight back against the tyranny of the 1%. Our collective struggles cannot be co-opted,” proclaims the Occupy Wall Street homepage in a statement disavowing the Demands Working Group. As one New York occupier explains, “The notion of demands connotes disempowerment, or hostage-taking. That’s not what we’re about. We’re about empowerment. The government shouldn’t need us to make ‘demands,’ because it should be of us.”

Not So Demanding: Why Occupy Wall Street Need Not Make Demands (Yet) - Brookings Institution
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I would suggest listening to this guy David Graeber an anarchist who is among the anarchist collective that started Occupy Wall Street after Adbusters suggested the idea.
David Graeber: On Playing By The Rules
David Graeber, the Anti-Leader of Occupy Wall Street - Businessweek

You make the point that the Occupy movement may have been started by Anarchists, but now they are a minority and I would assume that you believe that the movement has now been co-opted by progressives.

I am a frequenter of the liberal blog Daily Kos. Reading it regularly is probably the best way to get a sense of what the “progressive community” in the US—left-leaning voters and activists who still believe in acting through the Democratic Party—are currently thinking. Over the last two years, the level of hatred directed against Obama is extraordinary. He is regularly accused of being a fraud, a liar, a secret Republican who has intentionally flubbed every opportunity for progressive change presented to him in the name of “bipartisan compromise” with a rabid and uncompromising Right. Others suggest he is a well-meaning progressive whose hands are tied; or, alternately, blame progressives for not having mobilized to provide sufficient pressure to his Left. The latter seem to forget the way the grassroots activist groups created during the campaign, which were expected to endure afterwards for just this purpose, were rapidly dismantled once Obama was in power and handing the economic reigns of the US over to the very people (Geithner, Bernanke, Summers) responsible for the crisis, or how liberal groups that actually try to mount campaigns against such policies are regularly threatened with defunding by White-House friendly NGOs. But in a way, this feeling of personal betrayal is pretty much inevitable. It is the only way of preserving the faith that it’s possible for progressive policies to be enacted in the US through electoral means. Because if Obama was not planning all along to betray his Progressive base, then one would be forced to conclude any such project is impossible. After all, how could there have been a more perfect alignment of the stars than happened in 2008? That year saw a wave election that left Democrats in control of both houses of congress,[5] a Democratic president elected on a platform of “Change” coming to power at a moment of economic crisis so profound that radical measures of some sort were unavoidable, and at a time when popular rage against the nation’s financial elites was so intense that most Americans would have supported almost anything. If it was not possible to enact any real progressive policies or legislation at such a moment, clearly, it would never be. Yet none were enacted.[6] Instead Wall Street gained even greater control over the political process, and, since Republicans proved the only party willing to propose radical positions of any kind, the political center swung even further to the Right. Clearly, if progressive change was not possible through electoral means in 2008, it simply isn’t going to possible at all. And that is exactly what very large numbers of Americans appear to have concluded.

Say what you will about Americans, and one can say many things, this is a country of deeply democratic sensibilities. The idea that we are, or are supposed to be, a democratic society is at the very core of what makes us proud to be Americans. If Occupy Wall Street has spread to every city in America, it’s because our financial overlords have brought us to such a pass that anarchists, pagan priestesses, and tree-sitters are about the only Americans left still holding out for the idea that a genuinely democratic society might be possible.
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The core mechanism of the Occupy movement are not progressives either. "Our collective struggles cannot be co-opted,” proclaims the Occupy Wall Street homepage"

Progressives need to learn about who they have been helping by supporting the occupiers. The NYCGA is as pointed out by David Graeber, an anarchist model of democracy with a few other things thrown in for good measure. Certainly not a anarchist purest, but certainly not an progressive nor a Liberal. And very anti-capitalist to the core. When you promote the occupy movement you are promoting the General Assembly which is an anarchist design.

