people being paid to protest? i'm so glad to see the free market :P

*'see the free market at work :p', even.

Maybe the Nation predicted that Fox News would do this story for two reasons:

1. It's TRUE. Imagine that! A left-wing community activism organization being involved in left-wing community activism. Why is this so surprising to you, Putin? Or is it upsetting to you because it's just further proof that this so-called movement is bogus and has next to *zero* support amongst "99%" of Americans...

2. Fox News is the only news organization with enough integrity to actually do the story, as opposed the vast majority of the mainstream media (ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, CNN, etc.) that have **never** taken a balanced and honest look at this so-called occupy "movement".

Putin's just angry because another radical leftist cause is being shown as fraudulant and IRRELEVANT.

.....waiting for Putin's obligatory personal attack, because, as is normal, he will have no way to refute logical arguments....Bring it on...

What's fraudulent about the transfer of wealth to a very few over the past few decades? That isn't happening? People shouldn't be concerned about it?

Transfer of wealth? Ohhhh...ohhhh...you mean people getting and education, starting businesses and working hard to make money? You mean people that sacrifice for years before their business becomes profitable? You mean the go-getters; the hard workers? As opposed to the lazy assholes camping in a park, complaining about corporate greed while they do what? Ohhh...they stick their hands out and IN GREED DEMAND THEY BE GIVEN MORE OF EVERYTHING, even though they are unwilling to work for it. You mean the privileged, primarily White, Male college student movement?? Is that the movement you are talking about? The one that has been trying to kick the homeless out of their camps -- you know, the TRUE 99%ers??? THAT bogus movement???

By the way, Sergeant - do you grocery shop? Go to McDonald's? You know...do you ever buy food for yourself, and "transfer wealth" to a corporation?

Wait....wait a minute....if you do, where do you GET that wealth? Do you work? Do you perform some sort of labor, and then demand that somebody actually give you WEALTH in exchange for your labor?

Or are you some pie-in-the-sky collegel puke living off mommy and daddy....because it's OK to steal wealth from mommy and daddy? But...where did THEY get the wealth.

Idiot.

"Do you perform some sort of labor, and then demand that somebody actually give you WEALTH in exchange for your labor?" - No. Presumably Sergeant Citrus asks for money in exchange for his work, but money =/= wealth.
A penny, a one cent coin, is money. But if you had a penny would you say "Hey look, I'm wealthy". No you wouldn't. And lets face it, it is exceptionally difficult, if not impossible to become "wealthy" off of wage labour. What we would actually call wealth comes from investments, property ownership and business ownership. The "transfer of wealth" is not the same thing as "the daily exchange of money".

No, Krellin, I don't mean people getting "and education." I'm talking about the upper 0.1%, and how their wages increased dramatically since the 70's, while most people (including those getting an education, starting a business, so on) had relatively stagnant wages in real terms.

Unless 99.9% of the country is just lazy assholes, as you claim. Then fine, let the Randian supermen have the wealth. Guess all those plumbers and teachers and firefighters and physicists just didn't work hard.

I do work and have worked. But good to see that you immediately jumped into the personal attacks you were so sure that Putin would do. It's pretty funny.

And as Mafia pointed out, income =/= wealth. Wealth is things like property, etc. You generally need some wealth to start a business - for example, a house to take a loan out on.

Sergeant -- instead of bitching about not having enough, why don't you work hard and try to become one of those .1% -- then you can give all your wealth back to people. The truth is, you will *NEVER* apply yourself enough to get there...instead, you will make excuses and bitch and complain and stick your hand out.

As for wealth....all you Western Civilization pieces of shit need to travel to the MAJORITY of the world, then come back and tell me how poor you are? All you people with roofs over your head, food in your belly, clothes on your back, cell phones, internet connections, health care....all of you fucking whiners pretending like you don't have wealth make me want to fucking puke.

The problem isn't that you don't have wealth...the problem is that somebody has more than you and you think that isn't "fair"

Grow the fuck up.

And yes... I live in Western Civilization. But, unlike you, instead of bitching because somebody has more than me, I am pretty damned thankful for what I have, and I work hard to improve myself.

"instead of bitching about not having enough, why don't you work hard and try to become one of those .1% -- then you can give all your wealth back to people." - This happens like 1 time in 1000 if it happens that often. THAT IS WHAT THE PROBLEM IS KRELLIN. This doesn't actually happen often enough to count as a real phenomenon.

Again with the personal attacks. I'll cry myself to sleep.

Anyways, I challenge the entire idea that this is a meritocracy - that "just working hard" will get you more wealth every time. By that logic, almost all of America has not increased in productivity since the late 70's.

Unfortunately, worker productivity has actually gone up since then, and real wages haven't.

I'd like a meritocracy. I think it sounds like a great idea, and I value hard work. I just think a lot of people - hard workers - realize that the game is stacked against them.

@Krellin, how can you possibly be against the Occupy movement?

They are clearly NOT the government, they are people, and people make up the free market.

I mean governments gave money to banks, effectively regulating that market and making it less free, then they taxed these occupy people to pay for it. And you're in favour of this! I'm am utterly shocked.

krellin you are the worst kind of conservative. The kind who sits there and says "the experience of 1% of the population is how the world really works, the other 99% are just outliers". Think about it; if only 1% of the population experiences something, then in what sense is it the "usual experience"?

I just want to quickly salute Mafialligator, orathaic and SergeantCitrus for the lack of foul language. Your arguments seem more credible whereas krellin makes use of so many derogatory remarks it is near impossible to take anything he says seriously.

Welcome to conversations with krellin. Eventually he'll get so rude, smug and vulgar that one or more of us will bow out, and then he'll claim that we couldn't stand up to the logic of his arguments. But thank you kculver. I appreciate that you notice the difference.

