Forum Post: What should our long-term goals be?
Posted 13 years ago on Nov. 4, 2011, 9:44 p.m. EST by shihfa
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Respect to those men and women who are working everyday under extraordinary circumstances to keep this movement energized and alive.
But I thought I would take a moment to ask: What should the long-term goals of the Occupy Movement be?
To occupy the Democratic party? http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/change/science_egalitarians.html
To restore democratic debate? http://www.ted.com/talks/michael_sandel_the_lost_art_of_democratic_debate.html
It's not really that complicated. Ballots, not dollars, people before profits, every time, and all the time.
For me, this pretty much sums up the goals. The GOALS are simple, the path to them may be not so simple. If you want a simple list of ten or fewer demands, you might be be missing the point.
We should back candidates who back our goals so they are realized. This will be very difficult. The only reason people run for Congress or the Senate is to get rich, maybe famous for some. It will be hard because it will take a lot of money to them elected. Then, after we get a majority we pass campaign finance laws that say all campaigns must be financed with public funds.
Candidates can no longer take any money from Special Interest groups, Corporations, Lobbyists, or anyone. They can't even use their own money. We will give each party's nominee a chack, they will have 2 months to campaign, no TV ads, then we have the elction.
When elected no office holder would be allowed to accept any money from anyone for any reason. If we pay you $200,000 a year to work for the people that better be the only number on your tax form. If it isn't, you go to jail.
All long term issues hinge on the beginning - getting rid of CU.
We need to pick an issue that is simple - that is popular - how about an issue that 83% of Americans agree on - that 56% of TP agree on - that will cement the people in OWS with the people outside of OWS
Our only goal should be to pass a constitutional amendment to counter Supreme Court decisions Citizens United (2010) & Buckley v. Valeo (1976), that enable unlimited amounts of anonymous money to flood into our political system. It will be as short and concise as possible, a legally constructed “corporations and other organizations are not a persons and have no personhood rights” and “money is not free speech”.
We don’t have to persuade people to accept our position – we have to persuade them to ACT based on their own position. Pursuing this goal will prove to the world that we, at OWS, are a serious realistic Movement, with serious realistic goals. Achieving this goal will make virtually every other goal – from jobs, to taxes, to infrastructure , to Medicare – much easier to achieve – by disarming our greatest enemy – GREED.
THE SUCCESS STORY OF THE AMENDING PROCESS The Prohibition movement started as a disjointed effort by conservative teetotalers who thought the consumption of alcohol was immoral. They ransacked saloons and garnered press coverage here and there for a few years. Then they began to gain support from the liberals because many considered alcohol partially responsible for spousal and child abuse, among other social ills. This odd alliance, after many years of failing to influence change consistently across jurisdictions, decided to concentrate on one issue nationally—a constitutional amendment. They pressured all politicians on every level to sign a pledge to support the amendment. Any who did not, they defeated easily at the ballot box since they controlled a huge number of liberal, and conservative and independent swing votes in every election. By being a single-issue constituency attacking from all sides of the political spectrum, they very quickly amassed enough votes (2/3) to pass the amendment in Congress. And, using the same tactics, within just 17 months they were successful in getting ¾ of the state legislatures to ratify the constitutional amendment into law. (Other amendments were ratified even faster: Eight—the 7th, 12th, 13th, 15th, 17th, 20th, 21st and 26th—took less than a year. The 26th, granting 18-year-olds the right to vote, took just three months and eight days.)
If they could tie the left and right into success -
WHY CAN'T WE??????????
1) Recognize that we're not going to overthrow the capitalist system or the American republic. 2) Go home and look for a job.
End corruption...which has been the one demand of OWS since day one.