Forum Post: Your Fighting The Wrong Battle
Posted 13 years ago on Nov. 27, 2011, 6:44 p.m. EST by OccupyTheGovernment
(17)
from Jersey City, NJ
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
You need to be protesting your government. They are the ones bailing out the banks instead of you. If the government would have let capitalism take its course the big banks would have failed.
Business had done nothing wrong. Yes some have made billions but they are not entitled to give you any. This is America, you make your opportunity, and they made theirs.
The Government is entitled to help you though, thats why you pay taxes. Demand bailouts for the people.
Join the movement: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Occupy-The-Government/194659437286842
"Business had done nothing wrong. Yes some have made billions but they are not entitled to give you any. This is America, you make your opportunity, and they made theirs."
Wrong, they must give their fair share to society, because nobody needs that much money to eat and have a roof. A million is plenty; the rest can go to paying down the national debt rather than cutting food programs and services for the less fortunate.
There has never been a limit on profits. You can always work to set one, but up to now he's right, the financial world was following (just barely in some cases) the rules. Their only legal obligation, currently, is to the stock holders.
If Occupy has the numbers and the will to do it, the rules can be changed. Get politically organized and vote for candidates that support your goals.
And the only way you are going to get that is through the government.
That is called communism. They don't have to give you anything! The people are the ones making them rich, no one hands them money (except the government), people give it to them for a product or service.
Should they pay more taxes, Yes. Should they have a max wage, No. Should they have to give a "fair share", No.
"no one hands them money (except the government)"
It is OUR money that the government is handing them, and they give some of it back to politicians to insure that government keeps handing them OUR money.
what dont u get nobody is asking for anything to be given to them
Real LeroyLinux's post about 2 up.
Not all are asking for money, I understand, but the ones that are are giving you guy's a bad rep.
Those people that are not open minded enough will never get it and what I believe he means and what alot of people misconstrue it's not about a handout it's about paying there fair share into the system we little people get taxed more per our income then the wealthy why should they have special treatment when it comes to paying via taxes etc so again alot of people are misinformed and have the wrong idea
communist much?
You guys are cuckoo, seeing communists in every shadow. You probably think public libraries are a Stalinist plot for world domination. Taxes aren't communist. They've been around forever. Even the American Revolution wasn't against taxation - they brought in new taxes straightaway after - they were only against taxation without representation.
As far as a "fair share". Even Adam Smith, who was the first to advocate a progressive tax, believed in this:
The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.
<3
The rich should contribute and give back, but the message most OWS are sending is give us all until you are financialy equal. And that is communism...
That's just your imagination talking, you want to see communist phantoms in every corner. There's a few crazy kids around who like to wear Che shirts. So what. The populist right has Alex Jones and David Icke and a whole bunch of whackos too. I don't assume they all think we're being controlled by alien lizard-people, they're just a few nuts. Don't let your biases control you.
They are my favorite kind of phantoms ;)
Yeah but they're not real. Living disconnected from reality isn't a good thing.
The thought of having the rich give all their money to the scumbag protesters is just as disconected....
How about restoring Glass-Steagal? Is that as disconnected an idea as thinking that public libraries are a communist conspiracy?
I am for restoring Glass-Steagal. It should not have been removed in the first place...
And how about antitrust legislation? Is that a communist plot?
Antitrust laws are crutial. We need competition between businesses. It keeps prices low and increases the value of goods and services.
Government efforts to build public infrastructure with public money (ie highways, sewers, roads)?
Replying to your recent comment. The government should have to clearly state to the people buying the land that if the gov decides to build on it, the have to take their home value and leave before they buy it.
If they were aware when they bought it then yes they should have to sell and leave.
Well, they may not have any plans to build the road at the time the people buy it. They don't have a crystal ball and know ahead of time where roads will be needed. Unfortunately if you want to build a straight road, you have to remove people from their property (by giving them all market value at the outset, because again the road will cost a bazillion dollars if you allow holdouts to negotiate a price).
Im for serving the peoples needs. The problem is sometimes it is wasteful spending. In my city they pave perfectly good roads just to get the government funding for the projects. My local government is full of morons (why im saying occupythegovernment). However if its needed and justified im for it.
