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Jacoby
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10 Oct 2011, 2:00 pm

blauSamstag wrote:
Jacoby wrote:
Being against health insurance reform(health insurance enrichment is probably a more appropriate term), the bailouts, the stimulus, are all pretty clear cut things and anti-corporatist as anything. The original spirit of the Tea Party didn't completely die tho, there were a ton of great candidates in 2010 and some got elected such as Rand Paul, Mike Lee, Justin Amash.

Money in politics isn't the problem tho, it's the power that Washington and the Fed that is the problem. These special interests, corporations, etc. would have nothing to spend their money on if the powers they're trying to influence didn't exist. Not exactly what someone who wants an all encompassing unitary nanny state wants to hear but it is what it is.

Honestly, a good portion of the protesters seem to be protesting their student loans that they probably got ill-thought out degrees in like philosophy and art with.


What do you propose we that replace the major federal agencies with?

"Nothing" is not a valid answer. Central banking is necessary in the current world economy.

The way i see it, corporate interests will subvert any position they can get their grimy paws on. Even if it's a private not-for-profit.

It's late, so i don't remember the specifics, but there is (or was) a bicycle safety/advocacy group that was founded by avid cyclists to promote effective standards in the interest of cyclists. Things like limiting the use of rumble strips on roads that are not major highways, and discouraging cities from designing streets where the bicycle lane is between the road and parallel parking (because these streets kill a lot of cyclists).

Some bicycle manufacturers got involved - they promised to bring money and corporate resources to the aid of private cyclists and managed to get themselves situated into all the meaningful leadership positions in the organization.

And then commenced advocating for business as usual.


That's a nice a story about bicyclists, don't know the relevancy but okay.

As for the Fed, I suppose they don't have to get rid of it right away. Just repeal legal tender laws, legalize private mints, and eliminate state and federal taxes on gold/silver/etc coins and bullion. The Fed would either get their act together or go the way of the horse and buggy.



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10 Oct 2011, 2:34 pm

Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.


Wow, that is absolutely irrelevant to the OP's question. Are there any other talking points from Faux News or some conservative blog that you insist on using to spam and derail threads?


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Inuyasha
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10 Oct 2011, 3:00 pm

Master_Pedant wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.


Wow, that is absolutely irrelevant to the OP's question. Are there any other talking points from Faux News or some conservative blog that you insist on using to spam and derail threads?


Actually what I said was perfectly relevant, the fact you can't figure out how what I said was relevant when it is so blatently obvious is your problem.



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10 Oct 2011, 7:01 pm

Jacoby wrote:
Master_Pedant wrote:
Jacoby's analysis is also relatively dishonest. The Occupy WallStreeters didn't start protesting until Sept. 17, 2011. The Tea Partisans were around for a longer period of time (and, indeed, were initially planned as an extension of the "Ron Paul Revolution" after the candidate failed to win the nomination in 2008, somewhat before the healthcare proposal was fleshed out) before the various strands of the movement converged onto opposition to healthcare reform and (with Kock influence) a generic opposition to taxation.


It started as a moneybomb on the anniversary of the Boston Tea Party back in 2007 iirc but the point was that their message was more coherent which it is. The role of corporate money doesn't really mean anything, what are they protesting specifically? What is their goal? Dylan Ratigan, bless his heart, has been talking about some constitutional amendment banning political contributions to federal campaigns which is quite frankly stupid.


No, it didn't start out coherently at all. There were various ravings about the generic "socialism" of Obama, the amorphous threats of "Obama taking guns", opposition to taxes on the middle class (which Obama wasn't pushing), and an assortment of other issues before the GOP apparatus and various wealthy donors co-opted the Tea Party and focused them on opposing the RomneyCare National/Heritage Foundation Plan and opposing any tax hikes.

While it's hard to pinpoint the goals representative of the Wall Street Occupants yet, especially given that we're in a MUCH earlier point in the movement's development than we are for the Tea Party, central protest organizer AdBusters has said that the movement's objective is to get the President to "ordain a Presidential Commission tasked with ending the influence money has over our representatives in Washington."

http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbuster ... treet.html

The "official demands" of the New York Wall Street Occupants are still being drafted, given the tedious nature of consensual decision-making.

Jacoby wrote:
Being against health insurance reform(health insurance enrichment is probably a more appropriate term), the bailouts, the stimulus, are all pretty clear cut things and anti-corporatist as anything. The original spirit of the Tea Party didn't completely die tho, there were a ton of great candidates in 2010 and some got elected such as Rand Paul, Mike Lee, Justin Amash.