The real point of the imaginative exercise is just to point out that there are no clean breaks in history. The flip-side of the old idea of the clean break, the one moment when the state falls and capitalism is defeated, is that anything short of that is not really a victory at all. If capitalism is left standing, if it begins to market your once-subversive ideas, it shows that the capitalists really won. You’ve lost; you’ve been coopted. To me this is absurd. Can we say that feminism lost, that it achieved nothing, just because corporate culture felt obliged to pay lip service to condemning sexism and capitalist firms began marketing feminist books, movies, and other products? Of course not: unless you’ve managed to destroy capitalism and patriarchy in one fell blow, this is one of the clearest signs that you’ve gotten somewhere. Presumably any effective road to revolution will involve endless moments of cooptation, endless victorious campaigns, endless little insurrectionary moments or moments of flight and covert autonomy. I hesitate to even speculate what it might really be like. But to start in that direction, the first thing we need to do is to recognize that we do, in fact, win some. Actually, recently, we’ve been winning quite a lot. The question is how to break the cycle of exaltation and despair and come up with some strategic visions (the more the merrier) about these victories build on each other, to create a cumulative movement towards a new society. David Graeber: On Playing By The Rules
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The more that I research the Occupy movement the more conflict I find within it. How are Americans supposed to support a movement that cannot even define itself? The founders of OWS are anti-Capitalists, yet you claim the majority is not. Who am I to believe some guy on the internet or the actual man that was in on the ground floor that started the General Assembly in New York City, and one of the actual protesters?
 
Freedom From al said:
The more that I research the Occupy movement the more conflict I find within it. How are Americans supposed to support a movement that cannot even define itself?
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In your research, I think you missed this from just above:

"Within the movement itself, the lack of demands is a point of pride. The General Assembly of the New York City occupation has explicitly denied the Demands Working Group’s claim to speak on behalf of the movement. While the Demands Working Group has struggled to delineate a list of specific policy demands, the broader movement has firmly resisted this effort. “We are our demands. This #ows movement is about empowering communities to form their own general assemblies, to fight back against the tyranny of the 1%. Our collective struggles cannot be co-opted,” proclaims the Occupy Wall Street homepage in a statement disavowing the Demands Working Group. As one New York occupier explains, “The notion of demands connotes disempowerment, or hostage-taking. That’s not what we’re about. We’re about empowerment. The government shouldn’t need us to make ‘demands,’ because it should be of us.”
 
Catawba said:
In your research, I think you missed this from just above:

"Within the movement itself, the lack of demands is a point of pride. The General Assembly of the New York City occupation has explicitly denied the Demands Working Group’s claim to speak on behalf of the movement. While the Demands Working Group has struggled to delineate a list of specific policy demands, the broader movement has firmly resisted this effort. “We are our demands. This #ows movement is about empowering communities to form their own general assemblies, to fight back against the tyranny of the 1%. Our collective struggles cannot be co-opted,” proclaims the Occupy Wall Street homepage in a statement disavowing the Demands Working Group. As one New York occupier explains, “The notion of demands connotes disempowerment, or hostage-taking. That’s not what we’re about. We’re about empowerment. The government shouldn’t need us to make ‘demands,’ because it should be of us.”
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Yes I have read that, I even quoted a section of a sentence from it. Should I assume that the only disagreement that you had with the post was those two sentences? Are you trying to tell me that Progressives are willing to scrap our Government in favor of the model being showcased by the NYCGA?
 
Freedom From al said:
Yes I have read that, I even quoted a section of a sentence from it. Should I assume that the only disagreement that you had with the post was those two sentences? Are you trying to tell me that Progressives are willing to scrap our Government in favor of the model being showcased by the NYCGA?
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Believe whatever you like, if you think returning to the tax rates and regulations of the 1950's, is anti-capitalism, knock yourself out.
 
Catawba said:
From all indications the tens of thousand of OWS protesters around the country are progressives, from many sectors of society, including some anarchists, some seniors, some vets, and some celebrities to name a few.
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The "Democrats" are too fractured, too many opinions as to how things should be.
The "Republicans", on the other hand ,are much less so. There is a good reason for this..
TEA vs OWS ???
 
Catawba said:
I absolutely speak for the 99%. Just as you speak for the 1%, (well at least the more greedy amongst them judging by your posts).
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Is it in your interest for the government to go into bankruptcy?

Is it in your interest for the government to act constitutionally?

Would it be in your interest for the govenment to clean up the tax code and get rid of loopholes?

Is it in your interest to get rid of government waste?
 
