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De Omnibus Dubitandum - Lux Veritas

Showing posts with label Occupy Wall Street. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Occupy Wall Street. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 20, 2021

Occupy Wall Street’s Co-Founder Just Wants to Get Rich

October 18, 2021 @ Sultan Knish Blog

Micah White, PhD, the co-founder of Occupy Wall Street went to Davos last year to party with the super-rich. He’s been pitching cryptocurrency, including Sparkle: a coin he invented.

“Occupy Wall Street generated tremendous money,” White complained. “This whole idea that activists should do it for free and all that b____t is over. Like somehow I’m supposed to be a full-time activist and have zero income from it? It’s ridiculous.”

A decade after the Marxist grad students of Occupy Wall Street trashed some city squares, its co-founder has been working harder than many capitalists to make money from OWS.

For only $179.88 a year, you can enroll in White’s Activist School and watch video classes from Black Lives Matter co-founder Alicia Garza, antisemitic racist Lenora Fulani, and Micah White.

Not to mention, fake black woman, Rachel Dolezal.

For the eighth anniversary of Occupy Wall Street, White launched his own cryptocurrency.

According to him, “every time Sparkle is bought or transferred, 2% is taxed and redistributed to the entire economy” as a Robin Hood Tax. But according to his old OWS buddies, the 2% “is redistributed proportionally to the largest holders of Sparkle (i.e. Micah himself)” and “Micah ensures that he maintains a monopolist status in his platform by also taking 1% of all purchased Sparkle, and another 3% if someone tries to swap for their ETH back.”

Move over Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo. Had it worked, Wall Street would be bowing to White. But Sparkle doesn’t seem to exist anymore, and Micah seems to be promoting a new environmentalist cryptocurrency while touting his status as a cryptocurrency activist.

That follows his decision to move to Nehalem, Oregon, a small town of 271 people that lives off Airbnb rentals to hipsters, and run for mayor. White figured that he couldn’t lose a mayoral election in a town with fewer voters than a New York City apartment building.

Occupy Nehalem didn’t work any better than Occupy Wall Street.

“Ex-Occupier Is Bringing Revolution to Small-Town Oregon,” a headline blared. The small town still has the same mayor it did five years ago. Maybe the locals were tired of the hipster occupation. And even more humiliatingly, Tillamook County came out for President Trump.

White is still plotting revolution with his wife, the daughter of Obama's ambassador to Turkey, even as his old colleagues in the movement keep dismissing them as rich quick schemes.

Micah White, PhD was there at the beginning and at the tenth anniversary of Occupy Wall Street, he’s forced to watch latecomers like the Black Lives Matter gang cash out big from their activism while he’s out there shilling for cryptocurrency on social media. Why are Black Lives Matter’s co-founders millionaires out there buying mansions, while White tries to get someone to pay $180 bucks a year to watch videos of Rachel Dolezal and the Kony 2012 guy.

Like most visionaries, White was ahead of his time. And he’s been forced to watch Colin Kaepernick become insanely wealthy for taking a knee, Shaun King buy an $842,000 mansion, and Ta-Nehisi Coates go from calling 9/11 heroes “less than human” to writing a black Superman movie. Everyone is getting rich off the brand of activism White invented.

Everyone except him.

Getting rich is hard, but to give White credit, he’s trying. In the decade since protesting against the 1%, he founded a boutique activist consultancy (it’s gone), wrote a book, (#986,183 rank on Amazon, #553 in Canadian Politics), launched a mayoral campaign and a cryptocurrency, has his own “activist school”, and was an Activist-in-Residence at UCLA. (Being an Activist-in-Resident is probably the more comfortable way of occupying UCLA.)

It’s hard work making money by denouncing the rich.

Last year, White headed to Davos.

“Why I'm going to Davos - and why I'm hoping my peers don't find out,” White’s post at the World Economic Forum was headlined. Just to make sure no one would find out, he also wrote op-eds about it at The Guardian and The Independent, and gave an interview to the BBC.

"There's a way to keep your revolutionary integrity, to maintain these people as adversaries but say we need a united front with them," he explained the contradiction to the BBC.

But that’s the thing about White, he never stops. Even when he probably should.

When the pandemic arrived, he created Flu Mob, a "groundbreaking activist" platform to "be the vaccine" along with "helpful tips like how to make your own COVID19 mask” and “recipes to make your own hand sanitizer." The pandemic is still around, Flu Mob isn’t.

As Occupy Wall Street hits its tenth anniversary, it’s obvious that Adbusters, the magazine that Micah White edited and used to promote the movement, was actually advertising. In the decade since, White has embodied the frantic start-up ethos of leftist activism which is constantly generating new gimmicks in the hopes that some leftist 1 percenters will agree to fund them.

White just happens to be particularly bad at it. He’s the hardest working man in the activist business, but his ideas have a Krameresque absurdity to them that makes it impossible even for socialists to take them too seriously. And maybe that’s White’s tragedy: he tries too hard.

Leftists are supposed to make money without looking like they want to make money, while White sounds like he should be on Wall Street. He’s got the work ethic of Gordon Gekko, but he’s in an industry that doesn’t appreciate dedicated hustlers and salesmen. On Wall Street or in Silicon Valley, White might have been rich by now. Instead he’s stuck trying to earnestly get rich in an industry that is publicly hostile to wealth. And sneers at obvious social climbers.

Activists want what everyone else wants, they just take the least honest and the most abusive approaches to getting it. A leftist can’t be seen to be working to buy a big house, he has to wage a revolution to get a big house. Corporate America has long since picked up on the AdBusters brand and its ads for deodorant, sneakers, and diet soda sound like revolutionary manifestos.

No one buys products anymore, they join transformative causes by shopping for toilet paper.

A decade later, Occupy Wall Street is Wall Street, Adbusters is advertising, and Corporate America is the counterculture. All the elites hate the rich even while getting rich. But the guy whose beautiful dream helped usher in the wonderland of class doublethink is on the outs.

In a world in which Wall Street has been fully occupied and radicalism is used to sell everything from razor blades to cars, Micah White, PhD is still trying to sell someone on his vision of a new radical for-profit activist order. But in a world in which everyone is an activist, it’s much too late.

Despite his best efforts to join the 1%, the co-founder of Occupy Wall Street is stuck in the 99%.

Daniel Greenfield is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. This article previously appeared at the Center's Front Page Magazine.

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Thank you for reading.

Monday, September 24, 2012

San Failcisco: Occupy Anniversary Rally Flops in SF


The Occupy Wall Street movement celebrated its one-year anniversary on Monday, September 17 with birthday rallies in various cities around the country. The “party” in San Francisco only served to remind everyone how pointless, futile, disgusting and irrelevant Occupy has been from the very start.  Read More Here…..

