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Rep. Peter King (R-NY): Do Not Allow Any Legitimacy for Wall Street Protests, Or It Will Be Like 1960s Again
Think Progress / News Report
Published: Sunday 9 October 2011
Rep. Peter King (R-NY) blasted the media for providing fair coverage to the Occupy Wall Street protests. “They have no sense of purpose other than a basically anti-American tone.”
Speaking with right-wing radio show host Laura Ingraham on Friday, Rep. Peter King (R-NY), the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, blasted the media for providing fair coverage to the Occupy Wall Street protests. “They have no sense of purpose other than a basically anti-American tone,” he said.
King also explained that he is “old enough to remember what happened in the 1960s when the left-wing took to the streets and somehow the media glorified them and it ended up shaping policy.” He added, “We can’t allow that to happen.”
King is right that the 99 Percent Movement, with “occupation” actions from Sacramento to New York City and beyond, mirrors the broad-based protest movements of the 1960s. Back then, millions of American engaged in street protests which eventually led to the end of legal racial segregation, the creation of Medicare and Medicaid, as well as other successful programs to reduce the level of poverty and human suffering in America. The same protest movement King fears also led to the development of the Environmental Protection Agency, the birth of the mainstream feminist and gay rights movement, and the end of the wars in Indochina.
It might seem natural that King is an opponent of the 99 Percent Movement. He has spent much of his career in Congress placing the corporate interest over the public interest. For instance, King made a high-stakes legislative move to block health benefits for the rescue workers who developed cancer as a result of their heroic work during after the 9/11 terror attacks. He blocked the money because it was paid for by ending certain tax loopholes for foreign corporations. Indeed, like many of his GOP colleagues, King placed the foreign wealthy one percent over the people who risked their lives rescuing people at the World Trade Center.
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ABOUT Lee Fang
Lee Fang is an investigative researcher and contributing author for NationofChange. A resident of Sacramento, CA, Lee has written for the Boston Globe, The Nation, and ThinkProgress.org.
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36 comments on "Rep. Peter King (R-NY): Do Not Allow Any Legitimacy for Wall Street Protests, Or It Will Be Like 1960s Again"
qjvgdy
October 15, 2011 5:42pm
Who is this clown? and how does he sleep at night?
October 10, 2011 1:48pm
I'm a dues-paying member of M.O.B.S.."Mauled On Bankster Street"!! The nerve of this santimonioius sack of chicken-hawk crappe to say they "can't allow" this to gain "legitimacy"?? Who do these pieces of puke think they are? That ferret-faced little turd Eric Cantor and others ranting about "mobs"..and now this bucket of bilge-water backflow pontificating on our "anti-American tone"..well, keep it up, King!! They're going to find out that it's just their sort of behavior that is going to make this movement grow even faster and stronger!! They've already planted their neo-nazi operatives amongst the protesters and we can see this sort of rhetoric just lays the foundation for them to soon start the "violence"..doing everything they can to discredit and disrupt..just like they did during the VietNam and union protests! When the "bricks" start going through the WS windows, it will be the RNC's brownshirts flinging them! Eyes open, everyone..we need to "out" these megacorpmafioso extortionists and show the rest of America just what they're all about!
October 10, 2011 1:02pm
Do not allow legitamacy to the protests? Mr King, The legitamacy of a movement is not something that you can legislate. It is not something that you "allow". You are certainly free to choose to ignore the legitamacy of the protests but bear in mind that it is not your place to grant or disallow legitamacy.
October 10, 2011 10:10am
peter king is a lying cowardly chicken hawk who got out of serving during viet nam by using his political connections to weasle his way into n.y.national guard - he loved the iraq and afganistan wars but his son wouldn't go there - junior now work as a lobbyist for alphonse dimato --
October 10, 2011 9:33am
I would encourage all people globally to watch "Zeitgeist Moving Forward" which is available, for free, all over the net - I think Occupy Wall Street is a brilliant start but based on sound, basically irrefutable evidence put forth in the documentary, I wonder if the movement is enough?
October 10, 2011 7:23am
Where was this "don't let mobs affect policy" idea when the tea party was getting all the ink? What a hypocrital turd.
October 10, 2011 7:20am
Representative King! Let's set the record straight, you lying bastard. I remember what happened in the '60's. It took years for the truth about Vietnam to surface. Years for returning soldiers to relate the moral horrors they faced in service to their country. A generation of idealists raised on John Wayne movies answered the call for defenders of the weak; only to be foreced by politicians to act more like SS troops. It took years for these revelations to stir the news media to stop peddling the government's patriotic drivel and expose the American public to a dose of REALITY! A full blown look in the faces of misery created by our actions, or lack thereof.
But it didn't take years for the majority of Americans to react to this dose of truth. Through PEACEFUL demonstrations and awakened pressure at the ballot box a marginalized citizenry reversed the policies of an out of control bureaucracy. All of this was achieved with very little bloodshed; an affirmation of the effectiveness of representative democracy. According to this Repug pig King; we must not let this happen again!
October 09, 2011 7:04pm
Rep. Peter King is a Nazi bastard!
October 09, 2011 7:33pm
the good people voted lil adolph into office just like the good people of this reptile's district voted him in - so you git what you vote for - so the good people of new york can either vote him out or wait for him to choke to death on his next porter house or simply vote for the other miserable piece of shit that'll be running against him next time around .....
October 09, 2011 6:38pm
Again, who will stand against Obama in the Democratic primary?
October 09, 2011 6:38pm
Again, who will stand against Obama in the Democratic primary?
October 09, 2011 5:46pm
You mean to tell me , this bigot is chairman of the Homeland Security Committee!? How can that be? I thought Homeland Security was to protect the United States and its citizens, yet there's a lousy, unabashed, loudmouth bigot in charge!
