Occupy movement - I'm in the 100%

[Royd]

I have WHAT in my yard? :

ROYD

http://oathkeepers.org/oath/2009/03/03/declaration-of-orders-we-will-not-obey/

See order number ten and recognize the problem they face and what they are doing about it. This is so much more than hippies and college kids with a sense of entitlement.

Thanks, and I agree with every single item in that declaration. It is embraced solidly by the Tea Party. Smaller govt. and less govt. intrusion in our private lives. The OWS crowd seem to be lashing out at the corporate world, not realizing that the govt. has given a wink and a nod for them to run roughshod over the common man. The problem is Washington, not Wall St.

So, the question is, why didn't the OWS crowd, just embrace the Tea Party? Was it the old meme, never trust anyone over thirty. Remember that one?
Or is it because they really want something completely different than freedom from the heavy hand of government...Remember, most of these people have been raised in the public/government schools, and their minds have been warped to believe that government is good and more recently that it is the arbittor of all things good....Proof. Government jobs pay $70,000 + a year and private sector is lucky to get $30,000. That is no coincidence.
99 weeks of unemployment. Talk about buying votes.

Basically the Oathkeeper's Declaration is about shutting down the power of the police state, which, then, takes away the strongarm of the government. Short and simple.

The 99% declaration is a myriad of poorly thought out ideas, coming from the entitlement mindset.

As for #10, in the Oathkeepers, the key words are Peaceful assembly.....The OWS crowd is a churning cauldron of fomented anger, just waiting to explode, and to be exploited by our current politicians who sit in the seat of power. Sadly, our current president has given a wink and a nod at the situation, just looking for an opportunity to enact martial law.​

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

The movement needs to address one of their failings which is the lack of leadership. They are - with all best intentions - attempting to have "democracy" But democracy is mob rule which is why the U.S. does not have one. We have a republic which we are losing.

Those of you in Occupy need to regroup. Choose people like Bill Black and even (deep breath) Dylan Ratigan and others to help you. Otherwise this is going to go all to *** and soon.

Oathkeepers and others of their like will be coming out to "defend" you and they will take over. If the only tool you have is a hammer the world looks like a nail.

This thing is moving forward - one way or another. If you don't like the direction it is taking you need to get out there and steer.

Those of you who are pushing for less government need to step back for a moment and think it through. If you remove the government right now in the face of what is a very real fascist take over you will lose the ability to reclaim smaller sensible government. This needs to be done in steps and phases otherwise you lose. If you weaken the government now you will get free range international corporations beholden to no one and state entities will not be able to stand against them alone - why do you think the founding father's banded together in the first place?!?!

Regain the rule of laws that apply to everyone. Then you can begin regaining better control over the government. Because the laws will apply to them too.

 

[Royd]

Quote:
If you aren't proud to be labeled, maybe you shouldn't stand under the banner. I am glad to be associated with the Tea Party. We come, we talk, we pick up our trash, we go home and elect supporting legislators.

 

[Royd]

I have WHAT in my yard? :

The movement needs to address one of their failings which is the lack of leadership. They are - with all best intentions - attempting to have "democracy" But democracy is mob rule which is why the U.S. does not have one. We have a republic which we are losing.

Those of you in Occupy need to regroup. Choose people like Bill Black and even (deep breath) Dylan Ratigan and others to help you. Otherwise this is going to go all to *** and soon.

Oathkeepers and others of their like will be coming out to "defend" you and they will take over. If the only tool you have is a hammer the world looks like a nail.

This thing is moving forward - one way or another. If you don't like the direction it is taking you need to get out there and steer.

Those of you who are pushing for less government need to step back for a moment and think it through. If you remove the government right now in the face of what is a very real fascist take over you will lose the ability to reclaim smaller sensible government. This needs to be done in steps and phases otherwise you lose. If you weaken the government now you will get free range international corporations beholden to no one and state entities will not be able to stand against them alone - why do you think the founding father's banded together in the first place?!?!

Regain the rule of laws that apply to everyone. Then you can begin regaining better control over the government. Because the laws will apply to them too.

