The case against Occupy

Asking “Where did the Occupy movement go wrong?” is akin to musing “Where did Michael Moore’s fitness regime fall apart?” The answer: early, often, all over the place.

The propelling mindset driving the vast majority of the Occupy movement is not one of genuine civil service, dedicated to the honest betterment of America as a whole (like, say, the Tea Party), but rather one of entitled victimization from a growing number of those who think other people should be forced to share their success.

This compilation of old hippies pining for revolution amongst college kids who simply don’t want to make their own way is the unsurprising result of liberalism in America today. This is what happens when children are fed faux lessons in self esteem and tolerance from broken family systems and then taught in school that the theory of communism is noble, if only the implementation could be mastered. American students are engulfed in a sea of liberalism from kindergarten through university, often void of any opposing views and without prompting to study the historical precedent and common sense consequences of the ideology with which they’re being indoctrinated.

The protestors, in the beginning, took to the streets against “corporate corruption and greed.” A decent and reasonable cause to be sure, but one that lasted shorter than a New York minute. Unfortunately, any decent and reasonable people quite quickly picked up their corporation made signs and went home the instant they saw these protests for what they really are: A war against traditional American values, including capitalism, and a battle to get as much of somebody else’s money as possible.

Indeed, any reasonable people left at the first Communist Party endorsement and shivered as their leader said “We are marching side by side and with the occupy movement. They want what we want.” He received a resounding ovation.  Any reasonable stragglers willing to give it another try took off when the American NAZI Party backed the cause. With that the anti-American sentiment began piling up.

Spray painting American flags, cries for socialism and income equality, extreme anti-Semitism, signs depicting the decapitation of CEOs, videos wishing for the hanging of George W. Bush. And then, unfathomably, the original Occupy located on Wall Street in New York City created fliers showing how to make paper planes and then threw the planes at buildings.

Anti-American sentiment aside, the list of grievances at these protests expands vastly every day. Thousands of arrests, illegal drugs, dozens of incidents of violence, a growing number of rape and sexual abuse reports (and calls from within the Occupy Wall Street camp not to report the sexual abuse), causing disturbances in area businesses, defecating on the front steps of peoples’ homes, engaging in public nudity and sexual activity, and breaking numerous permit and sanction laws.

“Reasonable” and “occupier” are antonymous.

While the criminal activity and despicable actions are appalling and troublesome, it is the mindset, not the acts, that most frighten me for this country.

It is a lack of common sense that says “Down with evil capitalism!” with no regard for what the alternative really entails. It is a lack of logic that shouts “Corruption must go! Government should take over!”, as if a government takeover would produce less corruption, not eons more.  It is an entitlement culture that makes one believe that they have the right to take from someone else what they please.

Occupy Oakland opined recently, “This will take a complete collapse of our current governing system.”  And Occupy San Diego marched for citizens’ rights to print their own money. All of this while pushing for government takeover of banks, businesses, the housing market, and loan institutions. Marxism by means of anarchy.

This is America, where people have the freedom to work and make their own success. It is our blessed capitalist system that gave us the strongest economy on the globe, and provides the largest percentage of people the best chance to succeed.  It allows for the ebb and flow of free markets to determine what ideas are the best and which aren’t worth the time or money. Capitalism is the fairest system man has created, for it allows every single person an equal opportunity to succeed.

The occupiers want precisely the opposite. They are chanting for government mandated wealth, as if the government is so excellent at doing anything that they should also decide where funds come from and to whom they should be doled out.  The occupiers are ignoring thousands of year’s worth of evidence that says as government is expanded and freedom is stifled, everyone suffers.  This is socialism, and it grants nothing but equality of failure.

They call for the rich to pay their “fair share”, yet are unwilling to determine just what exactly that number is. The occupiers either choose to ignore, or choose not to care, the fact that if everyone in this country making over $250,000 a year was taxed at 100%, the government could fund the socialistic programs Occupy wants for all of six months.  Then what? Who to tax after that?

