Politics

Why Aren't Media Outlets Taking #OccupyWallStreet Seriously?

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Glenn Greenwald hypothesizes about why left-leaning outlets like NPR and The New York Times have been less than supportive in their coverage of #OccupyWallStreet: 

Some of this anti-protest posturing is just the all-too-familiar New-Republic-ish eagerness to prove one's own Seriousness by castigating anyone to the left of, say, Dianne Feinstein or John Kerry; for such individuals, multi-term, pro-Iraq-War Democratic Senator-plutocrats define the outermost left-wing limit of respectability.  Also at play is the jingoistic notion that street protests are valid in Those Bad Contries but not in free, democratic America. 

A siginificant aspect of this progressive disdain is grounded in the belief that the only valid form of political activism is support for Democratic Party candidates, and a corresponding desire to undermine anything that distracts from that goal.  

Meanwhile: Mother Jones describes the protests as disorganized and incoherent; the New York Observer photographs and interviews 50 special protesters.