When you have legislators passing 2500 page bills, who's intention it is, to get into everyone's private life and back pocket, but only reveal the nuances of the bill, a little at a time, that is where the problem lies. How about a taxcode that could make any citizen a criminal, along with the loss of freedom and assets, at any given moment, if your name got redflagged?

How is it, that when bad legislation is enacted, we are just supposed to act like that's just the way things always were, and God forbid, we should disturb a system, just because it's in place, even though it's totally disfunctional.

Many of the high paying government jobs are nothing but beauraucrats passing paper back and forth.

Getting a permit to do anything, shouldn't require 10 agencies and a 100 people...One person with a solid set of rules...It's a go or it's a no go. The problem with today's system is that sooner or later, palms get greased, and sadly, that is the purpose of it.

If the nation were a heart patient, your solution is to give them blood thinners and a wait and see attitude, when, in reality, they need a quadruple bypass, today. It's going to hurt for a while, but in the end, things will be far better.​

 

[chickened]

Were the people you mentioned that were unable to find jobs dressed in drudge , multiple body piercings or some other college age appearance fad that employers dislike? Not to lump all kids together but employment comes easier to a clean cut nice looking person over some as I described or worse.
Quote:

 

[FourPawz]

I have WHAT in my yard? :

Those of you who are pushing for less government need to step back for a moment and think it through. If you remove the government right now in the face of what is a very real fascist take over you will lose the ability to reclaim smaller sensible government. This needs to be done in steps and phases otherwise you lose. If you weaken the government now you will get free range international corporations beholden to no one and state entities will not be able to stand against them alone - why do you think the founding father's banded together in the first place?!?!

Regain the rule of laws that apply to everyone. Then you can begin regaining better control over the government. Because the laws will apply to them too.

IHW, I've been reading this thread and your quote above has me confused. Here is the definition of "Facism":

"a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism."

Now, if the definition above is correct, can we not assume that a system of limited government, such as that which the founders of this country envisioned, would have a far greater chance of eliminating any fascist elements of this society?

We have a recent history of governmental takeover of business. The interference in the banking system, General Motors and in the Chrysler corporation are the most glaring examples. General Electric, a multi-billion dollar corporation, pays zero taxes while supplying huge sums of money to political interests.

We have got to limit governmental interference in independent business. To do so, we must limit the size and the reach of government in our society.​

 

[punk-a-doodle]

Were the people you mentioned that were unable to find jobs dressed in drudge , multiple body piercings or some other college age appearance fad that employers dislike? Not to lump all kids together but un-employment comes easier to a clean cut nice looking person over some as I described or worse.

Thank you for not lumping all of the younger generations together. However, every single one of the people I specifically mentioned are clean cut and dress as what I can only call 'neutrally'. The people specifically mentioned, with the exception of my husband, all have traditional caucasian names regarded as 'American'. For my husband and I, 'neutral' is our prefered style of clothing, as neither of us enjoy having attention drawn to us. Unfortunately, we appear to look so non-threatening and 'part of the crowd', that we constantly had people in England asking us for directions and assuming we were local until we spoke. XD I have been dressed more nicely than the people interviewing me on more than one occasion.

Thankfully, the job I now work in has fair-minded and hard working managers, who do not discriminate based upon incorrect assumptions about the way people look, so we have a wide variety of worker appearances. I have found I can expect this environment more on more liberal campuses. The racial divides are still painfully obvious, regardless of education level.

If you aren't proud to be labeled, maybe you shouldn't stand under the banner. I am glad to be associated with the Tea Party. We come, we talk, we pick up our trash, we go home and elect supporting legislators.

What banner would that be? College grad? Why should I be happy with any sort of unfounded and overly generalized label placed upon any group, whether I belong to them or not? That said, the Oakland deal may very well have me standing under that banner. It certainly, er, piqued my attention about the group, though probably not in the way intended.​

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

I am glad you asked this question because labels are almost always the problem. They impede conversation. I should not have used that one although it is accurate. What has happened is that the government is being run as a sock puppet by various corporate leaders. If what you are looking for is personal freedom and communal responsibility - and by that I mean we have laws that we must all obey that are designed primarily to allow each of us maximum personal freedom then both sides of our national argument are losing. What has happened is a wrapping of nationalism and militaristic action, focused hatred toward vaguely defined enemies, the removal of the ability to debate because questioning the government is unpatriotic, while the parts of the government that can actually produce economic wealth are all privatized so that national issues become private sources of wealth.

