The Delphi Technique and #Occupy

[Bruce Dazzling]

IMO, the most important decision that needs to be made is whether or not OWS believes that it's possible to work for meaningful change within an existing system that has been specifically constructed with the goal of preventing meaningful change.

That depends on how well constructed the system is and how imaginative sand determined the members of OWS in their attempts to find ways to create meaningful change doesn't it?

No. Either you believe it's possible to change the system from within or you don't, and making that decision is an important one that I'm still not sure anyone has made.

Is OWS going to work within the 2-party system?

Is it going to create it's own party or party wing like the Tea Party?

Is it calling for a state-led Constitutional Convention to bypass Congress?

Is it a guerilla style revolution looking to tear it all down by any means necessary?

I haven't been involved in OWS at all since December, but my interactions with them prior to that made it clear that there really is nothing approaching consensus when it comes to the above questions.

I'm not asking for a detailed, point by point roadmap to utopia. I'm simply saying that I believe the first step has to involve answering the fundamental question of do we believe that we can make meaningful change within the system as it currently stands.

[Wombaticus Rex]

Via: Is #OWS Just Another Color Revolution?

...

The two biggest obstacles OWS will face in maintaining their commitment to nonviolence will be the attitude of low income and minority groups who deal with police violence on a daily basis and growing concerns about the possible role CIA-funded left gatekeeping foundations have played in engineering the Occupy movement’s exclusive commitment to nonviolence. This concern is heightened by the use of nonviolent guru Gene Sharp’s materials at several Occupy sites.

The CIA Role in Nonviolent Revolutions

Sharp’s longstanding ties with the CIA and the “democracy manipulating” foundations that instigated the “color” revolutions in Eastern Europe, Asia, the Middle East and North Africa (including Egypt) receive little attention in the foundation-funded “alternative” media. However the issue has begun to seep into the blogosphere, thanks to good coverage in the French and Australian left-progressive media. One example is a well-referenced November 25th article by Tony Carlucci in Land Destroyer entitled “How to Start (a Wall Street backed) Revolution”.I first came across the article December 1st on the Occupy Oakland website. It was taken down a week later, which I find quite ominous.

As Tierry Messan outlines in January 2005 on Votairenet, Sharp, a fervent anticommunist, initially formulated his nonviolence theory to assist anticommunist movements. He wrote his 1993 From Dictatorship to Democracy while working for the Albert Einstein Institution (AEI), specifically for use in the Myanmar (Burma) “pro-democracy” movement. He subsequently participated in the establishment of Burma’s Democratic Alliance – a coalition of notable anticommunists that were quick to join the military government. He later worked with Taiwan’s Progressive Democratic Party, which favored the independence of the island from communist China, something the US officially opposed. His other work included unifying the Tibetan opposition under the Dalai Lama; trying to form a dissident group to split the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO); and secretly training the Psychological Action division of the Israeli armed forces.

The “Color” Revolutions in Eastern Europe and Asia

The CIA would subsequently utilize Sharp’s book, From Dictatorship to Democracy, throughout Eastern Europe and Asia, and in 2011, the US-engineered “Arab Spring.” Sharp himself, with funding from the AEI, the US government backed National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and its subsidiary International Republican Institute (IRI), and George Soros’ Open Society Institute, is also on record as providing “humanitarian” advice and training to antigovernment activists in Serbia, Zimbabwe, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Syria, Iran, Belarus, Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, and Malaysia.

The February 2011 Al Jazeera documentary Egypt: Seeds of Change http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrNz0dZgqN8 echoes many of Messan’s and Carlucci’s concerns regarding the influence of CIA-backed foundations in the Egyptian uprising.

Ahmed Bensaada goes even further in Arabesque American, published in May 2011. Bensaada describes the direct involvement of the CIA-backed Serbian group Otpor in the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) “revolutions,” as well as a series pf joint conferences organized by the CIA-backed Center for Nonviolent Action and Strategies (CANVAS) and the State Department, in which Arab activists were brought to the US for training in “nonviolent” organizing techniques (http://stuartbramhall.aegauthorblogs.co ... mericaine/).