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Lines in the Sand: The Occupy Wall Street Movement!

By Rich Kozlovich

Some months back I wrote this about the Occupy Wall Street movement.
“This is a scary bunch of people. They are a segment of society that only hates. They hate the Jews, they hate capitalists and capitalism, they hate the police, they hate the military, they hate the banks, they hate the pharmaceutical companies, they hate America, they hate Americans and they despise authority. But they love Muslim fanatics and communists, who epitomize authority in its most tyrannical forms. Their other big love affair is with environmentalism, which has killed almost as many people as Stalin, Hitler and Mao combined. They rail against violence of any kind while they are perpetuating it themselves. How insane can all of that be? In truth, they hate humanity....and they hate themselves. To quote Dennis Prager; "People who are haters can't be happy and happy people can't be haters". How else can you explain what they do to themselves? These people are scary, crazy, violent and self-righteous; what better definition can there be for fascists? FYI: Fascists are the right wing of socialism and communism is the left wing, but they are still two sides of the same coin. We really do need to get that!”



Remember, this was a huge number of people all over the country, including Occupy Washington D.C., and Occupy Cleveland (where five of these geniuses planned to bomb an important bridge).  A guy fittingly named Zitt, supposedly representing the Occupy Cleveland movement, claimed they are ‘dedicated to non-violence’ and that they “would have thrown them out.” Right! How can you throw out people who aren’t part of any organized group, except in name? Did anyone take a look at the number of people who were sexually molested during these occupations? There was no structure, there was no official spokespeople, there was no official positions recognized by anyone…in short…this wasn’t an organization….it was a mob. How do you throw someone out of a mob?

So, what has happened to this mob anyway? Daniel Greenfield posted an article On July 6th answering that question. He states that; “Yesterday I took a walk down to the oldest part of New York City, where the Dutch landed and planted their flag near the current location of the Staten Island Ferry, where George Washington stood his officers rounds at Fraunces Tavern, now filled with Wall Street types, and where a bunch of smelly hippies stirred by an anti-Semitic Canadian magazine decided to squat a park in order to make a statement about their own need for attention.” He noted that “Zuccotti Park has returned to its original function” but that these losers now have decided to occupy Trinity Church.

Why haven’t we heard much about this? Well this church is old and there are signers of the Declaration of Independence buried there, so this isn’t a win situation for the leftists who “Occupy The Media”, which has acted like an irresponsible spoiled child during this whole affair. It must be tough to be the “unofficial PR corps” for a movement without any coherent plan or thoughts, filled with lazy, stupid, violent degenerates that really looks, feels, and acts like an unruly violent mob.

He did find “three”….that is “three”…. of these losers sitting in front of the Trinity Church with a sign accusing the “Trinity Church of greedily sitting on 200 million dollars while refusing the homeless….of Occupy Wall Street a small measly strip of land for their campsite”. After all, according to them the Trinity Church stole this land from the indians and they represent the indians. Amazing…I wonder if the indians know that? I wonder if the Indians like that? Furthermore they “blasted Trinity for being aligned with the “1 percent” and spun conspiracy theories about its parish vestry, which they allege holds over 10 billion dollars in real estate assets”.

You gotta luv the commies. They will always revert to character. They just turned on one of their biggest supporters. During this whole Occupy insanity “Trinity was an enthusiastic supporter of Occupy Wall Street, providing them with bathrooms and private conference rooms. Now however the mob wants the churches land….”but turning over Duarte Square was asking too much.” What’s that? Giving them the land they are demanding is asking too much! Wow! Did I understand that correctly? Isn’t that what they are demanding from the rest of the world? Isn’t that what Trinity claimed to be supporting? What did they think was going to happen if these geniuses actually took over? Yet, these and other ‘religious’ collaborators; who by word and deed gave this mob of socialists, presumably atheists, the cover of the divine; are now surprised?

It never ceases to amaze me when seemingly traditional institutions align themselves with the destroyers of stability and traditional values are upset when the insanity they prescribe for everyone else is finally turned on them. What exactly do these people think is going to happen? Can they possibly be that irresponsibly stupid? Apparently so! Is it any wonder why the mainline religions are losing members? If you don’t stand for something you will stand for everything! When you stand for everything you simply must disavow the values that are foundational to your organization, whether that organization is secular or religious.  That is basic logic.  How can they be anything but doomed if their foundation is not built on stable ground.

For the believers among my readers, this Bible quote is appropriate for this topic, and for the non-believers among my readers; you will see the logic of my last statement clearly.

"Many will say to me in the day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name, cast out demons in your name, and done many wonders in your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from me, you who practice lawlessness!'

"Therefore whoever hears these sayings of mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. But everyone who hears these sayings of mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall."- Matthew 7:22-27

If they wish to be socialists, then fine. However, if they profess to be servants devoted to disseminating Biblical understanding ….they have a problem. In fact…the Episcopalian Church has a lot of problems. The Episcopal Church is part of Anglican Communion with its roots going back to the English Reformation and the Church of England, where the Archbishop of Canterbury slammed Christians who feel ‘disgusted’ about homosexuality. (Additional information here)

No matter what a person’s views are on this subject, one must acknowledge this one incontrovertible fact. The Bible condemns homosexuality, and it isn’t just “Pauline Christianity” as some critics claim. This has been the moral imperative on this subject throughout Bible history.

So then, if one who professes to be a servant of the Supreme Being; and the understanding of that Being and his views are presumably presenting in the Bible; then one would think that they would know what the Bible has to say on the subject, believe what the Bible says on the subject, and act accordingly. Don’t you think?

If they disagree, which in America is perfectly acceptable, then they have to leave their organization. Don’t you think? That is unless their organization has now become as confused as their leader. So, the question that should come to mind to the most casual observer is this; if they can’t get the correct understanding on a morality issue that is so clearly outlined in what is supposed to be their foundational text, why would we expect them to get anything else right?

This OWS movement has clearly drawn lines in the sand. It can be credited with clarifying for the public the social, economic and moral positions of individuals and organizations. For that, humanity can be grateful. The news media, political parties, religious organizations are now exposed, one way or the other. There is no hiding behind misleading words and phrases.

If you stand side by side in support of the insane; then you are part and parcel of that insanity. And thanks to the Occupy Wallstreet Movement, we now absolutely know where everyone stands.

##

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Observations From the Back Row

By Rich Kozlovich

The purpose of “Observations From the Back Row” is to explore issues that are not typically seen in the media. These issues will deal with more than JUST the big headline stuff. It is my intention to feature articles that will aid in seeing farther, deeper and wider. I wish to explore the issues that are seemingly small, but may in reality be very foundational. I have found that this is where you see the trend that leads to end conclusions. This is where the history of any issue is being written. Tell me the history and I will give you the answer.

