OCCUPY

[jacee]

There's no tyranny of the financial elite, its a tyranny of a bloated govt. I'm 1% and i am certainly not calling any shots. What injustice is there, some people are more talented than others?

Are you calling "1%" on income (~$200k) or wealth (~$17m)?

Not that I'm asking for your personal details, but high income alone doesn't make a 1%'r powerful:

It's accumulated wealth that holds power ... the power to keep accumulating more wealth through tricks of the trade-rs and bankers and politicians who bend to financial power to gain and keep political power.

What if it isn't about talent, but a predatory penchant for criminality?

What if the inmates are running the asylum?

Computer programs detecting small stock movements, making billions of trades a day ... detecting what? Insider trades that set the trends just ahead of the law? Detecting 'phantom' penny stock items that can yield earnings out of thin air?

Or better yet 'hot air' ... nothing but smoke and mirrors to some of those companies ... and some daytrader 'fun'.

Saw a daytrader on tv crowing "Governments don't run the world! Goldman Sachs runs the world!" Guests dismissed the video saying "daytraders are unique people, and some of them are certifiably insane".

Ya, that really makes me feel better!

The big five banks in Canada have 89 subsidiaries in tax haven countries ... think the wealthiest don't take advantage of that?

And if the banksters are helping wealthy people hide their money from lawful taxes, kinda shows a weak sense of 'accountability' to the rest of us dontcha think?

'Talent' like that we can afford to 'lose' ... for about 10 years in the slammer would be good

And as for big government ... Harper's doing his best to spend as much as possible on jails and warplanes and adding MP's and challenging laws in court.

On the government services side, though, it's never clear to me what services people want to do without, when they complain about 'bog government' services, (oops it was supposed to say 'big' but I think it makes sense that way too). Can you give an example of services we should do without, blueblood?

Edited November 22, 2011 by jacee

[Shwa]

There's no tyranny of the financial elite, its a tyranny of a bloated govt. I'm 1% and i am certainly not calling any shots. What injustice is there, some people are more talented than others?

Interesting that you should say this without a qualification. Well, here's your chance. The government is bloated, because for the past 5 years or so, the CPC party - arguably the party that appears to be most friendly to the interests of the wealthy - has allowed it to swell.

Why do you think they have done this?

[g_bambino]

That's not even what I'm suggesting. However, it's patently obvious when Occupy has made it quite clear from the beginning what they're protesting, but the MSM continues to ignore it. When the MSM does run a story, it's usually about sensationalist crap like police raids or drug-dealing. You have people like Levant and Fox News that are bent on discrediting the movement anyway due to their ideological bias... So it's not a conspiracy.

I'm only talking about Canada, since the motivations for the Occupy movement here are different to those in the US; or, at least, the Occupiers should realise that.

Of course Sun TV possesses a political bias. It doesn't in itself, though, constitute the main stream media; there are numerous outlets in this country, most of which aren't nearly or at all as right-leaning as Sun. And yet, though others may express it less clownishly than Quebecor's Fox-wannabes, the message coming out of all is essentially the same: Occupy is chaotic, disorganised, and far too concerned with idealism to achieve much practically. Given that consistency amongst politically differing news and opinion publishers and producers, it's hard to buy that, in your words, "The MSM has portrayed Occupy in that light, probably as a way to discredit the movement." In other words, a conspiracy.

It's a function of the way MSM operates that creates a blindspot for the true complexity of these issues.

Sure, the media - of all brands - has a terrible time with complex issues; I agree wholeheartedly with that. However, the Occupiers should've been aware of that and worked with it, like every other group with a PR department and spokespeople does. It isn't the media's job to filter out Occupy's "true message" from the cacophony of other voices that attached themselves without resistance (almost the opposite, it seemed). It's the responsibility of Occupy organisers to ensure their message was made succinct and heard clearly.