Why the CIA Promotes Nonviolence

So why is the CIA so keen on promoting nonviolent revolution? University of California –Santa Barbara sociology professor Peter Robinson outlines the new CIA strategy in his 1996 book Promoting Polyarchy. According to Robinson, as CIA-backed dictatorships around the world lose their grip, the CIA preemptively co-opts the natural (violent) insurgencies that arise to topple them. They themselves instigate popular unrest, using the ensuing chaos to install a puppet of their choosing.

The International Center for Nonviolent Conflict

The International Center for Nonviolent Conflict (ICNC) is another important “democracy manipulating” foundation that promotes Sharp’s work. Australian researcher and journalist Michael Barker’s articles about ICNC (http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/38214) reveal it has strong intelligence links but is independently funded by Peter Ackerman, Michael Milken’s second in command in his junk bond empire. Barker and others also raise concerns about Stephen Zunes, ICNC’s chief academic adviser and one of Sharp’s strongest defenders in the mainstream and alternative media (http://xevolutie.blogspot.com/2011/03/1 ... en-de.html).

In “The Junk Bond ‘Teflon Guy’ Behind Egypt’s Nonviolent Revolution,” Middle East investigative journalist Maidhc O Cathail examines Ackerman’s involvement (along with the Albert Einstein Institution) in the attempted coup against Hugo Chavez. He also asks the thought-provoking question: why Milken was sent to jail, while Ackerman made off with a fortune? http://maidhcocathail.wordpress.com/201 ... revolution

My caveat would be that just because someone is rich doesn't make them sinister. There's all kinds of billionaire agendas out there, many of them quite weird and far afield from the stereotypes. I actually got to meet Michael Milken through my uncle and found him to be a fascinating and engaging guy with some curious and messianic goals that were barely related to Wall Street. Reminded me a great deal of Soros, actually, in terms of his worldview. Not that I've ever met his wrinkled eminence, just based off his books and essays.

(In terms of the question of Milken and Ackerman, that's a pretty simply matter of criminal law and SEC procedure, but that stuff is quite boring and I can understand why the author went with the simpler route of ending with an ominous question. )

Ackerman, however, has also shown up here on RI recently as the $5 million check that started off Americans Elect 2012, which is technically speaking a Hella Suspect Organization. Check that link for further data.

Anyways, here's the two source articles referred to, and some relevant excerpts:

Via: http://www.voltairenet.org/The-Albert-E ... nstitution

The Albert Einstein Institution: non-violence according to the CIA

by Thierry Meyssan

Unknown to the public, Gene Sharp formulated a theory on non violence as a political weapon. Also he first helped NATO and then CIA train the leaders of the soft coups of the last 15 years. Since the 50s, Gene Sharp studied Henry D. Thoreau and Mohandas K. Gandhi’s theory of civil disobedience. For these authors, obedience and disobedience were religious and moral matters, not political ones. However, to preach had political consequences; what could be considered an aim could be perceived as a mean. Civil disobedience can be considered then as a political, even military, action technique.

In 1983, Sharp designed the Non Violent Sanctions Program in the Center for International Affairs of Harvard University where he did some social sciences studies on the possible use of civil disobedience by Western Europe population in case of a military invasion carried out by the troops of the Warsaw Pact. At the same time, he founded in Boston the Albert Einstein Institution with the double purpose of financing his own researches and applying his own models to specific situations. In 1985, he published a book titled "Making Europe Unconquerable " [1] whose second edition included a preface by George Kennan, the Father of the Cold War. In 1987, the association was funded by the U.S. Institute for Peace and hosted seminars to instruct its allies on defense based on civil disobedience. General Fricaud-Chagnaud, on his part, introduced his "civil deterrence" concept at the Foundation of National Defense Studies. [2]

General Edward B. Atkeson, well-known by CIA director, [3] incorporated the Institute to the American interference stay-behind network in allied States. To focus on the moral issues of an action helped to avoid all doubts on the legitimacy of an action. Therefore, non violence, recognized as good-natured and assimilated to democracy, offered a suitable aspect to antidemocratic secret actions.

n 1989, when the Albert Institution became well known, Gene Sharp began to advice anticommunist movements. He participated in the establishment of Burma’s Democratic Alliance - a coalition of notable anticommunists that quickly joined the military government - and Taiwan’s Progressive Democratic Party - which favored the independence of the island from communist China, something U.S. officially opposed. He also unified the Tibetan opposition under Dalai Lama and tried to form a dissident group within PLO so that Palestinian nationalists would stop terrorism [4] (he made the necessary arrangements with Colonel Reuven Gal, [5] director of the Psychological Action division of the Israeli armed forces, to train them secretly in the American Embassy in Tel Aviv).

