think big thoughts

Occupy Wall St: It is All About Fairness, and that is the Strength of It

“The information that is coming out from the OWS movement and its repetition has made it clear that there is a major lack of fairness in economic terms. It is hard to know if we would have addressed this if it had not become so stark, and there were not so many people out of work or underemployed. However now that we are talking about it, the time has come to stand up for fairness.”

“If we take this essential meme and really push it, focus on the fact that most of us, Republican and Democrat, Liberal and Conservative, Hippy and Square alike are mostly being treated unfair, then there is a chance to actually move the nation in the direction we need to go.”

UC Davis faculty member open letter demanding Chancellor Katehi's resignation

UC Davis Assistant Professor Nathan Brown demands Chancellor Linda Katehi’s resignation for ordering the police to use force against student protesters. This blatant police brutality against peaceful protesters is despicable.

Rawls on Wall Street

NYT opinion piece about how Occupy Wall Street could benefit from the wisdom of American political philosopher John Rawls.

…in a just society, citizens should be understood as free and equal participants in a system of social cooperation. Some individuals may be more motivated and harder working, and thus can legitimately expect greater rewards for their efforts. But everyone deserves the same bundle of individual rights and liberties, and everyone is entitled to “fair equality of opportunity,” including access to a decent education and a genuine chance of success in pursuing one’s life plans.

Inequality becomes injustice when the cooperative nature of society breaks down and a significant segment of the population finds itself unable to thrive, despite its best efforts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Rawls

Psychologists tie the reluctance to protest Wall Street bailouts to a deep-seated need to justify the status quo.

From Miller-McCune:

A new psychological study… finds people are strongly motivated to perceive the socioeconomic system they live under as fair and just, and links this pro-status-quo impulse with a reluctance to protest against the Wall Street bailout.

…

“Because of our immense psychological capacity to justify and rationalize the status quo, human societies are very slow to fix system-level injustices and to enact substantive changes.”

What will it take to limit the role of money in politics?

Listen to the November 1st podcast of Rose Aguilar’s radio show, Your Call, in which she talks with Lawrence Lessig about solutions to the problem the corruption of congress by money and corporate interests.

Lawrence Lessig discusses reform of political funding

Lawrence Lessig discusses reform of political funding on MSNBC this morning:

“The big time structural reform is called for because the inside-the-beltway plan cannot work, we cannot get congress, this congress, to change the way it funds its system. As Jim Cooper says, “Congress capital has become a farm league for K Street,” so people are keen and fixed on saving the system as it is. So you need a way around… what gets us to that place? Furious anger that develops in a way that begins to focus on real reform.”