Everything we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality. That has been the foundation logic for my views and conclusions for some time. Expanding on that we must honestly say that everything we are told should have some foundation in past history. Everything that exists, and everything that is an issue, has some historical foundation with an historical context. We have to know that before we can make judgments on anything. Otherwise we are like waves crashing against the rocks; washed back and forth with every new philosophical flavor of the day.

Another one of my favorite sayings is that 'everything really is a conspiracy'. Of course everyone rolls their eyes and snickers when I say that. But I keep wondering if they have ever read a history book, and if they did; did they understand it? Other than natural disasters, things involving people just don't happen in a vacuum. Events don't take place without participants. Are we to assume that these people just walked up to one another one day and decided to do_____(fill in the blank) worldwide without any conversation, discussion, promotion or encouragement? As for these spontaneous eruptions by masses of people; if you look carefully at the history you will find that this spontaneity was fed by events and activists for some time.

Is that being paranoid? Does recognizing that people really can be against you make you paranoid? In my world I am surrounded by those who would destroy my industry and my business. Worse yet, they have “Stockholm Syndrome’ allies within the industry that can hardly be called anything except “Fifth Columnists”. Is it really any different in any other industry? We have regulators, bureaucrats and political leaders that openly state that they intend to eliminate some industries. Coal fired power plants is Obama’s personal choice. Are we to believe that he isn’t surrounded by even more radical anti-industry anti-capitalists? Has anyone recently checked out who his Czars are?

The destructive behavior of the Left is based on the fact that they have no values. They will adopt or reject any policy or philosophy that will put them in power. Here is a historical fact. Dystopia is the final result of socialism. That is a fact. Does that make it paranoia?


OCCUPY WALLSTREET

Will Occupiers Get Their Violent Chicago Riot?
The anti-American activists of the Occupy Wall Street movement announced they plan to violently disrupt the G8/NATO summit in Chicago on May 19. Adbusters, the Noam Chomsky-friendly magazine that spearheaded the Occupy movement, claims the movement will conduct a massive occupation of Chicago “in the tradition of the Chicago 8.” Of course the radicals of the Chicago 8 organized riots at the Democratic Party’s national convention in that city in 1968. Hundreds of police officers were injured. Adbusters vows that this time the rioters won’t give an inch to the police. A massive occupation of Chicago involving “50,000 people from all over the world” will begin on May 1: …..Occupy Wall Street, and the satellite protests it spawned in cities across the U.S. and around the world have been spectacularly violent. Radical activists are responsible for hundreds crimes, including assault, gang rape, arson, rioting, robbery, and a host of others……In anticipation of the May protests Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel, himself a radical Saul Alinsky-inspired thug, has increased fines for resisting a police officer.

Exposing the Alinsky Party
Of no other occupant of the White House can it be said that he owed his understanding of the political process to a man and a philosophy so outside the American mainstream, or so explicitly dedicated to opposing it.”
“Barack Obama’s Rules for Revolution: The Alinsky Model” by David Horowitz
When Newt won the battle of South Carolina, he also laid out the stakes for the larger conflict beyond the primaries and even beyond the election. It is the battle for the soul of America. In the 2004 election, John Edwards borrowed James P. Cannon’s Two Americas metaphor to showcase his vision of a divided nation.

MEDIA

Reporters Without Credibility
Founded in 1985, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF), also known as Reporters Without Borders, professes to be motivated by a profound devotion to freedom of expression. The organization has apparently done good work on behalf of journalists in countries like Cuba and China, where press freedom simply doesn’t exist. But RSF also issues an annual Press Freedom Index – the latest was released just the other day – in which it purports to rank countries according to the degree of freedom their journalists enjoy. Let’s just say that the list doesn’t represent RSF at its finest

Liberal Bias Detected in Science Media
Incredible as it sounds, the science news media seem to have a liberal bias. This is astonishing, considering the vast majority of science professors in academia are Democrats. The following examples illustrate this trend that came to light around 1859.

RELIGION

‘God Is an Imaginary Friend’: Atheist Billboard Ignites Controversy in Colorado
Atheists have a way with billboards. In fact, it’s one of the primary methods many non-believers use to communicate with the public at large. This is exactly the method a Denver, Colorado-based group, called Boulder Atheists, is using to spread its message. Reaction to the group’s newest billboard, which targets those who hold a belief in God, has ranged from giggles to anger. Boulder Atheists has erected three billboards that each read, “God is an imaginary friend. Choose reality, it will be better for all of us.” This statement, which will clearly offend the religious, is not intended to start problems, the group says.

New Bible Yanks ‘Father,” Jesus as ‘Son of God’In the world of questionable and sometimes downright silly Bible translations, one would think that it couldn’t get any worse. After all, we’ve seen the “In da beginnin’ Big Daddy created da heaven an’ da earth” Ebonics Bible, as well as the “Apostle’s Log” Star Trek English paraphrase Bible. In a more serious effort, the New Oxford Annotated Bible was created in part by pro-”gay” and feminist scholars in order to set forth a more “gay” revisionist interpretation of Scripture.

But now there is a major controversy developing as the latest altered Bibles are being created by organizations that most would think of as being more conservative and reasonable. At the forefront of the controversy are the Wycliffe Bible Translators, the Summer Institute of Linguistics and Frontiers, all of which are producing Bible translations that remove or modify terms which they have deemed offensive to Muslims.

That’s right: Muslim-friendly Bibles.

True Religious Freedom Means Freedom for All
A recent development in Obamacare’s reach raises an important point about religious liberty. The health care law requires hospitals to provide contraceptives to patients. Churches have protested and have won an exemption to this regulation as it concerns their own health services. This is all well and good: Religious institutions shouldn’t be forced to support practices they find morally objectionable. For related reasons, various tax exemptions on religious institutions are also consistent with the principles of a free society.

My Take - This is one of those articles that everyone should read because it takes a reasonable person out of their comfort zone. Religion has always been a blessing and a thorn in humanities side,.  That is why the founding fathers insisted on making sure that this new country was never going to be caught up in the same quagmire that Europe was in for hundreds of years.  They fought wars within wars; because as they conducted wars against other nations because of faith; they also conducted wars against their own citizenry because of faith. If you take the time to read about the religious wars of Europe you will find that it isn’t a simple case of Catholic against Protestant.

As you read this article please remember that the founding fathers were believers .  And in spite of what you may read my modern critics they believed that Judaic/Christian values and practices were far superior to all other religious beliefs. As a result all of the stuff going on today would have never occurred to them. They just didn’t realize that people would get so weird! They also never believed that a secular authority should have the right to become an atheistic semi-religion entity imposing it’s litany on believers.

