Forum Post: tea party, ows & common ground
Posted 12 years ago on Oct. 13, 2011, 3:41 p.m. EST by Chaotic
(35)
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What I don't understand is why the tea partiers are so down on ows? I am a small business owner, I identify with a lot of what the tea party is about:
from http://www.teapartypatriots.org/Mission.aspx Core Values •Fiscal Responsibility •Constitutionally Limited Government •Free Markets
How is that different from what I understand about OWS? Fiscal responsibility is a no brainer, but it has to apply to EVERYONE, even the ones at the top.
limited government is also a no brainer, but that doesn't mean the guys at the top can just do what they want, we ALL should play by the same rules/laws
free markets could be a bit of a sticking point, but I dont think the tea party really believes huge corps should have no checks or accountability.
There is common ground here! Could you imagine the reaction from DC if Tea Partiers and OWS came together?
They get their information from Fox News. When they come to understand what this really is, I think they will find a place at the table.
"Could you imagine the reaction from DC if Tea Partiers and OWS came together?"
I think the DC reaction would pale in comparison to the reaction from mainstream media. They've struggled so hard to put the Tea Partiers in one box and OWS in the other box -- it would be amazing to see them try to spin a narrative around the two groups coming together. OWS' best hope is to be too open, inclusive, and complex to be dismissed with a sound bite.
I think that if OWS wants to truly represent the 99% with their goals and get everyone behind them, then the leaders (whoever they might be) need to reach out and contact some local Tea Party leaders. They need to ask for help in forming some bi-partisan goals so that it's truly bi-partisan and everyone can agree to get behind it.
This is where it gets complicated...
http://occupywallst.org/forum/flat-tax-fair-tax-and-9-9-9-oh-my/
NOTE - Both Buffett AND Cain are not to be trusted.
Oh! And remember that most of the uber rich make most of their income from capital gains and dividends -
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/19/140599307/does-buffett-rule-add-up-for-obama-deficit-plan
Also - The NPR article is a bit misleading. 50% is still very regressive compared to the post-War era. (where it was 90%)
http://occupywallst.org/forum/the-flat-tax-is-unfair/#comment-70544
http://ntu.org/tax-basics/history-of-federal-individual-1.html
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/publicroads/96summer/p96su10.cfm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_landing
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,155487,00.html
So let's see...back when taxes were "high" we had a moon landing, the creation of the highway system and the microprocessor for three things. Therefore it did -not- kill investment.
Also - you'll see the most regressive tax area to be somewhere around the late Coolidge and the early Hoover era. (Even more regressive than we are right now by around 10%)
I think you know where I am going here.
Meet The Great Depression
http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/depression/depression.htm
There is just no excuse. The 1% have no excuse at all.
What -most- of us seem to agree on is to end corrupt shit like revolving door, kickbacks, bailouts, cronyist subsidies, etc.
What I don't understand is why the TEA Party is being demonized by the OWS crowd at every opportunity. If you give the slightest hint of being right of center you get blasted ans being a Republican or Tea Party member and are then told to go away. Perhaps that accounts for a lot of the criticism coming from the TEA Party.
I have been trying to make constructive comments, build common ground and consensus, but am slammed at every turn because I'm not a liberal/progressive. It takes two to tango, as they say.
Exactly, it takes two. You can't just get in the forums and tell everyone they're ignorant and don't understand economics and are wrong and need to stop smoking weed, etc. etc. etc., which is exactly what I'm seeing. You need to accept that you may also be wrong and be willing to listen to people about why they disagree with what you're saying.
And yes, I've read some of your comments. I'm not sure that were as constructive as you think they are.
I'm happy to engage with tea partiers in a civil way and I think a lot of other OWS folks are too, but that doesn't mean we stop believing what we believe and start believing everything you say. You have to actually make your case (as do the socialists and communists and anarchists etc.).
