We’re Not Going Anywhere!

“This is always the price of liberty—taking the risk of going to jail, of being beaten and perhaps being killed.” – Howard Zinn

“Change we can believe in,” was President Obama’s campaign slogan back in 2008.  Well it’s 2011, and even though there’s a new body in the White House, it still seems that it’s business as usual.  Imperialistic-like military policies have furthered under the new president, and it’s abundant that Obama’s ear is not to the people who elected him, but instead the top 1%.  If George Bush was doing what Obama is doing, he’d be called a fascist.  But, I guess, what can one expect?   “If you wear Caesar’s clothes, you have to behave like Caesar.”

“Bloomberg seeks to end disruption of business as usual as do other elites elsewhere in the world. We want to end business as usual. It is that simple.” — Michael Albert

With the Occupy Wall Street movement, average everyday people are learning that a government run by the rich will never give them “change we can believe in.”  Instead, the 99% needs to look to and rely on each other to achieve that change through some other avenue.  That other avenue has taken the form and been labeled Occupy Wall Street.

Mainstream media may trivialize the movement, but with the actions of the New York and Oakland police this last Tuesday, it is evident that the people at the top are beginning to show their apprehension.  Whenever the right arm of the rich, the police, come out against peaceful citizens, you know what’s at stake is immense.  When those in power decide to spit in the face of the constitution and use police brutality to break up peaceful protests, it should make it quite clear that we’ve shaken their throne at least a little bit and should inspire us to take it even further.  Once people see images of the destruction of Liberty Park, indifferent citizens will gravitate towards the Occupy Wall Street movement and furthermore, the cause.

The main criticism of the movement reiterated by people who don’t understand the movement is they don’t have a clear, concise message or slogan.  That is what is awe-inspiring about the movement; they don’t claim to have one answer or solution, but they have pin-pointed the problem:  the current model that benefits so few and disenfranchises so many needs to be dismantled.  The world is watching as the protest is now coming from the “belly of the beast.”  What will replace this system is up to us.

That is true democracy in action.