Ian Bunn | Political & Popular Culture Arts

What this chatter about loopholes is about (April 25th 2012)

Allison Margaret Kilkenny the 28 year old USA social critic has published an article on The Nation speaking to the ‘Spring Awakening’ resurgence of the Occupy Wall Street movement and Tax Day protesters taking to the streets in New York City. In the article, Kilkenny states ”It’s time for the big banks and corporations to pay their share of taxes like the rest of us do. …the major corporations and 1 percenters pay little to nothing in taxes. Though the right’s favorite talking point is that America has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world at 35 percent, this doesn’t take into account corporations’ tax-evading practices. The S&P is home to 115 companies that receive more in credits than they pay out. It is this unbalanced system—where extremely wealthy individuals and corporations reap the rewards of rigging the US political system and tax code, while poor people are forced to sacrifice their already meager means… Meanwhile, it seems as though the financial elite simply don’t understand what this chatter about loopholes and tax-dodging is all about.”

Inspired by Allison Kilkenny http://ow.ly/anD9h image source netrootsny http://ow.ly/anD1L

“getting money out of politics” his top goal (April 5th 2012)

Michael Francis Moore the 57 year old US filmmaker, social critic and activist has published an article calling out for the occupy movement to take political action from within the political system. Moore states “Here’s what we don’t do: don’t turn Occupy Wall Street into another bureaucratic, top-down organization. That will certainly kill it. Baby boomers who grew up working within traditional organizations need to calm down and not shoehorn this movement into the old paradigm of “Let’s elect people to office and then lobby them to pass good laws!” Let Occupy take its natural course. The candidates for office that we need are in this movement. (Are you one of them? Why not? Someone has to do it, and it would be better if it was you!) The laws that must be enacted to make this a more just nation will come in due time. And not ten years from now; some of this will happen this year. The leading candidate for Congress from my hometown of Flint, Michigan, has already taken a pledge to make “getting money out of politics” his top goal once in office. Others have joined him. We need to vote for them and then hold them to it.”

Inspired by Michael Moore http://ow.ly/9MLc0 image source David Shankbone http://ow.ly/9MM8H

Not fully grasped a world war is occurring (November 14th)

Naomi Wolf the 48 year old US author and social critic has lashed out at American politicians following her arrest in New York during a supportive visit to the Occupy Wall Street movement in Lower Manhattan. In an Aljazeera article, Wolf claims America’s politicians “have had their fill of democracy. Across the country, police, acting under orders from local officials, are breaking up protest encampments … sometimes with shocking and utterly gratuitous violence”. Wolf states, “…most commentators have not fully grasped that a world war is occurring. But it is unlike any previous war in human history: for the first time, people around the world are not identifying and organising themselves along national or religious lines, but rather in terms of a global consciousness and demands for a peaceful life, a sustainable future, economic justice and basic democracy. Their enemy is a global “corporatocracy” that has purchased governments and legislatures, created its own armed enforcers, engaged in systemic economic fraud, and plundered treasuries and ecosystems”.

Inspired by Naomi Wolf http://ow.ly/7kdyB image source David Shankbone http://ow.ly/7kdNy