The Nobel prize-winning economist addresses the multitudes gathered near Wall Street.
The scene was surrealistic: megaphones are banned in this corner of the Land of the Free, so an “echo-chamber” of young people amplified his words to the crowd.
Wall Street, he said, has become rich by “socializing losses and privatizing gain.” This is “not capitalism,” he said: comments on that debatable point are welcome.
“After the bubble broke, they continued in their way of disobeying the law, in a sense. Throwing people out of their houses, even in some cases when they didn’t owe money…
“We bailed out the banks with an understanding that there would be a restoration of lending. All there was was a restoration of bonuses. Unless we deal with the anti-competitive practices with the reckless vending and speculative behavior, with the anti-competitive practices, unless we restore demand to the function it should serve, we won’t have a robust recovery.”
New York’s Finest, between bouts of savage brutality, have been using offensive crowd control tactics to prevent demonstrators from actually getting to Wall Street itself. But now the demonstrations are growing and spreading, and the corporate media are having to take notice—even though the coverage has been wildly biased.
The burgeoning anti-Wall Street movement has been endorsed by labour and has begun to attract serious Congressional support as well. Joseph Steiglitz, in other words, has other mainstream company. But will this sort of support, effectively reformist variations of the capitalist status quo, sap the fierce energy of the protests or itself become transformational?
Experience is not on the side of the latter.
But let’s live in the moment. The Left’s decisive answer to the Tea Party is now on the streets, in a positive cause rather than a hateful, racist one. Good to see, gladdens the heart—and I wish I could feel optimistic.