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| Who's to blame? |
It's hard to take these people seriously, but someone has to do it: so what is really behind these protests?
It seems to me that all of this came to a head after President Obama vilified the rich (1%) by saying that they were not paying their fair share. Sounds like another attempt to take from someone who has something and give to someone else who doesn't -- be it a job, good benefits, an education, a home or a paycheck.
For those who know President Obama's background, this is part of his plan, advocating a classless society through the removal of economic differences. As he says in his book, Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance -- "While we welcome the idea of a prevention [of class problems], we should try to cure what has slipped in .. we.. need to eliminate power structures that have been built through excessive accumulation so that not only a few individuals shall control a vast magnitude of resources as is the case now... "
University-educated youth have been taught this same drivel by liberal professors and are now acting upon it. Making matters worse, these students are graduating from college with no job prospects and big debts, leading to cries of unfairness and economic injustice. With no concept of how money is earned -- and the amount of hard work needed -- they are asking for their fair share.
The age-old concept of fairness has been a staple of democratic politics forever. As long as it doesn't apply to them, Democrats love to be seen fighting for the poor, the minority and the helpless. Obama's JOBS bus tour continues to stir this pot, even to the extent that he recently gave the protesters a shout out at a recent campaign stop.
Responding to President Obama's lead, and feeling unfairly treated by banks, schools and the rest of corporate America, the Occupy Wall Street crowd is doing what it does best: pitch a tent and wait for a hand out. "Stop corporate greed! Stop zombie banks, make financiers pay for the depression!" shouts a young woman in lower Manhattan's Zuccotti Park, site of the New York city protests. Someone next to her holds a sign that reads: "Democracy, not corporacracy."
Let's look at some of their more "rational" (I know they're hard to find) complaints and put them to the test:
The Wall Street bailout.
It's interesting that the Occupy crowd has chosen to take their fight to Wall Street rather than the White House. It was Congress who drafted and passed the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) of 2008 that provided $700 billion to failing banks that contributed to the recession and cost an estimated $4,635 per working American. Despite objections by over 100 cities throughout the United States and by a large margin of Americans, the Democrat-controlled House and Senate voted in favor of bailing out private banking companies with taxpayer's money. And much to my disappointment, President Bush passed it into law.
I don't mean to pass all of the blame away from Wall Street, because they deserve plenty of it for selling these risky mortgages as safe investments. But they dug themselves a deep hole by ceding to the demands of Washington to include lower lending standards for minorities. In addition, it was Washington that proposed the eventual take over of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, both central to the sub prime mortgage crisis.
Protesters are also conveniently forgetting that President Obama took more money from Wall Street fat cats than any other candidate in our last presidential election. More than $15 million in contributions to his 2008 election from Wall Street paved the way to friendly bailouts and financial reforms.
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Where to get started on this one? I think one of the funniest videos I've seen from this Occupy Wall Street crowd was one from a student holding up a sign that said "Pay for my tuition!" He started the video interview by saying that he was there to fight economic injustice, but when asked about his sign, he said that he really thought government should pay for his education. When asked why, he could only say, "I don't know, it's what I want." What he wants? Why not pay for his apartment and car while you're at it? When pressed by the interviewer, he concluded by saying, "Hey, I can ask for anything I want, so I'm asking for a free education. Why not?"
Um, maybe because SOMEONE has to pay for it (chances are, his parents are paying for it anyway).
About the only legitimate argument being made on tuition is a 1% Wall Street tax on all financial transactions (including stocks, bonds and derivatives) that would help pay off these student loans. Legitimate, but not realistic. This typical socialist thinking is found in comments like this one from a student who told Reuters Television, "I am going to start my life as an adult in debt and that's not fair. Millions of teenagers across the country are going to start their futures in debt, while all of these corporations are getting money fed all the time and none of us can get any." Ergo, tax the corporations that are making money and use it to educate the youth of this country.
What are we teaching these people in school? Obviously not economics.
Jobs, jobs and more jobs.
A final argument coming from Occupy Wall Street is one complaining about jobs. And I'm not talking about Steve Jobs, who was as CEO of Apple was as big of a capitalist as there ever was (God rest his soul). There are people in Zuccotti Park who think our financial system is gutting standards, living wages, and jobs in the interest of earning a buck.
Criticism of something called "neoliberalism" is a staple of Occupy Wall Street protests. A organizer of Occupy Wall Street had this to say: "Neoliberalism is everywhere, robbing us of decent labor standards, social contracts, living wages and jobs. It is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money." I'm not entirely sure what that means, but I think he was saying that we have a system in America that allows the 1% to enrich themselves by impoverishing humanity. By sacrificing jobs, our standard of living and destroying the environment.
A more realistic focus should be on Washington where Obama and Congress have stifled economic growth -- AND JOBS -- by creating harmful regulations that are making the business of making business impossible. That's not to say that I am in favor of letting Wall Street and other business owners write their own rules (as President Obama would have you believe).
For example, I read that a chain of restaurants is leaving California because it takes almost two years to open a new restaurant due to lengthy and restrictive regulations. In the state of Florida, it only takes six months to start a new business. Guess where the new jobs and construction are going?
And earlier this month, Elizabeth Milito, senior executive counsel at the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) had this to say, "America's small businesses, the backbone of our economy, are facing a huge challenge when it comes to understanding and complying with labor law. Small business owners are left to contend with an increasingly punitive landscape of overlapping and sometimes conflicting regulations that even a labor lawyer would have trouble interpreting. The result is a chilling effect on small business growth and hiring." If we as a country are serious about creating jobs and boosting our economy, it is time for these Wall Street protesters -- and voters -- to start complaining to Washington about these harmful federal regulations.
These protesters need to put away their Guy Fawkes masks and get a clue about what this nation needs. That means take a shower, get some decent clothes, get off the streets and get Obama out of Washington.
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