Biden Attacks Big Banks, Compares Rise Of Occupy Wall Street To Rise Of Tea Party

[highplainsdem]

Source: Talking Points Memo

Vice President Joe Biden empathized with the Occupy Wall Street movement Thursday, and criticized big banks in harsher terms than most people in the Obama administration are typically comfortable with.

At The Atlantic's Ideas Forum, Biden said he understands what underlies the anti-Wall Street movement, and compared it to the anger driving the Tea Party.

"What is the core of that protest, and why is it increasing in terms of the people it's attracting -- the core is the bargain has been breeched with the American people," Biden said. "The core is the American people do not think the system is fair or on the level..... That is the core of what you're seeing on Wall Street. And that's what started, by the way -- there's a lot in common with the Tea Party. The Tea Party started why? TARP. They thought it was unfair -- we were bailing out the big guy."

The Tea Party arguably didn't take off until well after TARP, when the Obama administration began considering providing relief to people with underwater mortgages. But to illustrate the sorts of actions that sparked Occupy Wall Street, Biden mentioned the recent decision by Bank of America to institute monthly ATM fees, to make up for profits lost by new rules limiting the "swipe fees" banks can charge retailers for each debt card transaction.

-snip-

Read more: http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/10/biden-attacks-big-banks-compares-rise-of-occupy-wall-street-to-rise-of-tea-party.php

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Biden went on to compare what the banks are doing now to a kid who's been stopped from driving because he doesn't have a license (after he's been caught driving without a license) then telling his parent that if he can't do that any more, he'll have to steal a car.

[young but wise]

1. Only thing is OWS is a real movement.

[jwirr]

13. Fully volunteer. That makes it grass roots. A real movement. nt

[Kingofalldems]

2. K and R

Reads like an endorsement to me.

[DeSwiss]

3. rEvolution, because it can't be fxed. :-/ n/t

[Lint Head]

4. Please, Powers that Be, Stop Comparing OWS to the Tea Baggers.

The OWS has more brain cells in it's little finger than the entire Tea Bagging movement!

[monmouth]

5. Seriously, I hate hearing the two names even in the same sentence. One

has nothing to do with the other.

[YvonneCa]

11. I agree. MoveOn did this a few...

...weeks ago and got a piece of my mind. :7

[elleng]

6. He/they've got it.

'the core is the bargain has been breeched with the American people," Biden said. "The core is the American people do not think the system is fair or on the level..... That is the core of what you're seeing on Wall Street. And that's what started, by the way -- there's a lot in common with the Tea Party. The Tea Party started why? TARP. They thought it was unfair -- we were bailing out the big guy."'

[No Elephants]

17. Biden must be joking. The Koch brothers began cookin up the Tea Party in the 1980s.

[tularetom]

7. It ain't the same thing at all

The fat cats who bankrolled the tea party are the same people the OWS movement is pissed off at.

Tea party supporters are basically stupid people, uninformed Americans who can be easily manipulated by media controlled by the uber wealthy.

OWS participants are well informed citizens with genuine concerns about the role of money in the American political process.

Not the same.

[elleng]

8. I understand DUers don't like hearing such comparisons w t-buggers,

but I suspect the origins are in fact similar. T-buggers have been co-opted.

[YvonneCa]

12. No. Just...

...no.

[No Elephants]

19. You are mistaken.

[elleng]

22. I'm mistaken that DUers don't like hearing comparisons? That t.buggers have been coopted?

[No Elephants]

25. You are mistaken that the origins of the two movements are similar.

The teabaggers were not co-opted, either. They started out co-opted.

Ask David Koch and Dick Armey.

[LiberalLovinLug]

21. You're not mistaken

Both groups have at their core, a belief that they are being tread on. That they have lost a lot of power and that their taxes and other costs of living have become unbearably unfair and they "want their country back".

The difference is, as you say, the baggers have been co-opted by the very people that are oppressing them, thanks to 24/7 reich wing radio and FAUX News telling them its all the rich Hollywood elite, and other limousine liberals, gays, immigrants etc... who are the problem.

If there was ever a coming together of the minds where they could agree on a few points...like going after the Wall Street crooks for instance...then look out!

[elleng]

23. Thanks. 'Interesting times,' eh?

[No Elephants]

27. Perhaps a lot less interesting because people post without facts or research.

Please see Reply 26, for starters.

[elleng]

29. I have. We disagree.

[No Elephants]

26. The Kochs began planning the Tea Party in the 1980s and Dick Armey

helped them. Koch money has been behind the Tea Party and Fox News has been giving them far more exposure than the merited and exaggerating their numbers. Not to mention that form Fox nut case massing them
in Washington D.C.


Nothing about the occupy movement is similar to any of that.

[LiberalLovinLug]

31. Point taken

The Tea Party were not co-opted but basically created out of thin air (and hot air) by corporate interests.

My point was that IMO many of the dupes with tea bags hanging off of their hats are angry at the government for screwing them over. The OWS folks are also angry at the government and have taken to the streets because they don't see any help from that government in regards to controlling the predatory behaviour of the financial sector. If the two groups could just agree on this one point it would be a way to grow the movement even more. If only the OWS folks can woo over some of the ignorant but well-meaning Tea Party folks to at least agree on the Wall Street problem. But of course that would be difficult as the baggers are being steered clear of that by their billionaire overlords.

[Doctor_J]

33. Tea Baggers were STARTED by billionaire shill on CNBC

get your facts straight before you start lecturing.

[Javaman]

9. So is biden going to reverse himself on his rewriting of the bankruptcy law?

that helped out the banks and the credit card industry?

[bread_and_roses]

18. exactly. Biden has 0 credibility on this

being the good Bankster Bud that he is - actions speak louder than words

[closeupready]

30. Yup. +1,000. That's an essential part of his record in the Senate. He sponsored

it while serving as Senator from Delaware.

[Blue Owl]

10. Tea Party rallies never lasted more than a few hours

And the crowd never exceeded more than a thousand individuals, more like a few hundred at best.

Do we need to break out the tea party rally photos again?

[David Sky]

14. Yes, that's a GREAT IDEA... compare and contrast the two ..

In pictures and in facts!!!!

It's the facts that will get to the Tea baggers, as they flail and flip flop between Palin, Bachmann, Perry, Cain, and Christie...

THERE'S A CONTRAST RIGHT THERE!!! teabaggers are looking for their own leaders to lead them, while OWS is NOT looking for leaders

[No Elephants]

28. One is a real grass roots movement, the other is astroturf masquerading as grass roots.

Please see Reply 26 for more contrasts.

[TygrBright]

15. Close, Joe, but not exactly. Teepers have the attention span of gnats.

We've been in the streets for three weeks, more people are arriving every day, it's spreading organically from city to city, and we have no Faux Snooze talking heads fellating us on the air.

Other than that, though, there may be some similarities.

ummm... I'll get back to you if I think of any.

amusedly,
Bright

[totodeinhere]

16. It's an insult to the OWS movement to compare it to the corporate funded Tea Party people.

Biden wants to have his cake and eat it too. He recognizes the power of the OWS movement and rightly so, but he also wants to play the other side of the street and suck up to the Tea Party. Joe, that won't work.

[No Elephants]

20. Bull puckies, Biden, bull puckies. :You know better than that.

[Windy]

24. OWS is BIGGER than the pathetic tea party. nt

[Doctor_J]

32. Why is Joe catapulting this lie?

This is something that could have come straight from Fox "News"