Nicholas Kristof, NYT: The Bankers and the Revolutionaries

[highplainsdem]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/02/opinion/sunday/kristof-the-bankers-and-the-revolutionaries.html

Kristof's column is well worth reading in its entirety, but here are a few snippets:

-snip-

I tweeted that the protest reminded me a bit of Tahrir Square in Cairo, and that raised eyebrows. True, no bullets are whizzing around, and the movement won’t unseat any dictators. But there is the same cohort of alienated young people, and the same savvy use of Twitter and other social media to recruit more participants. Most of all, there’s a similar tide of youthful frustration with a political and economic system that protesters regard as broken, corrupt, unresponsive and unaccountable.

-snip-

Where the movement falters is in its demands: It doesn’t really have any. The participants pursue causes that are sometimes quixotic — like the protester who calls for removing Andrew Jackson from the $20 bill because of his brutality to American Indians. So let me try to help.

-snip-

¶Impose a financial transactions tax. This would be a modest tax on financial trades, modeled on the suggestions of James Tobin, an American economist who won a Nobel Prize. The aim is in part to dampen speculative trading that creates dangerous volatility. Europe is moving toward a financial transactions tax, but the Obama administration is resisting — a reflection of its deference to Wall Street.

¶Close the “carried interest” and “founders’ stock” loopholes, which may be the most unconscionable tax breaks in America. They allow our wealthiest citizens to pay very low tax rates by pretending that their labor compensation is a capital gain.

-snip-

[eleny]

1. They need to clearly define themselves before power does it for them

[tama]

2. Down with Definitionism

Power defines, categorizes, divides.

We live together as undivided whole, the whole planet of us, each unique being.

[WCGreen]

3. Taking Jackson off the $20 bill got people out to protest....

god love them, they try so hard...

The problem with ill defined goals is that there is no way to claim a victory.

The left is full of boutique protesting while the right coalesces around a few emotional talking points that resonate.

And we wonder why no one pays attention to whatever it is we are protesting about.

[Amonester]

4. Oh, there R dicktatoR$... They R the 1%.

Other than that, he hits the nail on the head.