I agree all the efforts in each individual city do need to have leaders and do need to organize in a concerted effort with the main goals and take it to Washington occupy the whitehouse and occupy congress and stay until they listened I'd like to see what happens if the govt would give it back to the people or their would be martial law I for one plan on taking action instead of sitting here and talking about it good luck to u all and join me if u want real change or live oppressed by this corrupt govt
Yeah, bridges to nowhere do happen. But we need roads. We need straight roads, even, and that means forcing people to sell their property so it can be built in straight line (and not cost a bazillion dollars because of some holdout). What do you think of that?
the centeral bank is the problem
Protesting the government is in the works and will be done fairly soon. You are wrong about at least one thing though. You claim business has done nothing wrong. Goldman Sachs, among others, committed outright fraud on a massive scale, to the tune of billions of dollars. There's $1.7 billion missing from the coffers of MF Global, much of which may never be recovered. Fraud and grand larceny, last I checked, are indeed against the law.
I was reffering to on a large scale. And what you said is true, but why are people not protesting just Goldman Sachs or any other unlawful company?
OWS has generalized all business as evil, corrupt, and fraudulent.
I believe that's a misconception. There are protesters with signs saying stupid things like 'down with corporations' and other generalizations, but thankfully they are in the minority. Unfortunately they get their pictures in the paper and that leads to the misconception. The people on-line, for the most part, seem smarter than that, as least that's the impression I've been getting on these forums. There are those types here but I have a tendency to tune them out and focus on the people that seem to have a head on their shoulders. That's probably easier to do on line than in person at Zuccotti or the other camps.
It may be true that the big banks would have failed if the government desired to let capitalism run its course. What would that have accomplished? I don't know. If many of the big banks had large national stakes, then we could well still be in this mess. Nothing you said gives any indication as to how the big banks got in this mess, in the first place.
Business had done something wrong. The financial industry had done that ever since they began to lobby to have regulations removed ever since the break-up of the Bretton Woods system. The repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act was probably the final straw in the matter that got everything out of control.
The lobbying efforts on the part of the banks to repeal those laws and then to gamble on peoples' money should be seen as a crime against humanity. It is not so much about what we are entitled to as to stopping them from moving any further with their criminal behavior.
Allowing banks to write financial legislation in their own interest is almost like allowing a serial killer to write the next crime bill.
business have done lots of theft against individuals and groups, and the govt has let them. they pay off the judges and attorneys. Both govt and corporations are to blame. There are so many small and large cases not referenced here...
Im not saying the businesses are innocent. The government should be protecting the innocent in court, not the powerful.
The court system is a main area we are trying to fix
Join: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Occupy-The-Government/194659437286842
I don't do facebook, I don't do Google, I don't do gmail. they are the .00001% that has stolen from me and many others. I don't know why occupy doesn't recognize this. google/facebook/youtube are one of the top 5 worse adversaries against the 99%.
if the info is on another website i will take a look.
http://www.oneredpill.com
http://www.occupyvideo.org
So many people have no idea how to manage what little money they do have. How bout getting more money management and investing classes into the grade and high schools.
Thats a goal of ours, more financial education in schools
Join: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Occupy-The-Government/194659437286842
The effort to gain the ear of the elite is a multi-front battle field. If ones approach is to only protest corporations and their facilitators on Wall Street then they are missing the point. Money buys power and power protects money. Corporations have money to purchase high ranking political seats that guarantee votes on the floor that will pass business friendly bills to further corporate agendas. You cannot direct your hatred of the system at only one aspect of it. The U.S. government is corrupt. Elections are bought and paid for before one commoner ever approaches the voting booth at their local fire hall or post office. To fight the famed "1%" you must wage a simultanious war against the establishment of a non-democratic, pre-determined government and the one's who's goal it is to insure that their agenda is furthered by legal means at any cost. What I am saying is that a glove can do nothing without the hand.
You need to protest on Capitol Hill and stop ignoring the House. Just because you think that they are puppets of Corporate America does not mean that they are not equally as powerful. They create the legislation and the laws that benefit corporations soo much. March on them, call them, occupy their districts but don't let them get reelected.
I agree, the problem is with government's wasteful spending.
now here is an idea to consider seriously. Congress has the reins on wall st. Trouble is it's way more enriching to not bother reining at all. A global pandemic evidently.
When someone hires a hit man to murder someone for them, you go after both the murderer and the one that hired the murderer - giving an even harsher sentence to the one that hired the hit man.
Murder is a crime. Doing everything you can legally do to make a huge profit is not a crime.
Who got killed?
I agree we should be at the White House protesting, a Government is supposed to be set up by the people, and for the people , but today we have a government that is set up by the Banks and Corporations and for the Banks and Corporations, we need to confront our Government on is to why they are allowing this to be so, even the bible says in Proverbs22:27 if you have nothing in which to pay why should he take your bed from under you. so even the Holy scriptures are against this type of system that we have set up, it is just not right, people do not have to be suffering the way that they are is what upsets me more knowing that, if the peoples tax dollars are going to the Government which they use to makes weapons and Bombs and do top secret government experiments, i feel that we should not only know why they need so many guns ect and what they are experimenting on and if they are not experimenting on anything that is going to benefit mankind then we should get our money back and not have our tax dollars go to something thats only benefiting the Rich and powerful and not the poor.
business had done nothing wrong? Please, you need more information. Hostile take-overs, undrepricing competition through use of lower paid slave workers in other countries.. then ripping the jobs and sending them to other countries may not be criminal, but it sure can not be viewed as human.