Bishop: Obama Administration Is Telling Catholics ‘To Hell With You’
“The Obama administration has just told the Catholics of the United States, ‘To Hell with you!’” the bishop said in a column posted on his diocesan website. “There is no other way to put it.”

Obama Sandbags the Archbishop
In forcing the Catholic Church to violate its own principles, Obama has committed an act of federal aggression, crossing the line between church and state to appease his ACLU and feminist allies, while humiliating the Catholic bishops. At the end of Sunday mass at the church this writer attends in Washington, D.C., the pastor asked the congregation to remain for a few minutes. Then, on the instructions of Cardinal Archbishop Donald Wuerl, the pastor proceeded to read a letter. In the letter, the Church denounced the Obama administration for ordering all Catholic schools, hospitals and social services to provide, in their health insurance coverage for employees, free contraceptives, free sterilizations and free "morning-after" pills.

My Take - This is a “famous statement attributed to pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) about the inactivity of German intellectuals following the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group. The text of the quotation is usually;

First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak out because I was Protestant.
Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Asked About Plight of Syrian Christians, State Dept. Erroneously Blames Regime
Christians are under threat in Syria, but the Obama administration appears unaware of, or unwilling to acknowledge, the source of the danger facing the minority. Asked several times during a press briefing Monday about violence and threats facing Syrian Christians, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland appeared to blame the government – although Christians reportedly are at risk from elements among the anti-regime forces……“Now they are afraid of the future. Will they have to flee their country like Iraqi Christians have done over the last several years?... Of those who said they wanted Assad to stay in power, the most common reason given – by 46 percent of that cohort of respondents – was:……. “We do not want to see Syria become another Iraq.  (I think these are two worthwhile follow-up articles.  RK)  U.S. Military Archbishop: Far Fewer Christians in Iraq Since U.S. 2003  (and )‘We Stand With You,’ Clinton Tells Syrian People Ahead of Security Council Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a message to Syrian protesters --

VOTER FRAUD

Left Demands James O’Keefe’s Head Over Voter Fraud Exposé
The Left is in a horrible huff. Once again James O’Keefe, the conservative film-maker who exposed ACORN, has demonstrated the duplicity of the Left. This time he proved why strict voter ID laws, opposed strongly by the Left, are necessary.  In more than 10 minutes of video footage, which has gone viral on the Internet, O’Keefe demonstrated how easy it was in New Hampshire for an individual to pose as a deceased voter and still receive a ballot to vote in an election.  New Hampshire House Speaker William O’Brien, (R-Mont Vernon) called the video “a shocking exclamation point on the need for immediate reform to New Hampshire’s election laws to ensure that voter fraud does not taint the rights of our citizens to have their votes counted in an honest, responsible way and impact our state.”  New Hampshire Governor John Lynch vetoed legislation passed in 2011 requiring photo ID at the polls. Governor Lynch had stated in his veto message that there was “no voter fraud problem in New Hampshire.”

MIDDLE EAST

How to get Russia on board in Syria? Hint: Think of the sea
Russian foot-dragging is now a key barrier between the Syrian demonstrators and their prospective liberation from Bashar al-Assad’s rule. Even the timid Arab League has called for al-Assad to leave, and Syria’s powerful neighbor, Turkey, has declared that it’s ready for internationally sanctioned action. The question is, can a U.N. Security Council resolution, including Russia’s vote, be secured, paving the way for an end to al-Assad’s rule?

Selfish politicking  (Wow!  Politicking that is selfish...imagine that!  RK)
Over the weekend we witnessed a dangerous intensifying of events in Syria: the freezing of the Arab League observer mission with team leaders citing safety reasons and a high number of casualties, accompanied by the regime’s indiscriminate use of heavy artillery. With over 200 dead since Thursday, we now have a clear idea that the regime of President Bashar Assad is going flat out with its idea of a “security solution,” designed to smash the uprising……But as Russia continues to supply Syria with arms and fuel, mere words have become futile. The Arab states must now collectively approach Russia, warning Syria’s ally that any influence they still retain in the Middle East is in jeopardy. This is the language that countries understand. They are not charities, but pragmatic machines, with markets and interests at stake.

My Take – Two different writers; two different approaches; two different solutions; both wanting the same outcome. Nothing is ever as it seems. However, everything is as history defines it. If we don’t know history we can’t define anything. If we can’t define it, we can’t explain it; if we can’t explain it, it is an illusion! But nothing is ever as it seems. RK

EUROPE

What kind of people have we become?
Churchill would be dismayed by modern Britain’s capitulation to jackboot egalitarians, says Jeff Randall. Between Christmas and New Year, the 70th anniversary of an event, which in no small way helped change the course of history, passed almost unnoticed. On December 26, 1941, less than three weeks after Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor, Winston Churchill addressed both branches of Congress in the United States. The prime minister, who was in Washington to agree military strategy with President Roosevelt, used the invitation from Senators and Representatives to excoriate the Axis powers and pose a simple question: “What kind of people do they think we are?” ……According to a recent government report, some 3,775 former foreign prisoners, who were in line for deportation by the UK Border Agency, have been released from custody and are living here, most thanks to Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, the right to a family and private life. A Nigerian rapist was due to be sent home after losing a series of appeals in British courts over his jailing for an attack on a 13-year-old girl. But Strasbourg’s worthies insisted that they must protect the culprit’s “social ties” with Britain, which had blossomed while he defied expulsion.

Mary Ann Sieghart: The dreamers who gave us the eurozone stand condemned
This was a policy blunder born of arrogance and insouciance at the highest levels. And it can't easily be reversed. An elderly man in France was arrested last week for supplying faulty breast implants to 30,000 women. Yet an elderly man in Germany is still free to enjoy his retirement despite having wrecked the lives of more than 500 million Europeans, with repercussions for billions more around the world. Not only that, but Helmut Kohl has been feted by an American President as "the greatest European leader of the second half of the 20th century". He should instead be found guilty of the greatest policy blunder of the second half of the 20th century. The formation of the euro has more than a little in common with the PIP implants scandal. In both cases, rules were deliberately broken, dreadful consequences were easily foreseen, and a culture of willful blindness and moral negligence prevailed. In both cases, untold human pain has been caused, with little chance of redress for the victims. But at least in the case of PIP, someone is being held responsible. In the case of the euro, not a single politician has suffered for his negligence.

Europeans See Poor Job Market
In most countries, pluralities say it is a bad time to find a job. Few Europeans in 2011 said it was a good time to find a job in the city or area where they live. A median of 12% of residents across the 27 countries Gallup surveyed were positive about the local job outlook, while a median of 80% said it was a bad time. Greeks were the least optimistic, with 2% saying it was a good time to find a job, and Germans were the most optimistic, with 50% saying it was a good time.

