I’d like to see a special prosecutor assigned to prosecute all the financial ‘Corporations’ (if still in business) and all of the senior officials of (all) of those corporation who were employed at any time during the financial bubble. I would like to see special prosecutor sweep through the highly paid board of directors who served on any board of any of those corporations.

I don't think it's possible, because those people dominate from a revolving White House door that welcomes only the elite 1% of it's population and many of those criminals now serve the ‘country’s best interest’ AND many more of those criminals think they are safely hiding under the guise of professorships, Deans and even Presidents of some of our highest rated universities.

There seems to have been no point what-so-ever to the Congressional inquiry of 2009 – just a show to placate the masses.

As long as all those criminals maintain their political influence from WITHIN the system, there is no fixing it.

The best use of our most fervent OCCUPIERS (at the moment) would be as educators. They’re able to set up 24 hour live stream videos then we can set up Channels for educating the public. We can even run our own political candidates. They won’t win, but it will be a better protest then taking no part at all in a political equivalency of the Wall Street ponzie schemes.

Every state should have an interest in every other state’s politics because interstate commerce, our educational system, and the basis of all human rights must be equitable between all states.
Just as grassroots movements recruit and train new leaders, so too should the OCCUPY movement focus on new leaders, thinkers, organizers, teachers and we must all learn to value a different kind of risk other than derivatives, more like the risk of middle class philanthropy.

The big banks are still unregulated, prime interest rates are next to nothing, and at this point given the millions who have walked away from a home mortgage, defaulted on personal loans, and continue to build credit card debt on top of debt that they will never be able to pay, there is about as much risk of any criminal offence for individuals as there is to all those people who created this world crisis and were rewarded with compensations of stocks, cash, and the power of holding newly acquired and highly influential social and political status.

I say take advantage of the big banks who are STILL unregulated to build a new infrastructure under the old one and on the money they stole in the first place. We need new technology for greener energy, and new industries to make the products of that new technology. Small businesses should be prime recipients of bank loans and they will create long-term jobs that will require both professionals and non-professionals – they will be the industry that helps the US emerge from the depths of greed and depraved war mongering out to the future that calls us.

In our new infrastructure we need to build a lot of cooperatives. We NEED rural coops so we can band together and stop the likes of Monsanto and the GMO seeds and their ONE TIME seed generation that assures them of world monopoly on seeds. We need to put them out of business and we desperately need rural togetherness and world agreement to sap the likes of Monsanto dry. It’s time for us to use the knowledge and skills of Monsanto type professionals, not for greed but for a better quality of life, a healthier environment, and a future for new generations to enjoy.

If our coops generate enough growth then our own credit unions would be possible. We need creative ideas for new forms of the old Town Hall Meetings. We need to work small and build while maintaining the most important thing that this Occupy movement has created – connections between the subcultures in our own society and so with the distant national cultures we have connected with during this world crisis.

Creating international sister coop organizations on a non-profit level will undermine the mega corporations whose power is great enough to create false supply and demand at will to raise prices.
Educating this country about the role our consumerism has played in this whole fiasco is a good start but we need the coops to offer alternatives.

If we really are the 99% then we have every advantage on our side because we are machine that drives the greed and we have the power to break the hold the 1% maintain over us.

We need new leaders, thinkers, organizers, teachers and we must all learn to value a different kind of risk other than the Wall Street idea of derivatives. We need to take the risk of middle class philanthropy.

The ideals through which our society has developed include restricting law to the least level which will provide the greatest freedoms to individuals while protecting the rights of everyone.

Our first major issue is: – How do we, and how does the law, relate children to the word ‘everyone’?

Children are legally considered adults (in the U.S.) at the age of 18, however, there is a lot of ambiguity that surrounds the age. An 18 year old can still be considered part of a family so that many family benefits can still cover the adult as a child while allowing the parents to take tax exemptions for that adult’s maintenance under child care laws.

Also, there is the 1984 National Drinking age which is 21, though an 18 year old can vote and serve in wars. States have a lot of control over other issues regarding ‘legal’ age as in age for, consensual sex, marriage, leaving school and others.

