Living in New York, the take over of a small park down in Wall Street, has kept the media happy for over a month. When I say happy, that means, the Occupy Wall Street movement, can be the head lines on a slow news day, or a filler for those 90 second spots, that just need something.
For me, its a very mixed bag of views. The main theme of this month old "sit in" is the same as I have.
Our Financial Market is not working, and we need it to work correctly. But with any protest movement, you will get the extreme groups, mixed in, and the media will focus on the extremist, which has a tendency to obscure the message of the main party or group.
During the civil rights movement, the core idea was to have a equal rights, for minorities that were the same as whites in America. This is not a bad idea, nor was it bad when they said women should have the same rights, and Hispanics, in fact it should be equal across the board. We had fringes, that wanted the Federal government to pay "slavery reparations" or establish a black only state.
We also had the anti Vietnam War movement, stop the war in Vietnam, get out. Some of those people demanded the United States pull our of every where. Give the land back to the Indians ( so they could turn it into a casino???)
The point is, ( hmmm much like religion or forms of government ) you start out with a good message you want heard, and too often it is over taken by the fringe groups, or worse its not taken over by them, but that's what gets focused on. Now to be fair, its not the core groups fault that the focus is shifted. In fact it is a powerful media tool, to focus on the crazier elements, so the 85 percent dumber than a rock population believes that is what every one in the movement wants.
Today the media has to divide its time between social issues, world politics and who is the next couple removed from "Dancing with the Stars" you know the important stuff.
The folks currently reading this blog, probable have only seen "Dancing to make money for the Network" only once or twice, but unfortunately the people who are the target of this blog, know only to well about that show and believe the Occupy Wall Street crowd are a bunch of lazy, commie subversives !!!
( Hey you readers, start pasting my blog next to advertisements for strip clubs, hooters, and all night liquor stores, the election is around the corner and I need readers !!!)
Now in truth, the point at which American industry cared about the people, was pretty short lived. I think between 1948 and 1970 and that was only because they could focus on destroying the lives of people outside the U.S while making money here.
Occupy Wall Street, if I understand their message, is not some radical ( excuse me for this ) hippy movement, it only wants the economic power in the United States to be fair. Pay their fair amount of taxes, distribute the wealth, and take a smaller profit in order to put Americans back to work.
Oh I know several readers who understand economics, can jump on this statement. But what is better for a society? Remember the only reason for a company is to provide a good or service for a society.
60,000 years ago when Arg, was napping flint, making spear heads the only reason to do this was so the group could hunt. Maybe Arg.....traded with the tribe two valley's over and got those nifty red sea shells, you know, the ones Mabel likes so much and her birthday is coming up, so I'll trade an elk fur with Arg for the shells and..... sorry I digress. But you get the idea. Well if Arg wanted to be a lone caveman sorry caveperson, yes he could. But if he wanted the benefit of the a society, he needed to do right by that society. Including, not over charging on his flint spear points.
GM was good for the country, for maybe 10 minutes. OK that's a sarcastic view, but General Motors lost its way. Its function in society was/is to make transportation vehicles. It was not meant to be a loan company, a pizza franchise, it makes cars and trucks, and tanks. You get the picture. And it receives compensation ( money) for that product.
I believe the majority of the people in Wall Street, and San Francisco, and Madrid , are saying , "You can make your profit, but remember us" The level of a profit is more an ethical question than legal. But if a society has no room for ethics, in its existence, than that society has truly regressed. Face it, we are not all created equal. And 60, 000 years ago, if Kurt wanted that new spear head, he could knock the snot out of Arg, take the spear head for free. Kurt was the strongest guy in the tribe. He could take the spear head, the red sea shells and Mabel. We have decided as a society, that this system of economics, is NOT what this society wants. Grog is not allowed to go into a show room, beat up the sales person and drive off with new car. We have made a conscouse decision, how to operate our society.
Having said that, the folks protesting are trying to tell the world industries, and in our case United States industry, " You have moved outside the ethic boundaries, you are no longer operating in what is an acceptable level of morality.... you don't pay a fair level of taxes to this society, you don't put a fair number of our citizens to work, and you only care about money, not about the people or product."
Legally?? Not a leg to stand on, but morally, whats wrong with what they are saying. My problem is to have a message. They need to articulate, to explain to everyone, even the 85 percenters..." We are not anti American, in fact we are very much pro American, we want the companies selling stocks to become pro American again. We want them to care as much about the United States as we do"
Lets say, that just because Caterpillar can make more money investing profits in Goldman Sacks than it can by investing back in Caterpillar, doesn't mean it should. Legally Caterpillar can invest how it wants, ethically it makes heavy equipment. It will still make a profit. Middle America is asking them to still make a profit, but not at the expense of our society. Hire back the Americans, be fair, pay your taxes.
