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Jewish World Review
Dec. 6, 2011
10 Kislev, 5772
Can an anthem save Occupy non-movement?
By
Dana Milbank
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
The folk-rocker Jackson Browne showed up on Freedom Plaza to perform for the Occupy D.C. protesters. He played five political tunes but left out the one most relevant to the protest movement: “Running on Empty.”
Two months ago, there was hope that the Occupy Wall Street movement and its offshoots could be the start of political counterweight to the Tea Party. But that never happened, and any last chance of it ended when New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg closed the encampment in lower Manhattan. Nationwide, the movement lost its idealistic roots amid reports of accidental deaths, drug overdoses and scattered violence. In Washington over the weekend, 31 demonstrators in McPherson Square, a previously peaceful encampment, were arrested in a standoff with police. In nearby Freedom Plaza, there are fewer tents than there were earlier in fall -- and it wasn’t exactly booming then. When Browne, the 63-year-old singer and activist, walked to the microphones, there were all of 125 people to listen to the performance, including a media pack of about 40. “You are the 99 percent!” Browne, in leather jacket, blue jeans and Salomon athletic shoes, told the modest crowd. “This is what democracy looks like.” But this is not what a mass movement looks like. Browne, who gave the world “Somebody’s Baby” and “Take It Easy” in addition to “Running on Empty,” deserves credit for encouraging the demonstrators in New York and Washington. The demonstrators in Washington deserve credit for maintaining their dedication even as other encampments have shriveled or been disbanded. But it looks more and more like a lost cause, as the masses fail to mobilize behind the Occupy activists. After Browne’s performance on the plaza, I asked the singer about the failure of the movement to ignite. “I see this encampment lasting through the winter, and I see the movement playing a role in the coming election,” he said, predicting that the political parties would grapple “with a growing people’s movement.” Is he surprised more people aren’t angry? “I think people are very angry,” he fired back. “How angry people are is not really carried by the mainstream media.” Hey. Take it easy. No doubt people are angry – as well they should be after the high unemployment and low corporate responsibility of the last few years. But for whatever reason, they aren’t taking to the streets to join the demonstrators. Browne did his musical best to encourage the Occupiers. He talked about how, on his recent tour, he dedicated “certain songs to those people occupying America, and the place always explodes. At least the kind of people who would come to see me are always with you.” Facing the White House and the Treasury, his back to the Capitol and a Christmas tree that protesters made from plastic bags and water bottles, he played “Casino Nation,” “Far from the Arms of Hunger” (“more of a prayer than a song”), and “Lives in the Balance” (“one reviewer said it’s more of a speech than a song”). He had some lyrics written on a yellow legal pad on the ground – but not all the lyrics. Singing “For America,” he drew a blank midway through. “Ah, that’s the wrong part of the song,” he said. “Sorry.” He kept strumming. “It’s just a small part of the song but if you don’t have that part you can’t go on.” A woman from the audience piped up with the missing phrase: “Reap what we have sown!” “Oh yeah, yeah yeah,” Browne said, resuming. At another point, he had to stop to tune the guitar. “I’m sorry, I can’t really bring myself to sing this song with a guitar this out of tune,” he said, blaming a balky electronic tuner. “It’s the weather, you know.” Like its musical leader, the protest movement is also searching for the right notes. “It remains to be seen what happens,” Browne said in his soft, mellow baritone. He said he “always wondered what it would take to get people into the streets the way they go into the streets in other countries.” A German reporter asked Browne if he thought the Occupy movement needed its own song. “You don’t need a new song for the movement,” he said. “It’s got plenty of songs. It just needs people to show up and sing.” He’s right. But where are they?
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Previously:
• 12/05/11 The winner of the GOP campaign: Washington
• 11/30/11 Barney the bully: Congressman Frank's other legacy
• 11/23/11 Jon Kyl's search-and-destroy mission
• 11/21/11 Pay to play, brought to you by Washington
• 11/17/11 Big enough to save the supercommittee?
• 11/16/11 Why Newt Gingrich won't last
• 11/08/11 The 2012 campaign gets seedier
• 11/06/11 A Machiavellian model for Obama
• 11/03/11 The Herman Cain crack-up
• 11/01/11 Cain can --- he will survive
• 10/27/11 Stuntmen of the supercommittee
• 10/26/11 Democrats on the sidelines
• 10/24/11 Rick Perry's birther Parade
• 10/24/11 The birthers eat their own
• 10/19/11 The GOP's middle man
• 10/17/11 The waiting for nothing Congress
• 10/12/11 Sparsely occupied D.C.: Why the movement hasn't caught on
• 10/10/11 Can Obama strike an alliance with Occupy Wall Street?