Rand Paul is already being bought. I wonder how long he'll last as a true libertopian maverick.

Jacoby wrote:
Money in politics isn't the problem tho, it's the power that Washington and the Fed that is the problem. These special interests, corporations, etc. would have nothing to spend their money on if the powers they're trying to influence didn't exist. Not exactly what someone who wants an all encompassing unitary nanny state wants to hear but it is what it is.


Money in politics totally is the problem. The Canadian State, while very far from perfect, isn't in a colossal financial clusterf*ck and has a lot more former teachers and other middle class professionals in it's House of Commons because of caps on financial contributions. Even a minarchist state can be corrupted by money in politics, as the Republican Guardians or whoever else are tasked with "ensuring contracts are recognized" can be bribed into how they interpret the contracts by outside money.

Jacoby wrote:
Honestly, a good portion of the protesters seem to be protesting their student loans that they probably got ill-thought out degrees in like philosophy and art with.


I suppose in your uneducated opinion.


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Jacoby
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11 Oct 2011, 3:05 am

I don't see how there can be official demands. Special interests are already trying and succeeding to get out in front of this already. It's not grassroots anymore, the original people if they did have a goal are outnumbered by people with their own agendas now. If Michael Moore started a protest, I doubt too many people would show up or care but that's not stopping him from pretending he's leading the crusade now. The same with all the union bandwagoners. I don't think the fact that the "movement" being only a month or two old really makes much of a difference, the media is eating it up now and the transformation has been accelerated. I can see why you want to be optimistic about it but it seems obvious where at least the media wants it go and that's to be a shill for the democratic establishment. If they claim to be against Wall Street but still support a stooge like Barack Obama, it's been turned on it's head. I think even you can agree with that although you don't seem to be above voting for the "lesser of two evils".

Money is more of a symptom of the problem than the actual disease. I don't think capping political contributions or banning them all together which I believe Dylan Ratigan is proposing would do much if any good. I don't doubt that Canada functions better than the US does and, despite Canada's reputation of a "socialist country" in the US by certain groups of people, a whole lot less bureaucratic.

I don't know why you say that about Rand. He's not as blunt as his father but that's also why people like Inuyasha and the Fox News crowd like him despite him not differing from his father in hardly any significant way. When push comes to shove he was out there against the PATRIOT Act and the adventure into Libya. When he starts voting for bad bills, I'll start distrusting him.

As for the last part, I do have to say you have a fantastic recollection of every I've ever posted on here but student loans does seem to be a theme I see coming up a lot with the young people in these protests. The price of education is ridiculous but they're protesting the wrong people. Maybe if the government didn't stick their nose into education it wouldn't be so unaffordable?



Inuyasha
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11 Oct 2011, 1:00 pm

Uh I have to agree with Jakoby about Rand Paul, as far as I know he hasn't been bought by any special interest groups.

Ron Paul on the other hand has been known to put earmarks in bills then vote against the entire bill.



visagrunt
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11 Oct 2011, 1:16 pm

Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.


I think you will find yourself on the wrong side of history with that analysis. (Your "unofficial minor," notwithstanding.)

How many were arrested as a result of the salt satyagraha? How many arrests were made of civil rights protesters in the 1960s? There comes a point when the imposition of law and order becomes the repression of the legitimate expression of civil grievances. It is well established in United States constitutional law that the right to petition through public demonstration cannot be unreasonably constrained.

Now it may well be that these 700+ people were acting beyond the limits of the exercise of their First Amendment rights--but history suggests that governments will exercise force against movements with which it disagrees.


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11 Oct 2011, 1:41 pm

visagrunt wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.


I think you will find yourself on the wrong side of history with that analysis. (Your "unofficial minor," notwithstanding.)

How many were arrested as a result of the salt satyagraha? How many arrests were made of civil rights protesters in the 1960s? There comes a point when the imposition of law and order becomes the repression of the legitimate expression of civil grievances. It is well established in United States constitutional law that the right to petition through public demonstration cannot be unreasonably constrained.

Now it may well be that these 700+ people were acting beyond the limits of the exercise of their First Amendment rights--but history suggests that governments will exercise force against movements with which it disagrees.


The Civil Rights protesters under Martin Luther King Jr. practiced nonviolence. The occupy wallstreet groups have committed acts of violence.



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12 Oct 2011, 7:05 am

Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.
This tells me that tea parties are the most likely to be mainstream pawns.


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Inuyasha
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12 Oct 2011, 1:24 pm

Vexcalibur wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.
This tells me that tea parties are the most likely to be mainstream pawns.


So you think committing acts of vandalism, violence, and trashing places makes protests legitimate?



