As a native Oregonian, I have a love hate relationship with the entire state. I keep trying to get out, but so far I also keep coming back.
Regardless of where I go (Minnesota, Illinois, New Hampshire, etc.), I’m usually the “crazy liberal chick.” I recycle. I avoid Wal-Mart like the plague. I’ve been disillusioned with both the Democrat and Republican parties,* so I’m a registered independent. I was in New Hampshire for the 2008 primary and was able to vote in the First-in-the-Nation Presidential Primary,+ and I was able to vote for Bill Richardson.# However, step into the bike riding, part-time working, sandals with sock wearing hipster mecca that is Portland, Ore., I might as well be Ann Coulter.
It’s hard to say that I agree with the Occupy Wall Street movement, since as of yet it doesn’t have a well defined definition. Participants have each brought their own purpose to march – social awareness, discontent with financial and/or political systems, or just an enthusiasm for demonstration. Honestly, the potpourri of causes reminds me a little of PCU – protesting just to protest.
But, I have to ask – for as much as Occupy Wall Street’s website talks about the American Dream or Adbusters states that the movement began in America – why does everything have its roots in the great white north? Adbusters put out the call to occupy Wall Street on July 13, 2011. For those of you who don’t know, Adbusters is a not-for-profit based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Occupy Portland’s website is crying foul over a “False Press Release,” that they’ve traced back to Vannet Technology in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada. It may have been over looked that that this press release could be the real deal. Sure, it might be a great fake, but to me it sounds it was written by the same people who create the website content. Who else talks about where “Saturday Market touches the river”? And, I’d like to point out that Vannet Technology offers a free online fax service. For a group who has FaceBook, Wikipedia, and an internet committee, I think it’d be ridiculous to imagine a member of this group to walk down to the nearest FedEx Kinko’s and pay to fax a press release. Plus, using a free service that can be traced to another country does provide a comforting blanket of deniability. So, we’re not even going to get into whether Occupy Portland has a permit to march today (as best I can tell from their message forum – they don’t) or if the other claims in the press release have any tidbits of truth to them.
Maybe I’d be more involved with the local movement if: I was one of those people who only worked part-time at a coffee house, because fulltime work interfered with my busy social schedule. Or, if I made a conscious decision not to vote, but spend the rest of the year complaining about the people who were elected. (This is a thing. One of my ex-roommates during the 2004 general election did this.)
But, I’m not.
If their dissatisfaction with the current government system, heath care, financial industry, or whatever is so substantial – they should change it. Yes, a protest is a great way to go, but get the flipping permit. Y’all realize that you’re going to put a substantial strain on the Portland Police Department’s resources, right? The organizers COULD work with PPD to make the protest a safe place for the children and families that it’s calling upon to show up today.
But, Occupy Portland is not.
So, I will quote to Occupy Portland from The Big Lebowski, “My advice is to do what your parents did; get a job, sir.…”
*It started off with 18-year-old me not knowing the difference between the two. My mother was a Democrat and my father a Republican. The only reason either had for their party selection was because that was also their parents’ party. My parents both liked voting in the primaries, but they were both equally opportunity voters when it came to general elections. Take, for example, my father. He talked buckets full of smack about President Clinton during his first term, but then my father voted to reelect Clinton in 1996.
In short, I knew I wanted to vote in the 2000 general election, but in my mind the Democrat and Republican parties were pretty much the same thing and nearly interchangeable. To an extent, I still feel that way. I believe that both parties are too caught up in the spectacle that has become “entertainment politics” (see: Sarah Palin or any political impasse over the last decade or even the past year (see: the 2011 federal government shutdown or the fiasco in Wisconsin this spring that had Democrats fleeing the state) to actually work together and come to mutually beneficial resolutions.
My problem with the Democrat and Republican parties has its roots in the 2004 election cycle. I had just moved back to Oregon and needed to reregister to vote. While walking home from the bus I crossed paths with someone doing voter registration at Last Thursday, so I registered to vote and mark the box to be an independent/unaffiliated/not a member of a party, and hand it back to the nice lady. Magically, I was added to the Democrat mailing list and phone tree.
Since Oregon allows people to vote by mail, I had my ballot all set to be mailed off a few weeks before the election deadline when there was a knock on my door. There was a young clean cut guy going door to door collecting ballots and offering “to be drop it off for you.” Weird, right?
Well, a few hours before the polls officially closed the doors on the allegations of election and voter fraud, I received a frantic voicemail from the local Democrat phone bank indicating that my ballot had never been received. Even weirder, right?
+As a registered Democrat for the whole five minutes it took to vote. Of course, I reregistered as unaffiliated while walking out of the room.
#Bill Richardson is still the first and only presidential candidate that I have been really excited about.
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