Occupy Wall Street Militancy Just Getting Started
Posted 11/04/2011 06:55 PM ET
Politics: What is the real point of "Occupy Wall Street"? The violence in Oakland offers the first clue. Now with politically connected union bosses and Acorn involved, it might just be worth looking at its links to Democrats.
Now that Oakland's streets have been "redecorated" with shattered glass, cement chunks and burning garbage from the Occupy Wall Street movement, it's critical to see that these acts are no aberration, but came after calls for force and violence. What makes it disturbing is how close the White House is to them as election time approaches.
United Steelworkers President Leo Gerard, speaking on radio host Ed Schultz's show last Monday, declared, "What we need is more militancy." Asked to clarify, Gerard said: "I think we've got to start a resistance movement. If Wall Street Occupation doesn't get the message, I think we've got to start blocking bridges and doing that kind of stuff."
The Canadian union leader then denounced Americans' 2008 election of Tea Party representatives to the House as "nut jobs," and called for more force and illegality: "We ought to be doing more than occupying parks. We ought to start occupying bridges. We ought to start occupying the banks' places themselves."
Despite his proletarian persona, Gerard is close to Occupy Wall Street's criteria for the 1%, pulling in a $188,000 salary and benefits. He's won an honorary college degree and attended galas in his honor. He's served on the board of the Apollo Alliance, tied to one-time Obama "green jobs" czar Van Jones, and served on the board of the Economic Policy Institute, a George Soros front. And he heads the tony-sounding Blue-Green alliance, which links labor to wealthy environmentalists.
That's elite all by itself. But more to the point, he's political. He's got the White House ear as a frequent visitor, and has been appointed to the White House Advisory Committee on Trade Policy and Negotiations. On that board, he evidently had enough clout to delay the U.S.-Colombia free-trade treaty for nearly two years.
Now Gerard's calling for taking U.S. bridges and banks by force, depriving citizens of their property, access to money and right of passage. This isn't democracy — it's violence, as the Oakland protests showed.
Two months ago another White House ally, Teamsters chief Jimmy Hoffa, openly called for his members to "take these sons of bitches out" in Congress, as Obama stood silently at his side. "They got a war with us and there's only going to be one winner," he growled.
Hoffa's Teamsters, it should be noted, have the most violent record of all labor unions, clocking in 454 incidents of violence since 1991, according to the National Institute for Labor Relations Research in Washington.
Then there's the SEIU-linked Acorn, which has made OWS its latest cause. The Obama-tied group had supposedly disbanded, but now operates as New York Communities for Change (NYCC), using the strong-arm political tactics of community organizer Saul Alinsky.
Since it was discovered that NYCC was a prime funder and director of the Occupy movement, Fox News reports that the group has been shredding documents, firing staff, offering up alibis and surveilling Fox News personnel.
One starts to wonder: Is Occupy Wall Street a grass-roots movement, or a corrupt, violent organization whose real center is the Obama administration itself? One thing's for sure: It isn't interested in democracy. |
