COMMENTARY | At the heart of the Occupy Wall Street movement lays "corporatism." Led by the youth of America, the Occupy movement is creating a buzz in the political establishment, despite the efforts of the mainstream media to paint them into a negative corner. Identifying the corruptions of Wall Street and its impact to their future, the anger and resolve of the OWS protest is justified and understandable. With corporatism as a central issue in the tea party movement as well, two grass root campaigns have found common ground.
At the inception of the tea party movement, supporters were rallied around a cause and belief greater than party politics. The movement began from a revolutionary spirit, disgruntled with many of the same issues expressed in the OWS protest. While the spirit was the in the air, the consensus opinion was that we the people were being baited into violent revolution by the establishment. Such events would give cause for "Big Brother" to impose martial law, suppressing all efforts or inciting all out civil war. (I ask the OWS followers, does the story sound familiar yet?)
Choosing to make peaceful impact instead of violent conflict, the tea party supporters moved their efforts to the political arena. Mainstream media today portrays the tea party has been hijacked by the GOP, yet the truth could be no more different. The tea party has hijacked the GOP. Just as the mainstream media hopes to paint you with a negative brush, the tea party still suffers from stigma, largely undeserved. Their power and influence, however, are vastly underestimated and deliberately understated by the establishment.
If, and it is a big if, the tea party and Occupy Wall Street movements could find some way to unite their respective efforts, true change is within reach. The issue of corporatism can be the uniting factor. Concentrating on the culprit at the root of so many other problems, supporters from both camps can choose to get past the rhetoric and work together on a real, big-picture answer.
Railing against corporatism for years, tea party favorite and GOP contender Ron Paul has accused President Obama of being a corporatist. Drawing a line of distinction between corporatism and socialism, Paul's command of economic principle and theory are evident, and his arguments quite compelling. After several attempts at a Third Party run for President, Ron Paul made the political shift into the Republican Party, attacking a two-party dominated system from within. Could Ron Paul's independence from party-line allegiance and his stance on the issues of corporatism propel him to office in 2012? The answer lies firmly in the hands of the OWS movement.
OWS, you have our attention, the eyes of the world are upon you. Your actions to date have been necessary in some respects to get attention and prove you are serious, the question that remains, what will you choose to do next? The legendary Wavy Gravy once said of Woodstock, "We did our very best because we knew the world was watching." Will the OWS movement progress further into violent action and reaction, or can the youth of America change the world? Your future, and that of this entire country, could rest in your decision.
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