Robbing innocent people of their proposed retirement funds, then blaming them for it.. is ludicrous.
Raking in millions as civil people lost millions, and even paid them millions to build up their companys to yank the jobs away from them, yet expect them to continue bying the slave-labor products, when they also lost their income is just unbelievable.
You think the corporations have never commited fraud, or stole from society? Please, research deeper and wake up soon... before it is completely too late.
They have, but its a small number, and its the same business the government is bailing out.
Social Security is just a big scam.
You act like very business is evil, when its such a small number...
not every business. corporations have eaten most of the smaller ones.
So, on a previous post, FormerWS says this:
"Financial gambling at its core is destructive to the economy, I have watched as companies approach first, second and third stage investment institutions and submit sound business plans with conservative P & L sheets, and purchase commitments.
The result of these entrepreneurs hard work? They are laughed at. The return rates on investments are so comically low compared to speculative investments that their is no incentive to invest in businesses anymore.
I am talking about companies that show 4-10% growth per quarter, out performing the stock market being turned down just because gambling pays more than creation."
http://occupywallst.org/forum/how-to-really-fight-back-against-investment-banks/#comment-436550
I think the banks are absolutely in the wrong here. Are you saying, what these banks are doing is the fault of the government?
The banks are still in business today because of the government. They would have failed if they did'nt get a bailout.
There are corrupt business ran by idiots, but the eventually fail. Capitalism does take its course.
Yes, the government did bail out the banks, I also did not agree with that. They said they were trying to prevent a disaster of global scale. Pure capitalism would never have bailed out the banks, because it does not have a conscience. No morality, no code of ethics, no honor. There is only one dimension to capitalism and that is the bottom line. I agree we need to do something about the government as well. I disagree that the banks did nothing wrong.
you have a huge misconception about what this is about u listen to the news tell u there is no goals lazy hippes unemployed defacating anarchist socialist it is about a govt for the people by the people they are not asking for a handout not at all they are asking that the govt and corporations are held accountable for the tax money and 401ks of the people they want what is rightfully theirs what they worked sweated and earned i dont know if youve heard of cspan thats the channel they hold all congressional hearings its not the news reporting it it comes straight from congress with all this inflation tuition hikes no jobs etc do u think that we should be suffering while 9 trillion doallars of our hard earned tax money has dissappeared and the federal reserve doesnt know where it went or how about the 2.3 trillion dollars that is missing from the dod rumsfeld even admitteed it on tv or how about the 10 billion that flew off to iraq to never be seen again one more thing the money i put and every other tax payer that just payed for that ceos bonus because they were to big to fail why didnt they sell their yatchs multimillion dollar houses or luxury cars to bail their own asses out another thing is that it is illegal to use tax money for private co and the govt thumb their nose at everybody and did it anyway that money is supposed to be for our infrastructure like jobs and education so no hand out here we just want whats righfully ours back and get this govt for the people by the people and stop the theft and corruption that exist thanks for listening
Thats why we need to be protesting the government. They "lose" our tax dollars, and give the rest to people who don't deserve it or live in another country. If Governent would have stayed out of it they would have went out of business. Our Government is run by crooks like Rumsfeld. Thats what we are trying to fix.
I don't understand why I have the misconception you pretty much agreed with me.
u think people are asking for a handout or am i incorrect
Some are, not all.
If you go to the top of this post read Leroy's post, he's asking for a handout.
I understand allot are not asking for handouts, but it;s those who are who are giving you a bad rep...
This is exactly where they should be protesting, particularly the Obama admin, the biggest crooks there is
he is not just to blame they are all the same and bush is the one who made the legislation for the bailouts
Exactly
That money is gone, bro. The only thing left is the IOU that we are all responsible for.
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They need to be protesting the Obama admin. Obama is in support of this movement only for he will not get attacked for all of his failed policies
That is silly.
Not Occupying the Government - Occupying the government isn't silly, it's a good idea.
Not Occupying Wall Street - that's silly.
It's been an effective attention getter. The Koch suckers are all gamblers - and lets not forget some of them got bailed out too as I recall. And they are begging for the privatization of Social Security -
you must be a repelican shill or a corporate mule
I'm guessing the later - cuz you look like an ass to me.