Excellent Charlie Rose episode Tuesday night, with the first segment being about Occupy Wall Street: A reporter from NY Mag said there's a radical utopian wing (think Adbusters) and a radical reformer wing (think European social democrats here in America). I've not phrased it that way, but my blogging on that issue falls exactly on those lines. My critiques of segments within OWS has been about the radical utopian wing, while pushing to strengthening the radical reformer wing, with actual, and transparent leadership, formulation of specific ideas, etc.
That said, a note to the radical utopian wing, per previous blogging. If you do want to overthrow the current structure, your utopian ideas about structureless society are simply wrong. So, what NEW structure do you, or will you, propose to replace the current one after it collapses, or you should collapse it?
The NY Mag reporter went on to compare this, in possible political impact, to 1968, and how the antiwar movement wound up hurting Humphrey, noting the Occupy movement could hurt Obama, either by undercutting the enthusiasm of 2008 or pushing away independents.
Knowing Obama, I know he'll take his gamble on being hurt by the true left rather than independent voters.
Meanwhile, the New York Review reporter on the show said that Obama might be partially dinged by 16 years (yes, Clinton as well as Bush) of diminution of the office of the president. That might be a bit possible, but, Obama had the biggest victory since old man Bush in 1988, arguably, and had something on which to build, and failed.
Meanwhile, the still-stagnant economy will likely play some action in how Obama (speaking of Clinton) tries to "triangulate" off of Occupy Wall Street.
Anyway, go to PBS and find the link. It's good stuff.
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