Co-Operation Not Co-Optation

Those who are worrying about Democrats and organized labor getting too cozy with or even "co-opting Occupy" possibly need to re-think their priorities when too many Democratic Mayors are actually attacking peaceful protestors in their cities and when Republicans are explicitly organizing to destroy the movement and planning media strategies to defeat Democrats on the basis of their misrepresentations of Occupy.

Oh, how I wish we could get more Democratic Mayors cozier with Occupy! Oh, how I wish we could get more Democrats who will be smeared with associations with ridiculous reactionary fantasy constructions of Occupy anyway to actually talk with Occupiers, actually testify to the reality of the protests in the media, actually express support for the righteous and commonsense critiques provided by the movement, and actually declare their solidarity with the protests!

Of course the Democratic Party is far from an ideal partner in the work to provide real justice for the 99% and for the 1% given its historical complicity in the emergence of the financial crisis and the present limits of its aspirations in addressing the resulting injustice.

But it seems to me that such a partnership can only be a wholesome thing in the eyes of those who would want the Democratic Party to become a better vehicle for the majority of people who work for a living. The Occupy Movement needs as much organized co-operation as it can get, and should not misread indispensable co-operation always only through a paranoid fear of inevitable co-optation. Even if there are risks in such a partnership these risks seem flabbergastingly far from the ones that should be most on our minds at a time like this.