What do you think about the Occupy Wall Street movement?

The “1 percent” subtly suggest that they earned their money. The “52 percent” suggest that most of us just work really hard to earn our way and are proud of it. The 99 percent Occupy Wall Street crowd screams and beats the drum for fairness. Are any of them correct?

They are all correct. They are all using the freedoms given them by our Constitution. The protest, although not pretty, is the way we do liberty. Our country is founded on principles that suggest that we have the right to say when something is wrong. Well, something is wrong.

It is my freedom to suppose what that might be. Let’s start with government. Washington is filthy with millionaire senators and congressional delegates. We elect a millionaire every four years to the White House. Is there some tie between wealth and government?

Most of us are happy enough to get along, get paid regularly and have a little something in retirement. We don’t whine or complain about it. But just when we get comfortable, the economy goes to heck and out come the protesters.

That is exactly the way democracies function. We should use that voice to discover what is behind the pain and suffering of the people. Why is the “wealth gap” growing so fast? That is what democratic systems do. When the functioning government cannot keep pace with change, protests happen.

Did the civil rights movement happen because Lincoln freed the slaves? No. That was a beginning. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. squeezed the politicians into a corner to make things right. Occupy Wall Street is doing just that.

I wish them luck and I support them. Who can say they are wrong to do it?

Mark Bachinski

Norridgewock

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