Will German Politicians Wreck Europe To Save Their Own Skins?
Readers of Via Meadia know that there’s little love or respect here for the lazy, lying demagogic politicians whose corrupt patronage politics have ruined Greece. Nor do we hold in particularly high esteem the cultural qualities that led the Greeks to support such rotten politicians year after year. Greek politics is in the school of Huey Long who famously told supporters that “If you’re not getting something for nothing, you’re not getting your fair share.” It takes some truly talented screw ups to come up with a worse plan for Greece than the one the Greeks have developed for themselves, but the Germans have risen to occasion in fine form. The latest German plan to “fix” Greece: the country should surrender control over its tax and budget policy to a European commissioner in exchange for the next €130 billion that Greece needs to pay off the rapacious and stupid European banks who, encouraged by fatheaded German banking regulators among others, paid top dollar for its worthless bonds.

Can the Germans stop being German?
For all Angela Merkel’s tough talk, she will eventually be forced to accept the inevitable on the euro crisis. One of Davos’s more amusing characteristics is that it can be used as a quite reliable contrary indicator. I’ve been coming to this annual gathering of the world elite of finance, business and public policy for some years now, and you can set your watch by it. If the mood is buoyant, you know that disaster is just around the corner, and if it is intensely gloomy, that things will soon be picking up. En masse, bankers, economists and business leaders tend to be a very poor form of economic indicator. Sometimes they are so wrong that one wonders how they manage to stay in business.

Conciliating the Armenians
I go to France quite often, but after this article is published, I may be liable to arrest if I set foot in the country. The French parliament has just passed a bill, proposed by President Nicolas Sarkozy's party, that will make it a crime to question whether the Armenian massacres in eastern Turkey in 1915 qualified as a genocide. Sarkozy will doubtless sign it into law next month, just in time for the presidential elections. It won't be just a crime to deny that hundreds of thousands of Armenians, perhaps as many as a million, were killed in eastern Anatolia in 1915, and that it was the responsibility of the Turkish state. That is a historical fact, and only fools, knaves and Turkish ultranationalists deny it. It will also be a crime, punishable by one year in prison and a fine of up to 45,000 even to question the use of the word "genocide."

Mary Dejevsky: Could France show Europe how to move left
Across Europe, a widespread assumption has been that the combination of the cold economic climate, harsh austerity measures, and general disillusionment with politicians boosts the electoral chances of the populist right. The French presidential race, where Marine Le Pen offers a soft-ish version of the far-right option for the National Front, will be one of the first tests of this hypothesis.

My Take - I would love to be able to say “The French; what do you expect?”, except that this is playing out everywhere else also! Socialism is a failure. Socialist policies got the world into the mess it is in. So why are socialists considered for any leadership position? It is all so destructively insane that it seems Satanic. RK

MILITARY

German Angst as U.S. troops bid "Auf Wiedersehen"Walter Brunner, a lively 82-year old whose blue baseball cap matches the color of his eyes, leans across a red leather booth at the American-style diner in this southern German town and tries to make light of the looming pullout of U.S. troops. "We Germans fought for the Russians to go, now we are fighting for the Americans to stay," jokes Brunner, chairman of the German-American contact club in Grafenwoehr, whose lifeblood is its U.S. military base. He watched a young Elvis Presley arrive here for training in 1958 and still goes tenpin bowling with his American friends every Monday night. News that the 172nd infantry brigade, with its 3,500 soldiers and 8,000 family members, is being pulled from Grafenwoehr to return to the United States has hit this town hard.

RACE

Obama's Racial Politics
Many Americans thought that with Obama's presidency, we were moving to a "post-racial society." Nothing could be further from the truth.

A Black Man Can by Mike Adams
There is a bumper sticker I have often seen displaying these four simple words: “A Black Man Can.” The words could be taken in either of two ways. One interpretation is liberal - calling for whites to stop discriminating and give black men a chance. Another interpretation is conservative - suggesting black men can achieve without the help of government programs......

EDUCATION

Universities Abandon Western Civilization
Most students no longer are taught their nation’s triumphs that would equip them to be knowledgeable citizens. Major universities have turned from instruction in the significance of Western Civilization to the “profound” influence of Lady Gaga, (real name: Stephanie Germanotta), the bizarre recording artist whose commercial success has somehow topped charts around the world. In some colleges today even history majors don’t have to delve into our nation’s influences and beginings. The national Association of Scholars, in a new analysis, “The Vanishing West: 1964-2010,” describes the tragic near disappearance of the study of Western Civilization from the American undergraduate curriculum. (My Take – It would be interesting to see what would happen if the federal government stopped funding student loans. If there was less money being thrown at the universities then perhaps professors would really teach and students would really learn. In a world where no one has to compete those in that world will stop excelling. Welcome to higher education!)

WELCOME TO ISLAM

Christmas Under Islam
Earlier I discussed how mosques, some of which breed radicalization and serve as terrorist bases, flourish in America, while churches are increasingly targeted and destroyed in the Muslim world, especially the Middle East, the cradle of Christianity.

The Most Dangerous Place to be an Atheist
Alexander Aan was just another bureaucrat holding down a desk at the Department of Planning until his Facebook Atheism page came to the notice of Indonesian authorities in Obama’s old stomping grounds. Now Aan is facing a five year jail sentence for using social media to spread the message that Allah does not exist. Alexander is being charged with “defiling” Islam by using passages from the Koran to challenge the Islamic religion. And while the State Department and the media routinely go on the attack against any manifestation of what they call “Islamophobia,” it isn’t likely that they will be rushing to Aan’s defense. This isn’t exactly the first time that atheists have run afoul of the Islamic codes under which the Muslim world operates.

Violent Jihadist Video Riles Norway
It was, shall we say, an interesting week in Norway. On Tuesday, January 17, a video was posted on YouTube that called for Norwegian soldiers to be withdrawn from Afghanistan. Over images of Norwegian soldiers and of Norway’s prime minister, foreign minister, and crown prince, a text calling for Allah to “destroy them and let it be painful” was read aloud in Arabic, with subtitles in Norwegian. The video, which concluded with an image of Norway’s flag in flames, urged Muslims to show up for a protest rally on Friday outside the parliament building in Oslo. (My Take - And this is in a country that has bent over backwards to accommodate the Islamists within their midst believing they would eventually become part of Norway's community. To remain in Islam and to become one with the Norwegians is impossible. I wonder if the Norwegian leaders have ever read a history book of European history? RK)

Muslim Hate Groups
Muslim Hate Groups On Campus by Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center, exposes the radical origins and violent objectives of the purportedly mainstream Muslim student organizations that have set up shop on our nation’s campuses.