When CIA realized how useful could the Albert Einstein Institution be, it brought Colonel Robert Helvey into play. An expert in clandestine actions and former dean of the Embassies’s Military Attachés Training School, "Bob" took Gene Sharp to Burma to educate the opposition on the non violent strategy for criticizing the cruelest military junta of the world without questioning the system. By doing this, Helvey could identify the "good" and the "bad" opponents in a critical moment for Washington: the true opposition, led by Mrs. Suu Kyi, was labeled as a threat to the pro-American regimen.

...

Since that moment, Sharp has always been present everywhere American interests are put at risk. In June 1989, he and his assistant, Bruce Jenkins, went to Beijing, two weeks before Tiananmen events. They were both expelled by Chinese authorities. In February 1990, the Albert Einstein Institution hosted a Conference on Non Violent Sanctions that brought together 185 experts of 16 countries under Colonels Robert Helvey and Reuven Gal. This marked the beginning of an international anticommunist crusade to involve peoples in non violent action.

...

When the CIA-organized-coup against Venezuela failed in April 2002, the State Department counted again on the Albert Einstein Institution which advised the owners of enterprises during the organization of the revocatory referendum against President Hugo Chávez. Gene Sharp and his team led the leaders of Súmate during the demonstrations of August 2004. As done before, the only thing they had to do was questioning the electoral results and demanding the resignation of the president. They managed to get the bourgeoisie out in the street but Chavez’s popular government was to strong. All in all, international observers had no other choice but to recognize Hugo Chávez’s victory.

...

But, why Albert Einstein? It is an unsuspicious name. Gene Sharp’s first book on Gandhi’s methods began with a preface signed by Albert Einstein, though the book was written in 1960, five years after the genius’s death. Therefore, Albert Einstein did not write anything for Sharp’s work. All that Sharp did was reproducing an article on non violence written by the scientist.

Some good points there, and I was especially tickled by the post-Newtonian notion that Gene Sharp operates at superlimnal speeds in the interest of the CIA. Quite an impressive guy, that Gene Sharp.

Up next...

Via: http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2011/ ... acked.html

...

Gene Sharp Has Defenders

Despite this, there are still voices out there calling criticism of Gene Sharp's affiliations with the US government and the CIA "wild accusations" and "conspiracy theories." One of these voices is director and Sky News/freelance journalist Ruaridh Arrow of the UK. Arrow has a lot invested in his views, as he is the director of "How to Start a Revolution" and has invested a tremendous amount of time and effort attempting to portray Sharp as anything but an agent of US-funded sedition promoting corporate-fascist global hegemony.



...

In a recent exchange, Mr. Arrow brushed aside all of this evidence in favor of his emotional documentary portraying Gene Sharp as an unsung hero and aging father of a global wave of genuine "democratic revolution." He labeled the June 13, 2011 article "Fake Revolutions" as a "conspiracy theory." He insists that "his research" has brought him to "different" conclusions and stands by his work. While he agreed that Wall Street is a dictatorship, the irony apparently escaped him that his film is about Wall Street literally overrunning the planet with semi-covert revolutions from Tunisia to Thailand.

I'm going to have to spend some time parsing out that Tony Cartalucci piece, because the connections appear to be very tenuous and tortured indeed. It definitely appears to be a "Guilt By Kevin Bacon" routine, something that Glenn Beck, Wayne Madsen and LaRouche are all so fond of -- but I'm open to the strong possibility I'm just not well versed enough in the players here.

That photo of Mr. Arrow definitely reminds me of the infamous Invisible Children founders pic where they're all holding guns, though.

