Speaking to a “We Are Change” activist at “Occupy Wall Street” this week, political hip-hop artist Immortal Technique threw down the gauntlet to those in the media who characterize the anti-corruption movement as a partisan affair, suggesting that the 99 Percent are willing to “sacrifice” President Barack Obama’s second term if it would send a message powerful enough to spark change.

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“I keep telling people, everyone that I meet, that I think this is one of the best expressions of democracy that people have seen in America in the past few decades,” he said. “Unlike the tea party, this is something that’s organic. It’s not corporate funded. It’s not by the Koch brothers. This isn’t a reelection campaign for Obama. We’re willing to put his second term on the altar of democracy and sacrifice it if we need to, to send a message to the rest of the world saying, ‘If you promise us change, and then you deliver nothing but the same, if you do these little superficial changes to pacify the people, to placate people, then you expose yourself.’

“[That’s] unlike the tea party, which wasn’t necessarily a repudiation of Obama, but more an addressing of conservative values. Their first targets were conservatives, not Democrats. They wanted to restructure what they thought the Republican party was moving away from, which was social conservatism and the religious right, which they wanted a closer connection to. This is more of an organic, non-corporate, anti-corporate movement. This is something that’s trying to address real issues in the streets.”

This video was published to YouTube on Thursday, Oct. 20, 2011.