Thank you so much for your continued analysis. Your work is amazing and I look forward to all you do.
Joe Manchin is a legend in his own mind. I feel he opposed Neera Tanden for OMB because she tweeted harshly of Manchin's daughter, Heather Bresch. Bresch was CEO of the Netherlands-based Pharmaceutical company that owns the EpiPen. In 2016 they jacked up the price of the EpiPen from $50 to $600 for a two-pack. She retired at the age of 51 in 2020 with a net worth of more than $31 million dollars.
The fact is he is more conservative about The American Rescue Plan than his own Republican governor.
Skip, I am so grateful for folks like you who know the back stories of our lawmakers. Your revelation of the apparent reason for Manchin's opposition to Neera Tanden makes perfect sense.
There was one high-profile bad boy (name forgotten, hah) whose loud mouth earned him conviction and lawsuits. But most other culprits escaped serious consequences, like those responsible for the Great Recession.
Here's the deal, Joe and Marty: punishing corporate criminality is an essential part of supporting workers and the labor movement. Too many pols lack fortitude to do what's needed there. Love y'all so far, but we are watching carefully.
I'm not as aware of that as I am of how many parents can't afford to buy an EpiPen for their child at that price, especially since they "expire" after one year! And schools can't really afford to provide many at that price either.
I would also find when I got them from the pharmacy the expiration dates were all over the place, rarely would you even get a year from the prescription. Recently they are doing better on this, or people now know to check more carefully.
Tis the relatively privileged who have employment-associated insurance of which you speak. I remember them costing $360 and the price kept going up...a rip off for people and insurance. That blatant abuse was litigated
That sounds more "reasonable" (not a good description) than the current whining about "mean tweets", tho. Considering the past four years of tfg (not even capitalizing) and HIS twit habits? Why could there not be more made out of that comparison? How many of these people nominated are being blackballed because they tweeted something? Remember the old "sticks & stones" saying? Really - these politicians are such fragile flowers that they feel damaged by words? Just galls me!
I pray for the same thing, Lynn. Unfortunately Trump opened Pandora's box and there's no stopping ugly, hate-filled politics. Let's pray Republicans don't regain power in 2022.
A commentator on Washington Week last night asked why the GQP doesn't try to recruit Manchin and the reply was there is no way because Manchin is truly a democrat and will never switch. If Manchin is truly a democrat he is doing a fairly good imitation of being an obstructionist. I don't know that the democrats have much choice but to court him until the 2022 elections when they may have a chance to widen their leads in both the Senate and the House which will take him out of the spotlight and lessen his influence.
I have never forgotten Manchin's hideous daughter's unethical high jacking of EpiPen pricing. She's right up there with Martin Shkreli and Elizabeth Holmes.
Exactly. But as HCR said above, this is what you get with a 50/50 split in the Senate. The only way to remedy this is to elect more Democratic Senators. Then, members like Manchin can be pushed to the sidelines as their votes won't matter. I don't see that (more D-Senators) happening anytime soon unless demographics shift some more. If Dems don't get their act together and invest time and energy into seeing how to get their message out, they risk losing both House AND Senate in '22 and/or '24, and even the Presidency, and we could end up in a political wilderness for years. Eric Levitz for NY Magazine offers some very sage advice for Dems after crunching a lot of the data from the 2020 election. (Not sure if there is a paywall...) Apparently there are some small shifts to the R column from traditionally reliable D groups--Hispanic voters are shifting more to the Rs, as are even some African-American and Asian voters. It is something to keep abreast of, but we could still beat the odds and not lose ground in '22. As Levitz opines, we should have a better idea how Dems might fare by the end of this year. (If necessary, I can copy & paste sections of the NYM article...it's very interesting.)
I should add about the above article I linked, from NYM: "To gain some insight into these matters, Intelligencer turned to our favorite socialist proponent of ruthlessly poll-driven campaigning, David Shor. A veteran of the 2012 Obama campaign, Shor is currently head of data science at OpenLabs, a progressive nonprofit. We spoke with him last week about how his analysis of the 2020 election has changed since November, what Democrats need to do to keep Congress after 2022, and why he thinks the Trump era was great for the Republican Party (in strictly electoral terms)."
thanks for pointing out the connection. As an epi pen consumer, I had issues with that fiasco. Now that you've tied it to Manchin tells me all I need to know. Thank you.
