I keep seeing this sentiment, and I am compelled to ask:
SO FUCKING WHAT??
Some people have more money than others. It’s not a crime. Cope.
Note: I am the 99%.
So what is that the percentage of wealth that the top 1% controls continues to rise. At some point this will be incompatible with a stable government. What happens when the top 1% control 95% of the wealth? Revolution. We can either continue policies that allow the few to get an ever increasing monopoly of wealth or we can start to tax them at a rate that makes more sense.
That some people have more money than I do isn’t something I’ve got a problem with.
The problem is that it’s hard for political power to do anything other than follow economic power. Which means a lopsided distribution of wealth results in a politics that’s largely about the wants and needs of the richest members of our society.
This is not merely theoretical. For the year and a half prior to Obama’s finally, finally proposing a serious jobs bill, our political discussion was all about the deficit and the possibility of inflation, in an era of 9% unemployment, an additional 7% underemployment, and millions of families being kicked out of their homes.
This conversation didn’t serve the needs of the citizenry at large, but rather those at the very top.
Even now, when massive majorities of the citizenry favor Obama’s jobs bill - heck, even large majorities of Republicans favor the current piece of it that the GOP minority in the Senate blocked from even a discussion - it can’t even get debated in the U.S. Senate because the GOP ignores the sentiments of even the rank-and-file Republicans to protect the interests of the rich.
That’s where these movements fall apart. There is a discussion worth having (Elected officials serve the money, not the citizens, and that needs to change). But instead of focusing on that, the message that comes out is “OMG CEOs HAVE TOO MUCH MONEY LOL”.
Right, because when your neighbor has something that you want, the correct approach in a civilized society is to break into their house and steal it. Good call. Unless, of course, your issue that politics serves the money instead of the citizenry, in which case you’re focusing on the wrong thing.
Nice caricature. You can make similar caricatures of any populist movement. There ARE people who are making cogent arguments. But that doesn’t make for good sound bites.
If you want to focus on just the rabid, hyper partisan people involved in the protests, that’s fine, but be fair and do so for all groups equally.
Who said anything about “correct”? It’s just what happens. The reason people are concerned is not that it is “correct” for wealth and income to be more equally distributed but that in situations where inequality increases anyway (and yes, both wealth and income distribution is lopsided and getting more so), bad things happen. People - rightly or wrongly - get angry and do stupid things.
So, let me repeat that more succinctly. IT’S NOT A MORAL JUDGMENT, IT’S A PRACTICAL ONE!
It’s not about the “correct approach” or “civilized society”. It’s about situations that lead to the breakdown of civilized behavior and taking PRACTICAL (if immoral, at least in your view) steps to avoid or mitigate the breakdown in civilized behavior.
I have no problem with the people that make a lot of money having lots of money.
I do have trouble with them playing casino games with the economy for their own enrichment and then holding us hostage with threats of crashing the entire economy unless we hand over billions of our tax dollars so they can keep their Gulfstream jets and mansions in every major world city.
I am very much in favor of free market economics, but the free market went out the window when this country was ransomed for billions of dollars so the wealthy losers could go double or nothing and win back our economy.
And when they then decided just to keep it and use it to preserve their own wealth, who are we to complain? It’s THEIR money now, to do what they want with it.
In fact, both parties seem to be treating the wealthy like some sort of angry gods that must be appeased
Oh no, we can’t look to closely at what actually happened in 2008 or they will get mad and crash the economy again. Oh no, we can’t make any effort to discover who actually screwed up, we must protect the reputation of these individuals and companies at any cost or they might get mad and hurt the economy. We can’t raise taxes on them or they will retaliate by not creating jobs. Best just to hand over the keys to the treasury and hope that appeases them enough to leave us alone. Their lives have value, yours don’t.
In a civilized society? No.
However, revolutions historically tend to be a bit uncivilized, especially right at the beginning. Those at the very top, whose position there depends heavily upon society *remaining *civilized would, I should think, have the keenest interest in maintaining that civility.
“Tallest pile of treasure wins” is a fun game until the mob is at the door.
Heh. From your linked article:
When the results of Democracy doesn’t work out the way you wish, go for benevolent dictatorship, I always say.
The fucking what is because it has been done by tax breaks and corporate giveaways in spite of the fact the rich pricks were acting illegally.
here is an example of fucking what. The SEC hit Citigroup for a 285 million dollar fine for deceiving investors in mortgage backed securities.
