Stern on OWS

And now for something a bit different: Howard Stern on the Occupy Wall Street festival. For those of you with sensitive ears, it’s best to just skip to the next post. For the rest of us, it’s pretty funny:

Now sure, Howard’s just going for laughs and any large public gathering will provide all the material he needs. I’m positive there would be a similar level of incoherence on display at any Jets game.

But this is the movement, and these are the people, whom the President hopes to ride toward a political rebirth. It’s a genuine risk, if the numbers former Clinton pollster Douglas Schoen’s colleagues generated on the Wall Streeters is any indication of their overall aims and worldview:

Our research shows clearly that the movement doesn’t represent unemployed America and is not ideologically diverse. Rather, it comprises an unrepresentative segment of the electorate that believes in radical redistribution of wealth, civil disobedience and, in some instances, violence. Half (52%) have participated in a political movement before, virtually all (98%) say they would support civil disobedience to achieve their goals, and nearly one-third (31%) would support violence to advance their agenda.

So they aren’t political neophytes and, as Schoen discovered, “[a]n overwhelming majority of demonstrators supported Barack Obama in 2008.” But slightly less than half intend to support him next year.

Those are the headline numbers. Below the surface, there’s an ideology waiting to break free:

What binds a large majority of the protesters together—regardless of age, socioeconomic status or education—is a deep commitment to left-wing policies: opposition to free-market capitalism and support for radical redistribution of wealth, intense regulation of the private sector, and protectionist policies to keep American jobs from going overseas.

Sixty-five percent say that government has a moral responsibility to guarantee all citizens access to affordable health care, a college education, and a secure retirement—no matter the cost. By a large margin (77%-22%), they support raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans, but 58% oppose raising taxes for everybody, with only 36% in favor. And by a close margin, protesters are divided on whether the bank bailouts were necessary (49%) or unnecessary (51%).

One could say this all represents the President’s existing agenda. If so, it’s no road map to electoral success.

It’s even more of a road to nowhere if the folks the Stern show interviewed are at all representative of the larger movement.

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About the author

Norman Leahy

Norm Leahy has written about Virginia and national politics online since 2002, beginning with One Man's Trash (OMT), and continuing through Bacon's Rebellion (both the blog and the e-zine), Sic Semper Tyrannis, NBC12's Decision Virginia, Richmond.com and Tertium Quids. He is the chief blogger at "The Score" and a producer of "The Score" radio show as well as being a Washington Examiner contributor.