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New Poll: Majority of Americans Support Wall Street Protestors!

GabrielWithoutWings

GabrielWithoutWings

Well-Known Member
Sunstone said:
Do you think the Protests will continue to gain support among Americans? Why or why not?
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Support among Americans? Yes, definitely.

Will it do any good in the long run? No. If march after march didn't bring the troops home from Iraq then this won't do any good either.

When the President appoints an Attorney General that has a blistering hatred of white-collar crime and a few poor people start burning houses and businesses down, THAT would be a turning point.
 
Alceste

Alceste

Vagabond
GabrielWithoutWings said:
Support among Americans? Yes, definitely.

Will it do any good in the long run? No. If march after march didn't bring the troops home from Iraq then this won't do any good either.

When the President appoints an Attorney General that has a blistering hatred of white-collar crime and a few poor people start burning houses and businesses down, THAT would be a turning point.
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Key difference: the international anti-war protest was one day. Everybody took to the streets, waved some signs around, then went back to their jobs and homes to complain that the war happened anyway. I always thought that if they didn't go home, the Iraq war would not / could not have happened, and I was always angry that the protesters' commitment to their cause was so feeble. A million people have died in that conflict who would otherwise still be alive.

Now that a lot of people in the states don't have jobs or homes to go back to (thanks to Wall Street), they can stay indefinitely. The entrenched powers are terrified of this, and rightly so. If the Egypt protest had been one day long, Mubarak would still be sitting on his throne.
 
Alceste

Alceste

Vagabond
Sunstone said:
According to a new poll, conducted by Time Magazine, a majority of Americans now support the Wall Street Protesters. Even a majority of Republicans support some of the Protesters demands.

In typical "fair and balanced" style, Fox News Corporation still calls the Protesters, "fringe", despite that a majority of Americans agree with the Protesters. But given Fox News reputation for distorting the news, the fact they refer to the Protesters as "fringe" comes as no real surprise.

Do you think the Protests will continue to gain support among Americans? Why or why not?
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Please don't spoil a good story by shifting focus to the way Faux Spews is telling it. The majority of Americans support the protesters. Great!
 
Sunstone

Sunstone

De Diablo Del Fora
Premium Member
Alceste said:
Please don't spoil a good story by shifting focus to the way Faux Spews is telling it. The majority of Americans support the protesters. Great!
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You're right. I've edited the OP to remove references to Faux.
 
Rakhel

Rakhel

Well-Known Member
Form my perspective, actually being down in the trenches of Zaccotti park, what most of those who have shown up after this started are supporting is the right to protest. They are also supporting the protesters. And when I say "supporting" I mean providing food, clothes, showers, blankets, toilets...
 
YmirGF

YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
I do find it amazing that people are being supportive of a loosely affiliated group that has thus far to express their objectives. I think this is a classic example of people seeing what they want to. Heck, it worked for Obama, why not with these "protests". Oddly, one would expect that Obama had made America a bit gun shy. Evidently that is not the case; they still haven't learned their lesson yet.

I want to see how this "movement" survives once the cold weather hits.
 
Alceste

Alceste

Vagabond
YmirGF said:
I do find it amazing that people are being supportive of a loosely affiliated group that has thus far to express their objectives. I think this is a classic example of people seeing what they want to. Heck, it worked for Obama, why not with these "protests". Oddly, one would expect that Obama had made America a bit gun shy. Evidently that is not the case; they still haven't learned their lesson yet.

I want to see how this "movement" survives once the cold weather hits.
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I would find it more amazing if, in the face of an outrageous wealth disparity, a public uprising of some kind did not occur. I'm hard pressed to think of a society in the last few hundred years where outrageous wealth disparity wasn't met by a public rebellion of some kind during a time of economic hardship.

I'm also not surprised that the protest does not yet appear to have coalesced around a specific message or leader. I'd be very suspicious of a "popular movement" that appeared from the outset to have an agenda that could be easily summed up in a sound bite. I've read too much about the PR industry. Real human beings are complicated, confusing, poor communicators. Only carefully crafted, focus-group tested messages written by admen are clear and make instant intuitive sense.
 
McBell

McBell

mantra-chanting henotheistic snake handler
Wow.
They really think that asking a whopping 1001 people represents the whole country?
 
McBell

McBell

mantra-chanting henotheistic snake handler
Sunstone said:
If the study was done scientifically, I can see no reason why that number of people would not suffice.
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I have serious doubts as to the accuracy of the statement: "MAJORITY of protesters support wall street protesters" based an a poll of 1001 people.
 
Mister Emu

Mister Emu

Emu Extraordinaire
Staff member
Premium Member
I have serious doubts as to the accuracy of the statement: "MAJORITY of protesters support wall street protesters" based an a poll of 1001 people.
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That is statistics... ~1000 people leads to about a +/- 3% error for the U.S. population.
 
Falvlun

Falvlun

Earthbending Lemur
Premium Member
Sunstone said:
Read down to the second half of the article.
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For those who might be similarly challenged:

article said:
As the movement has snowballed, it has become -- as the Tea Party did -- the subject of sneers from opponents bent on undermining its objectives and minimizing its influence. Like the Tea Party, it benefits in its incipient stages by venting a broad array of common frustrations. Many of these are vague enough that even Republicans can co-sign them. Of the respondents in TIME's poll familiar with the protests, 86% -- including 77% of Republicans -- agree with the movement's contention that Wall Street and its proxies in Washington exert too much influence over the political process. More than 70%, and 65% of Republicans, think the financial chieftains responsible for dragging the U.S. economy to the brink of implosion in the fall of 2008 should be prosecuted. Other questions reveal a sharper split along partisan lines but nonetheless reveal the strength of economic populism. Nearly 80% of respondents (96% of Democrats and 56% of Republicans) think the class chasm between rich and poor has grown too large, and 68%, including 40% of Republicans, say the affluent should pay more taxes.
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Like the article says, many of those are vague enough that they can appeal to most everyone. In general, though, Gjall has a point: People are so frustrated right now, basically anything that can channel that frustration is looked upon favorably. Protests fit the bill quite admirably.
 
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