My dad is an economist. More accurately, he is an economic prognosticator whose specialty is one specific industry which employs about a hundred different chemicals in its manufacture. He helps giganormous corporations save money by forecasting the price movements of these chemicals.
Each of his quarterly reports contains a big picture overview, which means he was telling me about the evils of mortgage derivatives back in the 1990's. Right now he's most concerned about the current account deficit. I won't go into his solution which is along the lines of "drill baby drill."
Not only did he predict the derivatives meltdown and the current state of our economy, but he's also been predicting large scale uprisings. While he's always been a part of a vocal minority, he is by no means the only one who holds these beliefs. What's important to note is that even in this harsh economic downturn, he's gaining clients, because his long term prognostications have been spot on correct.
I believe the Tea party unrest was an attempt to fabricate the civil disobedience which he predicted, and the OWS movement is more along the lines of the organic protests that he saw coming.
More and more, I've been seeing indications that people have been listening to him.
And instead of doing everything in their power to prevent the unrest that he predicted, I believe the politicians and rightwing thinktanks are actually strategizing how to leverage these protests to their advantage.
What I see coming are two steps towards the same endgame, and they both rely on the movement becoming violent. Because violence will discredit the OWS movement and turn public sentiment against us. But beyond that, violent protests will give the authoritarians a reason to crack down, strip us of our civil liberties and squelch our message under the pretense of maintaining national security. A few dozen bad apples in Oakland last night, a poorly done anonymous copycat video calling for the occupation of Iowa campaign offices, clearly these are agents provocateurs set on fomenting an unstable state.
These OWS protests were seen coming a long way off, long before the actual financial calamity which catalyzed them, and the message certainly has trickled through to the Republican leadership. Those of us watching can hardly believe leaders like McConnell, Boehner and Cantor would actually hope to destroy Obama with a prolonged recession, but I'm saying the truth could be even worse than that - they have been actively seeking to make things so bad that OWS would happen and now I think they're trying to turn the protests violent, not just to shut them down but to make it so the violence can be used to make the progressive movement self-destruct.
Fri Nov 04, 2011 at 5:36 PM PT: Apparently I'm a day late on the Agents Provocateurs story - - one day these guys are protesters, the next day they're dressed as cops. Legitimate participants? http://www.youtube.com/...