Is Capitalism Losing the Debate?

Is Capitalism Losing the Debate?

 

By Carl Finamore

 

A remarkable shift in mass public opinion is occurring

right before our eyes. It does not happen often.

Normally, only when there is a severe breakdown in

public confidence about the future.

 

Now is such a time.

 

Millions are demanding clear explanations for the

economic turmoil surrounding their lives and rejecting

en masse standard platitudes from an increasingly

discredited political establishment.

 

Fox-News pundits, Heritage Foundation business

scholars, glib right-wing loud mouths and two-faced

politicians from both major parties have been exposed

as stand-in ventriloquists for the wealthy -

shockingly, all in a few short weeks.

 

It all began with only a few hundred protestors camped

out on Wall Street challenging conceited notions of the

one percent.

 

Through it all, the Occupy Movement is discovering what

my generation learned during the civil rights, antiwar,

feminist and gay rights struggles begun some 65 years

ago - the ideas of the rich and powerful just don't stand up.

 

They don't hold water. That is, they do not accurately

explain what is happening around us, the measure most

rational people use to determine if something is true or false.

 

There was bitter political conflict with the status quo

during the conformist "American Dream" decade of the 1950s.

 

Fundamental rights of equality were denied and numerous

US military interventions into Central America and Asia

were excused by a conservative, misinformed and

compliant American population.

 

Eventually, it all turned around.

 

Principles of humanity and fairness displaced racist

fears. Support for national self-determination and non-

interference in other nations' internal affairs

ultimately won out against cold-war anti-communist

interventionist hysteria.

 

How did this happen? Simple, false assumptions of the

dominant powers in this country were challenged and examined.

 

There was a conversation in almost every American

household. Some were hotly contested with families torn apart.

 

Historical hindsight confirms the best reform proposals

in American history have come from socially conscious

mass movements. They have not come from traditional

leaders positioned inside the political machinery that

has so consistently and miserably failed us.

 

So it was in my days as a young activist.

 

In the end, the social, economic and political demands

of the popular mass movements thoroughly overcame

retrograde "Jim Crow" prejudices and reactionary "cold

war" misrepresentations.

 

The massively extensive political dialogue that broke

out in this country changed America.

 

For a precious few years, the lives of national

minorities, women and gays actually improved and,

significantly, lives were also saved as it became more

difficult for the United States to invade countries

using illegitimate pretexts and lies.

 

Extensive political debate can have a greater impact

today because the economic and social crisis is deeper.

Again, we have an opportunity to change our country and the world.

 

“Ideas, Like Rivers, Do Not Flow Backward.”*

 

The first collective statement from the original Occupy

Wall Street encampment is an extremely damning

indictment of corporate America:

 

"We come to you at a time when corporations, which

place profit over people, self-interest over justice,

and oppression over equality, run our governments. We

have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let

these facts be known."

 

In response, there has been no serious attempt by the

establishment to engage in authentic dialogue or in

spirited defense of their policies. On the contrary,

authorities have responded by letting loose riot

police, spewing slander and unsuccessfully trying to

change the subject by complaining about loud drum noise

and unsanitary conditions.

 

Really, it is quite a lame and ineffectual response

coming as it is from the most boastful and arrogant

power in the world that only a few years ago gloated

about the triumph of American free-enterprise over the

Soviet Union.

 

For a while, another "American Century" was trumpeted.

 

How quickly it has all imploded, not just their system

but their self confidence; and not just for US rulers

but for their cronies across the world as in Tunisia,

Egypt, Spain, Italy and Greece.

 

In fact, many of the protestors' claims are now

considered valid by most Americans. Even the corporate-

controlled media has acknowledged alarming facets of

corporate control they previously ignored such as the

vast gap in wealth.

 

For the first time in decades, political, economic and

social ideas are being reviewed more closely by

millions of working people.

 

The rich and powerful retain control of the US economy,

that's for sure, but they have been embarrassed off the

public stage where the Occupy Movement holds the

world's attention. It's laughable and also quite

revealing that Governor Rick Perry doesn't want to

debate anymore because he complains he just gets ridiculed.

 

Millions are fed up with the steady diet of distortions

concealing an infinitesimally small group of super-

wealthy financiers steering our economy into a ditch.

 

Occupy the Economy

 

Radicals have long accused capitalist western

democracies of being phony by asserting real democracy

is impossible while a small minority runs the economy.

 

Now, even this radical idea too is being seriously

discussed.

 

For example, talented documentarian Michael Moore, a

self-described liberal and supporter of President

Obama, proclaimed to thunderous applause at a recent

Oakland, California rally that real change will only

come when the 99 percent "begins to Occupy the

economy."

 

Yes, it is true that the Occupy Movement has not

precisely defined what that means nor have they

coalesced around a common set of solutions. But,

really, at this early stage, how could it be otherwise?

In fact, why should it be otherwise while the movement

is still growing and developing its legs?

 

The really momentous accomplishment is that a mass

political discussion is occurring throughout America,

kept alive by regular actions of the Occupy Movement.

 

Eventually, adoption of various programs and demands

will have to be considered and nobody has the

unrealistic expectation that divisions will not appear.

 

But we should expect, and actually firmly insist, that

differences not deter us from continuing to act

together against common symbols of greed and injustice

and in vigorous defense of civil liberties.

 

Let discussion on America's future ensue in every home,

workplace and community as the movement continues to

mobilize and as it begins to refine its goals and

objectives.

 

*Victor Hugo

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Carl Finamore is Air Transport Employees Local Lodge 1781, IAMAW, delegate to the San Francisco Labor

Council, AFL-CIO. He can be reached at local1781@yahoo.com and his other writings seen on www.carlfinamore.wordpress.com.

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