Opinion Editor Note: The “Between Columns” piece puts together two columnists to informally discuss current national and campus events. 

Will: Occupy Wall Street protesters are every bit as greedy as the banks they picket.

Now, before you bow up defensively and get worked up over my partisan hackery, think logically about that claim.  Greed is an intense and selfish desire for something.  What is the motivation of the entire Occupy Wall Street movement?  What’s its impetus—the gas in its engine, the fire in its belly?

They want the rest of us to have money owned by the top 1 percent.  It’s an intense, selfish desire.  They scream, like those godforsaken J.G. Wentworth commercials, “it’s my money [not really], and I want it now!”

Jordain: While I think your Wentworth comparison is funny,  I don’t buy— no pun intended— that “Occupy” protesters want money owned by the top 1 percent.

Instead they want the 1 percent, specifically corporations, to pay their fair share in taxes, major corporations to reform their practices which lead us into a recession, etc.

Will: Yet students have joined protests from New York City to Dickson Street.  It breeds from an anti-capitalist fervor.  They hate companies.  They hate rich people.  They hate all this economic stuff we have sort of been stewing in for the past couple of years.  A lot of these people never stopped carping about George Bush’s cowboy foreign policy; but this is cowboy economic policy—nuke big business and sort the rest out later.

Jordain: Again, I’m going to stop you on multiple counts. The “Occupy” protesters don’t hate “rich people,” and making that generalization ignores what the “Occupy” kids are getting at. They might be against an economic system that they feel puts the interest of corporations before people —Citizens United— and anti-big business. While rich people do own corporations, saying that they “hate rich people”  is an  unfair and untrue blanket generalization.

Will: As a college student, it’s easy to hop on board the bandwagon (Prius, high-speed rail or whatever).  I’m broke, Wall Streeters  aren’t.

I refuse, however, to cave to shallow thinking and vague rhetoric.  Steve Jobs died with billions of dollars, and he earned it.  Warren Buffett has nearly $40 billion, and my life is better because of the prosperity and jobs his businesses have created.  College students have opportunity to take the path these men took, start businesses, innovate and create new paths to prosperity.  We have no right to get mad at their success, throw a child-like fit and say “gimmie some.”

Jordain: I know I’m getting repetitive, but, again, I think you’re confusing people with corporations. The majority of the Occupy protestors wouldn’t say that they hate Steve Jobs or Apple for that matter.

They are against institutions like, for example because they protested at it Saturday, Bank of America and other financial institutions that they feel have behaved badly, and lead, in their opinion, our country into the housing and lending mess that exploded a few years ago.

Will: Well as a plucky member of the 99 percent, I am fully aware that there are exceptionally wealthy Americans.  But here’s the kicker: that doesn’t hurt me.  And it doesn’t hurt any other college students either.

Economics is not a zero-sum game.  Bill Gates has a huge slice of the economic pie, and according to the Occupy protestors economics that takes away from my slice.  But in the real world, he made the entire pie larger, so my piece can be bigger too.

Instead of protesting the banks and companies that allow for America’s economy to flourish, students should take all their angst on Wall Street to Washington.  Throw another pity party there when Congress bogs down the economy with regulations and taxes, or creates a housing bubble with regulations and dubious central bank policies.

Jordain: I actually agree with you, sort of. While I understand why Occupy Wall Street protesters are protesting big business and not the government, I think it ignores the fact that government can regulate big business, and perhaps if government officials had been paying more attention to some of the shady lendings, mortgages being given out we wouldn’t be in this mess.

While blaming government regulations is an easy and common solution to our economic problems, we were coming off at least a decade of increasing deregulation when the economy faltered.

As Occupy Wall Street protesters have pointed out, they believe that big business owns and has corrupted  the government and so they’re protesting against corporations. I disagree. If corporations have an unbalanced influence on members of government, it’s because our political system allows it. Campaigning is expensive.

Both Republicans and Democrats are going to have figure out where to come down on the Occupy protests. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee got slammed with phone calls from Wall Streeters after DCCC staff sent out an email supporting some of the Occupy rhetoric, and until the party picks a side that’s only the beginning.

I’m also curious how all of these “Occupy” protesters voted in 2010. Were they politically active? Did they vote?

But anyway, it might do them some good to blame both government and big business. More than 75 percent of Americans think Wall Street deserves a “fair amount” of blame for our economic situation, but almost 90 percent blame the government, according to a Gallup poll. (I’m with the 90 percent.)

Speaking of polls, my one worry about the Occupy movement is how many people don’t know enough about it. More than 60 percent of Americans don’t know enough about the Occupy protests to have an opinion. Occupy protests have been around for more than a month, and the more this public ambiguity hangs around the more it hurts the movement.

Will: Well in fairness, the movement is right to protest the corny capitalism of bailouts, but that’s a small part of their broader opposition to “the rich.”

I believe most college students will rise above the petty economic ignorance of Occupy.  We won’t despise companies as we use their products and demand their jobs.  We will improve our society and spend our days adding value to it rather than envying the success of others.

America cannot be bogged down in playing Robin Hood.  We cannot afford to throttle back the prosperity of some; we should be in the business of creating opportunities for all.  We shouldn’t be angry with 1 percent, we should ensure opportunity for 100 percent.  That’s what capitalism does.

Jordain: Or what our economic system is failing to do.

Will Simpson is a columnist for The Traveler. 

Jordain Carney is the 2011-2012 opinion editor.