Let's Not Get Carried Away Trying To

Defend George Zimmerman

Due to the usual race hucksters like Al Sharpton ramping up the racial tensions, there's been a lot of strong pushback from the Right to defend George Zimmerman.  


Yesterday I got a lot of tweets from people who were crowing about new, more recent pictures that showed TrayVon Martin looking like a 'gangsta'.  


I'm sure more facts will come to light as the investigation continues, but we need to remember what we already know: 


A bigger, older man in a SUV who was armed with a concealed handgun decided to start following an unarmed teenager walking on a street, then for some reason, decided to exit the vehicle and chase him on foot.  


No matter how people try to rehash this, the one huge red flag that keeps telling me Zimmerman is at fault here is that there is no reason whatsoever for him to get out of that car. The police dispatcher, from what she can hear of Zimmerman huffing and puffing on his cell phone, correctly deduces that Zimmerman has left his vehicle and is chasing Martin on foot.  The dispatcher pointedly tells Zimmerman there's no reason for him to be doing that.  

What people need to realize is that if Zimmerman was just going to WATCH Martin, he can do that perfectly fine from inside his car.  There is only ONE REASON to exit the car and give chase on foot: Because Zimmerman was determined to apprehend Martin.  


Which is absolutely dumb.  Chasing assumes you want to catch. What the hell was Zimmerman going to do if he caught Martin?  


Another thing to ponder: I haven't heard at any time if Zimmerman ever identified himself to Martin as a Neighborhood Watch captain.  All the versions I've read, all Zimmerman says to Martin before the altercation begins is "What are you doing here!"


Put yourself in Martin's shoes.  You're walking around then notice some guy in a SUV is following you.  You walk faster, the guy gets closer to you in his car. You start running.  THE GUY EXITS THE CAR AND RUNS AFTER YOU ON FOOT.  


A new story is emerging that says Martin turned back and ran up to Zimmerman after Zimmerman gave up the foot chase and was about to get back in his vehicle, as if somehow this 'proves' Martin was the instigator.  


In fact, I could see myself doing the same thing.  I'm walking around minding my own business, guy follows me in his car, I run for it, he jumps out of the car and chases me on foot, then turns back and runs to get back in his car.  


What would my first thought be?  THERE'S NO USE RUNNING. HE'S GOT A CAR AND I DON'T.  He's just gonna keep following me.  Maybe get so close the next time he jumps out of the car he will get ahold of me.  Damn right I'm going to decide "Let's find out what the hell this guy thinks he's doing." 


One thing the stories agree on: when Martin gets close to Zimmerman, he demands to know why Zimmerman is following him.  ZIMMERMAN NEVER TELLS HIM.  Instead, Zimmerman makes a demand of his own: "What are you doing here?!"


You know how I would answer that?  Probably the same way Martin likely did:  "None of your f**king business."  Imagine how you would respond if a total stranger jumped out of a car and loudly and aggressively demanded to know what you are doing walking on the sidewalk.  

In the rush to defend Zimmerman from the rabid mob Al Sharpton is trying to stir up, let's not lose sight of the fact there is plenty of evidence this kid is dead because Zimmerman made some really awful decisions.  

MSNBC's Karen Finney Doubles Down On Stupidity

Instead of learning from her huge gaffe the other day, Karen Finney is doubling down by insisting Conservatism/Republicanism is somehow responsible for TrayVon Martin's death:


http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2012/03/23/MSNBCs-Finney-Links-To-Trayvon-Shooting-To-Kochs-NRA 

MSNBC's Karen Finny: "How do we go from one state to 30? Who was the Typhoid Mary for this horrible outbreak? Try not to be surprised. It’s the usual suspects: the Koch brothers, the NRA, the American Legislative Exchange Council, and Clinton vets, remember the Scaife family? Oh, yeah. These are the same people who stymied gun regulation at every point who funded and ghost write these laws and others that have become a core of the conservative agenda that is being implemented across our country. It’s the same group that also wrote the voter I.D. laws which threaten to disenfranchise some 5 million american voters, many of them African-American." 

Tomorrow it'll be Reagan, Ann Coulter, William F. Buckley and anybody else she can think of. 

