Detroit, Grand Circus Park – This is no Tea Party. Call it the Free Party.
If there’s one thing that unified the angry, disparate Occupy Detroit demonstrators who took over Grand Circus Park in Detroit on Friday, it was that they all want something for free.
A group of college students, upset at having to pay off their student loans, wanted free education for all. One clot of protesters carried a huge sign demanding a “Federal Full Employment Act” in which the government would provide free jobs. And everyone agreed that health care should be provided free by the government.
One wonders, however, how “free” dovetails with another uniting factor: That capitalism is wrong.
“Corporations are all driven by the profit motive,” one demonstrator told me. “Make capitalism extinct” read a popular poster. But without the profit motive, how would companies make money? And if they don’t make money, where do the tax dollars come from to pay for all the free stuff?