People here hate those who collect welfare. They get so little over time that it is ridiculous - pay attention to the fact that several big banks make enormous sums of money off of welfare and unemployment. We privatized the administration of these programs and allowed these banks to charge welfare recipients for using their cards. Unemployed people MUST get bank accounts and then they lose part of each and every time they try to use their unemployment benefits to purchase things.

It has taken years for us to get to the point where the president is a puppet to the corporate leaders. Look at the economic advisors that have advised the presidents. Regardless of party the people have been a revolving door of cronies for the last three decades. The take over started under Reagan and really got traction under Clinton. Like now, we are drawing down troops in Iraq - who is taking their place? Who is profiting? You cannot privatize everything, the profit motive doe not translate well to every relationship.

There are specific laws that need to be upheld to help us get it back under control. The first is the anti-trust laws. Too big to fail is too big to exist. The second is fraud laws. These laws are already on the books and need to be applied. The 3rd is an immediate reinstatement of Glass Segall. Then Citizens United needs to be overturned by congress. Corporations are not people. Then we start going after our politicians as sock puppets. Too many of those elected were sock puppets of corporations and as such will enact only those laws that are good for the multinationals, not those that are good even for national or better still mid size businesses.

Over the last 100 years every country that has had anything that looks like a revolution has ended up MUCH WORSE OFF after. They almost always fall to dictatorship or military rule. While I empathize with the desire to throw the whole thing out in an attempt to start over, facts are facts. What our founding fathers came up with is the best thing in history, we need to get it back and that does not mean by dismantling the federal aspect right off the top. It means restoring the balance of power between the three branches by getting corporate interests out.

If you remove the government now you will get some strong arm corporate sock puppet backed by nationalistic mislead armed forces. We are dang close to that right now. Obama is a goldman sachs sock puppet and the right wants to replace him with a Koch brothers sock puppet. Same diff, in my mind. We need something new.

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

FourPawz

We have a recent history of governmental takeover of business. The interference in the banking system, General Motors and in the Chrysler corporation are the most glaring examples. General Electric, a multi-billion dollar corporation, pays zero taxes while supplying huge sums of money to political interests.

To specifically address this I would say that I reframe these. This was by far not the government taking over these businesses so much as it was these businesses using the government to scrape off their bad debt and to socialize their losses to you and me while retaining their profits for themselves. The government didn't take over these businesses, it got taken by them.



Believe me when I say I am NOT anti-business! I am anti multinational corporations who are so far reaching they are not beholden to any government whatsoever in any country. They have no loyalty to anything other than quarterly profit reports. They are not even loyal to shareholders which are now usually individuals pensions and retirement plans as oppose to people who ca afford to lose what is invested.​

 

[flyingtnh]

Completely (well, partially) off-topic, but up here in NH I'm realizing as I counsel kids that there are actually many good-paying jobs out there for new college grads (starting salaries $70-80k fresh out of school). However, a majority of them are for graduates with tech degrees: EE, CE, ME, Comp Eng, Math, etc. In fact, as I talk to some of the people in those companies who are hiring, they are having a hard time filling some of those jobs. Another good hunk of jobs available for other specialties: finance, accounting, nursing, biotech.

Jobs normally available to traditional lib arts degree grads are very hard to come by, tend to pay less, and lots of the more entry-level jobs have folks w/grad degrees and years of experience applying for them.

Meanwhile, most universities/colleges in the area (and I'll bet nationwide) are turning out ~80% of their grads with non-tech degrees.

Still, there is no dearth of those willing to spend $100-200K or more (whether it's their money, mom and dad's, loans, grants, scholarships, or whatever) to be one of those standing in line for unemployment. Part of that is due to the fact that nobody is telling Johhny and Janie the straight-up facts on what their prospects are.

We need English, Poli Sci, History, and Music History majors for sure, but we don't need the glut we're getting.