Understanding Liberal Pathology I

I first ventured onto the Internet in 1993 in the days of Compuserve, when America On-Line was king.  

The chat rooms and message boards of those bygone days were a revelation to me.  24 hours a day, at any time you could find people discussing a wide variety of topics, from religion to entertainment to politics.  

From entering numerous threads about topics like Abortion, Infanticide, Euthanasia, I quickly encountered plenty of Progressives arguing for their side of the national debate on these current issues. 

It's quite true that if you are Liberal or Conservative you tend to surround yourself mostly with friends - both on-line and off - that tend to think the way you do and share your common interests.  While you can't pick your family you do have control over who your close friends are.  

But what surrounding yourself with people who share your views, and more importantly, often come by those views in the same manner that you did often means is that you can not have a clear grasp of why the people on the other side of the political spectrum ended up over there.  

People tend to unconsciously think other people think, reason, and adopt ideas and beliefs the same way they do.  

That's why I found it fascinating to discuss current topics and issues with Liberals and study how they responded to challenges to their views. 

Here's what I've learned over the years from these discussions. 

Liberals don't adopt their views after careful and reasoned analysis.  

Progressives are not individualists; they seek Herd membership and status among the Collective is established by displaying love of conformity.  This is why groupthink commitment to The Accepted Group View is so vitally important to the Left. 

Conservatives come to their positions through reason and experience.  Liberals adopt theirs on the basis of Authority of the Herd and emotional commitment.  

This is why most Progressives view as challenge to their beliefs as a PERSONAL ATTACK.  This is why they almost immediately interject a lot of emotion into a discussion where they are finding their views being challenged.  

This is why Liberals and Conservatives are often talking right past each other.  The Conservative ends up thinking "If only I make a rational enough argument from reason and general experience, I can show them Conservatism is right" while the Liberal tends to think "If only I can demonstrate that evil motives drives them I can get this guy to STOP ATTACKING ME and graze with the Herd in peace."  

Liberals that bring up political topics in chat rooms and message boards are not really looking for a challenge to their views that is reasonable and well thought out; what they are really looking for is affirmation that they CARE and that they BELONG to the Herd.  

Rational arguments will not convince Progressives to give up Progressivism.  Having studied the personal stories of people  who were once far Left and who have come over to the Right - such as David Horowitz, for example - what I ended up discovering is that it's their own personal accumulated experience that leads to a 'Road To Damascus' moment where the scales fall from their eyes.  

The views of the Left are not adopted because they are rational; they are adopted because they are popular, and they hold forth a powerful vision that people respond to emotionally.  

Since they weren't argued into adopting it in the first place, it's often an impossible task to argue them out of it.  

It comes down to personality.  Some people only feel secure as part of The Group. Others have a mistrust of Groups and find their security in Independence.  

They are not so much defending a core set of ideas & policies as they are defending their own personality traits.  

This is why many Liberals IMMEDIATELY get emotionally hostile to having their views challenged.  They instantly view it as a personal attack.  Since they instinctively come to view the questioning of The Group's groupthink as a personal assault, this is why they not only defend their own views in such a emotional, sometimes nasty way, this also explains why they can only challenge the beliefs of others in the same emotional manner.  

Attacking the viewpoint of others, or defending their own viewpoint, they do so based on their emotions.  The meme of the Angry, Red-Faced Liberal has more than a little truth to it.  Whether defending what Liberals believe, or challenging a Conservative assertion, discussion for the Leftist Progressive is ALWAYS waged on a deeply personal level. 

This is what many Conservatives don't understand.  There they are calmly and reasonably discussing a certain subject - let's say pension funds for unions, which are going to bankrupt many states before 2020 gets here if something isn't done - and all of a sudden the Liberal they are talking to will lean over the table and hiss "Why do you HATE working families?"

This is what it always comes down to . They are convinced evil motives drive Conservative policy.  Therefore only evil people can adopt Conservatism.  Based on this bedrock assumption, they will totally ignore any rational points you are making that count against the Liberal position and at all times keep trying to discuss your MOTIVES for daring to question the Collective Wisdom.  

 Liberals will often claim you are IGNORING them if you don't respond to an attempt to change the subject or to a personal attack red herring, but instead keep calmly and rationally building your argument.  

