The Occupy Wall Street Movement is spreading across America and has reached Europe and Asia as well. We have Occupy London and now Korea, Malaysia, the Phillipines, Thailand on 15 Oct. Some Singaporeans are also talking about joining the Movement with Occupy Raffles Place this Saturday at 2.00pm. A facebook entry has been set up but meeting with lukewarm response. The police too have also taken to warn any would be demonstrators that it is illegal to do so except maybe Occupy HongLim.
The Movement started in New York where the protestors calling themselves the 99% are denouncing the greed in the finance industry, particularly the bankers and the Stock Exchange. They are saying that the huge income gap is unacceptable and the greed in Wall Street must be stopped.
How would this take shape here where the huge income gap is sung like a song, that it is perfectly a normal state of affair? From the look of it, it is going to be a non event. The people are happy with the big income gap and the greed all over as many are beneficiaries to the prosperity in every corner of the island. Everyone is feeling richer by the minutes while the income gap keeps widening. It is a good thing by the way.
Maybe they should change the tag into Celebrate Raffles Place. The turn out could be better and the festive mood may put the police more at ease.
Yes, yes. Not Occupy Raffles Place. Celebrate Raffles Place by the 99% of which many are millionaires also. They can also shout, Corporate Greed Is Good.
Singapore being a tiny little dot, we should scale everything down. How about "Occupy Parliament" or Occupy Cabinet"? (No, not the one in the kitchen or bedroom.)
ReplyDeleteIt is too late to occupy anywhere in Sin, everywhere and everything are too expensive to occupy.
ReplyDeleteJust get far away from them, show them the cold shoulder, show them You despise them and don't look into their faces. It will be good enough for your message to get through.
patriot
The only good thing about expensive public transport is to prevent people from travelling from one corner to another corner to participate in occupation of squares.
ReplyDeleteNo need to Occupy Raffles Place.
ReplyDeleteVote wisely in GE 2016.
And make sure you convert another swing voter to also vote wisely.
If you just do this, you will have done enough already.
The only action that matters is the vote.
Have you thought of the police joining the demonstrators? They also 99%.
ReplyDeleteOne 'warning" from the police and singaporeans back off liao? What kind of people's will is that? How do you expect your soldiers or peasants to find and die for you if your opponent just send you a warning, do you back off? Keep up with that attitude, and this is the whole problem with Singapore. When your war come, don't expect people/peasant to fight and die for you also.
ReplyDeleteAnd is OK that your politicians can punch above their weight internationally, and is NOT OK for your people to punch their own weight in this island? What message are you trying to tell me? Reclaim your country . You can speak out anywhere peacefully and not just in one designated area. Occupy and celebrate!!
Mr redbean..you have a lot of voices for CPF right? Go and occupy CPF building lah..these young pple need 'steady hands' to stand by them. Support or not?
ReplyDeleteIt will be just you and me.
ReplyDeleteOccupy Raffles Place?
ReplyDeleteWhat are we going to do there?
Only can give a steady finger to join the steady hand.
Free buffet at Raffles Place.
ReplyDeleteAll you can eat chili crab!
Guaranteed Raffles Place will be occupied.
http://www.todayonline.com/Singapore/EDC111011-0000505/GIC-seeking-those-with-constructive-dissatisfaction
ReplyDeleteSo GIC act very quickly leh..very abnormal.
Name your demands..they want to hear your constructive dissatisfaction now!
Jus ignore them, give them no free advice.
ReplyDeleteUS still plundering global wealth.
ReplyDeleteChina Daily
Part One
Updated: 2011-10-14 07:56
By Zhang Monan (China Daily)
Comments(10)PrintMailLarge Medium Small0
Senate bill on currency exchange rates is another attempt to shift the cost of its domestic crisis to other countries
The passage by the US Senate of a bill aimed at pressuring China into appreciating the value of the yuan, at a time when the world's largest economy still faces a gloomy prospect of recovery, highlights the efforts of the United States to use the issue of the yuan's exchange rate to shift outward the US' domestic crises and problems.
The US has become accustomed to boosting its national wealth and reducing its economic risks by using money from other countries and diluting the wealth of its creditors.
The US dollar's status as a global reserve currency makes it convenient for Washington to buy foreign products and services by increasing the issuance of the dollar and to use dollar reserves held by other countries at a low interest rate.
The dollar's status as the leading global reserve currency also makes it convenient for the US to finance its national debts in overseas markets, a move that has facilitated an international circulation of the debts-dependent US economy.
Since 2000, the volume of US debts has increased year-on-year and is now 32 percent of the world's total foreign debt. In 2009, the US foreign debt ratio increased to 95.9 percent from 62.3 percent in 2003, an increase of 33.6 percentage points within seven years. Currently, the total volume of US foreign debts has rocketed to $14.5 trillion.
