Does anyone remember the Tea Party? You know, the big angry group of conservatives that protested against big government and tax hikes? What happened to them? Did Occupy Wall Street drown them out of the media? Did they go home?
I remember the Tea Party hosted a Republican presidential debate, where the crowd began to cheer at the idea of pulling the plug on an uninsured man on life support (I mostly remember the look on Ron Paul’s face). A few days later I remember the start of OWS, and I forgot about the Tea Party until now.
I have a mental image of a thin young hipster telling an old grumpy Tea Partier “there’s room enough for one protest group in this here country, and that’s us now, so skedaddle.”
It might not have happened that way, but it definitely happened overnight. Surely the recent nationwide Occupy fervor has been a bit louder than any recent Tea Party activities.
Critics of OWS say that the movement has no specific goals or demands, but did the Tea Party? Is being against corporate greed and corruption really any more specific than the Tea Party’s talking points? At least OWS isn’t using their causes as a cover up to take to the streets and express a general hatred for the President, his skin color, or to raise awareness of his not being born in this nation (a cause which currently plasters the official Tea Party website’s message boards).
It is certainly true that the OWS cause isn’t very specific. Saying you are the 99 percent and “standing up” to the 1 percent isn’t the most effective way of changing things. The movement does have the goal of generating conversation, and hopefully finding practical solutions to the corporate greed and corruption they have taken to the streets against.
For the record, OWS is an actual grassroots movement, it does not have a designated leader, and while the Tea Party didn’t either, there was substantial evidence showing that industrial powerhouse Koch Industries had a lot to do with funding and planning Tea Party activities, as well as spearheading many a conservative think tank in the past. OWS doesn’t have any corporate sponsors, and it would be a tad oxymoronic if they did. Ben and Jerry’s ice cream company recently announced their support of the movement, but I don’t think that means as much to OWS as Koch Industries did to the Tea Party.
If OWS really does want to make a difference in this country by ending corporate greed and corruption, and keeping corporation and government separate, then I support their cause. Unless they want to fizzle out like the Tea Party did, then they need to get their act together and create a reasonable list of practical demands and goals.
I hope that the amount of energetic, creative young people involved will help this cause. Perhaps their persistence will keep the movement alive long enough to see some of its goals to fruition. I hope that sensible voices in the crowd help settle down some of the more radical (and frankly, crazy) ideas, and perhaps turn them into something that will truly work for this country.
If Occupy Wall Street continues to just be a bunch of pissed off people camping in parks and having drum circles and mindless banter, then it will probably accomplish as much as the Tea Party did. But if sensible discourse and practical solutions emerge, the movement might have a serious positive impact on this country and the way it does, or shouldn’t do business.