In October of 2011, in a nationally televised news conference, President Obama had nothing but positive things to say about the Occupy Wall Street movement. That same month, in an interview with ABC News, the President said of Occupy, “We are on their side.” The following month, the President once again expressed his support during a speech:
Young people like the ones here today, including the ones who were just chanting at me –you’re the reason I ran for office in the first place.
What’s remarkable is that even as the President was encouraging and showing support for this movement — ensuring them “we are on their side” — Occupy had already devolved from goofy to lawless. By November 1, Breitbart News had already reported on over a hundred different acts of violence, anti-Semitism, vandalism, and perversion. Having made our point, we stopped keeping track at #417, but in the months since, Occupy has only roared back to life in an even more dangerous way.
Throughout all of this, we have yet to hear a President, who was more than willing to comment on Trayvon Martin and the “stupidly acting” Cambridge police, say a single word about the lawlessness and anarchy committed by those whose “side” the President is apparently still on.
Finally(!), yesterday, someone in the media had the stones to ask the White House to distance itself from these thugs. Naturally, the White House refused:
Fox News’ Wendell Goler: The President has voiced support for the Occupy folks in the past, or at least their goals, did their actions in Chicago sour his support?
Jay Carney: Well I think you’re making broad comparisons between different groups, what the President has said in the past is-he has understood-the frustrations Americans have about (pause) the (pause) failure in particular of Wall Street in some cases to – well obviously Wall Street’s role in the financial crisis that precipitated the worst recession since the Great Depression.
Now why would that be? Well, as Bill O’Reilly pointed out yesterday, some of the individuals and organizations backing this lawlessness are also allies of the President — including the DC-based Institute for Policy Studies, which is partially funded by George Soros’ Tides Foundation. Also, SEIU is covering $4,000 a month rent for DC Occupiers. There’s also Obama’s own former “Green Czar” Van Jones, who claims to have a hundred thousand Occupiers at his command.
As we saw with the Trayvon Martin maelstrom, Obama is counting on anarchy, division, and confusion to keep his base energized. In the case of Trayvon, it was the media that enflamed the racial tensions. In the case of Occupy, it’s Soros and SEIU helping to keep Occupy organized and mobilized. Granted, Occupy has protested Obama and might have — God forbid– even targeted Obama’s Chicago campaign HQ for a terrorist attack. But it’s the chaos itself that aids Obama and his SEIU/Soros allies, not where the chaos is directed.
George Soros, Van Jones, and SEIU are not super PACs. There’s no law stopping Obama from privately and publicly assuming a role as President of the United States as opposed to the leader of his party and demand that the funding and legitimizing of this violence and chaos end.
But Obama hasn’t, because Occupy forces his narrative of class envy and wealth redistribution to a media more than willing to aid and abet this narrative (and to downplay Occupy’s violence). In order to get reelected, Obama and his media allies require that a narrative take hold in which Wall Street (and by extension Mitt Romney) is the problem, not his failed economic policies.
Occupy are the Democrats’ shock troops — the frontline of 2012 — and Obama isn’t about to betray his base.
In time, Obama might be pressured into doing the right thing, but that would require the media to do the right thing, so don’t hold your breath.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC
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