That is what Occupy Wall Street needs to make clear as its message. " We are for America, Industry should be too!)
For me, its a very mixed bag of views. The main theme of this month old "sit in" is the same as I have.
Our Financial Market is not working, and we need it to work correctly. But with any protest movement, you will get the extreme groups, mixed in, and the media will focus on the extremist, which has a tendency to obscure the message of the main party or group.
During the civil rights movement, the core idea was to have a equal rights, for minorities that were the same as whites in America. This is not a bad idea, nor was it bad when they said women should have the same rights, and Hispanics, in fact it should be equal across the board. We had fringes, that wanted the Federal government to pay "slavery reparations" or establish a black only state.
We also had the anti Vietnam War movement, stop the war in Vietnam, get out. Some of those people demanded the United States pull our of every where. Give the land back to the Indians ( so they could turn it into a casino???)
The point is, ( hmmm much like religion or forms of government ) you start out with a good message you want heard, and too often it is over taken by the fringe groups, or worse its not taken over by them, but that's what gets focused on. Now to be fair, its not the core groups fault that the focus is shifted. In fact it is a powerful media tool, to focus on the crazier elements, so the 85 percent dumber than a rock population believes that is what every one in the movement wants.
Today the media has to divide its time between social issues, world politics and who is the next couple removed from "Dancing with the Stars" you know the important stuff.
The folks currently reading this blog, probable have only seen "Dancing to make money for the Network" only once or twice, but unfortunately the people who are the target of this blog, know only to well about that show and believe the Occupy Wall Street crowd are a bunch of lazy, commie subversives !!!
( Hey you readers, start pasting my blog next to advertisements for strip clubs, hooters, and all night liquor stores, the election is around the corner and I need readers !!!)
Now in truth, the point at which American industry cared about the people, was pretty short lived. I think between 1948 and 1970 and that was only because they could focus on destroying the lives of people outside the U.S while making money here.
Occupy Wall Street, if I understand their message, is not some radical ( excuse me for this ) hippy movement, it only wants the economic power in the United States to be fair. Pay their fair amount of taxes, distribute the wealth, and take a smaller profit in order to put Americans back to work.
Oh I know several readers who understand economics, can jump on this statement. But what is better for a society? Remember the only reason for a company is to provide a good or service for a society.
60,000 years ago when Arg, was napping flint, making spear heads the only reason to do this was so the group could hunt. Maybe Arg.....traded with the tribe two valley's over and got those nifty red sea shells, you know, the ones Mabel likes so much and her birthday is coming up, so I'll trade an elk fur with Arg for the shells and..... sorry I digress. But you get the idea. Well if Arg wanted to be a lone caveman sorry caveperson, yes he could. But if he wanted the benefit of the a society, he needed to do right by that society. Including, not over charging on his flint spear points.
GM was good for the country, for maybe 10 minutes. OK that's a sarcastic view, but General Motors lost its way. Its function in society was/is to make transportation vehicles. It was not meant to be a loan company, a pizza franchise, it makes cars and trucks, and tanks. You get the picture. And it receives compensation ( money) for that product.
I believe the majority of the people in Wall Street, and San Francisco, and Madrid , are saying , "You can make your profit, but remember us" The level of a profit is more an ethical question than legal. But if a society has no room for ethics, in its existence, than that society has truly regressed. Face it, we are not all created equal. And 60, 000 years ago, if Kurt wanted that new spear head, he could knock the snot out of Arg, take the spear head for free. Kurt was the strongest guy in the tribe. He could take the spear head, the red sea shells and Mabel. We have decided as a society, that this system of economics, is NOT what this society wants. Grog is not allowed to go into a show room, beat up the sales person and drive off with new car. We have made a conscouse decision, how to operate our society.
Having said that, the folks protesting are trying to tell the world industries, and in our case United States industry, " You have moved outside the ethic boundaries, you are no longer operating in what is an acceptable level of morality.... you don't pay a fair level of taxes to this society, you don't put a fair number of our citizens to work, and you only care about money, not about the people or product."
Legally?? Not a leg to stand on, but morally, whats wrong with what they are saying. My problem is to have a message. They need to articulate, to explain to everyone, even the 85 percenters..." We are not anti American, in fact we are very much pro American, we want the companies selling stocks to become pro American again. We want them to care as much about the United States as we do"
Lets say, that just because Caterpillar can make more money investing profits in Goldman Sacks than it can by investing back in Caterpillar, doesn't mean it should. Legally Caterpillar can invest how it wants, ethically it makes heavy equipment. It will still make a profit. Middle America is asking them to still make a profit, but not at the expense of our society. Hire back the Americans, be fair, pay your taxes.
That is what Occupy Wall Street needs to make clear as its message. " We are for America, Industry should be too!)
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