The US has also got used to increasing national wealth through dollar depreciation, or monetization of its national debts. As the dollar is the world's leading currency, increased dollar issuance can help the US fulfill its obligations to pay off foreign debts or dilute its debt burdens. As the result of dollar depreciation, the US evaporated $3.58 trillion in foreign debt from 2002 to 2006.
The two rounds of quantitative easing monetary policy adopted by the US Federal Reserve are essentially monetization of US debts. Through nationalization of private debts first and then internationalization of its national debts, the US has skillfully shifted the cost of its crisis to other countries.
The Federal Reserve's often-employed strategy to buy a large volume of US debts to bolster global liquidity highlights Washington's intention of accelerating this process. In 2009, the world's foreign reserves accounted for 13 percent of its gross domestic products, of which 60 percent belonged to dollar-denominated assets, or more than $5 trillion, while the dollar-priced assets held by foreign countries, excluding their financial derivatives, grew to 1.25 times the US' nominal GDP.
Dollar devaluation, however, has resulted in the drastic dwindling of a large bulk of global reserve wealth and purchasing capacity, and is plundering by the US of global wealth.
US still plundering global wealth.
ReplyDeleteChina Daily
Part Two
The quantitative easing policy adopted by the US-led developed countries has to a large extent contributed to imbalances in global monetary policy, which has in return further aggravated global trade imbalances. The ever-growing imported inflationary pressures in emerging markets as a result of this quantitative easing monetary policy has had a negative impact on emerging countries' manufacturing-led real economies.
Global manufacturing has shifted from developed countries to emerging markets while the global monetary and financial centers remain in developed countries.
With the deepening of de-industrialization in the US and the expansion of its current account deficit, the financial sector has increasingly replaced traditional manufacturing and trade to become the driving force of US economic growth. In this process, the US has harvested huge economic profits through long-term, large-volume outward investment.
In view of their less-developed financial markets and financial systems, exchange rate and assets risks on emerging markets caused by their dependence on the world's reserve currencies for pricing, settlement, borrowing and lending and investment still remain unavoidable.
By taking advantage of the dollar's status as the international leading currency and its dominance in global finance, the US has gained the lion's shares of the global wealth distribution and capital returns have become the main channel for Washington to acquire global surplus value.
Using the leverage of the world's leading settlement currency, the US has always developed the dollar-led international monetary system to its own advantage. At a time when the global economy is still off track, the US is using the pretext of promoting "global economic rebalancing" to force the yuan to rise in value and continuously escalating its disputes with China on exchange rate issues.
As early as the G20 summit in Seoul last year, the US submitted a so-called program to measure global economic balancing, in an attempt to set limitations on China, Germany and other countries that enjoy a favorable trade status and levy trade tax on other economies through pushing for the appreciation of their currencies.
So in fact it is the US that has gained the largest benefits from global economic imbalances through its firmly controlled dollar hegemony.
The author is an economics researcher with the State Information Center.
(China Daily 10/14/2011 page8)
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How to distinguish ministers, senators, congress men, MPs, stock brokers, bankers and big time businessmen in US and other places in the so call western democracies and the like from rogues, crooks and scoundrels. It 's next to impossible because they are all the same. They have no ethics, no morals, no conscience and are self satisfying and self aggrandizing with endless greed and lust for power and money. Even hell and heaven dare not accommodate them because they are too evil.
ReplyDeletesouthernglory1
We are even worst than USA ! We have the greed of government, of which is the root of all evils in the greed of everything in Singapore. You will find greedy ministers and MPs working in finance, insurance etc ... and are we surprise to find toxic product, high insurance premium... that make money into pockets for PAP lackeys ?
ReplyDeleteWhen Dr Chee tried to occupy the walkway outside CPF Board, they sent a team of riot squad to the scene.
ReplyDeleteWhat do you think will happen if a group of beans try to occupy CPF?
Better take your occupation to Hong Lim Park lah!
Morgan Stanley design Pinnacle Notes structure product to cheat investors. Product endorsed by MAS. Isn't this corporate cheat ?
ReplyDeleteOccupying Raffles Place will only drive off investor and cause many job loss.
ReplyDeleteOccupy Wall Street is OK because the crumbling of American economy causes alot of people to be jobless and families affected. Yes, the American causes some bad effect on us but not Raffles Place.
I think this one is organised by retailers/food operators at Raffles Pl. On weekend, there almost ghost town. This should help bring in the crowd.
You got a brilliant idea. The hawkers at Golden Shoe should organise one, Occupy Raffles Place on a Sunday with food at half price. I am sure it will be packed, and no problem with the law. Just apply for a permit and it will be given.
ReplyDeleteYes, I will like to fly to New York to support Occupy Wall Street: )
Hahaha
ReplyDeleteApply for a permit? That is the problem why it will never be successful.
Even if the powers that be issue a permit, there will be conditions galore. You know the system well enough lah! No need to elaborate.
Worse come to the worse, you may end up as one of those 'occupying Whitley or Changi or a holiday chalet on Sentosa' instead, if the situation gets out of hand.