This ambiguity plays havoc with parental rights and responsibilities. For example: what was the purpose behind the federal age of majority being set at 18? Why 21 to drink but in some states the age for consensual sex or marriage can be as young as 14?

We tend to have enough concern to voice loudly our disgust for the actions of some parents toward their children but we accept the ambiguities listed and many more.

As adults we all have the legal right to a living will including DNR (do not resuscitate) and the part about denying medical intervention. We have the right to transfer our care to another person (spouse, adult child, parent, or other).

A child, under the age of 18, is obviously a child whose health care is entrusted into the hands of the parent or legal guardian. Yet if that guardian refuses medical treatment for their child, for whatever reason, we are emotionally moved as to get a court order to deny parental rights.

We expect a parent to pay for property damage that their ‘child’ caused to a neighbor’s house while playing outside. Small claims court hears a lot of those cases and typically makes the parent responsible. But when a child as young as 9 kills another person, the parents are not responsible and the courts determines if the child will be held to adult standards or reprimanded to a state facility until a certain age.

CORPRAL PUNISHMENT: Now we have a huge dilemma because there is so much ambiguity about what is or is not excessive punishment? What is or is not acceptable behavior of a parent to his or her child? As parents, we can utilize corporal punishment but who determines the degree to which physical and psychological pain or damage is excessive?

I have seen children as young at 10 months old with piercings and I’ve seen children as young as 2 with tattoos. Is that humane? Might that cause psychological damage? Is that excessive pain that is intentionally inflicted or do we chalk that up to culture and allow it?

If a child is sick and a particularly religious parent prefers to pray instead of seeking medical treatment do others have the right to step in? If a parent choose a less harmful and invasive (alternative) form of cancer treatment for their child should the court have the right to override the parents decision? If a doctor declares a child who was placed on life support brain dead, should the parent have the right to pull the plug or do we entrust that decision to our courts? Did the parent have a right to deny the excessive life saving attempt from the beginning?

The arguments abound but there are answers.

First, we have to resolve the national ambiguities that have developed at the same institutionalized level as racism. Children have never been considered humans with a full spectrum of human rights, they have been considered only for their worth – in the workforce, to work for the benefit of the family, to vote, and to fight wars.

This will make it necessary for society to explicitly define human rights on many dimensions. If a human right includes the expectation of a safe and caring environment, we need to define what those things are because that applies to all humans whether child, adult, inmate or prisoner. Making exceptions in any case, causes us to consider one less than human.

If a well informed adult of sound mind has the ‘human’ right to sign over power of attorney for the execution of a living will, then we have to determine who harbors that responsibility for a child under the ‘considered’ legal age of adulthood.

If the parent/legal guardian has the right to make medical decisions for a child (under federal age of majority), it makes sense that the parent has the right to invoke corporal punishment which the law has determined is not excessive.

But we can’t get to what is excessive until we determine what rights every human is entitled to simply by the fact that the person is a human.

If one person has an opinion, likely many will hold the same opinion. At least one person here seems to be concerned about the 'high' cost of the OWC to tax payers.

Just to put it in perspective, let's look at a comparison of costs here.

How much do you think the unethical actions that led to this recession have cost citizens and tax payers, just in this country?

Well, what if we rounded up all the millions of people who have lost their homes and defaulted on personal loans and credit card debt and put them in jail? Well not the children of course, we could put them in the social system (foster care, adoption, juvinal centers.

Since these people have little means and since they are all entitled to legal representation, I'm sure there would be many millions of law suits.

How much do you suppose that would cost current tax payers (& future ones)? You know, those who still have jobs and are working?

How does that compare to the expence of the unethical behaviors that have caused this national and world crisis?

And the big question concerserns counting the number of people who HAVE been imprisioned for unethical behaviors leading to this crisis, versus the millions who would be jailed due to that unethical behavior?

That's just a very small example. There are wars to consider, there are corporate interests for whom exemptions have been made at the highest levels, without notice and despite voiceful concerns of the public, like environmental issues, and union issues.

The issues that exist that separate that which the constitution was created to unite, are too numerous to list in a short post.

