Occupy Wall Street is Morphing into a Super-Tsunami
A tsunami is coming and political commentators are mistaking the drawback, that is the water receding from the beaches as a signal that the status quo is safe. This is not surprising. Political types detest the power of intuitive modes of communication. Everything has to be clearly laid out empirically -- with statistics, formulas, graphs and clearly-defined political agendas. But guess what? Those are precisely the most dishonest and easily manipulated or co-opted ways in which humans communicate with one another.
What is most frustrating to politicians and news commentators is that protesters banging on bongo drums in a Wall Street park cannot be fit into a simple ideological category in order to be ridiculed and their actions dismissed as meaningless. As a consequence, political observers are having trouble understanding how such an amorphous seeming movement is growing exponentially. But for all those who may be frustrated in their cluelessness, Alex Pareene at Salon offers an amazingly concrete "demand," which reflects the essence of this movement. He explains:
If the media needs specifics, they should write about these as a starter. And in the meantime I'll be joining the "Occupy Wall Street Movement" in North Texas.
What is most frustrating to politicians and news commentators is that protesters banging on bongo drums in a Wall Street park cannot be fit into a simple ideological category in order to be ridiculed and their actions dismissed as meaningless. As a consequence, political observers are having trouble understanding how such an amorphous seeming movement is growing exponentially. But for all those who may be frustrated in their cluelessness, Alex Pareene at Salon offers an amazingly concrete "demand," which reflects the essence of this movement. He explains:
Household debt is at 90 percent of GDP. Any stimulus proposal -- even "dropping money from helicopters" -- would result in a massive transfer of money from indebted Americans to cash-engorged banks, rather than the spending spree that would theoretically put us back to work.[...]
So my immodest proposal is simply this: Individuals and households in the bottom 99 percent who owe debt to any large financial institution that received federal government support during and after the 2008 crisis should see their debt forgiven. That would certainly stimulate the economy, as most people would suddenly find themselves with a great deal more money to spend on iPads (and food, and clothing, and housing, and healthcare). The debt can be forgiven by decree or if the government really wants to it can step in to pay it itself; I don't much care either way. (Though it'd be nice to see it just wiped off the books, to enrage the banks.)
Let's wipe the debt of the 99 percent off the books, tell the financial sector to eat it, and get on with our lives.
If the media needs specifics, they should write about these as a starter. And in the meantime I'll be joining the "Occupy Wall Street Movement" in North Texas.
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