What you said: "We need to reform the state union pension system to keep the state from going bankrupt." What the Liberal hears: "I hate working families."

What you said: "There is no national crisis where women cannot obtain cheap, effective birth control, and this new mandate violates many citizens' First Amendment rights because it would force them violate their religion, and the Constitution is very clear that Congress cannot pass or enforce a law that does that." What the Liberal hears: "I hate women and I want to make war on them."

What you said: "We've tripled our spending on public schools in 2 decades and the present system continues to vastly underperform.  It needs real reform to ensure taxpayers and students aren't being shortchanged."  What the Liberal hears: "I hate kids and teachers and I want the American public school system to fail."

What you said: "The national cost of illegal immigration is bankrupting some of our states and it's not right that illegal immigrants end up having more rights and protections than people who are legal citizens, so we need to enforce the immigration laws."  What the Liberal hears:  "I hate everybody who doesn't look like me and I want all immigration to America to cease." 

What you said: "America should be a color-blind society where merit decides who rises, not skin color or gender.  If some segments of society are not equally represented in some fields, the answer is to improve the education and preparation for the work force of that segment of society, not to lower the standards in order to promote unqualified people to positions they can't handle."  What the Liberal hears: "I hate anybody who isn't white and women too."

What you said: "Marriage is an institution that has been the basic building block of society for thousands of years.  We shouldn't be tinkering with it and casting the traditional view aside when nobody really understands what the long term effects of such tinkering will be."  What the Liberal hears: "I hate gay people."

What you said: "Human life begins at conception, and abortion destroys that human life.  Such a thing should only be done for the most compelling of reasons, which is why the 98% of abortions that are done for elective and not medical reasons need to be more strictly regulated to demonstrate we are a culture that values human life, no matter what stage it is at, young or old."  What the Liberal hears: "I hate women."

Understand, in the Liberal Mindset there can't POSSIBLY be a completely rational and compelling argument for what the Liberal Mindset rejects.  This is why 99% of the time you are attempting to argue rationally, the only thing the Liberal is thinking about is the next statement they are going to make that will demonstrate what a terrible person you are. 

They completely mentally dismiss any argument you make without even seriously listening to it.  It can't be a valid argument because..........hate.  

As far back as 1996 I was starting to realize that no matter how dispassionately and reasonably one argued with the Far Left, it always comes back to this:  ADMIT YOU HATE PEOPLE.  YOU'RE ONLY A CONSERVATIVE BECAUSE YOU DON'T CARE.

Liberals  adopt these beliefs to show they CARE and that they BELONG.  

So here's what the Liberal is also hearing, besides the fact that you are full of HATE: 

What you said: A rational, carefully thought out argument in favor of a Conservative position.  What the Liberal hears:  You want me to STOP CARING and to CEASE BELONGING. 

How dare you attack my core personal identity, you pond scum!

Since these two core values are so deeply rooted in the bedrock of the Liberal Mindset, challenging them provokes a hostile response.  This is also why when a Liberal shifts to becoming a Conservative, they always talk  about how FRIGHTENING it was to step out as a real individual for the first time in their lives, how alone and cut off they felt.  

The Collective can only explain a conversion from Left to Right in terms of mental instability or loss of character.  There can't possibly be any legitimate reason for someone to shift from Left to Right, so some other explanation must be found.  

That's why when someone like Frank Miller publicly declares he is now leaving The Collective behind, it has to be explained away as "he's lost his mind" or "he was always evil, he's just now letting us know this".  

"Hey OWS - go back to your mom's basement! That's right, I'm evil! Always have been, suckers!"

It never occurs to Liberals that if Conservatives/Republicans are driven and motivated by HATRED of anybody that is not white and male, how can the Republican Party and Conservatism have so many non-white, non-males as members?  

This explains the rabid hatred Liberals reserve for those who refuse to bow to the Collective Will on Race and Gender politics.  Nobody gets more hatred directed at them than Conservatives who are non-white and non-male.  Because they aren't where they 'should' be - safely under lock and key on the Liberal Plantation.  Ideological conformity based on race and gender and class is a MUST for Progressivim's agenda to succeed. 

