Occupy Wall Street is just the beginning of the discussion

The majority of media outlets are attempting to deal with the Occupy Wall Street phenomenon as any other mass movement that pops up out of nowhere with a clearly defined voice and message. As the protests continue and with no clear end in sight the mainstream media is pointing fingers at everyone from George Soros to the Obama administration. While there is no doubt that many individuals and organizations across the political spectrum are attempting to co opt the protests, I believe the protests are only in the beginning stages and not yet under the control of a single ideology, demand or idea. The protesters are not hyper-political or previously even politically active, they just know they played little to no part in causing the country’s current economic situation.

The US day of rage website, which was the original organizer of the event in New York City suggested a demand for the protesters: one person, one dollar, one vote. A general “take the money out of politics message.” Simple and something everyone can agree on except those who are injecting money into the political process and gaining power and influence in return for their investment. The original plan as laid out on usdayofrage.com was to have small groups each come up with one demand as they slowly occupied lower Manhattan block by block, each block having its own organization. In retrospect that high level of organization was a pipe dream and now it has become simply a free for all of ideas. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. But it does make it easy for the mainstream media to cherry pick and either discount the protesters or have an individual or a small group broadly represent the entire movement of protesters.

It would have been far more disturbing if the protesters had come out day one with a unified message. Now that the discussion has begun, I believe that the protests will lead towards disabling the mechanisms currently inherent in the system that allow for such widespread corruption among what the protesters are calling the 1%, or controlling elite in this country, whether that is manifest in Wall Street banks, Washington or the Federal Reserve system.

While there are discussions taking place at the protests themselves, many more discussions and debates have started across the internet and amongst people who are not attending the protests. Hopefully these discussions will lead to research and the research will lead to real solutions namely ending the wars and an end to crony capitalism via the Federal Reserve system. And maybe someday we will return to a truly free system where success is won on merit and not corruption or access.