[JackRiddler]

Some notes: These pieces all strike me as "Kevin Bacon" research. Some people are influenced by Gene Sharp's strategic and tactical recommendations. So? I find many things to agree with in Machiavelli's, am I therefore in the employ of the Florentine secret service? Also, false dichotomies, undefined abstractions ("violence"), and argument by (possibly false) association with ideas, up the wazoo. Dr. Bramhall doesn't even bother to define the supposedly effective "violence" and sets up "non-violence" as something the CIA wants. Bullshit.

Among its many functions, the CIA is a large academy unto itself and it studies everything political; its range of theory is going to be a lot broader than its actions, however. Also, it's going to involve itself in every single situation that arises, so that it will always be possible to see a CIA hand in given revolts regardless of whether they were part of originating these or not. Nowadays USG has learned always to hedge its bets, so that as USG backed Mubarak until the last couple of days it also scrambled to place its institutes within the Egyptian resistance.

Moreover, I'd like to see her explain how "violence" is the way to change in the United States, or what "violence" (or "non-violence") even are. Does she mean self-defense against police attack? Breaking a Starbuck's window? An armed insurgency in the woods? Urban terrorist cells a la RAF, blowing up bigwigs? When has there been a successful "violent" revolution in an advanced capitalist nation? The evidence is overwhelming that while cases of insurgent "violence" in the advanced capitalist nations may at times truly be violent, they A) have always amounted to symbolic politics, symbolic insurgency: Kill a boss, be killed by his replacement; and B) have almost always come as a big favor to the forces of reaction, authoritarianism and expansion of state power. You'd think the latter lesson would have been learned by now. Who really did 9/11? Why was it right-wing and fascist intel forces who set up Gladio with its fake leftist terrorists? Who really ran the "fourth generation" of the RAF, and to what purpose?

I hate to think what Meyssan and Bramhall would have been insinuating about MLK, if we transported them back in time. Malcolm X provided a critique - he didn't snitchjacket the man!

[lupercal]

I hate to think what Meyssan and Bramhall would have been insinuating about MLK, if we transported them back in time. Malcolm X provided a critique - he didn't snitchjacket the man!

Let's see if I can help out here. Here's exactly what Meyssan had to say about MLK, on own his website, last April 4, 2009, the 41st anniversary of King's assassination:

Every year, Martin Luther King’s contribution to the moral character of the United States becomes clearer and clearer.

What also becomes clearer is the power and ruthlessness of the forces he was opposing.

The probability that King was killed by forces within the US government becomes clearer every day too.

The elite’s worst fear is that people will overlook minor racial and social differences and not only understand how they’re being screwed but also join together to do something about it.

No one had a clearer voice on this subject than King which is why his life was snuffed out.

http://www.voltairenet.org/Why-King-was ... ated-video

And here's the accompanying video he posted:



As for Meyssan, he's not writing about OWS so much as color revolutions, which he has an intimate knowledge of, having spent most of the last two months in Syria. As you might know, he's consistently reported that the violence there is coming mainly from NATO-backed provocateurs, not Syrian "rebels," and that support for al-Assad remains strong. From his latest report:

Bashar al-Assad, who continues to be the most popular head of state in the Arab world, met with Homs dwellers, but refrained from the traditional walkabout due to the likely presence of isolated terrorists.

“The battle to topple the Syrian regime is over once and forever," said Jihad Makdissi, the Syrian Foreign Ministry spokesman. The country, whose main energy infrastructure and telecommunications have been sabotaged, is entering a phase of reconstruction.

In the meantime, NATO and the GCC have continued to indulge in their schemes. http://www.voltairenet.org/The-Syrian-debacle

So in terms of first-hand experience alone I'd give his analysis a very high rating.

[TerryBain]

Great points by all:

Bruce, for the sake of argument, let's assume the whole premise of the Occupy Movement is that non-violent system change from within is not only possible, but also 1)crucial and 2)a reality that is happening, as we speak (meaning, we ARE winning.) I personally feel that every effort must be made to fix this mess, before the shooting starts - because it's always easier to start violence, than to end it.

The theoretical advantage to the two party system is that it automatically insures majority support of the winning candidate. The reality, documuented in Tragedy and Hope, is that the Money Power has figured out how to subvert the two-party system, at least since J.P. Morgan - buy out all the candidates. The two party system is worth saving.