Catawba said:
Believe whatever you like, if you think returning to the tax rates and regulations of the 1950's, is anti-capitalism, knock yourself out.
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Returning to the tax rates and regulations of the 1950's is Regressive, not at all Progressive. many things in the world have changed since the 50's one would have to come up with something new to address all of the dynamics of an modern economy. Economically and socially it would be impossible to apply the tax rates and regulations to todays reality. Even if you started a new country those outdated Progressive concepts would not work today.

Maybe that is why Progressives are unable to make any progress, they are not progressive thinkers but rather regressives stuck on the policies of FDR rather than thinking on their own.
 
Freedom From al said:
Returning to the tax rates and regulations of the 1950's is Regressive, not at all Progressive. many things in the world have changed since the 50's one would have to come up with something new to address all of the dynamics of an modern economy. Economically and socially it would be impossible to apply the tax rates and regulations to todays reality. Even if you started a new country those outdated Progressive concepts would not work today.

Maybe that is why Progressives are unable to make any progress, they are not progressive thinkers but rather regressives stuck on the policies of FDR rather than thinking on their own.
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I am not sure what is going to happen but something must. I agree that it may indeed be something very new. However both the UK and the US need also to get back to being meritocratic societies which offer equality of opportunity and have social mobility. That is social justice. Do you not believe in that? These are the things which we were working for in the 50's and leaving them behind and allowing the rich to become massively more rich and powerful while keeping society united through perpetual war has had it's time. The young are coming out just like they did in the 60's and this is going to have an effect just like it did then. I believe that a lot of the problem comes from the fact that people have simply been brainwashed, particularly since 2011. Have you read Who Rules America: Wealth, Income, and Power Are you OK with that? Are you OK about living in an increasingly unequal society with more and more crime and perpetual war?

I have for a long time regretted not having studied economics but am getting started now. Have a look at this On Public Funding of Colleges and Towards a General Theory of Public Options. | Rortybomb. Check out the link in it The Slack Wire: Public Options: The General Case - original story I was reading this Pepper spray nation - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

In just the same way as the Unions apparently were not working in the late '70's the neo liberal way is coming to it's end because it has been found to be unworkable and something else is coming in it's place. Exactly what we do not know. My wish would be that we regain our feeling of community - which we can get from caring rather than perpetual war, that we get back our feeling of social conscience and that we start to work for a society which offers an equal chance for everyone, valuing again the quality of life rather than the fatness of the pay check. My daughter trained to be a dancer and teaches dance at a professional dance college. She told me she chose dance because she loved it, not for money but that if she had not loved it, she would have gone after whatever it was that made the most money. I hope the world we build will have a lot more quality in people's lives so that they can enjoy their work rather than needing to feel the relief of the addiction of buy, buy, buy.


Like it or not the world is changing. The OWS with all it's imperfections and beauty also, is just getting talking about where we can go.

it may be many other ways, I'm tempted to hope OWS is going to stop us going down the far right nazi type route I thought we were headed for.

Peace and good night ;)
 
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alexa said:
I am not sure what is going to happen but something must. I agree that it may indeed be something very new. However both the UK and the US need also to get back to being meritocratic societies which offer equality of opportunity and have social mobility. That is social justice. Do you not believe in that?
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I do not really believe that today's society is really so unequal that something drastic must be done. I am friends with a lot of elderly people that see today as much better in terms of opportunity than when they were young. Even in my life I know that it is easier to obtain wealth now than it was during my youth. No things are not perfect by any means but that is the nature of the world. We have to keep improving the state of things otherwise we end up with stagnation. Hence why there are changes to laws, policies, and regulations through out the years.

Ironically while you are calling our community a community based on war as the adhesion in some romantic conspiracy, the basis of your argument is conflict and blame. Is there inequality in our society? Yes. Is the Left the only people capable of providing a solution? No, this country is not just the Left but the Right and the Left and everything in between and beyond. The solutions come from all of us not just one section of society. We are an Representative Democracy so that all sections of our population has a voice. OWS in contrast is a mob rules model of Democracy they will not provide solutions only distractions.

People who choose the career that makes the most money are not evil greedy people, they are smart. Some people dont really care what career that they are in. That is just how some people are. It does not make them bad people. It is logical that is you sell your time to someone else that wanting to be rewarded more for your time makes more sense than less. We only live for a short time and time is worth a premium to humans. No one should be made to feel guilty for insisting that their time is worth X amount to them.

