For example "What have we really become? Corporate run government is fascism."
Really? When did this become the definition of fascism? There has never been a fascist state that was run by corporations. Mussolini's and Hitler's fascist states were states where government controlled the corporations. That is a far, far different thing. To not understand the distinction is to completely miss the point.
Especially because the very thing these protestors would like (simultaneously with advocating anaarchy, go figure), is more government control of corporations.
I'm not a particular fan of crony capitalism, or crony socialism, which is closer to what we have. But the problem isn't the corporations. The corporations rationally seek to gain influence with a government of sweeping, nearly unlimited regulatory powers that can, at the stroke of a pen, destroy their business, or enrich it. What else would you expect them to do? And in what way would you ever make them stop? As you give government more and more power over the fate of corporations, you give corporations more and more incentive to seek influence within government.
Every time these supposed anti-fascists push government to tax and regulate corporations more, they move one step closer to actual fascism.
Meanwhile, another protestor displays the anarchy symbol, and a quotation from Abbie Hoffman. "The first duty of a revolutionist is to get away with it." Unshown is the followup sentence "The second duty is to eat breakfast." I'm honestly unsure what's profound about either sentence.
I'm not fond of actual anarchists -- as some very wise men understood, governments are instituted to secure our rights. A state of anarchy may be preferable to totalitarianism, but not by much. However, these deluded fools aren't anarchists. They sport the symbols and the "down with authority" language, but all their actual demands call for an ever-larger government to grant them ever more entitlements. Don't they get even a little bit embarrassed by that? Did anyone ever sit down with them and actually explain what "anarchy" means?
Another unintentionally hilarious (and true) sign depicts a large check (very professionally printed, I might add). It lists "Payee" as "99 percent," yet also states "Pay to the order of the top one percent" the amount of "5 billion dollar state tax cut."
Now, I know the poor protestor has probably never cut a check to anyone in his life, being a money-grubbing parasite who would prefer to take than give, but "Payee" is the party in an exchange who receives payment, so what he's really saying in his sign is that both the one percent and the 99 percent benefit from the 5 billion dollar state tax cut. Exactly right. But I don't think that's what he meant.
Another great photo shows the protestors posting a bill on the front of a Chase bank branch. The bill is for "foreclosure/(illegible) crisis, loan 'swap' deals, property tax loopholes, cuts to small business" -- uh, wait, aren't most of those things controlled by the government (even, arguably, the foreclosure crisis, due to federal policies that encouraged sub-prime loans)? Why is the bill going to Chase, not the government?
Is Chase responsible for taking advantage of legal property tax reductions? Shouldn't you be mad at government for offereing the "loopholes" not at a company for rationally taking advantage of them? And how, exactly, does Chase have the power to "cut" small business? By no longer offering loans it considers to risky? I'm a small businessman and had trouble with Chase taking an exorbitant amount of time to do a loan for me earlier this year -- they were being ridiculously slow about approving a loan I was obviously a good risk for. Instead of whining about it, we just took our business to a different bank. Problem solved. That's capitalism, baby: you get to shop around, find someone who wants your business and vote with your pocketbook. I love it.
There are a lot of signs along the lines of making banks pay. Funny, no matter how hard I try, I can't think of an instance where a bank owes me money it hasn't paid me. No bank ever came to me and forced me to do business with them, or forced me to sign a contract, nor violated the terms of a contract I willingly signed. Why do they owe us, again? Meanwhile, the government takes money against my will all the time and spends it on a lot of really worthless stuff (Solyndra, anyone?). Why are these people mad at the banks instead of the government? Why do they want the government to exert more control over the banks?
Do they seriously think the government will make better decisions than the bankers? Who has more skin in the game? I think that would be the bankers.
I can't keep cataloguing the signs. The idiocy is just too infuriating. And too self-evident.
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