HOMOSEXUALITY

Blurring the Lines Between An Agenda and Human Rights
On December 6, President Barack Obama’s support for the demands of the “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender” agenda rose to the next level when he issued a memorandum directing federal agencies abroad to “improve protections for LGBT asylum seekers and to strengthen opposition to criminalization of LGBT status or conduct.” The key phrase in the directive was Obama’s claim that so doing is but another part of the “United States’ commitment to promoting human rights.” This shift in characterizing the sexual and political demands of those who engage in homosexual behavior as a “human right” is as purposeful as it is dangerous to liberty, marriage, and the family. And if Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s speech last week in Geneva was any indicator, the appeal to “human rights” is the new moniker for silencing and punishing any person, organization, or state that will not support the homosexual agenda.


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Friday, January 27, 2012

Zone of Reality: Occupy Wall Street Movement

By Rich Kozlovich

No organizational structure, no outline of objectives, no discernable philosophy, no common goals, no obvious goals, no leadership, no solutions, no money and no desire to attain any of these....at least through their own efforts; and the the talking heads in the Lame Stream Media can’t even begin to comprehend how they have been able to “unite” with no discernable philosophy and no organization? First of all .....they aren't united! Just like the homeless street people they emulate......they're just being oboxious while squatting together. The LSM have supported and promoted a group of irrational left wing crazies, bums and losers,; presenting them as a major force for political and social change.

The protestors are no more united than an amoeba that keeps splitting and increasing with no discernable goal other than to consume and increase. They are all losers who now have a cause; a cause that requires nothing of them other than to shoot off their mouths, take up space, be obnoxious filthy jerks while consuming and increasing at no cost to themselves! At least the amoeba will go about their affairs silently through their own efforts. Get over these idiots. They don’t want jobs, they won’t work at jobs and if hired they would fail at those jobs while  creating havoc while there! We need to get that! You just can’t fix stupid...or the media.....same thing!

There is one thing they have in common. They hate traditional values and stable civilized activity, and they have nothing to offer except complaints. Does anyone really think that represents a movement that is in any way sane? So...if the media is promoting them can we assume that it is possible the media is also insane? Could be!

The futility and hypocrisy of the Occupy stragglers
Kanaska Carter is 26...a former hairdresser from Canada who came to the US to protest on the 10th anniversary of September 11 but got caught up in Occupy Wall Street….now there’s the Google wars, another natural fit for a…young protestors attention. They don’t have a discernable message. They don’t want a leader. They don’t even agree with each other. But they’re going to the White House anyway... “I felt I’ve been waiting my whole life for this kind of activism.”

One Final Note: If anyone has any doubt that the Left Wing Media is anything less than irrational as they attempt to create facts in place of reality please read Alan Caruba's article, Liberal Lunacy.  The Wall Street Movement truly is the reality of "The Left". 

Saturday, October 15, 2011

Observations From the Back Row: 10-15-11

...
“De Omnibus Dubitandum”

New Video: Paul Ryan on Repealing Obamacare

Everthing we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality!
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A week before President Barack Obama was scheduled to deliver yet another big-think proposal to Get America Working Again, reality intervened with a well-timed smack upside the head: Solyndra, a California solar panel company, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Back in May 2010, as part of the run-up to what the administration was then touting as “Recovery Summer,” Obama used Solyndra as a poster child for both the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and his long-stated promise to create millions of “green jobs.”…. Agency numbers cited by Investor’s Business Daily in August, the Recovery Act’s $7.2 billion in “clean tech” money had “created or retained” a pathetic 7,140 jobs, at a cost of about $1 million each. According to the Department of Energy’s inspector general, one reason for this paltry payoff is the wage and regulatory provisions of the Davis-Bacon Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Buy American Act. In sum: The government scooped up hundreds of billions from taxpayers, redistributed it in the name of creating jobs, then attached a series of requirements that made job creation much more expensive and therefore unlikely……Contributing Editor Deirdre McCloskey highlights what may be the most salient point: “‘Jobs’ are deals between workers and employers, and so ‘creating’ them out of unwilling parties is impossible. The state, though, can outlaw deals, and has.” Until that insight sinks in, it will be a long time before America gets back to work.



How did a failing California solar company, buffeted by short sellers and shareholder lawsuits, receive a $1.2 billion federal loan guarantee for a photovoltaic electricity ranch project—three weeks after it announced it was building new manufacturing plant in Mexicali, Mexico, to build the panels for the project.

The company, SunPower (SPWR-NASDAQ), now carries $820 million in debt, an amount $20 million greater than its market capitalization. If SunPower was a bank, the feds would shut it down. Instead, it received a lifeline twice the size of the money sent down the Solyndra drain.


The green jobs subsidy story gets more embarrassing by the day. Three years ago President Obama promised that by the end of the decade America would have five million green jobs, but so far some $90 billion in government spending has delivered very few.  A new report by the Labor Department's Office of Inspector General examined a $500 million grant under the stimulus program to the Employment and Training Administration to "train and prepare individuals for careers in 'green jobs.'" So far about $162.8 million has been spent. The program was supposed to train 125,000 workers, but only 53,000 have been "trained" so far, only 8,035 have found jobs, and only 1,033 were still in the job after six months.


Occupy Wall Street: Communism's Clueless Foot Soldiers




"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings."

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Friday, October 14, 2011

No One Can Warp Reality Like the Media

By Rich Kozlovich, Tags:

Over the years I have placed a great deal of the blame on the rise of the green movement and the outrageous regulations imposed on the nation because of them on the media. They have distorted the science, misreported the events and have generally favored these radical environmental groups for decades. This is just one more piece of evidence that everything you read in the newspapers, everything you see on the news is like looking through a warped lens of a telescope.  Describing what they do as propaganda is being kind. And much of what you see on the documentaries on the nature and science channels are nothing short of greenie propaganda also. 

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

The Wall Street Parade: Loons, Liars and Demagogues!



To see a list of their demands please go to,
"They don't know what they want, but they want it now!

Oops! Occupy Wall Street slums step on big toes
Protesters trashing park with ties to powerful political, financial players - New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's girlfriend serves on the board of directors for the private company that owns the park where Occupy Wall Street protesters have set up their home base, WND has learned. The protesters have reportedly been making a mess of Zuccotti Park, a public space that's owned by a private financial giant, Brookfield Office Properties, Inc. The park, close to Wall Street, is named after Brookfield's co-chairman, John Zuccotti. According to the Wall Street Journal, Brookfield wanted the protesters removed, but Bloomberg's New York Police Department urged the private company to allow the protests to stay in the park.