Now what is it that you think the protesters are doing wrong? What exactly, please list specific incidents, the law involved, and how you think punishment should be carried out in the most cost effective mannor. Then let us know if you think that is freedom worth the overall restrictions that would be required to enforce them.

You have no beliefs, therefore you can hold no opinion although it surprises me that someone who holds no beliefs would watch a few minutes of a video and draw such a black and white conclusion, similar to some of the most fundamentalist thought to be had.

Only the ones that directly address the OP. Long winded accounts of gun control and the Bush era did not apply.

People can sit at home and call, write, tweet, email, or facebook their political representatives to share a grievance and provide all manner of reasoning to support their own opinion regarding the actions they expect their representatives to take.

But we have no way of knowing if we, as individuals, have a minority view. All we have are the actions taken by those in power that seem to be contrary to our own desires.

Until this recession most people still placed some kind of faith in the election process, thinking that if enough people were unhappy with the actions of those in power, that our vote might bring more like-minded people to those high positions.

Obviously, many eyes have been opened and so many grievances have become public, that it required masses of people to come together just to sort out the real issues and how they need to be addressed.

When the 'Occupy' group first began they drew the attention of thousands and then tens of thousands and finally millions, because each individual realized he was not alone.

The fact that there are so many banding together that their mere presence can have an effect on traffic patterns or on business as usual is a testament to the loss of influence and control that people are suppose to have, not only over their own lives but over the governments that should be guaranteeing the freedom and opportunity to maintain that control.

There are many who repeat what others have told them, that the protesters are not peaceful, they are not keeping their sites of occupation clean, and that they refuse to obey the law. For a month now many of the ‘Occupy’ movements have had live, streaming , feed available on-line. What that feed shows are peaceful demonstrators, being herded, maced, thrown to the ground, hand-cuffed without cause and arrested. There have been obvious attempts by some police to hit targets (people) with the tear gas they are using to disperse the groups. People have been roped with no way out and maced. People have been hit with batons and rubber bullets and seriously injured, and hospitalized, without provocation (all caught on live tape). I have witnessed this myself, it's available to everyone - you don't need the news to tell you what to believe.

The Occupy sites in the larger movements have areas designated as medical, sleeping, eating, gathering and so on. They even have their own clean-up crews. Many have been told to leave because their “PERMITS” for assembly have expired. In some cases the police were sent in even while negotiations were in the works for new permits. Some agencies refuse to reissue such permits.

Freedom of assembly, and speech via permit only? and then having permit denied without reason given. IS THAT THE KIND OF FREEDOM YOU THINK WE SHOULD BE HAPPY WITH? It's not the kind of freedom President Obama and Hillary Clinton have expounded on so often.

The You Tube url in the op, shows some of these incidents in short clips in between clips of President Obama and Hilary Clinton making several speeches at different times about the recent incidents in the middle East. Below I have typed the speech clips for those, like Dragoness, who are not able to watch it. Keep in mind that the incidents being spoken about were in the middle east – but the ‘Occupy’ clips in between the speeches are examples of exactly what Clinton and Obama are so adamant about stopping in the middle east.

H.Clinton


Pres. Obama


H.Clinton


Pres. Obama


H. Clinton


Pres. Obama


H. Clinton


H. Clinton (yet another day, another speech)


Pres. Obama

Just out of curiosity,

Did anyone actually watch the You tube presentation?

The First Amendment (Amendment I) to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. The amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering with the right to peaceably assemble or prohibiting the petitioning for a governmental redress of grievances.

Let's have a discussion about those 'rights' that I have bolded.
Please review the following brief url and discuss. Whether you agree with the OCCUPY movement or not, consider our rights in conjunction with the First Amendment and current law and comment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S880UldxB1o&feature=share

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9ZRHoawyOg

There are a couple ideas in the vidoe up there and the video is less than 10 minutes.

Well that's just as accurate but youv'e missed the part about - How would we know that a deity or even the Christian deity HAS spoken to anyone? There are thousands of people who claim they have been spoken to - some of them attempt to change previously held religious beliefs. But should people follow - Heaven's Gate for example?

Well I missed a good responce, made by Aperture, to my post but I sure am happy to see that Message was looking in and stepped in.