Women and minorities who aren't where they 'should' be on the political spectrum - solidly on the Left, to hear some people tell it - thwart the Collective Narrative that they are in a fight for the survival of civilization with the Evil Young White Males.  

If Conservatives and Republicans honestly and truly hate Women, Black, Hispanics, etc. then how does one account for the fact almost half of Conservatives are women, more than 1/3rd aren't white, many are old, etc.  

Conservatives set about to win individual hearts and minds through rational appeal. Liberals set about trying to co-opt entire societal groups based on race, gender and class, and then assign PC 'cowboys' to ride herd on those groups by using Political Correctness to make sure most of them stay on the reservation.  

Hey you c*nt, get back where you belong!

Nothing shows cognitive dissonance like some Far Left Liberal who turns around from  hurling the most vile, disgusting and sexist invective at a Conservative non-white woman to demand why YOU are so full of hate.  

But this is what they do. I know they do it because I have watched them do it for more than a decade and a half.  The first couple of times I watched this sort of thing, I realized "I have got to set about understanding how these people can do this sort of thing without the gears in their heads exploding from the hypocrisy."  

This is why when older, sager Conservatives tell the younger ones rational arguments are wasted on people who can't argue rationally themselves, they have a point.  You should only make rational arguments to people firmly held in The Collective Groupthink if you are endeavoring to learn and study their responses so you can obtain a better grasp of how to lead them to admit from personal experience how the Collective Groupthink led them to believe things they can look back at now and see were manifestly untrue.  

That is the first chink in the armor of the Collective: "If holding to the Groupthink led me to defend something in the past so fiercely and emotionally that is now so obviously untrue....what has the Collective Groupthink got me believing RIGHT NOW that is untrue?"

In Part II coming next week: How to Tie Liberals Inextricably to A False Narrative Of A Current Event And Then Lead Them Ask Why They So Quickly Adopted That False Narrative.

UPDATE: John Hawkins helpfully provides 20 examples of Liberals revealing their true nature: 

http://townhall.com/columnists/johnhawkins/2012/03/06/in_honor_of_andrew_breitbart_20_examples_of_liberal_hatred_on_display/page/full/

NFL Bounty Scandal Actually Gets WORSE:

Coaches Tell Players Not To Worry About Fines For Illegal HitsBecause The Fines Will Be Paid For 

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/03/23/report-gregg-williams-put-15000-bounty-on-brad-johnson-in-2006/ 


Yes, this thing actually gets worse.  The headline is that then-Redskins Defensive Coordinator Gregg Williams dumped $15,000 on a table and commanded his defense to ensure Viking QB Brad Johnson did not finish the game. That's pretty bad. 


But what actually drew my attention was THIS section: 

Greg Blache, who was a defensive line coach under Williams at the time and later succeeded Williams as the team’s defensive coordinator, has said that he disliked and discontinued the bounty program. But Elfin quotes that same unnamed player as saying that in reality, Blache was offering players money to compensate them for any fines they got for illegal hits.“Greg Blache said, ‘If you get fined, it will be taken care of,’” the player said.

Now it's already apparent to most long-time NFL observers that the NFL fine policy is a joke.  Last year the Detroit Lions Ndamukong Suh was fined repeatedly for on-field illegal behavior - including stomping on the head of a downed opponent.  Each fine came to between $15,000 and $20,000. That might seem like a lot of money until you consider the fact that in 2010 Suh signed a 5 year contract worth more than $60,000,000, $40,000,000 of which was guaranteed.  

He plays 16 NFL games in a single season.  $60 million bucks divided by 5 years = $12 million dollars a year.  So he's making north of $750,000 a game. 

Every single time Suh laces up his shoes and puts his uniform on and runs out onto the field to play in the NFL he's making over 3/4ths of a million bucks.  

What kind of an effect is fining a guy like this $20,000 for an illegal hit going to have?  

And it's turns out that on at least one team, players pulling in millions of dollars were told to not even worry about their being fined for illegal hits as they pursued bounties set by their coaches, because apparently the coaches would take care of the fines too.  

Is this kind of thing going on anywhere else?  Even without a bounty program, a coach or team front office telling players not to worry about fines for illegal hits because the team will pay those fines for the players simply encourages players to make those kinds of hits. 

