Personal Reflection- Occupy Wall Street

I am an entrepreneur and small business owner- a capitalist, BUT I support the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Why am I a 99%er! I'm a small business owner no one is going to bail out if I fail. I pay taxes and am realistic enough to know I'll never be rich being a restaurateur in a small town. I believe in balanced budgets, but in the Lesser Depression I'm a Keynesian who wants to see a REAL stimulus package of about $1.5 trillion. I believe Wall Street is NOT the real economy- they neither produce goods nor offer a service that helps most. The advise their investors and then bet against them. They lie and give inaccurate advise if it benefits them. It is a business driven first and foremost by greed and the lack of the regulations put in place after the Great Depression has allowed this all to happen- thanks to Reagan, Clinton & both Bushes, who all deregulated them in the false belief that they'd regulate themselves. The have rubbed in our faces the bail; out they got with giving themselves outrageous bonuses for what?! Tanking the world economy?! And I am a believer in a progressive tax rate. They have bought, if not the best congress (Democrat and Republican) money can buy, it's pretty close. And Obama has made lame half-assed statements calling them out for their greed and they BLAST him as anti-business, when he has been anything but.

It's time for accountability: there are Wall Street types who should be in jail; members of congress voted out of office for their unyielding support of deregulation of the financial system; To-big-to-fail banks and financial institutions broken up; investment earnings should be taxed at income tax levels versus the 15% capital gains tax- which should be eliminated and make all capital gains simple income; we need to rewrite the tax code, end all deductions and make a progressive flat tax for individuals and corporations; but most of all we have to get money OUT of politics and pass an amendment to the Constitution that ends the definition of speech as including money and that corporations are not individuals.

These beliefs put me in the company of that great "Socialist" Warren Buffet; better company I could not ask to be included in. I think most Americans have no idea what Socialism means, but, just like the throwing around of Hitler's name for anyone who disagrees with them, they will continue to use it- continuously. That's because whenever money is tight we eliminate money for schools and teachers first- we have dumbed down the populous. The Corporate-Oligarchy have fed the populous the modern equivalent of the Roman Emperors 'Bread & Circuses'- 'Bud & Circuses; couch potatoes fed on beer, reality TV and sports. But Americans are waking up. First there was the Tea Party- They've been co-opted but it was the beginning of 'We the People' starting to stand up. Now there is Occupy Wall Street.... Let's just hope it isn't co-opted as well.