I often wonder if more compensation for ones time is wrong, then are you suggesting that people are making too much? Who decides what desires and what goals are morally corrupted? I have known people that worked their entire 80 years of life at low paying jobs and not once did they complain in their old age. They were happy even during the Great Depression. Life is what you make of it. If you see the world as vile that is the world that you live in. Take for example Anti-corporatists everyday is hell since Corporations are all around us. When we see a road with stores they see an evil empire out to screw them in every aspect of their lives. Certainly that existence must be hell. meanwhile everyday people (those that the anti-corporatists assume are duped or whatever) live happy productive lives free from feeling repressed. They enjoy their liberties and freedoms in America but dont think that they do not have concerns. Or are not actively fighting for those liberties and freedoms that they enjoy so much. It is a matter of perception.

it may be many other ways, I'm tempted to hope OWS is going to stop us going down the far right nazi type route I thought we were headed for.
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Perceptions are a funny thing. While you were fearing a slide to the far Right others see it as a slide to the far Left. Obviously someone is wrong.
 
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I would like to point out that a large amount of the protestors are not radical. Many of them are not anti-capitalist; they are simply opposed to the greed of many corporations. In today's society, 'not neoliberal' seems to translate to 'radical', when neoliberalism itself is radical.
 
JustinS said:
I would like to point out that a large amount of the protestors are not radical. Many of them are not anti-capitalist; they are simply opposed to the greed of many corporations. In today's society, 'not neoliberal' seems to translate to 'radical', when neoliberalism itself is radical.
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Well of course many are not Anti-Capitalists. But I disagree that people are protesting just because they think some Corporations are greedy. There are some definitive ideological positions being aired regularly at the protests that extends a great deal farther then the single concept of greedy Corporations. We must accept the signs at the protests as the words of the supporters, if not than it would be pointless for protesters to print signs and carry them. And from those signs one could easily assert that OWS is radical in nature.
 
Freedom From al said:
Returning to the tax rates and regulations of the 1950's is Regressive, not at all Progressive.
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Look up the definition of both regressive and progressive tax rates, and compare them.

Now look up the Glass Steagall Act, and see why its repeal in 1999 led to banks too big to fail.
 
JustinS said:
I would like to point out that a large amount of the protestors are not radical. Many of them are not anti-capitalist; they are simply opposed to the greed of many corporations. In today's society, 'not neoliberal' seems to translate to 'radical', when neoliberalism itself is radical.
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I see the majority of them as radical. Many of them are indeed anti-capitalist, as we can see by many of their signs that view capitalism as the enemy. Furthermore, one can deduce meaning by the addition of so many socialist/communist groups who have joined the movement. Though I can sympathize with some of the OWS's meaning, don't try to obscure things by not saying what they are, JustinS. When you try to cover what they are people like me who are a bit more central and interested in their cause get turned off because we don't like the coat of obscurity.
 
Wake said:
I see the majority of them as radical. Many of them are indeed anti-capitalist, as we can see by many of their signs that view capitalism as the enemy. Furthermore, one can deduce meaning by the addition of so many socialist/communist groups who have joined the movement. Though I can sympathize with some of the OWS's meaning, don't try to obscure things by not saying what they are, JustinS. When you try to cover what they are people like me who are a bit more central and interested in their cause get turned off because we don't like the coat of obscurity.
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Wake-did you read about the Glass-Steagall Act? That is one of the grievances of OWS, how this was a great set of regulations and was gotten rid of by Carter, Reagan, Bush, & Clinton.
 
Thunder said:
Wake-did you read about the Glass-Steagall Act? That is one of the grievances of OWS, how this was a great set of regulations and was gotten rid of by Carter, Reagan, Bush, & Clinton.
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I have the link saved, and I'll be adding it to my forum to be read/saved soon. But yeah, thanks for that.
 
Freedom From al said:
I do not really believe that today's society is really so unequal that something drastic must be done.
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There is basically no social mobility. I have provided information which shows this. Britain and the US are the worst in the Western world concerning this. However in the period from around 1914 up to 1980's or so that was not the case. During that time we both had high social mobility. Now how you end up is largely dependent on the family you are born into.

