Obama and Occupy Wall Street

 According to Democracy Now, hundreds of protesters have been arrested across the Nation during the Occupy Wall street movement. They announce that the arrest totals include: 175 in Chicago; 100 in Arizona; 92 in New York City; 19 in Raleigh, 19 in Denver; and 19 in Washington, D.C., including Princeton University Professor Cornel West, on the steps of the Supreme Court. West was arrested at the new MLK memorial, where according to Democracy Now, Obamas dedication speech included words such as "It is right for us to celebrate Dr. King’s marvelous oratory, but it is worth remembering that progress did not come from words alone. Progress was hard. Progress was purchased through enduring the smack of billy clubs and the blast of fire hoses. It was bought with days in jail cells and nights of bomb threats."
I can’t decide if this is a warning, or simply encouragement from president Obama. He appears to understand where protesters are coming from; in a recent news conference he concluded that the protests revolved around a "broad-based frustration among Americans about how the U.S. financial system works.” According to The Las Angeles Times, Obama seems to feel what the 99% feels when he announces that "not only did the financial sector, with the Republican Party in Congress, fight us every step in the way. But now you've got these same folks arguing we should roll back all those reforms and go back to the way it was.” He then added that “that does not make sense to the American people. They are frustrated by it and they will continue to be frustrated by it until they get the sense that everyone is playing by the same rules."
True, but is Obama just saying what the American people want to hear? I find it hard to truly understand something until I have personally gone through it myself. Sure, you can use empathy and what not, but you can never really KNOW until it has actually happened to you. Obama is not going to lose his job because of the financial crisis. Well, actually he may, but not under the same terms or conditions. He will lose his job because he didn’t DO anything about financial crisis, whereas the 99% could easily lose their job as a victim of it. Obama does not have to worry about his home being foreclosed, or how to pay for supplies or admissions for his children in school. He doesn’t have to worry about filing for bankruptcy, or stress over the electric bill. So does Obama really understand? I think not. He has and never will be where most all of us are today, stuck in an economy where even something as simple as going to the grocery store can put grey hairs on your head. He hasn’t seen the other side, where you wonder where your tax dollars are going and can’t keep track of where all your hard earned money ended up.
If Obama truly realized that there was a problem with our current system, if he truly understood, then those 175 people in Chicago wouldn’t have been arrested. Same with the other cities. He would be doing more to protect the protesters from cops, one of which arrested a lady as she was innocently trying to withdrawal money from a bank, according to Democracy Now. Remember all that “change” Obama was talking about in 2008? Yeah, there would be a lot more of that.

Works Cited

Memoli, Michael A. "Obama Occupy Wall Street | Obama News Conference: Obama: Occupy Wall Street Protests Show Americans' Frustration - Los Angeles Times."Featured Articles From The Los Angeles Times. Las Angeles Times, 06 Oct. 2011. Web. 24 Oct. 2011. <http://articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/06/news/la-pn-obama-occupy-wall-street-20111006>.

Kamat, Anjali. A Daily TV/radio News Program, Hosted by Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, Airing on over 900 Stations, Pioneering the Largest Community Media Collaboration in the United States. Democracy Now, 16 Oct. 2011. Web. 24 Oct. 2011. <http://www.democracynow.org/>.