• 10/06/11 Chris Christie, such a presidential tease
• 10/05/11 Obama and his foot soldiers go toe to toe
• 09/28/11 Cain could deliver
• 09/26/11 Republicans? Mr. Nice Guys?
• 09/22/11 Why Ron Paul is winning the GOP primary
• 09/21/11 I am a job creator who creates no jobs
• 09/20/11 Obama launches a revolution
• 09/19/11 Dems for Romney?
• 09/14/11 ‘Supercommittee’? More than stupor committee
• 09/07/11 Mitt Romney finds his (corporate) voice
• 09/01/11 The infallible Dick Cheney
• 08/31/11 This liberal says Perry is the ultimate conservative candidate
• 08/29/11 Wanted: More bite from Obama the Great Nibbler
• 08/10/11 How Rep. Austin Scott betrayed his Tea Party roots
• 08/09/11 The most powerful man on Earth?
• 08/08/11 The FAA shutdown and the new rules of Washington
• 08/04/11 Lt. Col. Allen West fires a round at the Tea Party
• 08/03/11 Government on autopilot
• 08/02/11 Dems mourn debt deal like death
• 07/27/11 Life imitates sport
• 07/26/11 Obama and Boehner take on Washington
• 07/21/11 Why Americans are angry at Congress
• 07/20/11 The new party of Reagan
• 07/18/11 Rob Portman, the boring Midwesterner who could bring sanity to the debt debate
• 07/13/11 John Boehner's bind
• 07/04/11 Stephen Colbert, Karl Rove and the mockery of campaign finance
• 07/01/11 President Puts Up His Dukes, As He Ought To
• 06/28/11 Rod Blagojevich verdict: All shook up
• 06/27/11 Progressives voice their anger at Obama
• 06/24/11 ‘Mission accomplished,’ Obama style
• 06/22/11 Jon Huntsman's first step toward oblivion
• 06/21/11 Scott Walker finds making bumper stickers is easier than creating jobs
• 06/20/11 A day of awkwardness with Mitt Romney
• 06/06/11 Hubris and humility: Sarah Palin and Robert Gates on tour
• 06/02/11 The Weiner roast
• 06/01/11 Congress clocks in to clock out
• 05/30/11 Hermanator II: No More Mr. Gadfly
• 05/24/11 How Obama has empowered Netanyahu
• 05/24/11 Pawlenty bends his truth-telling
• 05/20/11 Default deniers say it's all a hoax
• 05/18/11: Gingrich gives voice to moderation
• 05/17/11: Donald Trump and the House of Horrors
• 05/16/11: The medical mystery of Mitt Romney
• 05/12/11: The body impolitic: Schock photos should tempt lawmakers to cover up
• 05/10/11: Muskets in hand, tea party blasts House Republicans
• 05/09/11: The GOP debate: America -- and the party -- needs the grown-ups
• 05/05/11: Mitch Daniels, an alternative to scary
• 05/03/11: Obama's victory lap
• 05/02/11: How the journalist prom got out of control
• 04/28/11: Obama's birther day: Why did he lower himself by appearing in the briefing room?
• 04/27/11: Obama, lost in thought
• 04/24/11: Andrew Breitbart and the rifts on the right
• 04/22/11: Ten Commandments for 2012
• 04/21/11: Obama likes Facebook. Facebook likes Obama.
• 04/18/11: Without Nancy Pelosi, Obama is adrift
• 04/15/11: If progressives ran the world
• 04/14/11: Faith in political apostasy
• 04/13/11: One man's revolution is another's political expediency
• 04/11/11: Shutdown theatrics
• 04/06/11: Paul Ryan's irresponsible budget
• 04/05/11: Robots in Congress? Yes, we replicant!
• 04/04/11: Robert Gibbs, Facebook and the White House corporate placement service
• 04/01/11: Haley Barbour, the fat cats' candidate
• 03/31/11: Republican freshmen in House shut down compromise, and possibly the government
• 03/30/11: Coburn and Durbin, the dynamic duo of the debt crisis
• 03/28/11: The Obama doctrine: A gray area the size of Libya
• 03/24/11: Dems as Weiners
• 03/23/11: Obama's quick trip from tyrant to weakling
• 03/17/11: Who's afraid of Elizabeth Warren?
• 03/15/11: The underwear flap over Bradley Manning
• 03/10/11: In Senate's debt debate, talk isn't cheap
• 03/09/11: With Obama's new Gitmo policy, Administration officials had some 'splainin to do
• 03/02/11: Issa press aide scandal is like bad reality TV
• 02/25/11: Jay Carney: Mouthpiece for an inscrutable White House
• 02/14/11: The Donald trumps the pols at CPAC
• 02/09/11: Arianna Huffington's ideological transformation
© 2011, Washington Post Writers Group
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