Distribution of income and wealth have seen a similar story. I spoke of that in this post http://www.debatepolitics.com/polls...ovement-represent-99-a-17.html#post1059972780

Freedom From al said:
I am friends with a lot of elderly people that see today as much better in terms of opportunity than when they were young.
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Then they are deceiving themselves depending on how old they are. It is reckoned that in 5-10 years we will be at the same level of inequality as in Victorian Times. I was one of those brought up in the times of social mobility and I know that what we worked for is not what we have now. Those elderly you speak to seem to be those who enjoyed getting the goodies for themselves but do not care for those that follow or else those comparing now to Victorian times but if you compare the whole of the 20th Century, you will find that from around 1913 there was a decline in the difference between the richest and the rest of us leading to a steady rise in equality of opportunity and social mobility and this reached it's peak between 1950 and 1980. Since then everything has been in decline, the gap between rich and and the rest of the population broadening all the time until, as said earlier we are nearing the inequality of Victorian Times.

BBC News - UK High Pay Commission: 'Victorian inequality' warning

Freedom From al said:
Even in my life I know that it is easier to obtain wealth now than it was during my youth. No things are not perfect by any means but that is the nature of the world. We have to keep improving the state of things otherwise we end up with stagnation. Hence why there are changes to laws, policies, and regulations through out the years.
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Really? Explain exactly how that is because there is no evidence of it. Bring some proof to show that social mobility is now higher than it was in your youth whenever that was. All the research says otherwise.

Freedom From al said:
Ironically while you are calling our community a community based on war as the adhesion in some romantic conspiracy, the basis of your argument is conflict and blame.
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No it is based on studying Neo-cons ideology. The 60's terrified them. Liberalism terrified them. democracy terrified them. They decided it was necessary for them 'the elite' to spread 'noble lies' to the ordinary people in order to keep them united and united as to their, the neo con's agenda. United as in being Nationalistic, united as in feeling themselves good and the other bad and united in fighting the evil in the world. It began with spreading lies about the USSR which they managed to get Reagan to believe. It has been going on ever since.

Freedom From al said:
Is there inequality in our society? Yes. Is the Left the only people capable of providing a solution? No,
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It is neo Liberal policies which has created the problem. Stop talking of left and right. Just look at the problem.


Freedom From al said:
this country is not just the Left but the Right and the Left and everything in between and beyond. The solutions come from all of us not just one section of society. We are an Representative Democracy so that all sections of our population has a voice. OWS in contrast is a mob rules model of Democracy they will not provide solutions only distractions.
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The world recession was caused by the 0.1%. As for who the occupy people are. As you can see the Occupy London people certainly do no limit themselves to any particular view despite how the media may try to portray them

The media can’t seem to make their minds up which of the two we all are down here at the camp. The fact is that we are a diverse grouping of classes, races, nationalities, employment status and political persuasions. This movement is not party political, nor is it class-focused. It stands against corporate greed and against the recklessness of the financial sector, and it recognises that the current political and economic model is only working for those at the top. These are issues that transcend political loyalties and class. We have many protestors here that have jobs, some that don’t, and some that have recently lost jobs. We have teachers, soldiers, civil servants, youth workers, former bankers, musicians. The labelling may serve the media’s agenda – but that alone does not make it true.
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Seven Media Sins | TheOccupiedTimes

That's what you are failing to understand.

Of course the longer they survive and grow the stronger will be their influence. People visit


Freedom From al said:
People who choose the career that makes the most money are not evil greedy people,
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did I say they necessarily are?

Freedom From al said:
they are smart.
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Not necessarily. With the example I gave the first choice was self fulfilment, doing a job which enriches you. Only had that not been possible would my daughter have chosen making as much money as possible - and with her it would not have been at the exploitation of others.

Freedom From al said:
Some people dont really care what career that they are in. That is just how some people are. It does not make them bad people. It is logical that is you sell your time to someone else that wanting to be rewarded more for your time makes more sense than less. We only live for a short time and time is worth a premium to humans. No one should be made to feel guilty for insisting that their time is worth X amount to them.
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All people's time is valuable. It is their life. People should indeed take care how they spend their time.

Freedom From al said:
I often wonder if more compensation for ones time is wrong, then are you suggesting that people are making too much?
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You are changing what I am saying. I am saying we need equality of opportunity and social mobility.