Obama pastor: Occupiers on Wall Street 'stand with Jesus'
Suggests church members have 'potluck' at protests. A member of President Obama's controversial faith council has implied the Occupy Wall Street movement stands with Jesus, while asking church members to bring pizza and casseroles to the protesters.

Wall Street’s Disgruntled Utopians
How rhetoric about "income inequality" masks the protesters' true goal. - The Occupy Wall Street protesters are looking more and more like the shock troops of the Democratic Party’s electoral tactic of class warfare. Responding to a question about the protesters, the President gave an oblique endorsement when he said, “The American people understand that not everybody has been following the rules; that Wall Street is an example of that.” …… Certainly organized labor also thinks they can use the protesters, which is why some labor groups––particularly public employee unions hooked up to diminishing taxpayer-funded life support––are marching alongside them, in the hopes that they can exploit this movement to protect their Cadillac benefits.....[As for the rich paying their fair share] In 1981, the top 1% paid 17.58% of all federal income taxes; in 2005, this same cohort paid 39.38%. In 1981 the top 1% paid $94.84 billion (in 2005 dollars); in 2005 they paid $368.13, an increase of 288%. In the most progressive tax system among OECD economies, today the top 10% of American taxpayers pay 70% of all revenues, while the bottom 47% pay nothing. In other words, this increasing “income inequality” has led to the rich footing most of the tax bill for all the goodies the federal government dispenses. Contrary to the current class-warfare rhetoric, “If you want to get more tax revenues from the rich,” economist Arthur Laffer points out, “you’ve got to make the rich richer, and to make the rich richer, you’ve got to lower tax rates.” If the “anarchists for Big Government,” as Mark Steyn calls them, really want more federal money for their demands like “free college education,” “a $20 minimum wage,” and a trillion dollars for “ecological restoration,” they should be endorsing supply-side economics.

Cain steps up attacks on Wall Street occupiers
Herman calls protesters 'jealous' Americans who 'play the victim card' - Move protests to Obama's home, says Cain - Wall Street didn't write these failed economic policies. The White House did'

Pelosi Supports Occupy Wall Street Movement
House Democratic Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said she supports the growing nationwide Occupy Wall Street movement, which began on the streets of downtown New York City in mid-September.House

Meet the Obama link to Wall Street terror
Radical's plan involves strategy to collapse stock market - Stephen Lerner, a controversial anti-capitalist SEIU organizer, is one of the forces behind the protests on Wall Street and nationwide, according to quotes obtained by a socialist activist who doubles as a Washington Post columnist. WND was first to report Lerner was the brain behind some of the economic protest templates being used by the Occupy Wall Street campaign. Lerner recently laid out a mass economic protest plan intended to bring down the stock market, and boasted his plan could be used to cause a new financial crisis. His ideology prompted some conservative critics to go so far as to label him an economic terrorist.

Occupation of Wall Street—What Would Che Guevara Do?
Guevara would clear the occupation of Wall Street in a New York nanosecond. His colleagues of the time recall Che cheering the Soviet tanks slaughtering Hungarian freedom-fighters in the streets of Budapest. The youths they machine-gunned and blasted were all “fascists and CIA agents!” he raved……In a TV speech on June 26, 1961, when Che Guevara was Cuba’s “Minister of Industries,” he proclaimed: “Cuban workers must get used to live in a collectivist regimen, and by no means can they go on strike!” …………Che Guevara also denounced those who “choose their own path” (as in growing long hair and listening to “Yankee-Imperialist” rock & roll). These were vilified as worthless “roqueros,” “lumpen,” and “delinquents.” In his famous speech, Che Guevara even vowed “to make individualism disappear from Cuba! It is criminal to think of individuals!”

ACORN: Puppet Master of Occupy Wall Street
The Working Families Party, an infamous ACORN front group notorious for corruption, was instrumental in organizing the Occupy Wall Street protests, according to radical journalist Laura Flanders of Free Speech TV….. ACORN allies are also involved in protests aimed at destabilizing the nation’s financial system….. Last year George Goehl, executive director of Chicago-based National People’s Action, said that “the banking crisis” was “the next big thing,” and “the way to build a big economic justice movement in this country.” Meanwhile, ACORN’s new front groups are also deeply involved in the Occupy Wall Street movement.


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Sunday, October 9, 2011

They don’t know what they want, but they want it now!

By Rich Kozlovich

I am always amazed at the lack of clear thinking in so many, especially those who just can’t seem to stay out of the streets with an overwhelming need to protest something. The greenies and the lefties all are filled with a sense of self-righteous superiority. Yet, I don’t even think most of them have any idea why they are really there, and from the interviews it is abundantly clear that they don’t even know what they want done.

Greenies and lefties are great at finding fault, but they are clueless when it comes to finding solutions. Why? They have never owned businesses, never met a payroll, never had to worry about meeting their payments to the bank, and never worked for months without a paycheck so that the employee’s checks wouldn’t bounce. They have never done anything that has contributed to the nation’s riches for which they are demanding a share. And they want a voice in the management of those riches.

Recently we have seen a huge number of people picketing Wall Street demanding….. well…..wait…..let me think a minute….. hummm…. it turns out that I just don’t know what it is they are demanding! I really hate being ignorant, but actually in this case; I don’t feel so bad about my ignorance, because they are apparently as ignorant as I! For someone to be ignorant of someone else goals isn’t that big of a deal; but when they are ignorant as to what they want themselves (while spending so much energy to promote it - whatever “it” is) goes beyond stupid.

One of these protestors was interviewed on the radio Thursday saying that he didn’t know what change he wanted but he definitely wanted change. To what; he was asked? “I don’t know” was the answer, but he still definitely wanted it. What’s even more fascinating are the prominent, rich and important people who have been applauding them. Those who have benefited so much from this system are applauding them for doing……what? And promoting …..what? Well someone finally came up with a thirteen point list of demands and a fourteenth caveat.