"Is it going to create it's own party or party wing like the Tea Party?" Ideally, the Movement will be so strong, by election day, that we won't have to endorse candidates, the candidates will endorse us.

"Is it calling for a state-led Constitutional Convention to bypass Congress?" I sure hope we don't have to throw the dice on a wild card solution like that - a government that actually abides by their Oath to the Constitution would be
a compromise I could get behind.

"Is it a guerilla style revolution looking to tear it all down by any means necessary?" I personally feel, as I stated before, that Occupy is winning, so we will dodge the bullet (so to speak) of a "ballots or bullets" decision. Ask any of the Veterans for Peace why that is a desirable outcome. Like the signers of the Declaration, I have mutually pledged my life, my fortune, and my sacred honor - to me Occupy is demonstrably worth it. That is specifically the fundamental question we all have to individually make.

[JackRiddler]

I didn't say what they'd write about MLK decades after his death, but how they might react to him when alive. Speculative, so no need to debate.

[Joe Hillshoist]

IMO, the most important decision that needs to be made is whether or not OWS believes that it's possible to work for meaningful change within an existing system that has been specifically constructed with the goal of preventing meaningful change.

That depends on how well constructed the system is and how imaginative sand determined the members of OWS in their attempts to find ways to create meaningful change doesn't it?

No. Either you believe it's possible to change the system from within or you don't, and making that decision is an important one that I'm still not sure anyone has made.

Is OWS going to work within the 2-party system?

Is it going to create it's own party or party wing like the Tea Party?

Is it calling for a state-led Constitutional Convention to bypass Congress?

Is it a guerilla style revolution looking to tear it all down by any means necessary?

I haven't been involved in OWS at all since December, but my interactions with them prior to that made it clear that there really is nothing approaching consensus when it comes to the above questions.

I'm not asking for a detailed, point by point roadmap to utopia. I'm simply saying that I believe the first step has to involve answering the fundamental question of do we believe that we can make meaningful change within the system as it currently stands.

Not that'd I know, living in the bush half a world away... but ... it seems to me OWs has to be of the belief that meaningful change is possible within the system to some degree at least otherwise it wouldn't exist.

If not it would have called itself burn down wall st and eat the rich and started a revolution.

Is that a fair assessment?

Mind you it could be a case of not believing that change is possible and people are going thru the motions to get laid look cool and all the rest but I dunno if thats a fair comment either.

[bks]

IMO, the most important decision that needs to be made is whether or not OWS believes that it's possible to work for meaningful change within an existing system that has been specifically constructed with the goal of preventing meaningful change.

This may seem completely obvious, but I believe that it's the kind of obvious that often gets overlooked. It's the forest that can't be seen for the trees.

Absolutely.

This has been a central and constantly recurring issue in the #Occupy cells I've seen, both in the GA context and informally. I also suspect that the lack of a clear platform and "demands" is a calculated bid to side-step this extremely divisive question. Yet this question is the core of any subsequent action.

It seems to me that the matter was "decided" at the beginning, which doesn't mean it can't become a problem to confront again later on [and perhaps it has]. I began the OWS metathread with the observation that:

ON THE REFUSAL TO DEMAND: OWS seems to understands that if you make a set of demands, you signal a willingness to enter into a kind of discourse that OWS seems not to want to enter into. If you say what your demands are, that's the first step in not having them met, of course. 'You asked for this, we'll negotiate, you'll get less than that or seem unreasonable."

By NOT asking, OWS seems to be saying that it understands that they cannot win by "making demands". By "not making demands" they show an principled unwillingness to accept the legitimacy of the 'protestors complain, the powerful listen, reforms are considered and either made or not made' frame.

SO OWS says, "no". We reject the this framing, because we see the operation of power in this society as fundamentally illegitimate. Not necessarily that any exercise of state power is illegitimate [though there may be many within OWS with that point of view], but that power as it is expressed in this set of circumstances is fundamentally illegitimate. And further: any appeals to that fundamentally illegitimate power to fix itself or to even make structural, deep reforms would be to legitimate that power in a fashion OWS fundamentally does not want to do.