They complain about Wall Street receiving bailouts, but choose to ignore the real problem: that our government is granting anyone bailouts in the first place. They call for the heads of CEOs while the President they support wasted over 500 million dollars on a “green jobs” scam.

They say, “End the massive amounts of money that control politics.” Yet, when polled, over 70% said they will vote for Obama, who received more Wall Street money than any other Presidential candidate in history. They are hypocrites at every turn. They know not what they want (in any organized, unified manner), nor how to get it, so they turn sharply towards violence and disorder in an effort to prove their relevance.

In a hilariously idiotic display of irony, Occupy Wall Street is experiencing firsthand the failure of the system they are clamoring for. They squabbled over how to properly distribute the over half a million dollars in donations they received.  Some people felt they deserved more because they were doing more activist work, versus those who spent their occupying days playing drum circles or doing, well, nothing. What’s incredible is that the same people arguing over how to redistribute the wealth given them are pushing for a complete American system of wealth redistribution. They see no correlation between their own inability to “fairly” distribute money and that government mandated wealth distribution would just as assuredly fail as well, but on a massive, nation-shaking economic scale.

Similarly, the kitchen staff at Occupy Wall Street ran into problems when they felt they shouldn’t have to prepare food for the “homeless and free loaders”. In summary, the group fighting for a socialist nation where everyone is equal regardless of output refuses to serve those who aren’t doing their share. Apparently, hypocrisy and irony are foreign concepts to the Occupy crowd.

What is perhaps most disconcerting is not that a few college kids and hippies are upset about student loans and mortgages, but that this clearly sordid movement has the complete support of major players in the American political system and media. Elizabeth Warren claims to be the “brains behind Occupy Wall Street” (insert joke here); Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, and the President himself have all spoken in support of the protests. If that weren’t bad enough, the liberal media has all but drooled over the occupiers and their plight for more than a month now. Keith Olbermann visited the Wall Street squatters, while Rachel Maddow, Anderson Cooper, Chris Matthews, and others have essentially plugged Occupy on a nightly basis. This, of course, is to be expected from those who not only agree with the protestors on most of their pleas, but are working to implement them in an official capacity even as we speak. Anyone who thinks Barack Obama isn’t a socialist hasn’t been paying attention.

It is bothersome that our nation’s leaders sympathize with this cause; it is worse still that they fail to distance themselves when any normal person would watch and be disgusted. What kind of culture do we live in when the President of the United States and his minions, along with thousands of others who may not consider themselves radical, yet certainly support much of this movement (some of my loved ones included) see a group such as this and say “Yes, this is what I support.”

These people got a dog to rip apart an American flag amongst a cheering crowd, drew a Swastika on Martin Luther King Junior’s statue, have “solidarity” marches with NAZIs and pedophiles, and hung an effigy of a banker with a noose. Who doesn’t step back and think, “Wait a minute, what am I hitching my wagon to?”

Normal people do not include themselves amongst NAZIs, communists, rapists, and thugs. Normal people run the other direction.

If you woke up from a 6-month coma and saw these two sides - one with the support of American tradition, family values, and good, smart people like Thomas Sowell and the other with the support of NAZIs, Jew-haters, beastiality advocates, and the current President of the United States – which would you gravitate towards?

It is not these protests that must be squelched, although I suspect that will happen eventually, the first time somebody gets shot (it’s coming), but rather the mindset that I deserve the benefits of another person’s success. That idea is dangerous to the very fabric of American freedom, and will forever cripple American prosperity (and consequentially the world’s economy will suffer) if not stomped out with every boot and ballot.  The idea that success should be a mandated right is distinctly anti-American, as is Occupy.

I want an America where hard work and success is celebrated, not shunned. An America where people want to make something of their lives because contributing to society is inherently good. An America more like Reagan’s America, where Communism is a dirty word, not prayed for in the streets of our cities.

Author’s note: If you aren’t sure what to think about the Occupy movement, or want proof of the events taking place, I’ve got dozens of videos and articles documenting the protests.  Just ask.