[c/e]

Edited November 22, 2011 by g_bambino

[GostHacked]

Yes...money is the ultimate form of American style democracy. Money talks...bullshit walks.

We have seen the exact opposite from these people. The bullshit is talking, because the money is walking.

Yes...my country's constitution expressly prohibits tyranny by the majority / mob. I don't care what you do with yours.

Actually it's a minority mob that is controlling the country. You may care, but your leaders sure as hell don't. Hows that debt reduction deal coming along?

[blueblood]

The ag sector has it's share of elites, survivors from the 80's who now run huge corporate farms. Small family operations like dairy are getting squeezed out. I watched a show the other night wherein farmers had even forgotten canning, but could learn on the internet!

My link

My link

What is interesting is that How small the average farm is. You'll have to tell me what huge is. The smaller guys can survive if they adapt. There are smaller guys who make far more per acre than I do because their business model allows for it. For example the growing halal meat market in Canadian cities.

[blueblood]

Interesting that you should say this without a qualification. Well, here's your chance. The government is bloated, because for the past 5 years or so, the CPC party - arguably the party that appears to be most friendly to the interests of the wealthy - has allowed it to swell.

Why do you think they have done this?

You guys in central Canada like big gov't. They do have to win an election.

[Shwa]

You guys in central Canada like big gov't. They do have to win an election.

That's one way of putting it.

[Boges]

Interesting that you should say this without a qualification. Well, here's your chance. The government is bloated, because for the past 5 years or so, the CPC party - arguably the party that appears to be most friendly to the interests of the wealthy - has allowed it to swell.

Why do you think they have done this?

Because up until this year they were in a minority government situation and haven't had the chance.

Member they tried to pass a balanced budget in late 2008 and the Opposition tried overthrow them.

[Shwa]

Because up until this year they were in a minority government situation and haven't had the chance.

No, the CPC have been satisfactorily bloating the government since 2006.

Member they tried to pass a balanced budget in late 2008 and the Opposition tried overthrow them

All smoke and mirrors my young apprentice. It's a Harrisism, bloat the public service then make your 'cuts' for the appearances of austerity, which the cons are forever claiming.

The good news in all of this is Deloitte gets a $90,000 per day consultant contract to figure out how the cut the public service.

[Boges]

No, the CPC have been satisfactorily bloating the government since 2006.

All smoke and mirrors my young apprentice. It's a Harrisism, bloat the public service then make your 'cuts' for the appearances of austerity, which the cons are forever claiming.

The good news in all of this is Deloitte gets a $90,000 per day consultant contract to figure out how the cut the public service.

As long as you support cutting the public service then perhaps we can be friends.

Looks like even Dalton has been forced onto the Austerity Bandwagon.

[blueblood]

Are you calling "1%" on income (~$200k) or wealth (~$17m)?

Not that I'm asking for your personal details, but high income alone doesn't make a 1%'r powerful:

It's accumulated wealth that holds power ... the power to keep accumulating more wealth through tricks of the trade-rs and bankers and politicians who bend to financial power to gain and keep political power.

What if it isn't about talent, but a predatory penchant for criminality?

What if the inmates are running the asylum?

Computer programs detecting small stock movements, making billions of trades a day ... detecting what? Insider trades that set the trends just ahead of the law? Detecting 'phantom' penny stock items that can yield earnings out of thin air?

Or better yet 'hot air' ... nothing but smoke and mirrors to some of those companies ... and some daytrader 'fun'.

Saw a daytrader on tv crowing "Governments don't run the world! Goldman Sachs runs the world!" Guests dismissed the video saying "daytraders are unique people, and some of them are certifiably insane".

Ya, that really makes me feel better!

The big five banks in Canada have 89 subsidiaries in tax haven countries ... think the wealthiest don't take advantage of that?

And if the banksters are helping wealthy people hide their money from lawful taxes, kinda shows a weak sense of 'accountability' to the rest of us dontcha think?

