Wall Street Protests - Astroturf or Genuine?

dionysusal has left a new comment on your post ""Best of FSK" - September 2011":

FSK,
Are you gonna do a post about "Occupy Wall Street"? Don't you work on Wall Street (when you work)?

I'd be meaning to do a post about that. Actually, I'd been doing most of my post writing on the subway, so I'm sort of falling behind.

Yes, I'm unemployed now. My most recent job was in that area, although I've worked in most parts of Manhattan. The protest didn't start until after my last day of work!

There really isn't much to say about the protests. It's the usual problem. A protest doesn't really accomplish anything. A protest doesn't really threaten the bad guys. A protest is a group of slaves begging their masters to be less cruel.

Yes, a lot of people are disgruntled. Now that I'm unemployed again, my personal disgruntledness factor has increased. My personal unemployment rate has increased from 0% to 100%.

Some of the "protesters" are probably planted disinformation agents or undercover State spies.

The mainstream media spin of the protests are "Higher taxes on the wealthy." The taxation rate for insiders is irrelevant. Most State insiders are negative taxpayers. If you steal $100M via the State and then pay $50M in taxes, is it more accurate to say "You paid $50M in taxes." or "You stole $50M."? CEOs present themselves are super-patriotic people paying high taxes and donating to charity, but they are mostly spending stolen property.

"Higher taxes for the wealthy" winds up hurting successful small business owners, rather than true insiders. The tax proposal will probably hurt the people in the 99-95th percentile incomes, while it won't hurt the top 0.1%-0.01% at all.

The protesters seem to have a low level of economic literacy. Let me know when you see some protesters saying:

1. Eliminate the Federal Reserve!
2. Eliminate the income tax! (State propaganda is "The income tax steals from the rich and gives back to the poor." The reality is that the income tax steals from the average worker, with the profits going to insiders.)
3. The Federal Reserve is a price-fixing cartel!
4. Fiat debt-based money is evil! (It'd be too much to expect any of them to understand the Compound Interest Paradox.)
5. Gold and silver are better than paper money!

The actual protesters seem to be pro-State trolling, at least the bits I've seen. They are disgruntled, but severely misinformed. They seem to believe things like "Deficit spending for the Federal government stimulates the economy!", or "Government should regulate banks more!" and similar nonsense. The protesters may be saying "Free markets are evil!", while the current financial industry is the result of government, and not a true free market.

Yes, the banksters looted the economy for trillions of dollars, and continue to do so. However, that theft happens in collusion with the Federal government. It's pointless to criticize the financial industry, without also criticizing the government that enables their theft.

It's almost impossible to organize an effective protest. Disinformation agents will be planted to disrupt things. The mainstream media might not cover it, or have biased coverage. A protest doesn't threaten the key State evils. You're at the protest, but the police still are collecting taxes and enforcing bad laws. A lot of people are unemployed, giving them nothing better to do than go to a protest. Eventually, a protest runs out of steam, because people have to work.

The protest is a good sign, that people are very disgruntled. It's a waste of time. The protests are probably controlled by disinformation agents and undercover cops. The protesters seem to be presenting a weak pro-State troll criticism of the financial industry.