Who's on the Menu?

Recently I watched a sports analyst respond to a question from a worried looking reporter concerning the NBA labor/management "crisis" that threatens to delay or cancel the professional basketball season. His comment was that he didn't get too worked up about who would prevail in an argument over money between super rich team owners and multimillionaire athletes.

So with all the recent news coverage of the OWS protests/camp outs - and the fussing over them by everyone on every side of every issue who think they can advance themselves or their cause by doing so - I thought it might be time to look at the whole thing from a so far under-explored  perspective. A world wide perspective, if you will.

Leaving aside the drunk, drug addled or otherwise mentally impaired contingent of the progressive/populist "movement", I think it's time to examine the thinking of the so called "99 percenters" who might actually be able to think about why they are there.

From the perspective of most of the world's population, it must be amusing on some level to see these people agitating to "eat the rich", since compared to the vast majority of the world the protesters are themselves relatively rich.

For most of the world, getting the next meal and staying warm and dry are the primary activities even when not engaging in protest movements. The really blessed among them spend the rest of their time trying to figure out how to save whatever piddling amount they might have left over so they can exist if they ever need a day off from those activities. To the extent that they have the time to observe the US follies, they have to be on the same page as the above mentioned sports commentator.

Among those who, via capitalism in even tiny doses, have escaped somewhat from the grinding poverty that is historically typical in the world, it must seem queer that people with i-pods, i-pads and i-phones would sleep in tents and pound drums to try to discredit or dismantle that system.

So in looking at the motives of those who have bought into the progressives' class warfare rhetoric, let's be clear that the "greed" under attack is basically the same as the "envy" of the attackers. The so called rich are greedy to keep what they have and the self proclaimed 99 percenters are greedy to get what others have.

The difference between the Tea Party and the OWS is that the former are opposed to government bailing out anyone, while the latter just want their cut of the action when it comes to student loans and the like.

In my mind, all of us should be angry with anyone who games the system. That includes bankers and brokers and agribusiness and any other businesses who get rich from associations with politicians and government programs. But it also includes favored solar businesses, double dipping union "teacher for a day" pensioners, recipients of government largesse in the form of student loan subsidies, "affordable housing" loans to people who never could or will not repay as well as bailed out auto unionists. But to be angry with those who game the system without being angry at the system itself is ludicrous. 


So when the OWS crowd demands that the not so rich eat the relatively rich they better hope the whole world doesn't show up for the banquet.  They should keep in mind, if the whole world decides to eat the rich, the vast majority of the OWS people are on the menu too.