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Obama nod for Occupy Wall Street ("The modern-day equivalent...of the civil rights movement")
The Hindu ^ | October 17, 2011 | Narayan Lakshman

Posted on 10/17/2011 12:18:53 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

He could not resist drawing the obvious parallel. When United States President Barack Obama spoke at the unveiling of a towering, 30-foot sculpture of civil rights leader Martin Luther King on Washington's National Mall, he came as close as he could to endorsing Occupy Wall Street, the modern-day equivalent of the 1960s social movement.

Reflecting on Dr. King's Mahatma Gandhi-inspired belief in non-violent civil disobedience as a means of protest, Mr. Obama said if Dr. King were still alive, “I believe he would remind us that the unemployed worker can rightly challenge the excesses of Wall Street without demonising all who work there.”

He also struck a blow for workers; unions which have watched helplessly as numerous Republican-controlled U.S. states such as Wisconsin have whittled away their collective bargaining rights, for example to set wages. The President said Dr. King would have believed “that the businessman can enter tough negotiations with his company's union without vilifying the right to collectively bargain”.

The ultimate blow Mr. Obama delivered was of course to his Republican and Tea Party opponents in Congress who have been single-mindedly fixated on the goal of cutting public expenditures even in the worst of the recession.

Gauntlet

He threw the gauntlet at those parties saying, “He would want us to know we can argue fiercely about the proper size and role of government without questioning each other's love for this country... with the knowledge that in this democracy, government is no distant object but is rather an expression of our common commitments to one another.”

But it was the Occupy Wall Street movement, and the challenges it poses to a worsening rich-poor divide in the U.S. that seemed to catch Mr. Obama's imagination the most. Evoking the harsh reality that Dr. King and other leaders of the civil rights movement faced, Mr. Obama reflected on how little things had changed in 43 years. He said, “As was true 50 years ago, as has been true throughout human history, those with power and privilege will often decry any call for change as ‘divisive.'”


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Politics; Society
KEYWORDS: alinskytactics; bhofascism; bhosocialism; corruption; democrats; elections; fraud; liberalfascism; marxism; mlk; nobama2012; obama; obamatruthfile; occupy; occupywallstreet; ows; owsisajoke; socialism; socialistdemocrats; teaparty
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Anyone who says nothing has changed since the 1950's is a fool.
1 posted on 10/17/2011 12:19:03 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
...equivalent...of the civil rights movement"

I see it as more of an UNcivil Leftists movement.

2 posted on 10/17/2011 12:21:50 PM PDT by LegendHasIt
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Out of the mouth of the worlds greatest pathlocial liar.


3 posted on 10/17/2011 12:22:32 PM PDT by Seanm
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
"The modern-day equivalent...of the civil rights movement"

I know you've heard me say it before, but permit me again: It's the 2012 equivalent of Obama 2008.

4 posted on 10/17/2011 12:22:37 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (...then they came for the guitars, and we kicked their sorry faggot asses into the dust)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Please note we have gone from “Could Obama be a socialist?”

To a full throated call for socialistic/ communist revolution.


5 posted on 10/17/2011 12:22:50 PM PDT by Williams (Honey Badger Don't Care)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
("The modern-day equivalent...of the civil rights movement")

And you're Martin Luther King Jr., right Mr. President?

6 posted on 10/17/2011 12:23:41 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (...then they came for the guitars, and we kicked their sorry faggot asses into the dust)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

McCarthy was right and obama should be tried and jailed for sedition and treason.

LLS


7 posted on 10/17/2011 12:24:21 PM PDT by LibLieSlayer ("Americans are hungry to feel once again a sense of mission and greatness." Ronaldo Magnus)
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To: Williams
To a full throated call for socialistic/ communist revolution.

It's more than a call: the troops have been mustered.

Wake up, America!

8 posted on 10/17/2011 12:24:33 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (...then they came for the guitars, and we kicked their sorry faggot asses into the dust)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Can’t believe they said “obvious parallel”. Maybe because of the leftists that were mixed into the protests of those days?


9 posted on 10/17/2011 12:25:32 PM PDT by Olog-hai
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Marx in the Parks.

Fighting for our civil right to shit on cop cars.

10 posted on 10/17/2011 12:26:06 PM PDT by dead (I've got my eye out for Mullah Omar.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I guess it’s the change of seasons, but I suddenly feel a strong desire to kick some hippie ass.


11 posted on 10/17/2011 12:26:32 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (...then they came for the guitars, and we kicked their sorry faggot asses into the dust)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Actually the Tea Party is the closest thing to a civil rights movement we’ve had in a while.


12 posted on 10/17/2011 12:29:39 PM PDT by jimfree (In 2012 Sarah Palin will have more quality executive experience than Barack Obama.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Right, look at the ‘President’ we have!!

Bottom line: Character STILL counts and short cuts DO NOT work!


13 posted on 10/17/2011 12:31:24 PM PDT by SMARTY ("Socialism means slavery." Lord Acton)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Much has changed, but the tactics of the Left are not necessarily among those changes. What worked for them in the 1930s, 1950s & 1960s, are what they hope will work for them now.

A not so funny indication that this was coming, was observed at a reunion at my Left-oriented Alma Mater (Oberlin College), this past May, where a Professor in what was the "Government Department," when I was tearing up the campus "Liberals" as an undergraduate, was virtually licking his chops at the prospect for being able to join a 1960s style agitation. This did not just happen!

I realize that some Conservatives, today, like to pretend that the organized "Civil Rights" movement was not on the far Left, but a closer look at the personnel, tactics & demands, will tell a quite different story. All of the Marxist groups, at the time, rallied to the opportunity.

William Flax

14 posted on 10/17/2011 12:36:16 PM PDT by Ohioan
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To: LibLieSlayer

McCarthy was right and obama should be tried and jailed for sedition and treason.

Yep, along with Pelosi, Reid and a long list of others. We the people let these traitors to our constitution go on long enough.


15 posted on 10/17/2011 12:40:31 PM PDT by Bitsy (!)
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To: Seanm

Did you ever think you would live to see the day when the President of the United States would egg on anarchist protesters? When you read things about CW2 and SHTF does it really seem so crazy now?


16 posted on 10/17/2011 12:44:19 PM PDT by Georgia Girl 2 (The only purpose of a pistol is to fight your way back to the rifle you should never have dropped.)
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To: Williams

I’ve noticed that too. I didn’t think it was possible, but I’m wondering if he’s escalating this to a major crisis before the next elections so he can take total control. Scary.


17 posted on 10/17/2011 12:45:11 PM PDT by freeagle
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

no, MLK belived that EVERYONE should be free, these clowns think EVERYTHING should be free, big difference


18 posted on 10/17/2011 12:53:10 PM PDT by edzo4 (You call us the 'Party Of No', I call us the resistance.)
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To: Georgia Girl 2

Ive never seen a President want to create anarchy like this President wants to. Never seen anything like it in my whole life. What Obama wants is to ensure that NO elections take place in 2012, either that or to destroy this economy completely that way even if he loses in 2012, he still wins. What Obama wants more than anything is to destroy the United States Economic system, to instead turn it into a European style Socialist/Communist model, its what he’s always wanted


19 posted on 10/17/2011 12:59:00 PM PDT by Sarah Barracuda
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To: Bitsy

Amen!

LLS


20 posted on 10/17/2011 1:00:34 PM PDT by LibLieSlayer ("Americans are hungry to feel once again a sense of mission and greatness." Ronaldo Magnus)
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