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12 Oct 2011, 1:29 pm

Inuyasha wrote:
visagrunt wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.


I think you will find yourself on the wrong side of history with that analysis. (Your "unofficial minor," notwithstanding.)

How many were arrested as a result of the salt satyagraha? How many arrests were made of civil rights protesters in the 1960s? There comes a point when the imposition of law and order becomes the repression of the legitimate expression of civil grievances. It is well established in United States constitutional law that the right to petition through public demonstration cannot be unreasonably constrained.

Now it may well be that these 700+ people were acting beyond the limits of the exercise of their First Amendment rights--but history suggests that governments will exercise force against movements with which it disagrees.


The Civil Rights protesters under Martin Luther King Jr. practiced nonviolence. The occupy wallstreet groups have committed acts of violence.


Their only act of violence so far I think has been to occupy a bridge and being accused by the unofficial House Unamerican Activities Inquisition of libertarians and neocons of being evil socialists who want to destroy America.



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12 Oct 2011, 1:30 pm

Inuyasha wrote:
Vexcalibur wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.
This tells me that tea parties are the most likely to be mainstream pawns.


So you think committing acts of vandalism, violence, and trashing places makes protests legitimate?

What? Where?



Inuyasha
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12 Oct 2011, 1:40 pm

Gedrene wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Vexcalibur wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.
This tells me that tea parties are the most likely to be mainstream pawns.


So you think committing acts of vandalism, violence, and trashing places makes protests legitimate?

What? Where?


Violence occurred at the Air & Space Museum.

Leaving trash laying around has occurred at Wallstreet, and other locations.


Glenn Beck's tea party rally actually picked up their trash and didn't litter all over the place.



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12 Oct 2011, 4:52 pm

Inuyasha wrote:
Gedrene wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Vexcalibur wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.
This tells me that tea parties are the most likely to be mainstream pawns.


So you think committing acts of vandalism, violence, and trashing places makes protests legitimate?

What? Where?


Violence occurred at the Air & Space Museum.

Leaving trash laying around has occurred at Wallstreet, and other locations.


Glenn Beck's tea party rally actually picked up their trash and didn't litter all over the place.


Oooooooooh! Leaving trash all over the place - that's certainly a felony there, I'll tell you what!
Maybe the tea baggers picked up all their garbage because everything about their AstroTurf organization was prearranged. The Occupy Wall Street people, on the other hand, being an organic organization, tended to do things sporadically as individuals.
And as far as the Civil Rights Movement was concerned; despite their non-violent actions, they were constantly being arrested and beaten by the police. And like the OWS movement, the Civil Rights demonstrators were also accused of being communists and threatening the capitalistic social order.
Have you even listened to any of their demands? They want regulations put back in place that would protect ordinary Americans from the abuses of banks and Wall Street speculators - they want politicians to stop serving as shills for Wall Street - and they want those bankers and Wall Street executives that have stolen from, and wrecked the lives of, ordinary Americans to be arrested and prosecuted. That doesn't sound like a threat to capitalism to me. If anything, something has to be done to rein in these abusive bastards on Wall Street, or someday, there very likely will be an armed insurrection that will be out to rid the country of a capitalistic system that not only hadn't done anything for ordinary Americans, but had actually stepped on them and ground them down.
By the way, your hero, Glenn Beck, has claimed that the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators are going to drag rich people out into the street and kill them. You can't tell me that that isn't more than a little bit of hyperbole.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer



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12 Oct 2011, 5:09 pm

we'l probably find out next election



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12 Oct 2011, 8:01 pm

Inuyasha wrote:
Vexcalibur wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.
This tells me that tea parties are the most likely to be mainstream pawns.


So you think committing acts of vandalism, violence, and trashing places makes protests legitimate?


Let me rewrite what I posted so that it becomes evident that you are putting words in my mouth:

Vexcalibur wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
There have been 700+ arrests (protesters getting violent and/or breaking laws) due to Occupy Wallstreet movements while there were 0 arrests associated with the tea party, enough said.
This tells me that tea parties are the most likely to be mainstream pawns.


Ergo, number of arrests by itself is not a great metric. The people in Syria are getting arrested like heck and you won't come to claim they aren't legitimate. You mentioned arrests and only arrests, and when I replied I talked about getting arrested.

I don't think arrests make occupiers legitimate. However, tea party not getting any arrest just tells me the sad true about them, that they are completely mainstream and not shaking any ground with their existence. That mainstream government and corporations are very happy with them.


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Last edited by Vexcalibur on 12 Oct 2011, 8:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.