'Talent' like that we can afford to 'lose' ... for about 10 years in the slammer would be good

And as for big government ... Harper's doing his best to spend as much as possible on jails and warplanes and adding MP's and challenging laws in court.

On the government services side, though, it's never clear to me what services people want to do without, when they complain about 'bog government' services, (oops it was supposed to say 'big' but I think it makes sense that way too). Can you give an example of services we should do without, blueblood?

Cuts in civil service, welfare, pension, e.i, healthcare, entitlements, gov't salaries,

Medicine tastes bad, but you gotta swallow it. Its going to have to be swallowed when the boomers become geriatrics.

[charter.rights]

These are the kinds of people Occupy movement wants out of government:

Grover Norquist

He is tied with big corporation America, and has been bullying Republicans who disagree with him. He seems to be a right wing crook with the most power in the US.

[bush_cheney2004]

....He is tied with big corporation America, and has been bullying Republicans who disagree with him. He seems to be a right wing crook with the most power in the US.

So what does that have to do with OCCUPY in Canada? Are there no "right wing crooks" to find at home? Do you have a "right wing crook" gap?

[eyeball]

But what the left wing doesn't realize is that the right wing also hates the authority the left hates. Do you think people on the right like their bosses or police telling them what to do?

No, but on the other hand, I think they're nothing but enthusiastic about their leaders telling the left what's what. It seems the tougher and harder and meaner that governments get the happier right-wingers get too.

[cybercoma]

Sure, the media - of all brands - has a terrible time with complex issues; I agree wholeheartedly with that. However, the Occupiers should've been aware of that and worked with it, like every other group with a PR department and spokespeople does. It isn't the media's job to filter out Occupy's "true message" from the cacophony of other voices that attached themselves without resistance (almost the opposite, it seemed). It's the responsibility of Occupy organisers to ensure their message was made succinct and heard clearly.

[c/e]

This just reads to me like, "it's not the media's job to do the media's job." This generation of news, where they simply present press releases as they are is a damn shame. Whatever happened to true investigative journalism? It doesn't make as much money. And there we have it again. Wealth controls the message. Not everything in society should be about profit for profit's sake.

Edited November 22, 2011 by cybercoma

[bush_cheney2004]

.... Whatever happened to true investigative journalism? It doesn't make as much money. And there we have it again. Wealth controls the message. Not everything in society should be about profit for profit's sake.

Yes it should....news organization with numerous world bureaus are not sustainable without audience share and resulting advertising revenue. Carrying non-profitable investigative journalism is not in anyone's business plan anymore. Welcome to the "new media".

Edited November 22, 2011 by bush_cheney2004

[cybercoma]

So what does that have to do with OCCUPY in Canada? Are there no "right wing crooks" to find at home? Do you have a "right wing crook" gap?

Occupy in Canada was to some extent stupid from the beginning. Having rallies in various cities to show support for the Occupation of Wall St is one thing. For people here to actually continuously occupy parks, as some form of long-term public grievance process is silly. Not only is it patently absurd to simply camp out in parks day and night, but it takes away from the message when this becomes a fixture. The pointed criticisms become whitenoise, as it all gets lumped together.

OWS, that is to say the original occupation, is something quite different that ought to survive, until the very real issue of money in politics is addressed. All the other issues they're bringing forward are nothing more than tangential issues that need to be addressed but not in this way. You need to crawl before you walk. They need to focus their efforts on one thing at a time.

The point I'm trying to make is that OWS should not be some new institution for the airing of all public grievances. They need to stick to their goals and continue their protest only for as long as it takes to have the most important issue of money in politics addressed. All this other crap is just taking away from the movement.

Edited November 22, 2011 by cybercoma

[cybercoma]

I just edited that last post like 6 times. Sorry about that.

[bush_cheney2004]

I just edited that last post like 6 times. Sorry about that.

That's what OWS does too.

