-By Frank Salvato
“Greedy: Excessively or inordinately desirous of wealth, profit, etc.; avaricious.”
– Dictionary.com
By now, no doubt, you have heard about the “incredible” Occupy Wall Street Movement taking place on and around Wall Street; a movement whose organizers claim is “organic” and spreading across the globe, not unlike the so-called “Arab Spring.”
There are a few problems with this claim, however. First, the movement is anything but “organic.” And second, for the most part, the “Arab Spring” has facilitated the rise of radical Islamist factions to the courts of power. Incredible indeed.
The “movement” is incredible for many reasons; incredible in that what we are being asked to believe the impossible or very difficult to believe, via the reporting in the mainstream media and declarations issued from the movement’s organizers. Interviews with a credible sampling of those in attendance prove that many participants don’t even know why they are there but for it being “the place to be” for the terminally and youthfully disgruntled.
But a closer examination of who is in attendance, who is stepping up to the proverbial microphone and what “the movement” is issuing as a set of “demands,” makes the studied eye suspicious that this may, in fact, be the mother of all political “astroturfing” initiatives, just in time to demonize the job creators as “greedy” in the run up to an election where the incumbent – Barack Obama – hasn’t an accomplishment to run on.
Perhaps the biggest “red flag” (no pun intended) came in the form of statements made by left-wing Progressive agitator, self-avowed Communist and former Obama Administration official Van Jones. Jones is currently the lead rabble-rouser of the “American Dream Movement,” a radically left-wing political activist organization run by the Progressive group MoveOn.org Civic Action, in partnership with a number of other Leftist and Liberal groups ranging from the Hip Hop Caucus to Planned Parenthood.
CNS News’ Matt Cover reports:
“Jones linked his American Dream movement to the left-wing Occupy Wall Street protests in New York, saying that both efforts were part of the same grassroots movement.
“‘There are two incredible expressions right now – and there may be more later – of frustration and pain and hope for this country,’ Jones said after the rally in speaking with reporters. ‘There’s the occupy movement, which we love and respect, there’s the American Dream movement – and keep your eyes open [because] there’s going to be a flowering of movements in this country to take back the American dream.’”
Jones went on to say:
“The American Dream movement is only nine weeks old…We are already massively bigger than the TEA Party was when it was nine weeks old…Yesterday’s story was the TEA Party. Today’s story is the American Dream movement. We are what’s next…”
Then there is the list of “demands” made by the Occupy Wall Street Movement:
- Restoration of the living wage.
- Institute a universal single payer healthcare system.
- Guaranteed living wage income regardless of employment.
- Free college education.
- Begin a fast track process to bring the fossil fuel economy to an end.
- One trillion dollars in infrastructure spending, now.
- One trillion dollars in ecological restoration.
- The decommissioning of all of America’s nuclear power plants.
- Racial and gender equal rights amendments.
- Open borders migration.
- Bring American elections up to international standards.
- Immediate across the board debt forgiveness for all.
- Outlaw all credit reporting agencies.
- Allow all workers access to unionization and collective bargaining at any time.
These “demands” look more like elements of the Communist Manifesto than a laundry list of unreasonable demands presented by activist university students and Progressive community organizers.
These “demands” are so incredibly inane and egregious that it almost defies any reasonable effort to critique them, and that is aside from the asinine idea of borrowing two trillion dollars in special interest spending from either Communist China or Islamist-friendly Saudi Arabia to satisfy just two of these ill-thought out “demands.”
I wonder if anyone has asked the rank-and-file Occupiers (ironic that they would use a descriptor that they themselves use to demonize Israel) just where the money would come from if, in fact, a “guaranteed living wage income, regardless of employment” were to come into existence. Who would work? Who would feel the need to have to? This notion is almost directly out of the policy that established the Soviet Union, yet Progressives say they aren’t Marxist in their philosophy.
Then there is the idea of “immediate, across the board, debt forgiveness for all.” The idea of “the collective” is strong with these young ones. We can thank the indoctrination mills we call universities for that; for teaching our children what to think instead of how to think; for failing to teach students critical thinking skills.
Pray tell, if everything that is owed to those who issue paychecks is made to be “forgiven,” with what capital will the paycheck issuers pay the “guaranteed living wage income, regardless of employment”?
But perhaps the most infuriating “demand” comes in the form of this: Bring American elections up to international standards. The United States – but for the manipulation of ballots and the voting process by opportunistic and nefarious elements, such as ACORN, MoveOn.org and any number of Progressive community organizing groups; and aside from the Holder Justice Department’s enactment of “social justice” measures to overlook voter intimidation laws – is the most equitable election process in the world. To look to the Third-World-friendly United Nations elections verification process – a process that validated the elections of Hugo Chavez, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Vladimir Putin, as well as Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon – is to enlist a lecher to chaperone a beauty pageant. The notion is absurd.
An honest man examines those involved with the “Occupy Wall Street” and “American Dream” Movements, along with the demands being made, only to identify the initiatives as emanating from far-Left activists more aligned with Marxism; with Democratic Socialism; with Soviet Era Collectivism; with the very dangerous and elitist Progressive Movement, than with American and Western-style Capitalism. Capitalism: one of the founding principles used to establish our nation and the great American experiment.
That understood, I do believe that Wall Street has some answering to do. So many questionable financial vehicles have been created to achieve monetary wealth; vehicles that have nothing to do with a company’s ability to produce or a product, that an honest “soul searching” is called for among the more laissez faire capitalists, among whom are counted George Soros, godfather and benefactor to the Progressive and anti-Capitalist movements.
In the end, it all boils down to the definition of “greedy” and the application of that word.
If someone works hard to acquire capital he cannot be thought of as greedy. If someone risks his or her capital on an investment, knowing full well he or she could lose that capital, the rewards of a successful investment cannot be misconstrued as greedy. Equally so, if someone takes their capital and creates a product that is insanely popular, the return on that risk cannot be labeled as greedy.
But those who demand that government take from the earners, the investors, the financial risk takers, the entrepreneurs, and the inventors, only to redistribute that wealth – that earned and rewarded wealth – to “the masses” so that they can be “guaranteed a living wage income, regardless of employment”? My friends, they are the greedy ones…and after three weeks they don’t smell very good either.
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Frank Salvato is the managing editor for The New Media Journal . He serves at the Executive Director of the Basics Project, a non-profit, non-partisan, 501(C)(3) research and education initiative. His pieces are regularly featured in over 100 publications both nationally and internationally. He has appeared on The O’Reilly Factor, and is a regular guest on The Right Balance with Greg Allen on the Accent Radio Network, as well as an occasional guest on numerous radio shows coast to coast. He recently partnered in producing the first-ever symposium on the threat of radical Islamist terrorism in Washington, DC. His pieces have been recognized by the House International Relations Committee and the Japan Center for Conflict. He can be contacted at oped@newmediajournal.us