For some time now, there has been an ongoing group-protest on Wall Street and New York’s financial district. The protesters are mainly young Caucasian brothers and sisters, who are totally fed up with where society, capitalism and democracy have been heading for too long now. It is no secret that significant numbers of enlightened folks nationwide are fed up with the many ways money corrupts the political system; and the many ways greed, connections, influence, self-over-indulgence, indiscretion, recklessness, power, unethical behavior and the like, corrupts the economic system. It’s becoming clearer everyday that our nation’s political, economic and social systems are devolving into places where we really shouldn’t want to go. Morality is now a matter of convenience and not consistency. Morality is no longer about values and ideals, but about personal gain and/or self-aggrandization.
We are a nation in crisis. To read the newspapers and/or listen to the network news it is all about economics: the “great recession” to be exact. But it’s not. It’s way beyond that. It’s way beyond greed and corruption. It’s about so many other things. It’s about over-consumption and waste. It’s about the natural and political environment. It’s about a legacy of racism and the attendant ills: caused by racism’s octopussian-tentacles protruding into every aspect of American life. It’s about racism’s denial by most Americans (black, white and other) and the fact that there are real problems therein. It’s about an education system that fails to graduate most citizens, and then set them all up for a life of moral failure. And by morality -in this particular context- I am talking about the way we interact with, are predisposed to, accept, respect, treat and deal with other human beings; especially people who don’t look, dress, talk, worship, sound, believe, and/ or act like we do.
It’s about the five hundred families whose total wealth surpasses the combined wealth of over 250 million people here (that’s 250 million folks/try to wrap your head around that). It’s about the cavernous gap between rich and poor. It’s about the widening wealth-gaps between black and brown and white.
It’s about presidential candidate Mitt Romney claiming membership in the middle-class, while his personal wealth is anywhere near one hundred million dollars. It’s about too many lies told by too many people in high places and filthy spaces; lies that too many regular folks accept as truths without question: regular folks who don’t comprehend the importance of their vote, and of the need for political education and deeper knowledge of the issues of the day.
It’s about the top ten percent of this country who own and/ or control about ninety percent of the country’s wealth and patrimony. And they have no shame with the way they manipulate the system to become wealthier.
It’s about the millions of people who are unemployed or under-employed. And the near one hundred million folks without adequate health-care insurance: most of them without any kind of insurance at all. It’s about class-warfare; where the middle and lower classes are being clobbered by members of the upper and uber-wealthy classes, who seem to display no conscience in going about their carnage.
It’s about the unfair tax codes. It’s about the rich paying their fair share for perquisites they derive via their influence on politicians, who in turn manipulate the mechanisms of government on their behalf and at their behest. It’s about corporations raking-in billions in profits but paying next to nothing in taxes. The same corporations which are now laying-off workers: again.
It’s about the near two million blacks (male and female), who are now in prisons, jails, penitentiaries, half-way homes and correction facilities all over the country. Don’t even talk about those who are on parole, or are in drug-rehab, or substance-abuse programs, and the like.
It’s about whites who cannot make ends meet anymore. Folks who can’t feed their families far less save for a rainy day. Folks who are going bankrupt every day. Some of whom watch hopelessly as their home-values fall. Some of whom watch hopelessly as their jobs are shipped overseas. Some of whom are standing in the welfare line for the first time ever. It’s about poverty on the rise again. It’s about crime on the rise again.
It’s about the wars we continually fight all over the world. It’s about the demons we continue to chase without stopping to think about the demons chasing us in our backyard; demons who have infiltrated the military-industrial-political complex: the demons who sell guns, bombs, and other wicked weapons of human- destruction, to the rest of the world. Wars which drain our resources. Wars that stop us from re-investing in our infrastructure and/or implementing much needed health, education and social-welfare programs for the needy not the greedy.
It’s about the three in five black fourth-graders who cannot read, write, spell or do math at grade level. And the three in four black males who will not graduate with a high school diploma. And the seven in ten black males who will grow up without their father’s influence on their young lives. And the black women living in the inner-cities who terminate half of their pregnancies. And the same group of black women who make up more than half of the new HIV-AIDS cases. All of which exemplifies deeper social ills taking heavy toll on blacks nationwide.
It’s about a country losing its political will because their electeds fail to inspire and motivate. It’s about electeds who are clueless as to their true roles and functions; who aimlessly drift from social event to social event and swear they are problem-solving. It’s about electeds who fail to propose new ideas/ solutions for nagging public problems; and who never studied public policy formation. It’s about electeds with no imagination and unable to think creatively.
It’s about apathy and lethargy. It’s about a nation going through clinical depression. A national depression not being diagnosed correctly, far less being treated with the right medications/ prescriptions/remedies.
It’s about the fiscal mess most federal, state and city/local entities find themselves in. It’s about the end-results of poor political, social and economic decisions made long ago finally coming back home to roost. And for the most part, it is the elected-officials we have to blame: well…….mostly. Every now and again academics led the day, with ideas which eventually turned out to be just plain bad; but for the most part, elected officials have hurt us with their ineptitude, depravity, ignorance, selfishness, rich egos, and poor attitudes.
It’s about poor planning and/or a lack of. It’s about sweeping things under the rug for too long. Eventually the rug will show bumps and protrusions where the garbage has piled up in a few spots. Eventually the stuff being swept under has accumulated beyond the rugs ability to hide it and cover it up. Eventually it smells or shows.
We are a nation of cowards living in fear: afraid to speak up, or act up, or write about the many things that ail us here; starting with the elected officials and this fraudulent and encumbering two-party-dominated political system. One which has overpowered and more or less stifled independent voices from all over the political spectrum: especially from the left.
On Wall Street and its environs, youngsters (overwhelmingly white) are being arrested everyday for their roles in the peaceful civil-disobedience actions they have undertaken. Some are being brutalized by the infamous NYPD goons. And Mayor Bloomberg with his humongous ego cannot even comprehend the implications and dimensions of this growing protest.
On Wall Street these young protesters are demonstrating the courage many of the old-timers lack nowadays. On Wall Street, the young brothers and sisters are showing us what youth and idealism can do: spark the beginnings for real change. And when I say change I am not talking about political slogans pushed for voter consumption; or the cold and calculated focus-group results utilized to manipulate more than activate or agitate.
I am talking about political change 1789-style. It’s coming. It may be a few decades away but it is coming. Make book on that if things don’t change significantly in the next few years. Right now the only question I can ask is this: where are the elected officials who should be out there protesting with these youngsters? Where are the electeds who should be out there speaking loudly to the other powers that be? They are invisible: that’s where they are; that’s where they have been for eons now.
Stay tuned-in folks.