Grass roots and I hope it gets focused and make more sense. A bit too many nonsensical rants but the effort is there.

Tea party hates them, thats enough for me.

But moving into Wall St's backyard in an attempt to hold both the banks and politicans accountable for the wholesale fraud committed upon the American people is beautiful.

Embarassing/pressuring these people in a very real way that has entered into international discussion may be the only way to get this ship righted.

I don't have any faith in America's powerful... I do have complete faith in the American tradition however

Listen to the "leaders" of this so-called movement. They can't finish a simple sentence. "Occupy Wall Street demostrations will be successful when _______________." They have no goals, they have no stated agenda that smacks of any thought whatsoever. When they're given a chance to speak, they spout brilliance like "Stop the war! Tax the Rich!" "All of the US economy should be run like an egalitarian, green laundry service in Chicago." "Wall Street should be shut down."

The truly great sign of a meaningful, grass roots movement, is when one of the organizers/leaders gets in front of mic, and is asked meaningful questions about what the movement is after, you get crickets.

It's embarrassing. It's even more embarrassing that the POTUS is taking them seriously. I sure hope it's not having him lose sleep or throw off his jumper.

arkrud wrote:Lobby is not a problem... liberals are.
Breaking million into dollars and giving them to million morans never helped anybody.

Yes it will because the so-called "morans" are going to spend those millions of dollars on actual products that will boost sales and create jobs, while the millionaires the republicans are so eager to give tax breaks to are just going to laugh their way to the bank as they put that excess cash in their savings while they wait for the economy to improve.

Panic of the Plutocrats
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: October 9, 2011

It remains to be seen whether the Occupy Wall Street protests will change America’s direction. Yet the protests have already elicited a remarkably hysterical reaction from Wall Street, the super-rich in general, and politicians and pundits who reliably serve the interests of the wealthiest hundredth of a percent.

And this reaction tells you something important — namely, that the extremists threatening American values are what F.D.R. called “economic royalists,” not the people camping in Zuccotti Park.

Consider first how Republican politicians have portrayed the modest-sized if growing demonstrations, which have involved some confrontations with the police — confrontations that seem to have involved a lot of police overreaction — but nothing one could call a riot. And there has in fact been nothing so far to match the behavior of Tea Party crowds in the summer of 2009.

Nonetheless, Eric Cantor, the House majority leader, has denounced “mobs” and “the pitting of Americans against Americans.” The G.O.P. presidential candidates have weighed in, with Mitt Romney accusing the protesters of waging “class warfare,” while Herman Cain calls them “anti-American.” My favorite, however, is Senator Rand Paul, who for some reason worries that the protesters will start seizing iPads, because they believe rich people don’t deserve to have them.

Michael Bloomberg, New York’s mayor and a financial-industry titan in his own right, was a bit more moderate, but still accused the protesters of trying to “take the jobs away from people working in this city,” a statement that bears no resemblance to the movement’s actual goals.

And if you were listening to talking heads on CNBC, you learned that the protesters “let their freak flags fly,” and are “aligned with Lenin.”

The way to understand all of this is to realize that it’s part of a broader syndrome, in which wealthy Americans who benefit hugely from a system rigged in their favor react with hysteria to anyone who points out just how rigged the system is.

Last year, you may recall, a number of financial-industry barons went wild over very mild criticism from President Obama. They denounced Mr. Obama as being almost a socialist for endorsing the so-called Volcker rule, which would simply prohibit banks backed by federal guarantees from engaging in risky speculation. And as for their reaction to proposals to close a loophole that lets some of them pay remarkably low taxes — well, Stephen Schwarzman, chairman of the Blackstone Group, compared it to Hitler’s invasion of Poland.

And then there’s the campaign of character assassination against Elizabeth Warren, the financial reformer now running for the Senate in Massachusetts. Not long ago a YouTube video of Ms. Warren making an eloquent, down-to-earth case for taxes on the rich went viral. Nothing about what she said was radical — it was no more than a modern riff on Oliver Wendell Holmes’s famous dictum that “Taxes are what we pay for civilized society.”

But listening to the reliable defenders of the wealthy, you’d think that Ms. Warren was the second coming of Leon Trotsky. George Will declared that she has a “collectivist agenda,” that she believes that “individualism is a chimera.” And Rush Limbaugh called her “a parasite who hates her host. Willing to destroy the host while she sucks the life out of it.”

What’s going on here? The answer, surely, is that Wall Street’s Masters of the Universe realize, deep down, how morally indefensible their position is. They’re not John Galt; they’re not even Steve Jobs. They’re people who got rich by peddling complex financial schemes that, far from delivering clear benefits to the American people, helped push us into a crisis whose aftereffects continue to blight the lives of tens of millions of their fellow citizens.

Yet they have paid no price. Their institutions were bailed out by taxpayers, with few strings attached. They continue to benefit from explicit and implicit federal guarantees — basically, they’re still in a game of heads they win, tails taxpayers lose. And they benefit from tax loopholes that in many cases have people with multimillion-dollar incomes paying lower rates than middle-class families.

This special treatment can’t bear close scrutiny — and therefore, as they see it, there must be no close scrutiny. Anyone who points out the obvious, no matter how calmly and moderately, must be demonized and driven from the stage. In fact, the more reasonable and moderate a critic sounds, the more urgently he or she must be demonized, hence the frantic sliming of Elizabeth Warren.

So who’s really being un-American here? Not the protesters, who are simply trying to get their voices heard. No, the real extremists here are America’s oligarchs, who want to suppress any criticism of the sources of their wealth.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/10/opinion/panic-of-the-plutocrats.html?_r=2&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha212

jrodmc wrote:You don't need to see a car wreck to know it's not a good thing.

