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Occupy Wall Street


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God. I f'ing love Calvin and Hobbes. I read all of their comics growing up because I thought they were hilarious and identified with Calvin really well. Reading them nowadays makes me realize how clever Bill Watterson really is.

I have all of his books stashed away somewhere. Seeing this today makes me want to dust them off.

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Good example of the sort of thing the OWS movement is so upset about:

http://www.thedailys...1/ellen-schultz

That's sickening, yet somehow unsurprising. The world might really be a better place if all the corp execs were rounded up and hung from the nearest lightpoles.

 

This happens from time to time. Czar Nicholas, James II, Louis XIV, Shah Pahlavi, even recently with the so-called Arab Spring. It so happens that power begets power, and believes in power, and forgets ultimately that the masses are the real power.

 

All that money Louis XIV played with couldn't save his neck. Didn't stop Nicholas from being executed, didn't stop the Shah from being deposed, didn't help Hosni Mubarek, and it won't help anyone else if the masses decide to throw over the status quo and start over.

 

I'm not predicting a revolution, and I don't think torch-wielding mobs are about to descend on Fifth Avenue, but the growing disparity in America is not a healthy thing. It's not healthy for the increasingly pinched Middle Class, and it's not healthy for the Upper Class, who are not safe from a radical rearrangement of the system.

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One's opinions of the two groups provides an immediate litmus test as to their larger political views, and you can tell a lot from the OP's initial post. I just like sitting back and watching the hypocrisy. Here we have two groups doing pretty much the same thing with a few differences and you have liberal media sources coddling the Wall-Streeters and condemning the Tea Party and Fox doing the opposite. I guess consistency has been tossed out the window for good.

 

Have you actually paid attention to the tea party? Have you seen how they act? Listened to the things they say? Watched any Republican debates lately? The bullsh#t they've been pulling in Congress? They've been a rather destructive force.

 

Get back to me when the crazy level of the movement gets anywhere near teaparty territory.

 

 

And also explain how it's useful as a litmus test when the majority support the movement.

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One's opinions of the two groups provides an immediate litmus test as to their larger political views, and you can tell a lot from the OP's initial post. I just like sitting back and watching the hypocrisy. Here we have two groups doing pretty much the same thing with a few differences and you have liberal media sources coddling the Wall-Streeters and condemning the Tea Party and Fox doing the opposite. I guess consistency has been tossed out the window for good.

 

Have you actually paid attention to the tea party? Have you seen how they act? Listened to the things they say? Watched any Republican debates lately? The bullsh#t they've been pulling in Congress? They've been a rather destructive force.

 

Get back to me when the crazy level of the movement gets anywhere near teaparty territory.

 

 

And also explain how it's useful as a litmus test when the majority support the movement.

 

You're being played. Keep fighting the good fight.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1011/66412.html

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Corporate America has been profiting from the disparity they help create.

 

The federal government - under both parties - has done little to discourage their biggest donors.

 

The TV pundits insist that you support one and vilify the other. But it's always been a package deal.

 

And if anyone is being played, it's the folks buying the line that Corporate America are the sancrosect "jobs providers" who need even more tax cuts and deregulation, or they'll fold up shop. Corporate America buys media semantics experts like Frank Lutz to craft these insanely counter-intuitive messages and Fox News and the blogosphere repeat them enough that people start to believe it. Funny story.....the people who believe it are often those most likely to suffer from it.

 

Or we could blame the Teachers Union for the worldwide credit crisis.

 

Your call.

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the people who believe it are often those most likely to suffer from it.

 

This has to be the single most baffling thing for me in this whole job creator/class warfare BS that's being floated around. The Republican base aren't typically rich, they're pretty much regular joes like me. Why they buy this line of thinking is beyond me. But they do.

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I think the answer is obvious and a little depressing.

 

 

the people who believe it are often those most likely to suffer from it.

 

This has to be the single most baffling thing for me in this whole job creator/class warfare BS that's being floated around. The Republican base aren't typically rich, they're pretty much regular joes like me. Why they buy this line of thinking is beyond me. But they do.

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I think it's pretty simple and I'm sure I'll get picked apart. We have lost manufacturing in America.

 

Is there more in depth analysis...absolutely, but it all starts there. There are a ton of solid reason why and they range from Unions, corporate profits, people wanting to spend $1 less at Walmart, government regulations, unfree trade to the entitlement building in the american culture. I could go on and on.

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I think it's pretty simple and I'm sure I'll get picked apart. We have lost manufacturing in America.

 

Is there more in depth analysis...absolutely, but it all starts there. There are a ton of solid reason why and they range from Unions, corporate profits, people wanting to spend $1 less at Walmart, government regulations, unfree trade to the entitlement building in the american culture. I could go on and on.

I don't know why you would get picked apart for any of that. Its all pretty obvious. Though, I would say that Greed is the largest driving force behind all of the economic problems.

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I think there could be a genuinely unifying movement to start making things in America again.

 

It's a big part of the problem and should not fall along party or ideological lines.

 

I do as well, but 'Joe America' is going to have to drive it. It has only been recently, the past couple of years, that I have started bypassing Chinese goods whenever I have a chance.

 

I still think a lot of people are oblivious to what is really going on in our economy. I will provide a small 'real world' example.

 

I worked for a small parts distributor that mostly dealt in recreational equipment. This was a sole proprietor business that had 5 total employees. Nearly all the products that we sold were American made. We had a gentleman approach us in the early 2000's that had a buddy that was an importer from China. He was based on the east coast. The guy actually came to Nebraska and looked at our inventory. He took some of our bigger selling products with him. In about six months, we were buying the same products from China that we use to get in the states. They were exact copies.

 

I think about one product in particular. We went from being just another distributor of a product that was made in California to the the exclusive US distributor of this product (Made in China) that cost 25% less than anyone out there. At the time I thought it was brilliant. Look at all the money that is to be made this way.

 

I really don't know the specifics of the company in California that we use to purchase this product from. I would assume they employed 10-15 Americans with benefits to produce the product that our industry demanded. I could only assume that there are no longer 10-15 people producing those products anymore. Instead of the revenue generated by that product going to the distributor, manufacturer and the manufacturing employees, it only goes to the distributor. Oh yeah...and China.

 

Multiply this scenario hundreds or thousands of times. Go to ebay and look for auto parts or household goods. It's all junk an we eat it up. There is no such thing a free trade. Thousands of people with a short term perspective have sold our country out. We need to slap a huge tariff on Chinese(or whatever other third world country) goods. The usual response is...oh, well they will call our debt. So what is my response to that.

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Can't disagree with that. The problem is that companies can pay a Chinese worker 75 cents an hour where they would have to pay a US worker $8 an hour. If you are looking at it from a pure profit perspective (which I thought you would be doing) it is a no-brainer.

 

I think it's pretty simple and I'm sure I'll get picked apart. We have lost manufacturing in America.

 

Is there more in depth analysis...absolutely, but it all starts there. There are a ton of solid reason why and they range from Unions, corporate profits, people wanting to spend $1 less at Walmart, government regulations, unfree trade to the entitlement building in the american culture. I could go on and on.

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