There is a big difference between the widening gap in the wealth of the average person compared to the top 1% and the standard of living increase. I would concede that the gap between the wealthiest Americans and the average guy like me has increased over the last several decades, but my standard of living has increased drastically over the same time period. This is why I don't buy into the whole "get the rich", "pay your fair share", "they have more than they need" arguments. On average, most Americans have a better overall situation than they did ten years ago. It's only when we look at the ultra successful and compare ourselves to them that all the it's not fair talk comes out, I call it envy. That is not to say that there are not cheats, or that wealthy corporation and individuals are free of blame. I just hate the generalized attitude of punish the wealthy because they must have done something wrong because they are better off than me. Some of them earned it honestly and should be able to do whatever they please with it.

As far as ACORN goes, they are absolutely ridiculous and a perfect example of dishonest crony capitalism. I don't mind people I disagree with voicing their viewpoint, in fact I welcome it so long as they respect the rights of others. That is where I have an issue with ACORN, they trample the rights of those that they oppose by committing voter registration fraud, cheating on taxes, and advising individuals on how to game the system on the backs of hard working tax payers.

@ joshbeaudette - If it were simply a matter of being able to afford a fancy car or a nice house then you might have a point. But in modern America large amounts of wealth translate into political power, buying the laws you want. And poverty isn't just, not being able to afford all of the luxuries you want. Despite increases in the standard of living, poverty is still correlated to high levels of crime, lower life expectancies, poor health, domestic abuse, substance abuse issues, the list is endless. I see what you're getting at, but your approach trivializes the experiences of the poor.

Thanks for a reasoned response, joshbeaudette.

I don't think of it as punishing the wealthy. I just think that the current way of doing things is unsustainable. I get annoyed by the word sustainability (hippie buzzword) but it's still something to consider.

The problem with just looking at standard of living is that it ignores debt. That's part of why wealth has been concentrated - debt is the opposite of it. If you have more wealth that debt, you're in a better position to start a small business, for example. You're also more willing and able to change jobs or move.

A lack of fluidity in labor is considered a market failure. It makes sense to minimize it.

@ the person who makes unfounded assumptions based on how they want things to be

"this so-called movement is bogus and has next to *zero* support amongst "99%" of Americans..."

TIME Poll: Occupy Wall Street Is More Popular Than The Tea Party
When asked for their view of the Tea Party, 27% of the respondents went with favorable, while 33% said it was unfavorable. When asked about the Occupy Wall Street movement, 54% looked at it as favorable, while 23% viewed it as unfavorable. In short, twice as many respondents viewed OWS as the favorable movement.

Digging even deeper into the numbers, the Tea Party was more hated (24% “very unfavorable” to OWS’ 13% “very unfavorable”), while OWS was more readily embraced (25% “very favorable” against the Tea Party’s 8% “very favorable”). For Tea Party supporters looking for any kind of silver lining, the group of poll-takers didn’t have much faith in OWS being more than just protests and tent-pitching — 56% said they felt it would have little impact on American politics.

And of course NONE of you geniuses has the intestinal fortitude -- or intelligence -- to address the real issue as I have described it: Wealth, and the *vast* amount of wealth all you whiny little bitches have, with your housing, food, clothes, cell phones, cars, internet access, computers, etc. This INCLUDES all the assholes camping out in the park living off mommy and daddy instead of attending classes. You ridiculously fall back upon the idiotic mantra of the so-called movement, and completely ignore the FALLACY behind their arguments.

Who gives a crap if someone has more money than you? Why can't you GREEDY GREEDY little people be happy with what you have -- which a HELL OF A LOT compared to global wealth -- OR WORK HARD to achieve more.

Instead, you claim it is legitimate to bitch and complain and, in reality, you do NOTHING to change the situation.

What a bunch of pathetic losers you all are. I don't want someone else's wealth given to me. As I said, I am *extremely* pleased with the moderate wealth I have as an American....which makes me EXTREMELY wealthy when compared to the rest of the world -- and YOU ALL fall in to the same category.

I challenge just ONE of you pinheads --- and that's not an insult...it's an accurate description --- to do a little research on GLOBAL WEALTH....and then tell me where the "99%" in our cozy little societies compare to the VAST MAJORITY of humanity.

You fucking douchebags.

Actually, i know you like accurate description, but i am infact, not a bag for douching...

@ krellin - what you seem not to realize krellin is that I'm not into the leftist movement for myself. I'm fully aware of all the privileges that being middle class has given me, and I'm doing what I can to fight against that system, against my own interests.

Also, that's a stupid argument. "There are poorer people elsewhere in the country therefore poverty in america doesn't matter." That doesn't follow at all. That's like saying "1 in 2 women in [insert horribly sexist country here] will be raped at some point, therefore there's no need to worry about the fact that 1 in 10 women will be raped in the USA. Umm...no...rape is still bad no matter where in happens.

Err that should say "There are poorer people elsewhere in the world"

Mafia....the little bitches in the park are saying EXACTLY that. They are saying "by %, someone has way more than us...therefore we (GREEDILY) demand more. And yet....if you apply the same argument GLOBALLY, those little bitches in the park ARE the 1% of wealth owners on the globe...and they happliy use their iPhones that have been built via internationally slavery, and use all the precious things they own that have been gained by nefarious means of exploitation around the globe.

Pure, pathetic hypocrisy.

Hmmm, I take your point krellin, and I do admit there is a problematic aspect of privilege there. But first off, to call the OWS protesters greedy is ignoring the staggering privilege and greed of the 1% they're protesting against.
The way to solve the problem of global poverty isn't to try and widen the gap between rich and poor in America.