Tea Party – Occupy Wall Street

Say what you will about the Tea Party and their tactics in the House over the debate surrounding the Debt Ceiling and raising it.

There is absolutely no doubt that the Tea Party has been wildly more successful in their ambitions to change politics than the Occupy Wall Street hippies ever thought they could hope for.

There hasn’t been a serious OWS story in a year, there are no Occupy candidates running for office and not one that holds office.

Given that success, which movement do you think more accurately represents most American’s desires – the Tea Party or Occupy Wall Street?

19 responses to “Tea Party – Occupy Wall Street

  1. Never mistake the Liberals and the subset of them in OWS for Americans. Just because they live here and were likely born here doesn’t make them our countrymen in way other than legalism,

    • jonolan, that’s true – the Tea Party had some success. And OWS didn’t. But I think that’s because it was quickly obvious that they were far away from any version mainstream liberalism and let themselves be overrun with the anarchists (poor anarchists, never manage to find a permanent home but I guess that’s not what they seek).

      But I think the big difference in outcomes is better explained by the fact that financing and an organizational structure jumped in and steered the TP toward elections. OWS didn’t attract any of that.

      And OWS had no policy positions, no goals, no mission and chased away the very people that would otherwise have been their natural allies. They ended up representing protest only.

      I do think however, that some part of what they started and failed at may resurface as something else, something a little more ‘grown up’.

      And of course they’re out countrymen (am I?) – social protest and revolution are build into who Americans are.

      • And of course they’re out countrymen (am I?) – social protest and revolution are build into who Americans are.

        I think that what jonolan means is this:

        America is more of an ideal than a place. You could take the population of America and swap it with the population of Europe. And America would follow across the ocean. It’s the idea that we are free and embrace individual liberty.

        That, at my discretion, I can choose to act or not.

        OWS folks don’t buy into that. They feel that there should be an explicit equalization applied by force through the government. That charity be mandated.

        In that regard they are not “of the American Ideal” and are not “among those we count as countrymen”.

        They are Western Europeans legally recognized as Americans.

        • Exactly, Pino!

          It is not their actions, for the most part, that mark them as un-American. It is their enemies and their goals that do so.

        • For all their faults, the mainstream of the OWS crowd were mostly about a single idea, one quite in keeping with the American story.

          I sympathized with much of their original message; they lost me with the delivery and how easily they let themselves be overrun with nonsense.

          They objected to today’s vast income inequality – I think anyone interested in the future and security of this nation has to be greatly concerned about that. It’s not good for countries and other living things.

          And in any case, this country is – and always has been – made up of a polygot of ideologies. Your view of who is and who isn’t a countryman is quite fascistic I think – does everyone have to think alike?

          I remember Rick Santorum – Rick Santorum!!! – saying during his last campaign “the American dream is still alive and well – in Finland”.

          I grew up in a country that acheived great things like going into space and amazing the entire world.

  2. Anytime you try to achieve equality by starting with envy, you inevitably are destructive. OWS was always about class envy. It was about using political power to blackmail the rich into giving the poor free stuff. It was never about providing a path out of poverty.

    The Tea Partiers are essentially middle class Libertarians. Amusing how this segment of the middle class are now labeled ” extremists “. So why weren’t they taken over by right wing anarchists and neo-nazis?

  3. From now on, whenever you insist the media is liberal, I want you to revisit this story. If the media is liberal, why was OWS treated as a circus sideshow and then ignored, while the tea party was given the red carpet.

    Oh, and while we’re at it, in ten years you’ll be embarrassed to have ever embraced the tea party. I’ll bet you a beer.

    • If the media is liberal, why was OWS treated as a circus sideshow

      They were held as the darlings of the media. It wasn’t until they ACTUALLY became a freakin circus sideshow that they lost their momentum in the media. They were raping their own in those camps. They were fighting over money and drugs. They would shit in the street.

      Had they not been so flippin’ “carney rat” ish, they may have pushed agendas. There is a LOT to be said about croney capitalism that they could have championed. There’s even some good work they could have done with illegal foreclosures and stuff. But you simply can’t govern or hold discussions with people acting like they were acting.

      There is no place in a civil world for that behavior.

      the tea party was given the red carpet.

      What?

      Tea Baggers?
      Racists.
      Spitting on black congressmen as they marched?

      You would be hard pressed to make the case that the media represented the Tea Party as anything but a fringe group of idiots.

      Oh, and while we’re at it, in ten years you’ll be embarrassed to have ever embraced the tea party.

      Te be sure, they have made mistakes and have over reached. When the message strays from anything have to do with taxes and spending, the Tea Party has lost it’s way. Their involvement in gay rights, abortion and any of that is too far.