Despite the use of "we" I don't really see OWS as a whole; I see it more as a collection of discreet parts that have organizational elements connecting them, but not into an organic whole. Part of the substantive connective tissue is [or certainly has been] acceptance of the illegitimacy of the current power structure - including of course that power structure's capacity to obstruct, thwart, co-opt or corrupt efforts to change its core operation. An ethos of non-conformity to that power system's actual operating principles is what I took the spirit of OWS to be. Minus that, OWS becomes something less radical and therefore less threatening.

Been reading these, as a way into re-exploring these questions [good for Jack's French Revolution thread too]:

Kant: What is Enlightenment? [1784]

https://www.google.com/search?q=what+is ... =firefox-a

Foucault: What is Enlightenment? Published to roughly coincide the 200th anniversary of Kant's piece [1984]

https://www.google.com/search?q=foucaul ... =firefox-a

[JackRiddler]

Not that'd I know, living in the bush half a world away... but ... it seems to me OWs has to be of the belief that meaningful change is possible within the system to some degree at least otherwise it wouldn't exist.

If not it would have called itself burn down wall st and eat the rich and started a revolution.

Is that a fair assessment?

Don't know, but the alternative you counterpose is definitely not the way to start a revolution but to strengthen reaction and legitimate greater state power. Revolutions in modern mass societies, if they've happened at all, are started by persistent and non-violent working for urgent and reasonable reform while espousing an unapologetic radical analysis - which, by the way, in this case means dismantling Wall Street - and educating and building a coalition of those whose interests and consciences converge around it, for years, until you demonstrate that the institutions in power will never respond to reason as long as they are in power. A seemingly sudden emergence finally comes, in which you make business as usual impossible via occupations and general strikes. Winning over the majority of soldiers in the army to a stance of (at the minimum) not shooting you is key to this stage. Then you watch some piece of the old establishment call itself a government and announce that it has conceded to all popular demands, as well as the IMF's, and contest with the majority view that wants a resolution already (having seen too many Hollywood movies) and a return to some imagined normalcy of the past. Etc. Etc.

.

[2012 Countdown]

I just think its funny that in the beginning, OWS was allegedly overtaken/ infiltrated and they were trying to be violent/got accused of being violent by the right wing/Fox/establishment. That was the meme.

Obviously the being violent/trying to was proof of CIA infiltration (by other 'theorists'). There were many observers who said no, not violent. Talk of Black Bloc tactics and how that would hurt the cause (I agree -for now. Things get worse, and they will, I suggest reevaluation). But now OWS is infiltrated because they ARE NOT violent.

Whatever. Attempts are/will be made, and maybe success by operatives in political areas too. But once those who use it to gain power then again do not deliver, what do you think will happen?

[TerryBain]

2012 - you are back to the main point of this thread. How do we Occupy Occupy? At this point, a pretty good case seems to have been made that Infiltration (of several different flavors) is a reality that should be assumed, for the sake of furthering this discussion. A pretty good case seems to have been made that the Delphi Technique (renamed Wombat, of course) exists, and can be countered with fairly simple Deliberative Body procedures (Robert's Rules, for example.) Once GA's learn how to do the work people came together for in the first place, other Infiltration techniques (like Black Bloc) should be able to be brought back under control.

Taking that all as a "Whereas...." What are the issues that we can agree not to disagree on. If we consider this board as a "Commitee of the Whole" - isn't it possible to work through the process of coming to that Resolution?

[Joe Hillshoist]

Not that'd I know, living in the bush half a world away... but ... it seems to me OWs has to be of the belief that meaningful change is possible within the system to some degree at least otherwise it wouldn't exist.

If not it would have called itself burn down wall st and eat the rich and started a revolution.

Is that a fair assessment?