Follow the link to see the original list. I have condensed these demands into 7 categories properly reorganizing them into some kind of logical order; a common problem when dealing with the ramblings of the greenies and the lefties; that and their unrelenting use of logical fallacies and outright lies to justify their positions.
1. Income and employment
a. Restoration of the living wage.
b. Minimum wage to twenty dollars an hr.
c. Guarantee a living wage income regardless of employment
d. This demand can only be met by ending "Freetrade".
e. Re-impose trade tariffs on all imported goods entering the American market.
f. Free college education.
g. Allow all workers to sign a ballot at any time during a union organizing campaign or at any time that represents their yeah or nay to having a union represent them in collective bargaining or to form a union.
h. Open borders migration. Anyone can travel anywhere to work and live.
i. This was the 14th caveat - These demands will create so many jobs it will be completely impossible to fill them without an open borders policy
2. Debt.
a. Immediate across the board debt forgiveness for all.
b. Debt forgiveness of sovereign debt, commercial loans, home mortgages, home equity loans, credit card debt, student loans and personal loans nowc. All debt must be stricken from the "Books." World Bank Loans to all Nations, Bank to Bank Debt and all Bonds and Margin
d. Call Debt in the stock market including all Derivatives or Credit Default Swaps, all 65 trillion dollars of them must also be stricken from the "Books."
e. And I don't mean debt that is in default, I mean all debt on the entire planet period.
f. Outlaw all credit reporting agencies.
3. Health Care
a. Universal single payer healthcare system.
b. Ban all private insurers must be banned from the healthcare market.
4. Environmental issues.
a. Begin a fast track process to bring the fossil fuel economy to an end while at the same bringing the alternative energy economy up to energy demand.
b. One trillion dollars in ecological restoration planting forests, reestablishing wetlands and the natural flow of river systems and decommissioning of all of America's nuclear power plants.
5. Public works
a. One trillion dollars in infrastructure (Water, Sewer, Rail, Roads and Bridges and Electrical Grid) spending now.
6. Civil Rights
a. Racial and gender equal rights amendment.
7. Bring American elections up to international standards of a paper ballot precinct counted and recounted in front of an independent and party observers system. (I have no idea what this is about. RK)
Clearly they believe that capitalistic prosperity is a problem and they are looking for a ‘solution’ to end it. Well….this is it. The long and the short of this is they are insane. They are demanding that everything be given to them on demand and that all their demands be met without challenge. What will their contribution be to all of these expensive and unattainable and unsustainable demands? They will have to right to make more demands that no one will be allowed to say NO to.

Others of this group insist on a caveat to these demands clearly stating that;
“This is not an official list of demands. This is a forum post submitted by a single user and hyped by irresponsible news/commentary agencies like Fox News and Mises.org. This content was not published by the OccupyWallSt.org collective, nor was it ever proposed or agreed to on a consensus basis with the NYC General Assembly. There is NO official list of demands.”
In other words they really don’t have any idea what they want, and if someone should make statements to the contrary they can claim that anything anyone says is an individual view. Pretty good! That way they can be for and against everything at the same time….maybe…..or then again….maybe not….as the whim should strike them, which can also then be discounted. So that brings us back to; I don’t know what I want but I want it now, and I don’t want to be responsible for anything or pay for those things I want.

I remember when protests of this type were going on in Seattle a few years ago. NPR interviewed a young woman asking with what they would replace this system of international trade. She kept saying; “great minds are working on this”. After repeated questions with this same inane answer the interviewer eventually said, “So you don’t have an solution?” She emphatically stated that “great minds were working on this”.

Wow! Great minds are apparently still working on it. That must be a great gig for unending employment. That is if there is someone who is willing to pay these great minds. And who exactly are these ‘great minds’? And do they have any idea when they will have a working framework for this ‘great minds’ solution?

Since there are only two systems of economics in existence; central planning (socialism) which has been a failure everywhere in the world, and individual responsibility (modern capitalism) which has brought more people out of squalor, misery and suffering than any system in human history, I have to wonder what these “great minds” are working on? Has there actually been a successful socialist system that eventually didn’t self corrupt with mediocrity, sloth, waste, poverty, hunger and tyranny.

That leaves capitalism, and since that is what we already have, what is left out there for these “great minds” to work on? Since we have capitalism (sort of), their only alternative is socialism, or some form of feudalism, which is a crude form of socialism. Guess which one works? So what is there left to think about?

Everyone wants perfection, yet as one person said, “the best we can hope for is the most tolerable imperfection”. A man once noted some years back that, “if you find the perfect organization, join it! But remember, once you have joined it has now become somewhat less than perfect!” I find this to be one of the basic truths. No matter how well intentioned or well organized anything is, eventually corruption will set in simply because people will be people.

Sweden was probably the only socialist system to have a successful posture. Why? The Swedes believe in work! They were a monoculture with an intrinsic work ethic. They have now become a major multicultural country with the problems this brings. What is the number one health problem in Sweden now? Monday! More and more people are calling in sick because they are going to be rewarded whether they go to work or not. So Sweden is now abandoning their previous system of absolute socialism and moving toward capitalism.

Do we have economic injustice in our quasi-capitalist system? Yes, and it is generally caused by government interference. The only economic injustice in a true capitalist system is when someone lies, cheats or steals from others(or damanges their property)for financial gain. And we have laws to punish those who have done so. But we have adopted so much socialist thinking in our economic planning that we have a ton of economic injustice that has been imposed the government.

This goes back to 179o’s when the federal government passed the Whiskey Act. Who supported this bill? The whiskey distillers in the major metropolitan areas! Why? Because it would eliminate competition by preventing backwoods farmers from turning their corn into moonshine and then transporting it into the cities without added unnecessary costs.

Is that an example of economic injustice?

In his book, The Big Ripoff, Timothy P. Carney makes this observation about big business, big government and everyone’s perception about both. “And so it goes that every time a regulation is defeated, its proponents claim a victory for big business and a loss for the little gal. Every time commentators see a big business favoring higher taxes or greater regulation they note it as an oddity. The big myth is alive and well.” One commentator noted that the National Association of Manufacturers, “has broken with its old reputation as a bastion of laissez faire.” In 1993 John Boehner noted that, “the Chamber of Commerce, has refused to be what it had been in the past, a firebrand, principled organization.”

Big business loves higher taxes and more regulations because they are big enough to absorb them without much ado and they can pass the cost along to the customer, and this tactic keeps the competition down. The bigger they are the more they love it.

Is that an example of economic injustice?

Whether it is the sugar industry, airline industry, the tobacco industry, and even WalMart, you will find massive government involvement that enriches these large corporations at the expense of the American public. And I am talking billions and billions of dollars.

Is that an example of economic injustice?

So let me help these poor misguided and foolish people find a goal. End these socialist programs of corporate welfare, and end government involvement in business that has nothing to do with corruption, fraud or theft. Reduce the size of government and regulations by 80% at the federal level. This will seriously reduce the 1.75 trillion dollars regulations cost the consumer. This will automatically end so many unfunded mandates to the states, which will in turn reduce the size of local government. Everything else could be handled by common law. How’s that for a start?

Of course the people they support are demagogues who publically scream about the rich while at the same time they are the worst offenders of the economic injustice of these socialist policies, so I don’t expect to see much justice come out of their efforts. Economic or otherwise!

Of course the goals I have suggested should only be a start. Their ultimate end goal should be to go out and get a job instead of hanging around Wall Street being supported by someone else. Because staying in New York City isn’t cheap.

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