If you're not paying attention by now, maybe this blog will help you put a face on the Occupy Wall Street protests.

We are the 99 percent. We are getting kicked out of our homes. We are forced to choose between groceries and rent. We are denied quality medical care. We are suffering from environmental pollution. We are working long hours for little pay and no rights, if we're working at all. We are getting nothing while the other 1 percent is getting everything. We are the 99 percent.

Brought to you by the people who occupy wall street. Why will YOU occupy?

To repeat: Seattle-based Occupy information can be found here and here. I know it's easy to snark about this sort of thing because it seems kind of amorphous and rudderless and full of flakes, but dammit, this is important for one simple reason: If the right wing can come out with pitchforks and teabags stapled to some hand-painted signs, by Jesus the left had better be willing to make a stink, too.

I've attended a couple of teabagger rallies, including the very first one to take place in Seattle, and I can tell you that they did not ever have a coherent message. But they were heard. If progressives in cities like Seattle just sit around and bitch about how there's no strategy or coherent plan for these protests, nothing will get done. The media has started, reluctantly, to pay attention to these protests, which means that if this just fizzles out, it'll look like liberals don't care. Every conservative blog will make hay out of the fact that we don't care enough about our issues to actually do something. They'll say we don't exist, that it's a bunch of fringe hippies and Hollyweird libtards raging against the conservative will of the people. That's not the case. I believe the majority of Americans want health care for themselves and their neighbors and regulations to protect the common good. I think these protests are an opportunity to refute the myth of the teabaggers. The only problem is that we need to stop fucking complaining and start fucking doing something.