The Occupy Wall Street movement has gotten so much attention in last few weeks that almost everyone has noticed it, even Evansville had an Occupy rally.

At the heart of this debate is the central principle that the people are 99 percent of the population and corporations are 1 percent, yet the government seems to serve just the corporations giving them tax breaks and allowing them to lobby for favoring legislation in Washington.

So, the 99 percent have decided to protest in major cities all across the United States, they have gained much attention and notoriety along the way. Depending on who you ask, on any given day, in any city with an Occupy rally, each person is there for a different reason. The main premise is that most individuals want corporations to pay more taxes and to take a step back from lobbying government.

I think this is a very large issue with the Occupy movement, there doesn’t seem to be one clear goal. Everything has to do with corporations, money and Washington, but after watching the news and reading various articles, I can name at least five different issues these people are protesting against. Their message isn’t very clear, and it seems to be unfocused.

Also, I understand that people want large corporations to stop lobbying government, but when people buy things from corporations, they become bigger. When you are fighting against large corporations, you have to think about how our country is structured. The people who are out protesting are wearing jeans from Levis, talking on a cell phone made by Apple or Samsung, they drove a car to the rally which uses gas, and they eat food most likely purchased in a large name grocery store and shipped to them from halfway across the world.

Corporations lobby for tax decreases and such because if they paid more taxes to the government, do you think they would take a cut in profits? The answer is no. They would pass those additional costs along to the consumer, which is us. Our nation is set up to focus on obtaining wealth.

Do you think that the oil companies want to take a cut in profits? Does a teacher want to take a cut in his/her salary? It’s the same premise, just on a much larger scale. I think that the Occupy Wall Street movement has some good ideas, who wouldn’t want corporations to pay more taxes and to stop lobbying in Congress, but is it really practical?

Is this is something that our country could attain? I don’t think people are prepared for the consequences that would arise and I don’t think those in the Occupy movement have thought out those consequences.