Occupy Wall Street Protests Result of 'Frustration,' Obama Tells Jay Leno

[Hissyspit]

Source: Guardian UK

Occupy Wall Street protests the result of 'frustration,' Obama tells Jay Leno

Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party are caused by economic frustration, Obama tell Jay Leno in Tonight Show appearance

Richard Adam's Blog

- snip -

Tuesday night was Obama's fourth appearance on the highest-rated late night TV talkshow, and his second as president. This time there was less of the light-hearted banter that had marked earlier appearances: this was a serious President Obama answering questions about the deaths of Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki and Muammar Gaddafi.

While protesters and police battled on the streets of Oakland, in the pre-recorded interview Leno asked Obama for his views of what was behind the Occupy Wall Street movement:

Look, people are frustrated. And that frustration expresses itself in a lot of different ways. It expressed itself in the tea party, it's expressing itself in Occupy Wall Street... Everybody needs to understand that the American people feel that no-one is looking out for them right now.

The answer, according to Obama, was that if people have a job and feel that they can get ahead, "then people won't be occupying the streets".


Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/richard-adams-blog/2011/oct/26/barack-obama-jay-leno-tonight?CMP=twt_fd

[Arctic Dave]

1. Uh, yeah. What ever man.

Not listening to you anymore.

[The Doctor.]

6. Except that he's right.

I really should stop listening to people like you.

But I'm not ignorant like that.

[madokie]

16. Right on Doctor

right the fuck on as this old hippie says, right the fuck on.

[Tunkamerica]

2. he hopes.

for some people, maybe a lot that's true. If you're comfortable you're less inclined to feel the situation is unjust even if its unfairness is blatant.

[quaker bill]

11. The unfairness has existed for a long time

but people were comfortable enough, so for most of the last decade there were no protests about it.

[SkyDaddy7]

13. In almost all cases if one is comfortable then the

system is either fair or lopsided in your favor...Ask the 1% if they are comfy.

Just because Obama says something does not by default mean its wrong. In this case he is correct. The system use to be fair when wages rose with GDP, Production & Profits...That all began to change in the 80's.

[SharksBreath]

17. This from the man who could have made the system more fair.

The frustration has boiled over because most of us have realized he's brought also.

One day you will notice it also.

Probably after he gets reelected and decides to start bending over to the GOP again.

[SkyDaddy7]

24. How 'COULD" Obama had made things more fair...

over the past 3yrs that did not require Congressional approval yet Obama just said FUCK THE MIDDLE CLASS...As so many here on DU act like he did?

Seriously, please answer this very easy question...because I can't figure it out.

Folks think Obama could have easily passed all our Liberal dream agenda despite the fact he could barely muster the votes to pass moderate bills...And the same people simply ignore all the Liberal accomplishments he did get.

Sorry, but I do not think Obama hates the middle class & I know he is fighting for the middle class but he needs a Congress that is willing as well.

GITMO is a perfect example...Obama tried twice to close that place but Congress including almost every Democrat chose to turn their backs on Obama out of fear of political backlash back home! But many here on DU placed 100% of the blame on Obama & no one else. Funny how that works!

[Tx4obama]

3. pre-recorded interview ---- that was BEFORE tonight's tear gas attack. n/t

[webDude]

4. Barack, get a clue, look in the mirror before you speak.

[Name removed]

5. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[The Doctor.]

7. You are correct.

And I'd like to answer before your post is deleted.

Yes, the door is open to those who would love to sow discord. It's part of enlightened discourse.

The only question is 'just how much do we let them distort reality?'.

[SharksBreath]

18. Reality. Obama: Wall Street hasn't broken any laws.

Just like It's time to look forward not backward on the Bush crimes.

At what point will you feel like a sucker.

If he would have done what he was supposed to do.

Which is a basic function of the job.

Which is to uphold our laws OWS wouldn't be happening.

[The Doctor.]

25. Oh no, if he prosecuted the BA war crimes, OWS wouldn't be happening.

We'd be in the midst of a civil war and coup d'etat.

And the corporations would be winning it.

[totodeinhere]

20. Not everybody with concerns is a right wing plant. Most are sincere and disagreeing with Obama

doesn't necessarily make you a hater. I for one am upset that in this interview with Jay Leno President Obama again took the opportunity to equate the OWS movement with the Tea Party. OWS is a genuine grassroots movement of the people. The Tea Party was created and funded by the likes of the Koch Brothers and other rich right wingers and it's inherently regressive and racist. Obama is wrong to equate the two and it doesn't make me either a right wing plant or a hater to say so.

[coalition_unwilling]

8. Oh, right, it's frustration. What a pathetic excuse for insightful

analysis.

See my report on Occupy Los Angeles and tell me it's 'frustration':

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=439&topic_id=2175014

[ObaMania]

10. Agreed

+1

[quaker bill]

12. It is frustration with the existing system

being expressed in interesting and creative ways. Yes, I read your report, and thanks for posting it. The process parallels early Quakerism, in the notion of consensus based democracy, a somewhat disorderly feel as people work out the kinks in this form of decision making, a radical committment to equality (early Quakers were understood as "leaderless"), a desire for economic justice, a disdain for those in power, and the regular arrests of the participants. Quakerism was born of frustration as well.

