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An Occupy Wall Street protester demonstrates in Foley Square in New York City - Source: Reuters
Occupy Wall Street, the protesters with few shared aims, but a shared sense of grievance over what they see as America's corruption, has spread to Washington DC, a place most people in the US identify as a giant trough where the most corrupt swill themselves silly on the public purse.
A collection of demonstrators stood outside the White House and shouted and waved placards. Earlier today they had obtained a legitimacy that extends far beyond being roughed up and pepper sprayed by NY cops in being mentioned favourably by President Obama.
Speaking at a news conference the President said that the protests, which have grown over the past few weeks, reflected "broad-based frustration about how our financial system works". He pledged to continue along the path of consumer protection that his administration has set itself on.
This approach probably wouldn't satisfy Ryan, a young anarchist I spoke to in Foley Park yesterday.
He was holding up a placard demanding the end of the Federal Reserve (essentially the US version of NZ's Reserve Bank). His studies in criminal justice and politics had led him to becoming an anarchist.
He batted off my questions about whether removing the Federal Reserve would create financial chaos (businesses would get used to it, he believed), with the assertion that he was against violence and coercion in any way, and anarchism was the best means to express this.
Shortly thereafter, my cameraman, who was dressed like an anarchist, handed me his i-Phone, and demanded I take a shot of him planking amidst the demonstrators.
As he lay face down on Foley Square (I pity his wife); people either walked around him or ignored him. It was that kind of a demonstration. Later the pepper spray came out, and there were arrests, though not in numbers enough to warrant news stories.
And anyway, Steve Jobs had died, and the attention of the media was shifting to the new Apple store on the Upper West Side. The iconic Apple store is the one on Fifth Avenue, opposite the Plaza, but it's being refurbished and is covered in tarpaulin. So the telly trucks went to the UWS, and where the telly trucks and hacks go, the people follow.
Which brings us back to Occupy Wall Street.
The numbers of supporters are growing but are they enough to say that something genuine is taking place? I don't know. The narrative of the new media keeps changing.
First the group was risible (I must confess I was embarrassingly fond of this riff for the first two weeks). It was victimised by the NYPD. Then it was mass-arrested by them. Then labour unions joined their cause. Some activists on yesterday said there were 50,000 people at the march. My toes there were. Now the group is seen as 'spreading' (more than 50 cities including Washington DC), and expressing frustration.
Something is clearly happening.
No one, least of all people like Ryan, knows what. I don't know. One theory is that Occupy Wall Street could turn into a Tea Party of the Democrat party. That would produce problems for... the Democrat Party, just as the Tea Party has driven the Republican Party further to the right, isolating it from independent voters. Also, one of Occupy Wall Street's many complaints is the monetisation of American political life. Pity. The President and everyone on down from him is monetised.
It's possible that what grumblers in the media like me complained about in the first instance could prove to be the most beautiful aspects of the Occupy Wall Street movement. It owes no one anything. It has no idea who it is. It's growing, like a charming adolescent with basically good manners. But it's no longer able to be discounted. It is something. Soon it will have to stand for something.
Have your say on what Tim has to say below.
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