Occupy Portland (and by association Occupy Wall Street) have my blood pressure rising these days. I believe their tactics, their message, their lawlessness to be off base, criminal, and un-American. A high school friend, Tony Roberts, had the following assessment on his Facebook wall. I couldn’t agree more.
1. You are not entitled to what I have earned unless I choose to give it to you.
2. Claiming to represent the middle class while harming them through your actions makes you a hypocrite.
3. It is not government’s job (nor anyone else’s), to make you happy.
4. The banks are not to blame for all of your problems. (They have tried that with other groups in previous times, read some history.)
5. If you borrow money you’re expected to pay it back. If you were not financially savvy enough at the time to understand interest rates, that’s your fault, not the banks.
6. Allowing hate speech in your organization and claiming that it’s allowance shows your tolerance does nothing of the kind, it shows your ignorance.
7. Threats and intimidation don’t go very far when it comes to getting people to support your movement.
8. The Founders of this country, for all of their faults and failings, were pretty smart people. You could learn more by reading their own words rather than the opinions of others.
9. It has always been those willing to work, not those willing to live off of the work of others that has made this nation great.
10. You are owed nothing.
