“Wall Street Cleanup” Implies Predicament of Americanized Democracy

Published in Wenweipo
(Hong Kong) on 17 November, 2011
by Zhang Jingwei (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Yipeng Xie. Edited by Andrew Schmidt.
According to the media, at 1 a.m. on Nov. 15, more than 1,000 police, with helmets and shields, raided “Occupy Wall Street’s” base at Zuccotti Park and succeeded in expelling all the protesters. During the “cleanup,” at least 70 people were arrested. The whole process took only three hours. In the eyes of New York authorities, the cleanup was successful.

Occupy Wall Street, Anti-corruption

Beginning on Sept. 17, Occupy Wall Street spread throughout the capitalist world. The situation makes people once again understand an irrefutable truth: The economic base determines the superstructure. The crisis originating on Wall Street has decayed the global economy. Although the main influence of the crisis has been transferred to Europe, the recovery of the U.S. economy is hopeless, and the ebb of macroeconomics has influenced the lives of everyday Americans. Since the crisis, Americans have had to live a frugal life and worry about mortgages and jobs, abandon living on credit and begin to save money as the Chinese do. However, the dilemma is that the unemployment rate is 10 percent, which doesn’t give anyone hope. As the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Charles Evans, said on Nov. 14, even in the best situation, the improvement of the U.S. economy would still not decrease the unemployment rate. All of this reminds Americans of the Great Depression of the 1930s, which was caused by Wall Street’s greed. And even though Wall Street brought on the crisis, Wall Street tycoons continue to enjoy a luxurious life.

As a result, Americans think that the U.S. financial system favors the wealthy and their corporations and that it is unfair to typical Americans. Hence, these beliefs triggered the Occupy Wall Street protest. The protesters based themselves in Zuccotti Park and indeed occupied Wall Street, influencing the entire United States and even the whole Western world. However, the two-month occupation was terminated by the police’s three-hour clean-up. The result of this protest illustrates that Americanized democracy is just a game and merely a dream.

Many people certainly admire Americanized democracy. When citizens are unsatisfied, they can complain, hold parades and even blame the president and politicians. However, such democracy, other than letting people complain, doesn’t practically solve any problems. Actually, during the climax of Occupy Wall Street, the politicians and media were intolerant and tried to ignore this protest and, even afterwards, treated it as a minor street topic. Some political figures even regarded these citizens as rebellious. The police cleanup means that when Occupy Wall Street developed into a public protest threatening the U.S. government, the police, as a national apparatus, had to take action against it.

Americanized Democracy Has Duplicitous Standards

Americanized democracy is not much different from the governments in Syria, Egypt and Libya in dealing with public protests. The only difference is the level of violence. However, the public protests in these countries are regarded as absolutely politically correct democracy by U.S. politicians and the media, and are given infinite support and even military intervention.

Of course, in terms of attitudes and actions toward the public, the U.S. government is smarter than Gadhafi or Mubarak because the U.S. government knows power- and profit-sharing and knows how to use democracy to assuage public complaints. But in terms of protecting its own profits and power, the U.S. government has similar strategies. Those foolish leaders were forced to resign and even deserved to die in the street or be put in jail. Nevertheless, smart leaders, who are more hypocritical and sly, make themselves the incarnations of democracy and freedom.

In fact, similar to the democratic anti-dictatorship movements in the Arabic world, this American movement also opposes financial monopoly. The monopolists on Wall Street, before ruining the American financial system, received a large amount of financial support from the government. This persuasively proves that the government and Wall Street share profits together. Because of this fact, Occupy Wall Street not only threatens Wall Street tycoons, but also the basis of U.S. governmental power. Such a democratic game will obviously be terminated.

Americans won’t compromise and will possibly hold another “occupation” in the future. However, is it meaningful to just complain and grumble without solving the actual problems via those movements? Or is it just to explain Americanized democracy? Americans are funny enough.