The fines were a joke in the first place; and now we're finding out it very well could be one of the reasons we are still seeing so many illegal hits is because players know the fine money won't be coming out of their pocket, so the only thing they have to worry about is not racking up too many illegal hits and getting suspended. 

Columnist Charles Krauthammer Reveals What ObamaCare Is REALLY All About:

 http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/obamacare-the-reckoning/2012/03/22/gIQALF1QUS_story.html?wprss=rss_opinions

If the federal government can compel a private citizen, under threat of a federally imposed penalty, to engage in a private contract with a private entity (to buy health insurance), is there anything the federal government cannot compel the citizen to do? 

If Obamacare is upheld, it fundamentally changes the nature of the American social contract. It means the effective end of a government of enumerated powers — i.e., finite, delineated powers beyond which the government may not go, beyond which lies the free realm of the people and their voluntary institutions. The new post-Obamacare dispensation is a central government of unlimited power from which citizen and civil society struggle to carve out and maintain spheres of autonomy. 

Figure becomes ground; ground becomes figure. The stakes could not be higher.[emp. added]

Anything the State couldn't compel you, the citizen, to do if this stands?  Nope.  Not really.  WHICH IS THE WHOLE POINT. 


A Progressive Utopian Leftist looking at that sentence by Krauthammer will shrug and go "Well so what? That's what we've been trying to move things along to for decades.  So we're FINALLY getting this backwards country to where it needs to be. What was the problem again? Did you have a point?"


A freeborn American Citizen who holds their rights to be precious to them will read that sentence and immediately recoil at the thought of a State with that much power over them.  


Which reaction did you have?  

And remember, this is for posterity, so please...........be honest?  

What reaction did you have? 

The Old Media is working harder than ever to obscure the basic POINT of the entire national debate over the Health Care Reform bill.  


DO NOT LET THEM.  Keep focused like a laser on the real issue: the fact the Federal Gov. in this country must NEVER have that kind of power over the citizen.  Ever.  

Before Any Facts Are Known About Whether George Zimmerman 

1. Is Even A Republican, Or 
2. If He Listens To Talk Radio At All, And 
3. Has Paid Any Attention Whatsoever To The Republican Presidential Race,

Let's Sound Smart By Accusing Rush, Newt And Rick Of 'Creating The Environment' That Led To TrayVon Martin's Death

MSNBC Host Karen Finney

Less than a year after the Political Left and it's media shills rushed to judgment after the AZ shooting that left several people dead and AZ House Rep. Gabrielle Giffords seriously injured, somebody else repeats the same mistake.

MSNBC hosts and others immediately started claiming that the 'climate of hate' fostered by the Tea Party, Sarah Palin, and talk radio 'influenced' Jared Loughner to embark on his shooting spree before hardly any facts were known.

Tea Party! Hey just look into his eyes - can't you see it??!! It's obvious!!!

And even after the facts came out - that Loughner was a slacker stoner Leftist with mental problems for YEARS before the Tea Party ever existed, wasn't conservative and never listened to talk radio, many of the people who pushed that meme never retracted it or apologized for it.


But you would AT LEAST figure they'd have learned something from the debacle, right? Right?!


WRONG. 


http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2012/03/22/MSNBC%20Host%20Blames%20Limbaugh%20Gingrich%20Santorum%20Rhetoric%20For%20Trevon%20Martin%20Death

So, when Newt Gingrich, presidential candidate Newt Gingrich says that, quote, "really poor children in really poor neighborhoods have no habits of working and have nobody around them who works. They have no habit of I do this and you give me cash, unless it's illegal," or Rick Santorum says, "I don't want to make black people's lives easier," or Rush Limbaugh calls a presidential candidate, Senator Barack Obama a magic negro, or Mitt Romney says nothing at all, the effect is dangerous.

Read more: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/scott-whitlock/2012/03/23/msnbcs-karen-finney-smears-racism-limbaugh-had-lethal-consequences-k#ixzz1py04Bm1L 



Newsflash to Karen Finney:  there isn't one shred of evidence that George Zimmeran is a Republican, much less that he's paid attention to the Presidential race or listened to talk radio.


