Ari Paul: The Return of Inequality | Boston Review
Getting people to talk about inequality is just a beginning. The chronically unemployed masses with student debt, the working poor, and the family facing foreclosure want results. Having an amorphous movement without specific demands has fostered this discussion, but when the GOP nominee debates President Obama, OWS should flag policy issues to force the incumbent to make at least some solid promises to the 99 percent. Even before the Zuccotti Park occupation, activists planning what would become OWS discussed a financial-transaction tax and the reinstitution of the Glass-Steagall Act, which separated investment and commercial banking, as worthwhile policy changes.
If Obama wins, it will be time for the movement to press the second-term president and Congress on those issues, though such an idea is anathema to the anarchist wing of OWS. With people outside the plazas of major cities talking about wealth inequality for so long, such demands to keep those promises will be harder for Obama and the Democrats to ignore.
