'Occupy Wall Street' Protests Like Tea Party, Says VP Joe Biden
Vice President Joe Biden has addressed the “Occupy Wall Street” Protests Thursday, while speaking at the Washington Ideas Forum.
At the forum, Biden was asked if he and President Barack Obama stood in solidarity with protestors in lower Manhattan that are challenging corporate greed and inequality in America.
Biden used the question to link the growing movement against Wall Street to the Tea Party.
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He discussed the substance behind the Wall Street protests saying, “Let’s be honest with one another. What is at the core of that protest? The core is: The bargain has been breached.”
“The core is that the American people do not think the system is fair or on the level. That is the core of what you’re seeing with Wall Street,” Biden added.
Upon discussing the protest, Biden compared the widely popular protest to another movement that garnered a lot of media attention, the Tea Party Movement.
“There’s a lot in common with the Tea Party. The Tea Party started, why? TARP. They thought it was unfair we were bailing out the big guys,” he stated.
TARP stands for the Troubled Asset Relief Program that allowed the United States Department of the Treasury to purchase or insure up to $700 billion of “troubled assets.”
The TARP was used under former President George W. Bush to bail out the financial system and was widely unpopular three years ago, and remains so today.
Biden added, “Look guys the bargain is not on the level anymore in the minds of the vast majority of the American (people) the middle class has been screwed.”
Biden’s statements echoed statements made by President Obama at a press conference Thursday.
“I think it expresses the frustrations that the American people feel that we had the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression, huge collateral damage all throughout the country, all across Main Street, and yet you’re still seeing some of the same folks who acted irresponsibly trying to fight efforts to crack down on abusive practices that got us into this problem in the first place,” said Obama about the “Occupy” movement spreading throughout the nation.