On a positive note to the OP, humans are constantly taking in matter and converting it to energy but where does does the energy go?

A person eats a meal, converts it into energy and pushes a plow and plants some seeds. (this is the short version) The seed prospers from the airation of the soil, the sun and the rain and it turns that matter into energy with which to grow and then humans consume what grew from the seed.

It's thought, by many, that energy simply contiues on, it cannot end.

So no matter what the form is, when we die the univers will find a way to turn what's left into energy.

I think you've caught the jest of what I was saying and used it to show another example. As Aperture said, it's illogical that a very communicative god would suddenly become silent for thousands of years.

Along the same lines, it makes almost no sense that a creator god would have so little understanding of its own creations that it would expect humans to believe and follow a human who said he has a message from god. I mean, how many poeple here would follow a Jim Jones type?

I think there is confusion around the concept attributed to the word 'energy'.

Can you contrast different kinds of energy and then explain what kind of energy you expect will be returned to where, when a human dies?

There is definitely some confusion here because Taoism or Daoism has no deity, so no creator to be worshiped, glorified, or feared and no prayer directed toward such a concept. Just because you believe that a singular god being exists does not make that the same god in which other assign deity to.



Here’s the thing, S1owhand, how can you possibly know what the principles of every religious view are and how can you possibly know that they cannot change? If god gave directions even once to any man in history, what would stop it from happening again? The fact that there is no consensus of what it is that any god actually said AND meant to any human means that there is no possible way to know what principles of belief that or any god would expect humans to follow.



How do you know that THOSE who you say are misrepresenting have not been directed by some ‘spiritual’ communication to bring new direction and beliefs to the people? Why would you even consider assigning such limitations to a being you reportedly believe we can know so little about, much less have any real understanding of.



Then you have contradicted yourself because in you’re quote above this one you show no tolerance for fundamentalists or for those who believe they have been directed to another path. There can be no ‘freedom’ of religious belief that is not constrained by law or by civil or social contract. The reason for these limitations is because there are god conflicts. The degree to which these conflicts extend clearly indicate that one religious group does not believe that another religious group is headed by the same god.

And just as clearly, the attributes that you have assigned to the god of your making are not the same attributes of gods created by others.

Thank-you for sharing a small part of the history of your people. Most of us have to dig into history and hope that the historians' view represents an honest attempt to portray the beliefs and values of the Native populations which existed prior to the coloniziation of the land they called home.

Through your family connections Mikey, you have, perhaps, a clearer understanding of the beliefs and values which once guided the daily lives of a past culture.

I am curious, in your opinion what part of the early Christian teachings were responsible for the greatest change between the beliefs and values of the pre-colinized Lakota people and the Lakota beliefs and values of the present time?

Do you think that there may have been Christian teaching that have survived to the present that altered Lakota beliefs for the better?

Ok, let me see if I understand this. Prophacy about the so-called 'end-times' occurrs according to some set seriers of events. The course of these events can be stretched over an unknown period of time.

All of the events MUST take place and must occur in the order of which they are foretold.

But at anytime during the course of these events unfolding, humans can become aware that they are witnessing the end times and they change something which then changes the outcome.

However, in the avoidance of the end times the prophecy was not fulfilled so humans are forced to repeat this series of events over and over until the sequence has been completed because, as all good believers know, prophecy MUST necessarily be fulfilled or it has failed - right?

So if we forced to repeat the whole series of events until completion ... well there we go messing with free will again.

Can we just make up our minds - either we are free or we are controlled...

Now that's a philosophy I can believe in!

Notice I did not use the laughing banana, that would be pure laughter.

No my laughter is more like 'UNBELIEVABLE' and then the moment hits and I think - it's really not funny, it's scary.

And so I end with:

So what you are saying is the soilent green is more like the original wafer of the Christian communion? If I Grok you and eat of your dead flesh, I am really consuming god? So soilent green may not be a bad thing then, right?

I noticed in the OP profile, a man wearing clothes. Did god manufacture them or did man? In either case they seem to be assembled correctly on the figure - perhaps there were instructions - The Ten Steps to Buttoning a shirt.