It would be epic. No money in politics. It isn't a left right issue, its about democracy
Chaotic wrote: What I don't understand is why the tea partiers are so down on ows?END-----
They are a product of social engineering of the nwo, designed to fail and to attack other movements with "anti-patriot" rhetoric. Their leadership originally taught the attitude used to perceive OWS, and approves of all efforts to do what you describe. I've found a method withn what OWS is trying to do to challenge the tea party. The tea party will converge with OWS or fail in hypocisy. The assumes OWS can understand as a mass of people with no leadership and a forum deluged with agents of "cognitive infiltration", http://politics.salon.com/2010/01/15/sunstein_2/ that Article V of the US constitution is the ONLY authority the changes they articulate can be legally be done with.------
1) Movement consolidates demand for Article V. 2)Citizens supporters in states create ballot intiatives or demonstate in demand at state offices and capitals to get legislators to apply to congress for an Article V. 3) Congress begins to convene delegates. Guarding the citizens voice, and ability to share then form quality opinion, with some uniformity to be tested, only the First Amendment is accepted for revision by the public because the movement has warned them away from all but the 1st amendment and elections. 4)While this is happening an interim proposal for amendment is made regarding election systems to assure that the vote will be properly taken and counted. 5) Citizens decry any accelerated amendments which may be in corporate interests, nwo interests, etc. BEFORE the First Amendment is revised giving national mass media to activist interests that can show their proposals for information meet the criteria for public support on national level. Paint them as corporate attempts to do again what they already did with 50 years of extremely manipulative, deceptive and exploitive media dividing and disabling Americans from unifying in support of the constitution. 6) Ratification elections in states take place and AFTER Article V is used to make certain that speech needed for survival is shared and understood, http://algoxy.com/poly/meaning_of_free_speech.html revision of the 1st amendment, then national media is used perhaps 4 nights a week for 1 to 2 hours of primetime tv to expose the entire hijacking of constitutional government. This educates the citizens to the point where their appreciation of what has happened compels them to unify properly and be prepared for survival through a wider, set of amendments dealing with economy, environment, immigration etc. 7)Following the education of America, about a year maybe, delegates are reconvened to review a newly created structure of amendments that undo all the unconstitutional aspects inserted over the last century or so. The informed public will have vetted the proper insertion of amendment to reduce the amount of amendment putting fears of rampant amendment to rest. Voters will ratify and the nations focuses on recovery.-----
Congress is afraid of Article V.-----
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_to_propose_amendments_to_the_United_States_Constitution "Congress acted preemptively to propose the amendments instead. At least four amendments (the Seventeenth, Twenty-First, Twenty-Second, and Twenty-Fifth Amendments) have been identified as being proposed by Congress at least partly in response to the threat of an Article V convention."
That is what I have been thinking as well. There are plenty around though that want to take on social issues from both sides. Insults, and deflamation directed at each other plays into the hands of those we oppose. We need to drop those for now and unite around the end the corruption mantra.
It would be a very large statement. Unfortunately, those that identify with the Tea Party see themselves as righteous in their cause, and unfortunately, exclude anyone else that doesn't exactly fit into their group.
Occupy Wall Street is a "open source protest". That means it's truly organic. And highly inclusive. And well, people who think they're better than others don't gel with this ideal.
Too bad though. We're all fighting against the same thing, more or less. But alas, it's human nature to feel superior to others, even if it is artificial.
I don't believe that to be the case. The group I have been involved with has been very inclusive. You have to remember that it's not one large group, it's a thousand small groups all over the country. They network, but they run independently.
Well, anything that promotes successful conversation and compromise is good. I hope that is something people realize has to happen once we finally fix the wagon.
there is common ground. however. the main thing to understand is that the tea party is pro corporate power and for the elites and against the people.
so its easy to understand why there is also conflict.
Wrong, wrong and wrong again. You don't want to be misunderstood? Then inform yourself and don't buy into the party warfare.
To be fair, Leanne, it's all too easy to get that impression from the media coverage of the tea party. And yes, that's obviously not the best way to learn about the tea party, but then again, it's not as if tea partiers aren't doing the same thing. Go read some of the things they're saying about OWS on Tea Party sites -- that the OWS protestors are all authoritarian communists, that the OWS protesters are in Soros' pocket, that the whole thing is an astroturf campaign (!). That they're all dirty, useless hippies, trust fund babies, whiny losers who just don't want to work.
Everyone's going to have to be willing to work around some misunderstandings and communication problems, here. It doesn't work if it's just one side.
You're totally right. Some are doing the same thing... that's why I'm saying that the best course of action is to extend the olive branch. The only way two "enemies" ever come together is to fight a common enemy. Corrupt government is that enemy and we will need to work together in order to overcome it. Sitting here just waiting for conservatives to join this group (which is decidedly hostile towards conservatives) won't work.
Have you noticed how OWS isn't one united mass of opinion? I can't force OWS folks who have strong reservations about conservative politics to stop having those reservations, and I can't force other people to "be the bigger person."
And ultimately, one side unilaterally accommodating the other side won't accomplish anything good. The impetus has to come from both sides. It's not a matter of OWS folks being unwilling to engage with the Tea Party -- the GAs are totally open, walk right up. Heck, try counting the number of anti-OWS folks posting on the OWS site. It's not like the Tea Party is being actively excluded, they're just objecting to their oxes being gored. Meanwhile, you're goring liberal oxes -- in case you were wondering why the reception might seem at times hostile.
I'll do what I can to promote solidarity over ideology, but I can't promise anything because I can't force anyone to behave the way I think they should (which is kind of the point). Just remember that negativity is louder than positivity so there's probably fewer haters and more reasonable people among OWS than you think.
i'm right, i don't buy into party warfare, and , thats what the tea party is; a big warfare scam against the people and for corporate interests.