據媒體報道,當地時間11月15日凌晨1點左右,美國紐約上千名警察頭戴盔甲、手拿盾牌突襲了「佔領華爾街」運動的大本營祖科蒂公園,並成功驅走了全部抗議者。在清場行動中,至少有70人被捕。整個過程僅僅用了3個小時左右。在紐約當局眼裡,清場行動幾近圓滿。
「佔領華爾街」反貪婪腐敗
 「佔領華爾街」從9月17日開始,接近2個月的「佔領」運動,幾乎蔓延至整個資本主義世界。這一情景,讓人再次明白了一個顛撲不破的真理,經濟基礎決定上層建築。全球金融危機始於華爾街,從此造成了全球經濟的沉淪。雖說危機的重心轉移到了歐洲,但是美國經濟復甦無望,宏觀經濟的低迷影響了普通美國人的生活。危機以來,美國人不得不節衣縮食,不得不為飯碗為房貸著急,甚至改變了借貸度日的生活方式,像中國人那樣開始學著儲蓄。尷尬的是,美國的失業率一直徘徊在10%左右,讓人看不到願景和希望。正如芝加哥聯儲主席查爾斯.埃文斯14日所言,在最好的情況下,美國經濟增長仍將不足以降低美國的失業率。這一切,不由讓美國人聯想到痛苦不堪的1930年代的大蕭條,讓美國人生活方式改變的恰恰是貪婪的華爾街,他們帶來了危機,但華爾街的金融大亨們依然享受著紙醉金迷的生活。
 由此,美國人認為,美國的金融體系是為富人和公司牟利的,而這對普通美國人是不公平的。因此,美國人才會掀起「佔領華爾街」的示威運動。他們以祖科蒂公園為據點,也確實佔領了華爾街,甚至蔓延為全美國和整個西方世界的群眾運動。但兩個月的轟轟烈烈「佔領」,在警察們3個小時的清場下就作了鳥獸散,凸顯這場運動不過是美式民主的一場遊戲一場夢而已。
 美式民主的確讓人艷羨,誰不滿都可以嗆聲、遊行,甚至大罵總統和政要。但是,這種民主也是讓人們出一口烏氣,發一番牢騷而已,根本解決不了任何問題。其實,在風起雲湧的「佔領華爾街」運動期間,美國政媒兩界並不那麼寬容,剛開始是視而不見,後來就是將其形容為「小打小鬧的街頭話題」,有些政治人物甚至稱民眾是「刁民」和「暴徒」。美國警方清場則意味著,當「佔領華爾街」延燒為威脅美國政府的群眾運動時,作為國家機器的警方不得不採取行動了。
美式民主雙重標準
 這也說明,美式民主和敘利亞、埃及、利比亞處理群眾示威的方式並無本質區別,只是暴力含量上的多少而已。只是,來自這些國家的群眾示威運動,被美國政媒兩界看成是絕對政治正確的民主,給予無限的支持,甚至不惜軍事介入。
 當然,美國政府在全力運作和對民眾的態度方面,較之那些卡扎菲和穆巴拉克們更為聰明,他們懂得權力分享和分肥,他們曉得用民主來紓解民生怨氣,但是在恪守利益資源和權力堡壘上,卻也異曲同工。愚蠢者被趕下台甚至橫屍街頭或鋃鐺入獄是罪有應得,但聰明者同樣揮舞大棒還把自己裝扮成民主自由的化身,則更為虛偽和狡詐。
 其實,和阿拉伯世界反獨裁的民主運動一樣,美國人反的是金融寡頭,而華爾街的金融寡頭們,在把美國金融體系搞得坍塌之時,美國政府不是照樣挹注海量資金予以奧援。這足以證明,美國權力和華爾街是利益共同體。正因為如此,美國人「佔領華爾街」不只動了華爾街金融大亨們的蛋糕,也動搖了美國政府的權力基礎。如此民主遊戲,自然會偃旗息鼓。
 美國人並不服氣,搞不好還會再來一次「佔領」,但只能抒發怨氣解決不了實際問題的群眾運動有何意義?純粹為了詮釋美式民主?美國人也夠搞笑的。
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