talkback and prose

Memes are ideas; for all intents and purposes at least. I'm simplifying an incredibly interesting and deep field of study, however, for my purposes, a meme is an idea. An idea that can spread throughout a population both vertically (from parent to child) or, and more importantly, horizontally (from person to person). Even if you're not familiar with the terminology, you are familiar with the concept:

Rebecca Black's Friday. YouTube videos of pandas sneezing. All that junk email you keep getting from semi-distant family members insisting that the President is a Muslim, or a communist, or the anti-Christ Those are all memes. They are silly or stupid memes, but at the end of the day, they are ideas that spread throughout a culture and end up affecting all of us.

Those are silly memes. Ones that do not really matter but make for an easy example. Occupy Wall Street is a meme. So was the Tea Party movement. Lack of trust in our government is a meme; it is always present in some shape or form throughout society yet that particular meme really began to spread virally in the late 1960's and early 70's. (Forgive my US centric focus, international readers)

The concept of memes is really fascinating to me. Richard Dawkins coined the phrase in his book The Selfish Gene where he goes into great detail discussing the biological similarities of memes.

What I am most interested in is why certain ideas do not take off. Why do some memes come and go quickly, seemingly intoxicating the entire world for a brief moment and then instantly fading into the abyss? While other memes, like a distrust of government, spread until they infect every possible person.

Recently, I've begun to talk more and more about the partial audit of the Federal Reserve in my daily life. This is due to the fact that last week was Thanksgiving and I spent the majority of time with a family that has a knack for talking, and partly due to the fact that I'm no longer completely surrounded by high school freshman. You're great kids, but your understanding of governmental organizations and international economics is seriously lacking.

I mentioned the audit briefly in my summary of Occupy Wall Street a few weeks ago. To summarize:

In mid-2011 the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released their report after a partial audit of the Federal Reserve. This was the first audit, of any kind, of the Fed since the 1950s. The report found that over a period of three years (Jul 2007-Dec 2010) the Fed had authorized $16.1 trillion- yes, with a "t"- in secret loans to banks and financial institutions, both foreign and domestic. It also discovered and outlined numerous problems with the personnel serving on the Board of the Fed while also occupying high-ranking positions in the financial sector. For example, the CEO of JP Morgan Chase served on the New York Fed's board of directors at the same time that his bank received more than $390 billion in financial assistance from the Fed.

These unregulated, unmandated loans were given at 0% interest to nations and corporations with absolutely no representatives from the United States Congress having approved them, at least publicly. There were no votes or discussions. This is entirely separate from the TARP bailouts. Speaking of, the TARP bailouts cost about $800 billion. I'm sure you remember all the political bantering and news commentators commenting oh so vigorously when the TARP bill was being debated in Congress. Yet, all the while the Federal Reserve, mainly through the New York branch, was giving out $16 trillion in loans.

GAO Report page 131

Now personally, I don't think you could write a better story if you were James Patterson. Big Whig, old boys club gives out trillions of dollars to their 1% buddies all while the nation at large goes through the worst recession since the Great Depression and unemployment hangs around ten percent. It is a story made for the movies, with evil corporations, massive lies and insane corruption.

Those numbers are in Billions. So 16 thousand...billions.

Yet, no one is talking about it. As I attempted to explain to my father over Thanksgiving dinner his main response was, "That doesn't make sense. I would have heard about it." He's not whistling dixie either, he reads and watches a lot of news. Every day he checks his websites and every night he flips between FOX and MSNBC.

So I did some digging, complete with pictures for your entertainment.

Fox News.

MSNBC.

CNN

BBC

Nothing. Not one story about the audit of the Federal Reserve. If you type in "partial audit of the federal reserve" into Google there is nothing but blogs reporting on the issue. No major network coverage at all. And I can't explain why. The story is too good, the meme has too much potential, yet I have absolutely no idea why nobody is talking about this.

This is what an insane person must feel like. As if the entire world can't see a plain truth sitting right in front of them. It's baffling and confusing. $16 trillion dollars is more than our debt. More than our budget. More money than any human being can honestly wrap their head around.

So what is it that makes a meme spread? What takes an idea from infancy to mass acceptance. How come powerful memes never become fully realized? Is it being stopped by the ever-mythical "man." As per usual, I don't have answers, merely questions. Yet questions are potent in their own regard. They can inspire and spread. They can change perspectives and force us all to accept things we once rejected. A question can be a meme, spreading the mystery faster and farther until, hopefully, it reaches a point that can provide answers.

