Occupy Wall Street: If South Americans Can Reform Their Constitutions, Then Why Not Us?

[Playinghardball]

Source: BuzzFlash
NIKOLAS KOZLOFF FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT

After a couple of weeks trying to find their groove, Occupy Wall Street protesters are now on a high and are set to take their movement to the next level. First came the announcement that New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg would not dismantle the encampment at Liberty Plaza, and then, as anti-capitalist demonstrators took to the streets in cities as far afield as Madrid and Rome, activists may have sensed that Occupy Wall Street stood to become truly global in scope. With the mushrooming of protest across the United States, corporate executives are sitting up and taking notice, while both the Republicans and Democrats have been forced to recognize the growing power of demonstrations. With the 2012 presidential election just a year away, it is not inconceivable that Occupy Wall Street will exert a political impact upon the campaign.

Though these wins are certainly impressive, the protesters must now face some daunting challenges. Youthful and energetic, Occupy Wall Street activists have enthusiasm and momentum on their side. There will come a time, however, when the demonstrators may find it difficult to sustain such a high level of mobilization. Perhaps sensing that it was too soon to put forth a concrete set of demands, anti-corporate protesters have, up until now, exploited a general sense of unease with Wall Street excesses and government bailouts of the financial sector.

Yet, for all their successes, the demonstrators are locked in a paradox: on the one hand, Occupy Wall Street must appeal to more disenfranchised people if it wants to grow the movement, yet by including other constituencies the protesters may find that the nature of their protest becomes too diluted or diffuse. Activists, then, must delicately find a way to channel their demands in such a way that the movement expands without losing its core focus. In looking to the future, some on the left are seizing on ambitious goals which heretofore might have seemed, to put it modestly, rather "pie in the sky."

Occupy Wall Street Thinks Big

Take, for example, the radical notion of amending the constitution to address protesters' demands or even convening a constitutional convention. Already, an Occupy Wall Street "working group" has called for a "non-partisan National General Assembly" which would convene in Philadelphia in July, 2012 to draft a "petition of grievances." In an echo of the original Continental Congresses of the colonial era, members of the assembly would deliberate amongst themselves and present points to the presidential candidates in advance of the 2012 election.

More: http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/13093

[Sarah Ibarruri]

1. We have amended it in the past, and the Constitution is imperfect and modifiable

No reason why it cannot be, in my opinion, and it needs to be.

[ChandlerJr]

2. Amending the constitution is not a radical notion

the mechanism is already in place. The idea that OWS could ever hope to control the process is naive at best and total wacked out lunacy at worst.

And a Constitutional Convention would splinter in 1000 different ways. Everybody and his drummer would want their own pet agendas addressed.

[Xithras]

6. Yep, "I'll vote for your amendment if you'll vote for mine"

Anyone wanting to see this in action merely needs to look at the EU constitution, which was 300 pages long and contained so many carve outs and exceptions that it was almost a parody of it's original concept. There's no evidence that the same thing wouldn't happen here.

And, of course, you still have to get it approved. Article 5 defines the requirements for calling a constitutional convention, but you'll still need to get 38 states to approve the new Constitution before it comes into power.

The odds of a convention generating a new usable constitution are small. The odds that the big money bankers would allow a constitution that undercut their powers to make it through the state legislatures is nearly zero. There's be a lot of new millionaires in government who would make sure that never happened.

[Silent3]

3. Characterizing OWS as "anti-capitalist demonstrators"...

...is surely one way to increase its "focus", but only at the expense of broad support. Very who support the American part of the OWS movement are anti-capitalist, nowhere near even being persuadable to that point of view.

[EFerrari]

5. In "Capitalism: A Love Story" Moore shares a poll that showed

when the right wing started calling Obama a socialist, the popularity of capitalism fell into the minority. lol :)

[Silent3]

7. I'll have to watch the movie again, because I don't remember that part

At any rate, I'll bet you'd have a hard time finding anti-capitalism as a consistent opinion polling result in the US.

When Moore talked about "replacing" capitalism with democracy, it seemed to me that the end result he was promoting was still really capitalism in another form, better-regulated capitalism with less government corruption and more corporate accountability to the public good.

[jwirr]

9. I was always told that capitalism was a form of economics and democracy

a way of governing. Apples and oranges.

[Silent3]

10. I agree, which is why I thought it odd Moore put it that way...

...and why I thought in the end that "Capitalism: A Love Story" isn't really an anti-capitalist movie, just anti-crony-capitalist and anti-corporatist.

[EFerrari]

13. He was trying to make two points at the same time.

That, the right wing smear backfired and that when people were spurred to learn something about socialism and capitalism, they chose for themselves independent of the media noise machine.

[EFerrari]

14. It's in the last hour of the film, where there are out takes of all those people

calling Obama a socialist. I don't remember though, who was polled. It might have been young people.

[Odin2005]

17. Us Millennials have no memory of the USSR, so the Commie-bashing had no meaning to us.

That's why, IMO, we have no aversion to going after Banksterism.

[kctim]

4. Why not you?

Because you will never have the support required to do it.

[jwirr]

8. So far the reason we have not had a constitutional convention has

been fear. I have always heard talk about the fear that we might lose control of the convention to rwers and then what. It is a valid fear more so now than in the past. These devils have had the power to take over our country not all that long ago.

[Fumesucker]

11. There's a non-zero chance we would end up with a theocracy?

I'd be very leery of a constitutional convention in this day and time..

[badtoworse]

12. I doubt the RW would support a constitutional conventiom either.

It's not going to happen

[Occulus]

16. I have one convention item nearly everyone could get behind

A Constitutional Amendment to Fire Congress.

Fire all of them, even the ones we like, just to be fair, and also include a second clause to forbid them all from ever again seeking any elected office of any kind.

They've stood by as they watched (and in some cases enthusiastically helped) our jobs go overseas, our roads and bridges crumble, our houses get foreclosed upon. We all know they're bought; that isn't even so much an open secret as it is blatantly unethical and/or illegal, yet they suffer such small consequences for their misdeeds.

And none of them seem to truly care about their constituents once they get to Washington; it's all business as usual, as if nothing is amiss. This, in the midst of an alarming financial crisis.

Why can't we just fire the lot of them?

[tama]

15. Not just South Americans

Also Iceland, Arab countries etc. Iceland is the most interesting example for Internet savvy - constitutional convention of ordinary people recommended by others and chosen by lot, drafting the constitution openly over Internet together with other citizens.

DU opposition to constitutional convention is self-admittedly based on fear of "liberal" fear of other Americans. I may be dumb, but for me that fear seems to be not based on love of democracy, but fear of not having a "liberal" tyranny over other "non-liberal" Americans, perceived as the majority and threat.

It's hard to call this fear of other Americans and fear of democracy as anything but Liberal hypocrisy of wannabe oligarchs and democrats in name only.