As relevant as a sibg can be.
People are longing for a president who can understand their pain, mix it up and get action — not one who averts his gaze, avoids conflict, delegates to Congress, wastes time hunting for common ground, cedes the moon to opponents and fails to get anywhere.
Berlin's Museum of Natural History, this is the Brazilian Treehopper, or Bocydium globulare - a real living insect, which only pretends to be an alien helicopter-
October 6, 2011, 9:38 AM
Unsavvy People
Nieman Watchdog has a very good piece by John Hanrahan about press coverage of the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations. Coverage was initially dismissive and minimal — and mea culpa, I wasn’t paying attention myself. But it’s becoming clear that there’s something important happening: finally, after three years in which Very Serious People refused to hold the financial industry accountable, there’s a real grass-roots uprising against the Masters of the Universe.
There will, of course, be the usual attempts to dismiss the whole thing based on trivialities. Look at the oddly dressed people acting out! So? Is it better when exquisitely tailored bankers whose gambles brought the world economy to its knees — and who were bailed out by taxpayers — whine that President Obama is saying slightly mean things about them?
Or, why don’t they try to work within the system? Well, how’s that been going for those who did indeed try? When palace intrigue undermined the likes of Elizabeth Warren even within the Obama administration, and Republicans have thrown their full backing behind the malefactors of great wealth, why shouldn’t protesters go outside the usual channels?
Finally, why not defer to people who know what needs to be done? Regular readers know the answer: the VSPs have been consistently, awesomely wrong, both before the financial crisis and after. Nothing in the recent record of policy suggests that the wise men of finance deserve any credence at all.
So, good for the protesters. And if the Obama people have any sense of self-preservation, they’ll try to mend fences with the people they have disappointed so badly.