Freedom From al said:
Who decides what desires and what goals are morally corrupted? I have known people that worked their entire 80 years of life at low paying jobs and not once did they complain in their old age. They were happy even during the Great Depression.
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My God, now you know people who were in the 1930's depression on low paid jobs and enjoyed it - pull the other one. Unlike them, I lived through the times when we had opportunity. The people who are reaching retirement now are those people. Having worked for such opportunities themselves why should they not fight for it for the young? You are not talking about reality.


Freedom From al said:
Perceptions are a funny thing. While you were fearing a slide to the far Right others see it as a slide to the far Left. Obviously someone is wrong.
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For the past 30 years I have seen us move more and more to the right. It is the nature of things that they move to a certain extreme and then move back. From around 1914 to the late 70's both the US and the UK worked towards creating a meritocratic society, one which aimed at the ideal of providing equality of opportunity, social mobility and ending extremes of power invested in people due to their indecent wealth. In the '60's and 70's we had for the first time ever people growing up who were able in large numbers through no reason other than hard work and ability to change their situation in life. This also led to people from all kinds of backgrounds managing to get a good education....and what did this lead to....mass rebellion. The Status quo was turned upside down, women claimed equality with men, gays were accepted for who they were, people demanded that all the people of the United States regardless of their colour be treated as equal, education tried to do what the original idea was - that is to draw out of people rather than to simply cram in ....and for the US possibly the most devastating of all, her own people seeing what was happening in Vietnam turned against her own government's actions. All these things created a terrifying fear in those who were to become the neo con's.

Then along came a recession and all was changed back but people didn't really notice too well what was happening, particularly after 9/11 when people became afraid to say their point of view.

I think probably the '60's suffered from idealism which needed something deeper than was there. Indeed we saw a lot of people quickly change over when the political climate changed.

Now we have the top 0.1% with such obscene amounts of money they virtually are running the show and they are responsible for the situation that so many people are suffering from. Does it matter to them? Of course not. They are not suffering. What will happen to for instance Ireland which has suffered significantly from this debauchery if she is unable to live up to her commitments - think Indonesia.

The Occupy Movement is just people speaking up when change must happen. People from all over the world standing up in solidarity. This time we need to sort it out and come to where our centre is that we can move on in peace and stability. We allowed our progress to be stolen from us too easily last time. Hopefully this time we will find our centre.

We Can Do It! - HerStory
 
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Wake said:
I have the link saved, and I'll be adding it to my forum to be read/saved soon. But yeah, thanks for that.
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also, go to Wikipedia, search for an article about the 2008-2008 Financial crisis, and read about the proposed causes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_financial_crisis#Background

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_the_late-2000s_financial_crisis

bad legislation and good legislation that was killed, is all over that section.

which simply goes to show that many of our problems are indeed quote fixable. and yes, OWS does want many of these changes done.
 
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Catawba said:
Look up the definition of both regressive and progressive tax rates, and compare them.

Now look up the Glass Steagall Act, and see why its repeal in 1999 led to banks too big to fail.
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The words regressive and progressive do have other meanings, and I used the proper meanings withing the sentences that I used.

I did not argue for deregulation by any means. What I did assert was that the dynamics have changed due to technology and social changes. Obviously a certain amount of regulation is needed but a more modern structure would be wiser I believe. I am not going to promote or denounce any certain regulations if that is your aim. I only offered an broad opinion that the 50's model is outdated and something newer is needed. That does not point to any certain solution. If I was pointing to solutions I would have outlined those solutions in detail.
 
Freedom From al said:
The words regressive and progressive do have other meanings, and I used the proper meanings withing the sentences that I used.

I did not argue for deregulation by any means. What I did assert was that the dynamics have changed due to technology and social changes. Obviously a certain amount of regulation is needed but a more modern structure would be wiser I believe. I am not going to promote or denounce any certain regulations if that is your aim. I only offered an broad opinion that the 50's model is outdated and something newer is needed. That does not point to any certain solution. If I was pointing to solutions I would have outlined those solutions in detail.
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Whatever floats your boat, personally I am glad to see that the majority of Americans now see that we need to return some of the progressiveness that has been cut away from our tax rates.
 
Catawba said:
Whatever floats your boat, personally I am glad to see that the majority of Americans now see that we need to return some of the progressiveness that has been cut away from our tax rates.
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How exactly do you know for a fact that the majority thinks that we need to return some progressive policies? That is a big claim that deserves proof, dont ya think?
 
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