Hey, here's my sources:
GAO report
Senator Bernie Sanders Summary (the most official summary other than the report itself)
Washington Post (not on the money, but on CEO's sitting on the board of the Fed)

My brain

Occupy Wall Street is now a worldwide protest that started in New York City on September 17th, 2011. I've kept my opinions in reserve as I watched this all develop, but there are too many things going on that too many people are missing to remain quiet.

Below I've pulled some of the most watched videos about some of the events that have happened since Occupy Wall Street started. I'll give a description as an intro and give my opinion at the end while trying to remain as neutral as I can.

The first video is one of the first clips I saw. Protestors are netted off and a white shirt police officer (Tony Balogna) approaches them and pepper sprays the crowd, leaving two women on their knees screaming.

This particular video is slowed down and highlights key points. I like it better because you can see what is going on, in reality it all happens very quickly. The unedited video is available on youtube.

The second video is of a marine shouting down several police officers. It's long and repetitive yet if you stick around and watch the whole thing you'll notice that there are dozens of officers that look ready to approach the crowd and then do not.

The third video is of a group of people getting arrested at a local (New York) Citibank. They were attempting to close their bank accounts at Citibank. The bank locked them in the store until police arrived and everyone was arrested. About half way through the video you'll notice a woman outside is dragged back indoors and arrested.

*Okay, bias coming, but I want to put it out there before you watch the video. Notice the woman who is picked up and dragged inside is being lifted by a man in plain clothes. He is wearing a black sweatshirt with some white writing on it and a black hat. This is an undercover police officer. Numerous eyewitness accounts say that this man was the loudest protestor inside the bank, attempting to rile the crowd up, then-when everyone was arrested and taken to the police station- he laughed in their faces.

Personal Opinion

These videos are all shocking and have had me on edge for the last few weeks. My general feeling on Occupy Wall Street is that it's too incoherent to fully understand. Talk to one person and they want to audit the Federal Reserve. Talk to another and they want to end the stock market, or legalize prostitution, or it's just a great party.

There's no leadership or structure. It's a hodgepodge of random people, probably started by college-aged adults, but certainly no longer limited to that segment of the population.

At this point the movement, at least to me, seems to be a collection of people who feel as if something is wrong with the way this country operates. And I wholeheartedly agree.

The Federal Reserve was recently partially audited and it was revealed that $16 trillion (Yes, with a "t") had been given out to US banks, corporations, and foreign banks between 2007-2010. That's more than our debt, more than our GDP, more than any budget being debated by congress. And you didn't have the slightest idea it was happening. Nobody did. Too many people still don't know.

The Worst Part

Occupy Wall Street is being attacked by the wrong people. Cops are not the enemy, at least most of them are not. Most police officers are hardworking individuals trying to do their jobs. However, when a bank, JP Morgan, donates $4.6 million to the NYPD- some higher-ups in the PD may start giving directions a little one-sided. This isn't a mystery either. There was no Woodward and Bernstein who found some secret accountant with all the dirty details. During the Occupy Wall Street protests, JP Morgan publicly announced they were giving the NYPD $4.6 million dollars. The next day 700+ people were arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge.

If this was Batman, Falcone just bought the Gotham Police. (Sorry, playing a lot of Arkham City lately).

The Best Part

Nothing like this has ever happened before. The internet makes it possible for any person to see a situation from multiple perspectives. So when the New York Times changes the front page article on the arrest of 700+ protestors, you can find out why.

A few google searches and youtube videos will lead you to an interesting couple of stories about how most protestors (including reporters on the ground) felt they were being lead by police officers onto the Brooklyn Bridge. Then the cops stopped, turned around, and arrested 700 people. The act is called kettling. You may better know it has herding or corralling.

Everyone can see the differences in people's stories. You can see where things are inconsistent and make up your own mind. There are thousands of videos that provide first-hand accounts as to what is actually happening.

I honestly don't know how I feel about everything. The main thing I feel is nervous. This is exactly how revolutions start. I'm not afraid- that would come much later and in a much worse situation. I'm on-edge though. I feel like something big could happen. Something monumental.

I don't know if I, or anyone, is ready for that.