This is pretty goddamn illuminating though for a look into the Far Left Liberal mind.  They see boogymen everywhere, compelling people to do things.  And they'll happily tell you this before any of the real facts of the matter have emerged.


Somebody at MSNBC had better set down some rules for journalistic integrity fast before that network becomes even more of a joke than it already is.


UPDATE: Susan Swift at Big Journalism discusses in an excellent new article the Old Media's compulsion to first try to find The Angry Right-Wing White Male as the perpetrator when these kind of stories are developing and before the facts are known.  And how they promptly memory-hole their earlier assertions once the actual facts come out.  This is in relation to the media's hope that the Toulouse shooter in France would turn out to be the the white right-wing wacko they expected, but it has bearing here too in this case now that Finney's jumped the gun: 


http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2012/03/22/MSM-Toulouse

After each terrorist incident, the Captain Ahabs of the MSM breathlessly announce they have sighted the elusive White Male who will finally confirm the media's meme of the "conservative white xenophobic male terrorist."   It's the media's single minded obsession to blame conservatives, and their speech, for the evils of the world.  

Call it the Media's Great White Hope. 

Just as the great white whale Moby Dick was the personification of evil to Ahab, conservatives are the personification of evil to the MSM, and the MSM will never stop hunting.  The DC Sniper (Muslim) Jared Loughner (liberal druggie) or Times Square bomber (Muslim)--take your pick.  Each time there's a terrorist incident, the media breathlessly regurgitates ad nauseum FBI profiles or law enforcement surmise that the purpetrator is a white malcontent, possibly conservative, with potential links to Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin or even the racist tea party. 

But as of this instant, with the Toulouse murderer, it appears the alleged gunman  is ... gasp! ... Mohammed, a Muslim with al Qaida ties who hates Israel.  Blogs are ALREADY pointing out the "discrepency" in the media's earlier reports.  Expect the MSM to bury this story along side the Times Square, Loughner and DC Sniper files now that the killer doesn't fit their narrative. 

UPDATE: And now fellow MSNBC host/lunatic Ed Schultz jumps on the 'hey let's blame Conservatives for this!' bandwagon:
 http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/ed-schultz-blames-bush-trayvon-martins-death/443481

UPDATE: And now it comes out that George Zimmerman is a REGISTERED DEMOCRAT:


http://freebeacon.com/registered-dem-killed-trayvon/

To see a larger version of the pic, click on it

I'll be waiting with bated breath for MSNBC and Karen Finney to take back the slander they have been pushing all week.

Why OWS Is Doomed 

And The Tea Party Isn't

In an earlier post I commented on the violent reputation OWS is getting after 6 months of thousands of arrests, numerous assaults and myriad acts of vandalism, and contrasted the actual violence of OWS with the breathlessly anticipated violence that was supposedly forthcoming from the Tea Party - at least if you believed people like Chris Matthews, Rachel Maddow, Ed Schultz, and others in the Old Media.  


Let's more clearly delineate the reasons why OWS is turning increasingly to violence while the Tea Party, despite all expectations, isn't and what this means for the future of both movements.  


The key factor in determining whether a group of people with a common goal will turn to violence to achieve that goal is how successful they are getting what they want WITHOUT violence.  

The Weather Underground Days of Rage protest.

In the 1960's and early 1970's, radical revolutionary groups like the Weather Underground were so far to the Left and so radical they knew they had exactly 0% chance of getting the dramatic changes they wanted in American society to happen by democratic means.  This was precisely why Bill Ayers, Ted Gold and others chose to use violence like their 'Days of Rage' rallies and setting off bombs to try to coerce the broader society into acceding to their radical demands.  

After being resoundingly rejected by the Pro-Life movement for his radical, violent

views - like openly calling for the shooting of abortion doctors - Paul Hill took

matters into his own hands and killed 3 people with a shotgun. 

He was put to death by the state of Florida in 2003

The counter of this showed up on the far Right in the 1980's and 1990's as radical right wing pro-life activists such as Paul Hill started killing abortion doctors.  These radicals were also fully cognizant of the fact they could not get what they wanted through democratic means: the full and complete halt of the American abortion industry.  So they turned to violence.  

