(Newser)
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With harsh police crackdowns against Occupy Wall Street protesters around the country, it's enough to make you wonder if Michael Bloomberg and the nation's police chiefs are actually on the side of the protesters, writes Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times. Of course they're not really, he writes, but Bloomberg has freed protesters from the confines of Zuccotti Park—where they were annoying locals, losing supporters, and facing a nasty winter—and given them yet another symbol of elite bullying.
"Occupy Wall Street isn’t about real estate, and its signal achievement was not assembling shivering sleepers in a park," writes Kristof. "The movement has planted economic inequality on the nation’s consciousness, and it will be difficult for any mayor or police force to dislodge it." Searches for "income inequality" have quintupled on one news database since the OWS protests started, and now the stunning statistic that the wealthiest 1% of Americans have a greater worth than the bottom 90% is now etched in our national psyche, as is the US' declining class mobility. The importance is not occupying parks with tents, concludes Kristof, but rather this: "Occupy the agenda."