      And yes, in their rush to govern, they have nominated some pretty crazy folks – who can forget The Witch and then the candidate they put up against Reid. But they have adjusted and now have some pretty strong folks not only in the House but in the Senate as well.

      Rand Paul is pretty strong, Rubio too. Cruz is a little too hard charging for me, but hey.

      • pino – I think the most interesting stuff in coming months/years is going to be new coalitions because we’re seeing more libertarians, who won’t buy any single party line.

        I agree that Paul can have some power, but Rubio will disappoint because he’s not who they think he is. As for Cruz, well, I think he burned his bridges to any higher office pretty fast, but he does have himself lined up nicely to become the smart Sarah Palin no matter what happens electorally. Political celebrity is very seductive.

        • I think the most interesting stuff in coming months/years is going to be new coalitions because we’re seeing more libertarians, who won’t buy any single party line.

          I hope you are right. We need candidates that can speak to fiscal responsibility without having to answer to the dumb-assedness that is the social conservative.

          I agree that Paul can have some power, but Rubio will disappoint because he’s not who they think he is. As for Cruz, well, I think he burned his bridges to any higher office pretty fast, but he does have himself lined up nicely to become the smart Sarah Palin no matter what happens electorally.

          I have the same problem with all three of them that I had with Obama.

          They are all first term Senators that have little, if any, experience running anything of significance. Obama’s inability to manage organizations is on display nearly twice a month.

    • Nick – this weekend we’ve got some GOPers in DC starting to eat their own (would you like some Cruz with that sir?), so I’ll stand with you on the bet.

  4. Red carpet? The Tea Parties are routinely slandered in the trained seal media. Even when rapes and riots and trashed public spaces became too common to ignore at OWS camp sites, OWS were underclass heroes in the media.

    We had ACORN, then OWS. I wonder what the next leftist acronym being cooked up in the bowels of progressive oz will be. I bet the usual suspects will all be there.

    • Alan, thanks for bringing me up to date on the name of the enemy. This “trained seal media” is new I guess. First it was the liberal media, then the mainstream media, then the lame stream media and now trained seal media. I am seriously impressed with the rhyming scheme. That’s the stuff Rush excels at.

      Media reported on both movements in the usual way with print, magazines, real online news sites etc reporting on them, while television mostly covered the circus aspects of both. Television is media but it sure isn’t news.

      • Ms. Holland,

        Actually I don’t know if I heard that somewhere or made it up myself. I never liked the way driveby, mainstream, lamestream, and some of Rush’s other terms sound. The talking heads seal barking and clapping for a fish on TV, on pretty much anything the President chooses to say is the image I have burned into my brain. If I had toy fish I’d throw them at my set along with the profanity I spew out while viewing. But I’m getting better. I’m learning to just walk away from the TV.

  5. Pino totally agree. Moe I agree as well. Bottom line the Tea Party organized and got results at an electoral and legislative level, like the results or not. The Occulosers were a sideshow.

    As I blogged during, I held out hope that OWS would get their $hit together as a formidable adversary on the left, but twinkly fingers and mike checks wouldn’t cut it. I liked their idea of promoting credit unions vs Bank of America but their spoiled loser antics ruined their message and momentum.

    Had they surrounded a news station’s headquarters or the White House or a legislator’s residence instead of a bank or a business (or ruining a park) I believe they would have been taken more seriously and actually achieved something significant (including respect). Unfortunately, all they did was come across as spoiled useless wannabe’s.

    • Vern – that’s a pretty accurate summary of how OWS went down. Some good thoughts in the wrong hands and a good idea gone very wrong very quickly. And when they let that happen, they made it harder for anyone following to resurrect the the message. Clown-assery really doesn’t get stuff done.

      I do think though that some of those issues are already resurfacing as people begin to recognize that there’s a threat posed by increasing income disparity. Question is who will carry the message and will it become dialogue or another circus.

      • I think what further complicates that, Moe, is that our culture has become increasingly passive on the one hand or too indebted on the other. Some simply want others to do their dirty work while others, if mature, responsible adults wanting to act, some of the even more passive protests like switching banks or taking a week off work to camp in a park are not so easy any more like perhaps like it was before. For instance, starting fresh with a new bank discards a long banking relationship and trust with your previous bank. We’re also so in debt, most cannot take off a week or even a half day to protest or March. Many are oppressed, in a sense, by their debt and can’t get out there leaving only the bum loser half-wits left to carry the message out in the streets.

      • Some good thoughts in the wrong hands and a good idea gone very wrong very quickly. And when they let that happen, they made it harder for anyone following to resurrect the the message. Clown-assery really doesn’t get stuff done.

        Totally agree. No matter what your idea is, no one takes you seriously when you look and act like that.

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