Among those who have an opinion, the public is split on how they feel about Occupy Wall Street. Thirty-two percent of Americans say they have a favorable view of the movement that has spread from Wall Street to Chicago, and that even cropped up at the most recent CNN presidential debate in Las Vegas. Twenty-nine percent of the nation says they have an unfavorable view of Occupy Wall Street.
But opinions are clear about Wall Street itself. Eight in ten say Wall Street bankers are greedy, 77% say they’re overpaid, and two-thirds say Wall Street bankers are dishonest, a number that has gone up by a third in roughly two decades.
In case you were wondering: 65% of Tea Partiers have an unfavorable opinion of OWS. And perhaps most unsurprising is the fact that they have the greatest faith in Wall Street of all cohorts in the poll, even believing that they are honest in much higher numbers than the rest of the country. (They do agree that they’re greedy, but I’m guessing they see that as an admirable quality. )
A majority of the country has not yet bought into Occupy Wall Street, but they all agree that Wall Street is a problem. That’s a good first step.
These Masters of the Universe have been thumbing their noses at the country for years and it was only a matter of time before there was a backlash. The right has spent billions on misdirection and distraction and blaming “liberal” government for everything and it worked pretty well up to now. But the facade is crumbling and more people are beginning to see that their problems can’t all be attributed to welfare queens and gay sailors.
And that explains why the right is kicking into gear to activate the rest of the conservative base against the movement. (I suspect they think it’s very clever to use anti-semitism against it as a mirror to the attacks on Tea Party racism. Good luck with that. )
The smartest thing the Occupy Wall Street organizers did was pick their target and put it right in the name. Half the battle was won right there. The other half is going to be a little bit tougher.