Many of the early Quakers spent much of their adult lives in prison, a good number of them dying there. They were hung here by the Puritans in Boston Commons. Eventually, to solve the political problem, Quakers were given a colony and were encouraged to go there. This is where Pennsylvannia came from.

There are letters from George Washington and Thomas Jefferson complaining about them and how they upset the economic order by freeing slaves and causing people (indentured servants) to "not know their place" in the social order. Tom Paine wrote "Common Sense" in part to complain about the Quakers not wanting to make war on the Indians.

The economic vision of early Friends was crushed all but out of existence by the PTB during the industrial revolution. It is good to see people looking at these concepts again.

[DeSwiss]

9. K&R n/t

[JustAnotherGen]

14. He got it half way right

He forgot that people who DO have jobs have found that ther dollar doesn't go as far as it used to. He left out that people who have an income from working Still feel housing, food, clohting, medical care insecure. We are overworked, and underpaid. He also forgot to say that every day the people who are working more and more say: There but for the grace of chance go I.


We have all gotten a raw deal. Enough is enough.

[No Elephants]

15. The Koch brothers thought up the Tea Party in the 1980's and funded it.

And, with tons of help from people like Dick Armey and the media, helped organize it, publicize it, etc.

See this article, entitled "Covert Operations: The billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama."

It's ten pages, but is a must read for every American, IMO. http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/30/100830fa_fact_mayer

Here's a small taste of what it says about the Tea Party:

"Five hundred people attended the summit, which served, in part, as a training session for Tea Party activists in Texas. An advertisement cast the event as a populist uprising against vested corporate power. “Today, the voices of average Americans are being drowned out by lobbyists and special interests,” it said. “But you can do something about it.” The pitch made no mention of its corporate funders. The White House has expressed frustration that such sponsors have largely eluded public notice. David Axelrod, Obama’s senior adviser, said, “What they don’t say is that, in part, this is a grassroots citizens’ movement brought to you by a bunch of oil billionaires.”



I really wish that everyone would stop mentioning the Tea Party and OWS as though they are alike.

Especially people who should know better. Especially Democrats.

[fasttense]

19. To some extent Obama is right.

Yes, people are frustrated, but it is NOT the same frustration stoked and paid for by the Koch brother funded teabaggers. The teabaggers with the encouragement of the privileged 1% are blaming the poor, the elderly, government workers, unions and minorities for the crumbling of our social infrastructure. They are blaming 75% of society for what is caused by 1% of our society. The occupiers are blaming the 1% because they are NOT controlled by the money of that 1%. The occupiers are a natural grassroots demonstration of democracy. The teabaggers are a demonstration of purposeful fear induced hatred for innocent fellow citizens because they are following the example (and money) of the privileged 1%. The teabaggers are a psychopathic expression of that frustration. The occupiers are a sane and rational expression of that frustration.

Obama is right in that the majority of Americans feel no one is looking out for them. They not only feel it, they know it. One party says that's ok. We can all pull ourselves up by our boot straps as long as we keep feeding our national wealth and lives to the privileged 1%. The other party says keep feeding our national wealth and lives to the privileged 1% but we should help out a few very desperate people as long as it doesn't interfere with feeding that 1%.

They both want to keep the status quo and there in lies the real frustration. The status quo does not work anymore. It has been broken and trampled. It is a deeply sick and psychotic society that has evolved. Where human life and misery has no meaning or purpose. Where people's lives are on par with their cars and houses. Where luck is seen as intelligence and wealth is seen as morality.

The fix is NOT in tinkering around the edges of our current system, hoping the magical hand of the free market will start producing again. The fix is in making a new system.

But Obama doesn't get that because the status quo has worked for him. He got his lucky break. This system has worked for President Obama and his family. Though he feels sorry for those who are trampled and crushed by the system he thinks the system works the same way for everyone. If they would just get out there and do what he did. He does not realize that the current system only works for a handful of lucky people who were born at the right time, at the right place, and worked and developed skills and abilities that happened to be useful at that time and place.

He does not see that the vast majority of people don't get those lucky breaks and are destroyed and mutilated by the status quo. He does not see the crumbling, gasping, sick society that has evolved because he has been lucky. He has his cloak of intelligence with his luck and his veneer of morality with his money. He doesn't understand that 99% of the people don't get that lucky.

[Crowman1979]

21. Ok, now I'm really done with Obama!

He appeared on LENO's TONIGHT SHOW?!?!? F***ING LENO?!?!?! :mad:

Yeah, I was already done with Obama with all that continuing of the Bush wars, giving in to the big banks and caving in to rethuglicans. But this appearance just puts the cherry on top.

[Kingofalldems]

22. If one perused LBN lately, OWS is full of criminals

[YBR31]

23. Watch the whole thing before you form an opinion

Obama went on to talk about frustration coming from the unfairness of a system where you can work hard, play by the rules and the field is not level and no one is hearing you or fighting for you.

[Safetykitten]

26. He should just get his own show.

[chrisa]

27. At least he didn't say, "Nuh one knows what theey're protesting about" (Whiny, Bad American Accent)

And he didn't repeat the meme as of late that the protesters deserve everything the police do to them.