than voting is not a legitimate form of politics? Thanks, you made my point.

^{Bad decisions make good stories.}

...do you? Sorry, I'm not your convenient straw man - hate to disappoint. What I am saying is that this sort of protest is hardly surprising given the anger that many - yourself among them - have been helping mainline into the system to fill easy copy inches.

Just to be clear, I don't find protest to be anti-democratic - having done rather a lot of it in my life. That said, I don't find widespread protest - particularly that trending to violence - to be a sign of a well-functioning democracy - to the contrary, it's symptomatic of unmet needs. Nor do I find voting to be the sine qua non of political involvement. Frankly, I think it's the most basic civic duty and quite a low level of commitment; the sense of entitlement that many folks who only vote and don't contribute in other ways carry around about makes me want to puke.

"In combat one should be very suspicious of painless moral choices. When you are confronted with a seemingly painless moral choice, the odds are that you haven't looked deeply enough." ~ Karl Marlantes

in your previous comment and was vague and seemed very out of context. I misunderstood you.

^{Bad decisions make good stories.}

My view, it's a good indication that the anger needs to be dialed down.

"In combat one should be very suspicious of painless moral choices. When you are confronted with a seemingly painless moral choice, the odds are that you haven't looked deeply enough." ~ Karl Marlantes

essential and needs to be properly channeled. The folks in Egypt were pissed and look what they accomplished by peaceful means. Anger is essential when forcing change by non-violent means. But it must stay non-violent.

^{Bad decisions make good stories.}

The challenge is that much of the anger involved in Internet-mediated discourse achieves little to nothing. If folks are not motivated by it to actually do something tangible, then the corrosive downsides of it far outweigh the upside. Me, I look at much of the anger prevalent today and I see two things - 1) a lot of it is what I labelled elsewhere as "free floating rage" anger in the sense of "what am I going to be angry about today" - wanting to justify a sense of anger that largely already exists, and 2) expressing the anger is about all people seem to do - the expression serves as a cyclical release that doesn't spark action to address the cause of the anger. The two of those things work together to produce passivity and a real sense that nothing can be changed without the intervention of the fantastic (oh, if only there were a revolution - preferably carried out by someone else whose little pink ass is less precious than mine). I don't think that's healthy or wise.

"In combat one should be very suspicious of painless moral choices. When you are confronted with a seemingly painless moral choice, the odds are that you haven't looked deeply enough." ~ Karl Marlantes

of my own thought lately, which is why I have become active in helping organize some non-violent actions here in Central Texas. If I don't do it no one will.

^{Bad decisions make good stories.}

...about that. It has potential to make much more of a difference than "one liners". Yes, I know the shortness of time is a major barrier, but demonstrating that something tangible can be done has far, far less of a downside than purely "virtual" anger.

"In combat one should be very suspicious of painless moral choices. When you are confronted with a seemingly painless moral choice, the odds are that you haven't looked deeply enough." ~ Karl Marlantes

I don't think anger is essential. I think it confuses things and contributes to the problems. I think clarity, courage and compassion are essential.

To say that anger is essential, "but it must stay non-violent," I think is wishful thinking. Once people get in the habit of getting angry, you don't know where it will lead.

The movements led by MLK and Gandhi both accomplished tremendous things--but because they were motivated by love, not hate. These movements were non-violent in their rhetoric as well as their actions.

My impression about Egypt was that the people were more desperate than angry. But, as far as I could see, the rhetoric of the movement leads was peaceful and non-violent. They were calling for positive change. (At least as far as I could tell.)

But is that reality the fault of people who feel that the major parties aren't real choices, etc.? Have these people (i am among them) snookered themselves or are they describing reality?

I'm with you in that it would be better to change the politics in the process than give up on the process, but i'm not sure how ordinary Americans do that without taking to the streets. We cannot hold politicians to account with money, they have better sources ... and we'll have to rely on them to write new laws that take away that money (i won't be holding my breath). We can only hold them to account at the ballot box, but even that's iffy. Higher turnout would help, as would people realizing that third-party voting doesn't count for much only because not enough people do it.

Maybe the current protests are an attempt to sow something for later reaping. By all accounts they're peaceful and spontaneously well-organized. It's not like Occupy Wall Street is a riot.

We could also turn around the "reap what you sow" comment on the political elites. It is, after all, their policy choices that created the situation in which people feel that protesting is the only political action they have left.

There are so many competent unemployed that scabs would take over in a matter of minutes, forget it, and move to another country.
Ask ex-Air Trafic controllers from the Reagan era.

during the 60s. Plus the man is interested in revenue from the lower classes and denying him the cash flow will make a point. After watching the NY protests and having a short fuse myself, I was hoping to find another way to defuse the NY semi federal's provocative conduct in order to prevent violent response. Just watching made me want to import some helmeted organized South Korean worker protesters. I was watching and I became combative, hell by now,had I been there, I would be in the intensive care unit, tubed up and trying to eat baby food after experiencing NYPD hospitality.

You would need to create an alternate path for sustainability, otherwise it is like people not buying gas on XX day of XX month to protest oil companies doing YY. If they know you'll be back the day after buying twice as much gas, what have you shown them?

What I'm talking about here would be a general strike for a week in which everyone on strike agrees to say, buy all their food from local farmers (who probably are protesting big AG), and/or refusing to buy gasoline (using foot/bike power as much as possible instead.) The farmers would give the strikers better prices than normal and, in general, striking members would help other members for free or at cut prices.

This would truly scare the shit out of the elites, as it promotes a competing system that they cannot control. Also, out of the people that switch, maybe 5% don't switch back (and perhaps as much as 35% at least augment their consumption with these new "paths".) Once we rediscover the power of community and looking out for each other, their system of rent taxes on all aspects of life look much less attractive.