[cybercoma]

Yes it should....news organization with numerous world bureaus are not sustainable without audience share and resulting advertising revenue. Carrying non-profitable investigative journalism is not in anyone's business plan anymore. Welcome to the "new media".

You say it should, but you don't give any reason why. You say they're not sustainable, but they're not sustainable because you're talking about a for-profit model of journalism.

I'm suggesting that ethically, journalism shouldn't be about making a profit. It should be about being informative, accurate, open, honest and unbiased. There's value in that regardless of the profitability of the enterprise. In fact, profitability only serves to corrupt that ideal. It's impossible to be unbiased and honest when you need to be careful not to lose funding from advertisers.

Profit-based journalism turns news into entertainment where the goal is to sell metaphorical tickets to the show. We get the WWE-style journalism that we have now, where so-called journalists are more interested in cutting inflammatory promos than actually educating the public. Otherwise, they're simply regurgitating well-crafted biased press releases, rather than investigating the issues.

This kind of journalism detrimental to the broader public and it's directly a function of the profit-making goal of the MSM. For this reason, we're seeing a backlash against the MSM in the way people share information through social media. The old cliche says, "the Revolution will not be televised." Well, that's not because the MSM is the propaganda mouthpiece for the government. The government isn't in control anyway. The MSM is a slave to the drive for profits and, therefore, are necessarily biased towards the corporations that also buy the politicians.

[bush_cheney2004]

You say it should, but you don't give any reason why. You say they're not sustainable, but they're not sustainable because you're talking about a for-profit model of journalism.

Yes...that would be the "for-profit" part of the name.

I'm suggesting that ethically, journalism shouldn't be about making a profit. It should be about being informative, accurate, open, honest and unbiased. There's value in that regardless of the profitability of the enterprise. In fact, profitability only serves to corrupt that ideal. It's impossible to be unbiased and honest when you need to be careful not to lose funding from advertisers.

Bias would still be unavoidable. There is no such perfect model.

Profit-based journalism turns news into entertainment where the goal is to sell metaphorical tickets to the show.

So what? "Dancing with the Stars" is more popular than "The National".

The old cliche says, "the Revolution will not be televised."

That oft used cliche came from a Gil Scott-Heron record that I own...it was part of "mainstream media" for recording sales profits.

Well, that's not because the MSM is the propaganda mouthpiece for the government. The government isn't in control anyway. The MSM is a slave to the drive for profits and, therefore, are necessarily biased towards the corporations that also buy the politicians.

The politicians and government would not exist in their present form without profits and economics. Make no mistake about which is more important, lest you desire a no expenses paid trip to a Somali paradise.

Edited November 22, 2011 by bush_cheney2004

[jacee]

I'm only talking about Canada, since the motivations for the Occupy movement here are different to those in the US; or, at least, the Occupiers should realise that.

Of course Sun TV possesses a political bias. It doesn't in itself, though, constitute the main stream media; there are numerous outlets in this country, most of which aren't nearly or at all as right-leaning as Sun. And yet, though others may express it less clownishly than Quebecor's Fox-wannabes, the message coming out of all is essentially the same: Occupy is chaotic, disorganised, and far too concerned with idealism to achieve much practically. Given that consistency amongst politically differing news and opinion publishers and producers, it's hard to buy that, in your words, "The MSM has portrayed Occupy in that light, probably as a way to discredit the movement." In other words, a conspiracy.

Sure, the media - of all brands - has a terrible time with complex issues; I agree wholeheartedly with that. However, the Occupiers should've been aware of that and worked with it, like every other group with a PR department and spokespeople does. It isn't the media's job to filter out Occupy's "true message" from the cacophony of other voices that attached themselves without resistance (almost the opposite, it seemed). It's the responsibility of Occupy organisers to ensure their message was made succinct and heard clearly.

[c/e]

The MSM, whether lib- or con-leaning/led, all represent and maintain the status quo for their political and corporate masters. Their consistency, thus, is completely predictable and unremarkable.