With this in mind, let's look at OWS and ask ourselves: what exactly is it that OWS wants?   What is it's nature, and how does it go about trying to get what it wants?  


OWS is a COUNTER-CULTURAL movement.  Counter-culture means COUNTER to the broader CULTURE in which it lives.  The opposite of, different, not like, etc.  

As a distinct counter-culture movement, OWS wants to bring radical and dramatic change to American society.  It has decided to try to call for the changes it wants by holding public protests in which they 'occupy' some public or private property and squat on it indefinitely.  


As far as I can tell, there has been only one document put out by anybody associated with OWS that states what their goals are.  Which they then COMPLETELY DISOWNED. Which means after 6 months nobody really knows or has coherently put on paper exactly what this mob is demanding. 


This was put out by the first OWS encampment at Zucotti Park in NYC back in October of last year.  Here is OWS's list of demands to the broader culture around it [which they state on their own website they are really not making after all]: 


http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-demands-for-occupy-wall-st-moveme/ 

Demand one: Restoration of the living wage. This demand can only be met by ending "Freetrade" by re-imposing trade tariffs on all imported goods entering the American market to level the playing field for domestic family farming and domestic manufacturing as most nations that are dumping cheap products onto the American market have radical wage and environmental regulation advantages. Another policy that must be instituted is raise the minimum wage to twenty dollars an hr.

Demand two: Institute a universal single payer healthcare system. To do this all private insurers must be banned from the healthcare market as their only effect on the health of patients is to take money away from doctors, nurses and hospitals preventing them from doing their jobs and hand that money to wall st. investors.

Demand three: Guaranteed living wage income regardless of employment.

Demand four: Free college education.

Demand five: Begin a fast track process to bring the fossil fuel economy to an end while at the same bringing the alternative energy economy up to energy demand.

Demand six: One trillion dollars in infrastructure (Water, Sewer, Rail, Roads and Bridges and Electrical Grid) spending now.

Demand seven: One trillion dollars in ecological restoration planting forests, reestablishing wetlands and the natural flow of river systems and decommissioning of all of America's nuclear power plants.

Demand eight: Racial and gender equal rights amendment.

Demand nine: Open borders migration. anyone can travel anywhere to work and live.

Demand ten: Bring American elections up to international standards of a paper ballot precinct counted and recounted in front of an independent and party observers system.

Demand eleven: Immediate across the board debt forgiveness for all. Debt forgiveness of sovereign debt, commercial loans, home mortgages, home equity loans, credit card debt, student loans and personal loans now! All debt must be stricken from the "Books." World Bank Loans to all Nations, Bank to Bank Debt and all Bonds and Margin Call Debt in the stock market including all Derivatives or Credit Default Swaps, all 65 trillion dollars of them must also be stricken from the "Books." And I don't mean debt that is in default, I mean all debt on the entire planet period.

Demand twelve: Outlaw all credit reporting agencies.

Demand thirteen: Allow all workers to sign a ballot at any time during a union organizing campaign or at any time that represents their yeah or nay to having a union represent them in collective bargaining or to form a union.

These demands will create so many jobs it will be completely impossible to fill them without an open borders policy.

Now here's the disclaimer OWS published: 

This is not an official list of demands. This is a forum post submitted by a single user and hyped by irresponsible news/commentary agencies like Fox News and Mises.org. This content was not published by the OccupyWallSt.org collective, nor was it ever proposed or agreed to on a consensus basis with the NYC General Assembly. There is NO official list of demands. 

So here we are half a year later and OWS still hasn't gotten around to an official list of what exactly it is they want that is compelling them to occupy these parks and dump buckets of crap into bank lobbies and so on.  


But notice what that official disclaimer doesn't say: it doesn't say they reject any of these demands.  They just state it's not an 'official' list of demands.  

If you've been watching and listening to OWS leaders being interviewed on TV for the past half year - and I have - that list does pretty much sum up what they are demanding.  Massive wealth redistribution, end of legal immigration, massive increase of Federal power, absolutely stunning levels of new tax increases and debt, and so on.  


