Community Corner

'The American Dream Has Imploded'

Members of Occupy Pottstown on Monday protested corporate greed, big bank and Wall Street bailouts.

Alan Croasdale had a thriving graphic arts business he started decades ago. The Collegeville-based company employed six workers, he said. 

The nation's economic downturn changed all that.

"In (2005), I lost my business," said Croasdale of Pottstown. "Right now I am unemployed ... I just lost my health insurance as well. My life has been turned upside-down."

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Croasdale said the U.S. is "under the thumb" of the corporate world.

To protest that relationship and its trickle-down effect, he and about 35 others gathered Monday for an Occupy Pottstown rally in the borough.

Find out what's happening in Pottstownwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"Wall Street people ... screwed we working people," he said. "We need to bring jobs back to the United States."

Dawn Wilson of Lower Pottsgrove Township was also at the protest.

The economic crash reduced her once busy pet sitting business to a light workload.

"So many of my clients have lost their jobs," she said. "Thanksgiving has always been my busiest time because people travel. I have one client this Thanksgiving. People aren't traveling. They have no money."

Corporate interest must be removed from the country's political system, said Occupy member Dina Browne, who was raised in a lives near Pottstown.

"Big business buys our whole government," she said.

Browne said she has a degree in psychology and is a certified English teacher. She lost her jobs in the mental health and teaching fields due to funding cuts, she said.

"I have been unemployed for 17 months ... I have no health care," Browne said. "I've worked my entire life ... There's just so much wrong with this system."

Browne said the U.S. bailout of big business contributed to the country's dire economic status.

"I don't want a welfare state but I want the government to stop taking care of (big) business so I can have a chance," she said.

The big banks got a $25 billion loan at no interest, Browne said.

"I can't get a loan at no interest," she said. "The American Dream has imploded. It's a nightmare." 


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