Yes, People, its time to rise up and take back our country - get rid of bigots, elected thieves and their cronies, as well as corporate gazillionaires that are only interested in the almighty dollar and screwing the 99% out of everything they have.
October 09, 2011 7:09pm
gee - what an amusing thing to think of - get rid of them - who do you think elected them - the local voting inteligensia of his district that swear he's a real good guy as a primary directive for their fingers hitting that button in the voting booth
October 09, 2011 4:43pm
Well said!!
October 09, 2011 3:39pm
And I'm supposed to care what Rep. King thinks because...............???
October 09, 2011 7:22pm
what rock did this reptile crawl out from under - and by the way , what's the average age of these creatures in both houses, they look a little too old to still be concerned with ego and ambition - none of them speak words of wisdom , experience and temperence - in this fellows case i think that this dust nuts should sit down and shut up before he has a stroke or something ....
October 09, 2011 3:29pm
Barack Obama is just as guilty as the one before him. The new banking legislation limits what banks can charge businesses, but not what they can charge consumers. These revisions/laws were passed during his time with a supermajority and this is what they did to the consumer - another screw job. W
October 09, 2011 2:29pm
He blasts it because this movement stands for everything he is against. Hell It wouldn't surprise me to find eye holes cut into some of his sheets. We threaten to take away his bargaining chips that keep him fat and wealthy. I love that this article stated the same things I was saying about his comments.
October 09, 2011 2:14pm
Thanks. So true Sunny
October 09, 2011 2:03pm
The movements of the 60's did not change policy because the media glorified them, but because they were right. And the same is true with the Occupy Wall Street (s) movement. They are right, and right will win out ultimately.
October 09, 2011 4:44pm
Well said, Tuck!
October 09, 2011 2:00pm
Wow, this guy reminds me of some sort of frothy mixture of semen, lube, and fecal matter. To bad they've already named that disgusting stuff after another Republican politician.....
October 09, 2011 1:16pm
Occupy Wall street is definitely not "anti-American", it's folks like Rep. Peter King and their actions, that are anti-American. Yes, time for Rep. Peter King to step down from his post as chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. He definitely demonstrates old-time thinking and it wouldn't surprise me one bit that he too, caters to the wealthy.
October 09, 2011 1:01pm
The real question is how the non rich majority actually let in these devils during the mid-term elections. The kind that want to decrease their own tax bills(after 8 years of the Bush regime plus a further 2 years tax cuts under the helpless Obama, amounting to a total of $4.5 trillion so far) even further. Methinks they used Islamophobia to get the sum dum goys to vote for them, only to now seek to damage the very same voters with health care cuts etc ?!!! Its the media owners, stupid !!
October 09, 2011 12:42pm
Keeping it honest: Remember the Movie: “Wall Street?” Isn’t Greed supposed to be NOT good? So many news articles stating that American protesters have “no clear “agenda? It seems crystal clear to the middle class America that they are frustrated by the lack of concern that exists for the people in this country who need jobs and hope to support themselves and families. Millions of unemployed people looking for work in this country are being ignored and slowly erased by mega-corporations including Big Oil, Banks, Computer Co., Drug Insurance Companies, whose only concern is for their obscene profits far exceed anyone’s understanding! The beauty and treasured tradition of America allows people the freedom to unite and speak out to draw attention to these huge social injustices. It’s about time that Americans did and said, “we are mad as hell and we are not going take it any longer!” Are you listening Mr. Cantor, you and your war on the Middle Class of America? For the record, “Greed is Not good”; it’s ugly, selfish, obscene and destructive for our society. After all, We are a still a democracy, not aristocracy, nor a Banana Republic! Just look around this great county! " It's no surprise that the Romney campaign and his republicans in the Congress are raising money from Wall Street by saying they want to repeal consumer protections sand allow Wall Street to write its own rules, AND the recipients of dollar tax payer bailout with no conditions and used it for non-performance bonuses!
October 09, 2011 3:32pm
It was a MOVIE!
October 09, 2011 11:43am
Camus said that when you are more than thirty you are responsible for
what you look like, meaning, that if you look like a corrupt bastard you probably are one.
Have a good look at this man!
Have a very good look at this man!
October 09, 2011 3:42pm
He looks like one of those mega rich TV evangelists with the pretty hair.......nuff said.
October 09, 2011 7:25pm
more like a closet pedophile
October 09, 2011 10:30am
Also, anyone who blasts "fair coverage" of anyone, including those they don't agree with are truly the "unAmerican" . It seems so.....Orwellian, this corporate mouthpiece is slamming the basic American Rights of Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Assembly. My God, it's gotten so upside down, backwards and sideways. When we can vote this fellow out?
October 09, 2011 10:28am
Also, anyone who blasts "fair coverage" of anyone, including those they don't agree with are truly the "unAmerican" . It seems so.....Orwellian, this corporate mouthpiece is slamming the basic American Rights of Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Assembly. My God, it's gotten so upside down, backwards and sideways. When we can vote this fellow out?
October 09, 2011 3:46pm
I usually scrape what he is off the bottom of my shoe.
October 09, 2011 3:43pm
Not quickly enough.
October 09, 2011 10:21am
Yep, those pesky 60 protestors helped bring civil rights into the forefront
October 09, 2011 10:10am
It might give non-Rep. King some comfort to know how many states are trying to overturn all of the good stuff accomplished in the 1960s. I fully support... the Occupy Wall Street movement and will continue to do so. Then in another forty or fifty years, future King-types will be trying to stop all the horrible stuff that hopefully will be accomplished today! I'm not too crazy about the idea of living in an oligarchy!