Occupy Wal-Street: In the Days of Oliver
"Please sir, I want some more ..", the young boy Oliver held his bowl up with more than a slight quiver to the Master. Fear gripped not only him but also the entire congregation of students, of what the outcome would be. The outcome, as told by Charles Dickens was indeed favorable to Oliver Twist, but not in the short run.
Back then as well, in the days of Oliver, there existed fat cats. These were men of high standing and stature who were well out of reach of the poor. Between then and now, nothing much has changed in terms of attitudes, except for the fact that the pie has tripled or even quadrupled in size and there are more people with knives and bowls at the table.
The leftists and socialists often blame the skewed system of capitalism for not providing equal opportunity to all, while capitalists in turn consider socialists to be a bunch of lazy bums wanting to live out of taxpayer's money in the name of social security. The truth lies of course between the melted cheddar in the middle.
What began as just an ordinary run-of-the-mill march against high prices in Israel has now turned into a full throttle drive against capitalism across the highways of the world as the segment of the seemingly deprived join hands on facebook.
The demands of the Protesters in Wall Street are by now, common knowledge. Their prime concerns revolve around the bankers who were bailed out with TARP money and are still around earning hefty bonuses. Worse still, those who invested in their schemes have gone broke.
A CNN contributor even suggested that the protesters align themselves with shareholders and voice their concerns in Shareholder meetings. This of course assumes that the crowd on Wall Street believes that working within the system would yield the desired results.
The only other legal option is off the table. The protesters from all the major cities cannot consider any form of Class Action lawsuit, since on all counts it was the Incumbent Administration that showered 800 Billion of Dollars on the Banks, with absolutely no conditions attached.
To be fair though, Capitalism to a large degree is more appealing that her half cousin socialism and has to a large extent many feathers in its cap. Free markets after all encourage entrepreneurship and meritocracy, and it is indeed no surprise that Silicon Valley still attracts some of the best talent in the world.
Continued on the next page
Follow Technorati