None of these thieves will go to jail. The fine is a pittance from what the made. The thieves will not have their names and faces put in public.
I will not cope.
No wonder the whole thing’s been such a failure. 
You (and David Bernstein, and Jonah Goldberg) are not making a terribly interesting point. I doubt that you think you are, but you’re making it anyway, so… what of it? It’s pretty surprising to me that a story about one person disagreeing with one other person about something is worth being repeated like this. Are you suggesting, like Bernstein did, that “anarchism” is even in substantial part what the protests are advocating for? Is one person’s opinion that one place is disorderly significant of something, or is there some important aspect of the protests that’s being repudiated here?
Especially considering that the (probably) fourth-hand anecdote is about an argument over some sleeping bags that an organized community group provided, it seems weird that I’ve now seen this shit about the perils of anarchy in multiple places. But I have.
And I’m aware that you’re going to say this is just a humorous little note, no big deal, isn’t it ironic, that’s all. But your cute little gotcha depends on the same misrepresentations as the rest of the mainstream response to these protests, and it gets a little old. So: anarchy?
No, not literal anarchy.
But it seems to me to be a vignette that does neatly encapsulate an area of what i feel is blindness, willful or otherwise, that afflicts many of the protesters. By their signs and slogans they reject corporations, while eating food delivered by corporations to local restaurants and without which corporations we wouldn’t be eating nearly as well. They enjoy the signs they are waving, seemingly unaware of the role corporate structures played in supplying affordable poster board and magic markers. They purport to be a People’s Collective, but are bedeviled by details like ownership and use of commonly-held property.
In short, many of the ideals that many of the protesters seem to be pushing are not practical, and their lack of practiclay is evidenced by the protesters themselves.
Anarchy? No. But at the same time, I’d humbly suugest:
Realism? No.
Poster board and magic markers and one person thinks somebody should tell somebody else what to do about mattresses.
Honestly, I feel like you don’t need anyone else’s help getting over that obstacle to considering the notion that these protests might actually have a valid philosophical underpinning. Which I’ll just go ahead and out with: financial institutions in this country have way too much political power and do way too much harm with that power, and that’s bad for all of our well-beings, that’s the idea.
It’s not practical to replace our system of governing 310 million people with the ad hoc community body that oversees giving out mattresses in Zuccotti Park. I agree with that. It is very likely impractical to replace any state or federal body with the Occupy Wall St. comfort team. These people choose things for themselves that they are not going to get writ large, and rather than writing their signs in their own blood and feces, they’re using actual tools which were purchased with money. Is that important to whether or not the Fair Elections Now act should be passed? Is it difficult, because of the polarizing mattress issue, to determine whether the Occupiers are generally For or Against an act like that?
[QUOTE=Jimmy Chitwood]
Is that important to whether or not the Fair Elections Now act should be passed?
[/QUOTE]
This is a great point. Stephen Metcalf, from Slate, had a similar rant on this subject this week. Although he was addressing the people criticizing the protesters for their appearance, I think his point was basically the same as yours:
Picking at the protesters’ method of organizing themselves, their problems doing so, their appearance, their (apparently annoying) drumming, or the lattes in their hands is ignoring the complaint that they’re making.
What!? They are against the corporations?! Well, that’s just plain stupid, isn’t it? Gosh, thanks a lot, Bricker! I wish I’d had you with me when I went to my local OWS, you could have pointed them out to me. Because I missed them, most of the people I talked to were pissed about corporate irresponsibility and greed. Or, so it seemed to me, but, as you know, I’m just a country boy from Waco, I don’t have your keen perception! They totally fooled me!
I never would have believed they would advance such a simplistic and fatuous program! I am resolved to remove my shoulder from its support, and let it come crashing down! Wow! Against corporations! Talk about stupid! Again, my gratitude.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/12/08/bofa-pay-137-million-settle-claims-defrauded-schools-hospitals/ Bank of America paid 137 million dollar fine for defrauding hospitals and schools. These institutions are corrupt and are damaging to the society. They should not be allowed to stay in business when they commit so many egregious acts. There is plenty to protest when it comes to our banks.
Too big to fail is too big to exist.
Bricker, I’d be interested to know if you think banks that are ‘too big to fail’ pose a problem for the US.