The motivations of OCCUPY are the same the world over: Disentangle the power of wealth over democracy; Destroy the corruption of democracy that serves only the greedy instead of serving the needs of every citizen. It just happens that the corruption has had a blatant effect in the US recently, but the same conditions exist in Canada: The destruction of the middle class, the 'austerity' agenda of the G20 corporate powermongers signalling attacks on the poor, unemployed, precarious and marginalized people, disabled people and the rapidly growing population of seniors ... all of the people who, in these recession times, need public support and services.

And while Harper et al spend buckets of money wasting peoples lives in prisons and killing, maiming and traumatising young people in wars, (Iran ... and WWIII next?) maximizing debt and deficit, the wealthy powermongers reap buckets in profits from interest on public debt: Recessions/depressions are just huge buying opportunities to them, and also opportunities to pull off massive transfers of wealth from the 99% of us who work hard just to stay in the same place, or lose ground as the job market shrinks and demands on government services grow.

Within days of its beginning in Zucotti Park, and without any attention from the muzzled 1%'r MSM, vast numbers of people expressed understanding and support of the protesters.

Those who persistently pretend not to understand the OCCUPY movement, who use words like "chaotic" to describe the inclusive and highly organized direct democracy of the Occupy movement ... those people are just the enablers of the money/power-addicts of the 1%. Greed enablers are those who hitch their wagons money and power, regardless of morality and humanity. They believe that their 'good fortune' in being born abler than others is God's (or 'Lady luck's) gift to them personally, to allow them to hold power over others and to victimize others in the' competition' of life.

They're wrong, of course: Life isn't a competition for the 'spoils' of planet earth and the human race - the most 'toys' and the most victims. Competition is intrinsically redundant, inefficient and costly in human and environmental terms. In the real world outside of the personal greedsters and their supporters, life is in fact a challenge in cooperation and efficiency in human evolution.

The 1%'rs and their enablers definitely lose on the evolutionary scale: Greed for profit is destroying the earth that sustains human life. And that isn't like 'cutting off your nose to spite your face'. It is more like burning down your whole city, killing innocent people in the process, to provide yourself with short term heat, but inevitably freezing to death ALONE in the ruins.

I suggest that those who expend effort trying to dismiss, denigrate and destroy the OCCUPY movement instead turn their efforts to reforming the corporatist greed culture into something of benefit to humanity, instead of the life-destroying monster it is.

I suggest that we all turn our efforts to cooperation and efficiency in sustaining human life here on earth ... because once it's gone, so are we and wealth won't protect anyone from the chaos that will occur as the earth's survival mechanisms kick in to shake off the human destroyers of life.

[eyeball]

I just edited that last post like 6 times. Sorry about that.

That's alright, they don't get it no matter how many way's they hear it.

[cybercoma]

Bias would still be unavoidable. There is no such perfect model.

Who's calling for perfection? It would be a hell of a lot more informative, as it should be.

So what? "Dancing with the Stars" is more popular than "The National".

So what? News shouldn't be a popularity contest. It's about being informative.

That oft used cliche came from a Gil Scott-Heron record that I own...it was part of "mainstream media" for recording sales profits.

So what?

The politicians and government would not exist in their present form without profits and economics.

So what?

Make no mistake about which is more important

I know what's considered more important now, thanks. That's the entire point of my argument.

I think I've figured out why you never really have anything to contribute. You don't actually understand what you're reading, so you just reply with gibberish that has nothing to do with the arguments presented to you.

Edited November 22, 2011 by cybercoma

[cybercoma]

The MSM, whether lib- or con-leaning/led, all represent and maintain the status quo for their political and corporate masters.

As they should, given the current model. They need to create a profit to be successful. If your advertisers can shut you down by pulling their funding, then you would be stupid to run stories or do things that alienate them. It's not some organized conspiracy by the MSM to keep the "political and corporate masters" in place. It's that the MSM relies on the corporate masters to fund them, just like the politicians.