Don't know, but the alternative you counterpose is definitely not the way to start a revolution but to strengthen reaction and legitimate greater state power. Revolutions in modern mass societies, if they've happened at all, are started by persistent and non-violent working for urgent and reasonable reform while espousing an unapologetic radical analysis - which, by the way, in this case means dismantling Wall Street - and educating and building a coalition of those whose interests and consciences converge around it, for years, until you demonstrate that the institutions in power will never respond to reason as long as they are in power. A seemingly sudden emergence finally comes, in which you make business as usual impossible via occupations and general strikes. Winning over the majority of soldiers in the army to a stance of (at the minimum) not shooting you is key to this stage. Then you watch some piece of the old establishment call itself a government and announce that it has conceded to all popular demands, as well as the IMF's, and contest with the majority view that wants a resolution already (having seen too many Hollywood movies) and a return to some imagined normalcy of the past. Etc. Etc.

.

Yeah ... we may be in agreement on that.

I mean .... Occupy is working within the system as it stands simply because ... it is. The only real way to live outside the system is to piss off to an uninhabited tropical island and start being self sufficient. Ultimately even a "revolution" (violent or non violent as you outline above) is within the system cos its just changing who controls the resources.

Ultimately OWs has to operate within some sort of system and its aim has to be to bring the extreme ends of the Pareto Distribution of resources closer together. (Cos the one percent are the top 20% of the top 20% of the top 20%.) That may mean dismantling the system "as it stands", but probably its better to do that within something resembling the US constitution and the Bill of Rights. Well maybe just the bill of Rights.

[2012 Countdown]

Not really the proper place for this, but he addresses occupy, and many of the things being brought up by posters here, and after posting it on another board ( a laregly right wing bd) I am finding a favorable reaction...



Thought I'd post it here, as our new member TerryBain should see it -if he hasn't already.

[Wombaticus Rex]

Harpers, Feb 2012 - "Some Assembly Required: Witnessing the Birth of Occupy Wall Street" by Nathan Schneider -- it's behind a paywall and I've got a physical copy in front of me, but: recommended, highly. Really illustrates how chaotic and multi-factional the genesis was. If any quotes leap off the page, I'll type 'em out. Definitely worth hitting a library for, though.

[TerryBain]

Thanks Rex - looking forward to it.

2012 - Thanks, SWEET interview, hadn't caught it, till now. Some reactions to the first hour:

At about six minutes, Hedges points out historically, liberal is not a left wing construct. It should be the center (Again, there used to be liberal Republicans and Democrats)

In the first fifteen minutes, it seems obvious that Hedges is not addressing Quigley's historic reality of our real opponent, the Money Power. That oversight is vital to the occupy movement actually winning - we know who our opponent is, and we know their plan. As Sun Tzu says, if you defeat the opponent's plan, you win without fighting a battle.

At about 16 minutes, he addresses the failure of educaton - Liberal Arts comes from Latin for education "worthy of freemen" - as opposed to a slaves more limited vocational education.

At about 35 minutes he reminds listeners that the Times is not liberal, as many Fox heads tend to believe.

39 minutes in, he states "Our children will never have the standard of living we had..." I do not concur - if I was a Malthusian, I might be forced to agree with that statement. I am not a Malthusian (Malthus was an employee of the British East India company - a Money Power subsidiary) More on that later - just saying....

42 minutes - He sums up the main message of Occupy, stating the Corporate Coup has to be reversed."

47 minutes - Hedges identifies the Occupy Opponent as "Corporate Capitolism" - Quigley and I would dissagree. Monopoly Capitolism is the problem and the difference is, once again, crucial. More on that later - just saying....

49 minutes - Hedges points out that predicting the timing of how long it will take Occupy to overthrow our opponent's coup is impossible. From his personal experience, he states he remembers being in Leipzig listening to knowledgable sources predict Free Passage of the Berlin Wall within a year - it actually happened within hours.

53 minutes - Hedges says the Times is not corrupt. Um...if he understood Operation Mockingbird and Quigley a little better - it is possible he might not be that charitable. Course, now, he still gets paid to write. It's been quite some time since I could say that. Personally, I would like to throw out there that if any representatives of the Royal Timese Machine are out there, I can't be bought, but I might rent pretty cheap if I could avoid puking in my mouth while I write. It breaks my concentration.

59 minutes - Having reported on Serajevo, he mirrors our thoughts that avoiding descent into violence is worth the effort. Obviously, I concur.

Dude - great interview. Thanks. Now I only have two more hours of it to get through. (Heavy Sigh)