The Decadent Left - OWS

NY Times columnist Ross Douthat penned an interesting article on December 3rd entitled, "The Decadent Left," an in-depth analysis comparing the Occupy Wall Street movement with the Union Protests and the Keystone Anti-Pipeline protests.  In his article, he mentions the fact that other liberal strategists wish that the OWS movement had defined goals on changing public policy, and had a more concrete and structural plan to accomplish them, like the Keystone and Union Protests.  The Keystone protest arguably has delayed the construction of an oil pipeline from Canada down toward the gulf coast, while the Union Protests have (supposedly) caused Ohio's attempt to curb public sector union's collective bargaining to come to a screeching halt.

But the true gems of Douthat's article exemplify why conservatives have been right all along:

The Wisconsin protests didn’t defend American workers’ right to bargain for their fair share of company profits, as traditional union protests have. They defended government employees’ right to negotiate with elected officials over the division of taxpayer dollars — a recipe for profligacy that even liberal icons like Franklin Roosevelt and the A.F.L.-C.I.O.’s George Meany once opposed.

Likewise, the Keystone protesters haven’t been defending “the interests of wage-earning Americans,” to borrow the historian Michael Kazin’s description of the historic purpose of the American left. They’ve been harnessing the power of the Democratic Party’s wealthy environmentalist donors to actively kill off American jobs.

Stopping the pipeline won’t drive down demand for fossil fuels, or prevent Canada’s oil from being extracted and shipped around the world. But for a small group of activists and donors, keeping the pipeline out of their national backyard is all that counts, even if American workers pay the price.

I suppose even a broken clock is right twice a day, but having a liberal recognize the problems caused by his own party's movements is just amazing.  And he's RIGHT!  The Keystone protests and the Union Collective Bargaining protests HURT America.

But while Douthat hits upon this grain of truth that both centrist and right wing Americans have known for a while, I can't help but smile when he expresses his hope and support of the OWS movement:

Whatever your politics, there’s arguably more to admire in the ragtag theatricality of Occupy Wall Street than in that sort of self-righteous defense of the status quo. Even if it has failed to embrace plausible solutions, O.W.S. at least picked a deserving target — what National Review’s Reihan Salam describes as the “moral rupture” created by Wall Street’s and Washington’s betrayal of the public trust.

Encouraging liberals and Democrats to support a movement characterized by violence, drug use, rape, and mental illness, with no defined goals, who frequently break the law, and call for a socialized society where freeloaders like the OWS protesters are GIVEN what they want, rather than earning it through hard work.

I love Democrats.