The detachment of reality from these demands is kind of awesome in a way. Here the country is about to slide into the financial abyss. The PERFECT time for a small loud group of hippies to show up and loudly demand trillions of dollars in new spending. 

...and after that I want all you pigs to pick up my empty Starbucks cups......

They know they have exactly 0% chance of getting any of this done through the American democratic process of elections and legislative changes.  There is no way the American people would ever agree to the radical kind of expansion of State power that would be necessary to enact even 1/8th of the demands on that insane list.  


OWS knows this.  Especially after the results of the 2010 mid-term elections, they are aware the majority in the country is swinging to the Right, not further Left like they would like.  

Yes, that sign is a parody.  Well, at least I hope it is.

Think about this: how many times have OWS leaders talked about voting, getting active politically, sending new members to Congress?  They don't talk like that. They make DEMANDS - that they want to see fulfilled NOW. And the 'OR ELSE' is coming.  


As a counter culture movement, OWS is very small and tiny. It has no real numbers and therefore, just like the Weather Underground, cannot even make a real attempt at affecting real change to the country using the ballot box.  The more honest OWS leaders have already admitted this and said in the end violent revolution is their only recourse.  

Let's contrast this with the Tea Party.  The Tea Party sprang into existence 3+ years ago when concerned Americans realized Obama's first move in office was to dramatically ramp up Federal spending to insane levels, far, far beyond anything in the Bush years.  


People already upset at how Bush wouldn't control spending and debt were moved to action and protest as they watched the Obama administration call for over $800 BILLION in new spending right off the bat for the stimulus bill.  

Unlike OWS, the Tea Party is NOT a counter-culture movement.  It IS the culture. That's why it focused immediately and has stayed focused on working within the American democratic system, calling for people to vote, educating themselves about candidates, and putting forth candidates that will shake up Washington.  It's about putting new people in power in the present system, not over-throwing it.


Instead of squatting in parks, assaulting cops, vandalizing buildings, etc., the Tea Party holds peaceful rallies. Everybody shows up, waves their signs, speeches are made, then they all pick up their trash and go home.   


Only disenfranchised fringe groups resort to violence to try to force others to give them what they want.  The franchised mainstream has no need to do that. And that's who the Tea Party is - the franchised mainstream.  

Due to a black man being beaten by union thugs in Missouri at another Tea Party rally, 

this man in Arizona brought a legally carried rifle with him. 

Yes, you are allowed to openly carry like that in Arizona. Awesome, huh?

Oh hey, look how MSNBC tried to make a story out of that: 

Yes, they actually did that. 

How successful has the Tea Party been at affecting the change it wants?  Take a look at what happened in the 2010 mid-terms.  Liberals have already flushed it down the memory hole, so it'll be good for them to review: 


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_elections,_2010 

The 2010 United States elections were held on Tuesday, November 2, 2010. During this midterm election year, all 435 seats in the United States House of Representatives and 37 of the 100 seats in the United States Senatewere contested in this election along with 38 state and territorial governorships, 46 state legislatures (exceptLouisiana, Mississippi, New Jersey and Virginia),^[1] four territorial legislatures and numerous state and local races. The election occurred in the middle of Democratic President Barack Obama's first term in office.
Approximately 82.5 million people voted.^[2] The Democratic Party suffered major defeats in many national and state level elections, with many seats switching to Republican Party control. The Republican Party gained 63 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, recapturing the majority, and making it the largest seat change since 1948and the largest for any midterm election since the 1938 midterm elections. The Republicans gained six seats in the U.S. Senate, expanding its minority, and also gained 680 seats in state legislative races,^[3][4][5] to break the previous majority record of 628 set by Democrats in the post-Watergate elections of 1974.^[5] This left Republicans in control of 25 state legislatures, compared to the 15 still controlled by Democrats. After the election, Republicans took control of 29 of the 50 State Governorships.

Awesome. The maps make it even plainer: 

If you want to know why the Tea Party will never turn to violence, no matter how many times Rachel Maddow digs up the ghost of Tim McVeigh in hour long specials on MSNBC, there's your answer.  


OWS isn't going to end well.  As this Spring draws on, they are going to get increasingly incoherent and violent because they really aren't getting anywhere, which will only heighten their difference in nature from the Tea Party.