Listen to the "leaders" of this so-called movement. They can't finish a simple sentence. "Occupy Wall Street demostrations will be successful when _______________." They have no goals, they have no stated agenda that smacks of any thought whatsoever. When they're given a chance to speak, they spout brilliance like "Stop the war! Tax the Rich!" "All of the US economy should be run like an egalitarian, green laundry service in Chicago." "Wall Street should be shut down."

The truly great sign of a meaningful, grass roots movement, is when one of the organizers/leaders gets in front of mic, and is asked meaningful questions about what the movement is after, you get crickets.

It's embarrassing. It's even more embarrassing that the POTUS is taking them seriously. I sure hope it's not having him lose sleep or throw off his jumper.

It may not be focused or have an articulated message at this point, but it's still political activism aimed at the Wall Street-to-K-Street "fix" that millions of Americans believe has disenfranchised them from something they deserved: Opportunity. Democracy is messy, OWS particularly so. But they are marching, which is more than sitting in their house watching CNN and fretting about the unfairness of it all. Besides, so many of them have given up looking for work because there are either no jobs or the corporate managers in charge of hiring start off the interview by saying "Want a job? Ok, bend over..."

DrAlphaeus wrote:...Plus, the attention to the issue of government for the public good as well as -- or instead of -- corporate good seems to be the clear overarching message, despite its varying manifestations. The masses are the message, to mangle Malcolm McLuhan.

Well said. At this point it's about drawing attention. It's not all progressives out there, either. People from all parts of the political spectrum feel like the system is rigged and unfair.

As one of my favorite public figures said recently: "Nobody got rich on their own..." (EW - go girl!)

jrodmc wrote:The real criticism is that America's oligarch's are rich. And the protester's are not.

this is about as least informed as it comes.

jrodmc wrote:

Markji wrote:OK Jrod, here is someone with a little more intelligence speaking up for the Wall St protesters. The wealthy don't want their control of the system impinged upon in any way.
Note: Paul Krugman won the Nobel Prize in Economics (2008) and graduated from JFK High School in Bellemore, Long Island. He is a New Yorker!

Panic of the Plutocrats
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: October 9, 2011

It remains to be seen whether the Occupy Wall Street protests will change America’s direction. Yet the protests have already elicited a remarkably hysterical reaction from Wall Street, the super-rich in general, and politicians and pundits who reliably serve the interests of the wealthiest hundredth of a percent.

And this reaction tells you something important — namely, that the extremists threatening American values are what F.D.R. called “economic royalists,” not the people camping in Zuccotti Park.

This special treatment can’t bear close scrutiny — and therefore, as they see it, there must be no close scrutiny. Anyone who points out the obvious, no matter how calmly and moderately, must be demonized and driven from the stage. In fact, the more reasonable and moderate a critic sounds, the more urgently he or she must be demonized, hence the frantic sliming of Elizabeth Warren.

So who’s really being un-American here? Not the protesters, who are simply trying to get their voices heard. No, the real extremists here are America’s oligarchs, who want to suppress any criticism of the sources of their wealth.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/10/opinion/panic-of-the-plutocrats.html?_r=2&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha212

And where in this intelligent article does it show what the agenda is? How does the "rigged system" get fixed? I listen to the audio of the protests every morning. They're given mics by news sources all over the country, and they still say nothing. They're yelling and moving from site to site, and no one ever talks about what the goal is, or what they're trying to achieve. All they know and keep saying is there are rich people who should pay more taxes. And the police are overreacting by arresting some of them. Oh yeah, and stop the war.

Yes, they're are rich people who make money off evil hedge funds and CDO's. CDO's, by the way, that were instruments backed by "individuals" who were happy to get into a mortgage that there was no way in hell they could afford. And the institutions were bailed out by your POTUS and TARP funds that were authorized by your current administration. Which your current taxpayers voted in.

The real criticism is that America's oligarch's are rich. And the protester's are not. Funny, where was Occupy Wall Street 4-5 years ago before the market collapsed, and all these mortgage-backed CDO's went into default? It's funny, I don't recall any "Occupy Wall Street" protests when Merrill Lynch was trading in the 90's... It would be interesting to see how many of these fine young protesters were day trading a few years ago...

And quoting FDR about economic royalists when FDR was an economic royalist is tremendously brilliant. NY Times. Fair. Balanced. Objective.

Well, at long last you finally admit that the system is rigged! That is the basic message of the protesters.

Krugman has written numerous articles on how to fix it. Do your homework; look it up and get a balanced view. Many others including people dealing in the financial markets have written as well. The Big Banks and Financial Markets do need to be regulated but their money and influence stops action against them. Buying off politicians with large campaigm contributions. FOX News, owned, run and controlled by Rupert Murdoch influences people by presenting very lopsided information and spouts emotional rhetoric. Etc.

Moonangie and Martin's comments are good and insightful.

Moonangie - Actually, it was Bush who authorized the bailout, and it was the Bush Administrations lack of oversight and focus on deregulation and unbridled greed that laid the foundation for the bubble and subsequent financial calamity. Obama had to deal with it, that's true. But like so many Fox news acolytes, you have your facts confused with your fictions.

It may not be focused or have an articulated message at this point, but it's still political activism aimed at the Wall Street-to-K-Street "fix" that millions of Americans believe has disenfranchised them from something they deserved: Opportunity.

Slogans and catchy phrases don't get me going either. We all have homework to do. Maybe OccupyWallStreet is just a way for making this homework appealing to a certain segment of our society who would otherwise be totally tuned out. You say you are tuning in everyday to try to figure out what their agenda, so maybe their tactics are working!