100% Skip. It is outrageously offensive that any in the Sedition Caucus is still in Congress at all. They're also a national security threat. That's why it's encouraging to read Dr R on progress with the Jan 6 cases. DOJ walls close in; the mills grind slow but fine.; the GQP crumbles to dust.
That a man with such vindictiveness has this much power is sickening. But he had to be placated lest he leave the Democratic Party, thus returning the Senate to majority control by McConnell.
Mary, I think you are misunderstanding the term "neoliberal". It refers to people who are radical proponents of the 18th-century "liberalism" espoused by Adam Smith and David Riccardo. Neera Tanden is a mouthy person with very clearly lefty ideas but that is not what a neoliberal is. Just to clarify. :-)
No, though you're of course correct about the famous early proponents of what is still called "liberalism" in Europe, I'm not "misunderstanding" the common and much-discussed term neoliberal--a term that covers the politics and policies of both our major parties at least since Reagan and Clinton (not to mention those of Blair and his successors, and the center-right PMs and presidents of France, including the Socialist Holland), and which I'm seriously engaged in working toward alternatives to. Neera Tanden has no affiliation with the actual left, and has expressed herself vituperatively about those who do. Here is a defense of Tanden from the center-left magazine The Nation: https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/neera-tanden-omb/ And here is the opening paragraph of Wikipedia's article about neoliberalism in the last 50 years: "Neoliberalism or neo-liberalism[1] is the 20th-century resurgence of 19th-century ideas associated with economic liberalism and free-market capitalism.[2]:7[3] It is generally associated with policies of economic liberalization, including privatization, deregulation, globalization, free trade, austerity and reductions in government spending in order to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society;[4][12] however, the defining features of neoliberalism in both thought and practice have been the subject of substantial scholarly debate.[13][14] In policymaking, neoliberalism was part of a paradigm shift away from the prevailing Keynesian economic consensus that existed prior to the persistent stagflation of the 1970s."
• Good old-fashioned white supremacy, which explains immigration restrictions, opposition to so-called “cancel culture” like ending publication of certain Dr. Seuss books, and outrage for taking down Confederate memorials and symbols. So many examples, so little space.
• Good old-fashioned family, with father as head of household and women in their place. The Good Old-Fashioned Party of male dominance and misogyny, the Good Old Boys Club of that one-term president, plus Ailes, O’Reilly, Epstein, Clinton, Prince Andrew, Dershowitz, Kavanaugh, Clarence Thomas, Cosby, Weinstein.
• Good old-fashioned boy-girl romance. Anything but the alternatives. Don’t change bathrooms. Don’t change Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head. Don’t change old-fashioned weddings, or corporate and business culture pre-1960s, and certainly don’t adopt any of the words in the acronym LGBTQ. We don’t want to do anything to ruin the old-fashioned family model.
• Good old-fashioned popular culture. Cowboys and Indians. But don’t listen to any of that revisionist history. Never mind that few of the original vaqueros were ever white. Never mind that whites invented scalping to get paid bounties on dead Indians without the inconvenience of having to drag around entire corpses.
• Good old-fashioned history of religion. Never mind that the founder of Christianity was Palestinian Jewish. We’ll ignore that. In our view, he’s a white boy painted like the images from the Italian Renaissance. Never mind that the original Saint Nicholas was from the eastern Mediterranean, we are going with the Madison Avenue ad culture which turned him into a jovial old white man resembling Burl Ives or Orson Welles (no offense to those two fine gentlemen, but they’re not descendants of people born in Asia Minor or Ancient Graecia).
Oops, we wanted to demonstrate our love of Christian heritage, but somehow it looks like we managed our own version of cancel culture, because Jews and Palestinians and Turks and even Arabs got erased, except 3 Asians who made a token appearance in the New Testament. Now how did that happen?
And that, dear friends, brings us right back around to where we began:
Are you thinking that it should be obvious that supremacy is in direct opposition to equality? That breaking down democracy is the best way to remain supreme? That fighting for equality is the hallmark of democracy? That we have a lot of work to do day in and day out to keep democracy alive and well, here and throughout the world? That formulating thoughts, getting people on.board, creating forward motion, etc takes time and effort? Unbelievable amounts of time and effort. But it IS worth it. Keep on keeping on, Roland. You aren’t alone in this.
Bravo, Roland. I’ve been thinking about the GOP recently as the “pretend oppressed” party, after seeing Facebook posts from people who claim all sorts of indignities imposed on them by our society—saying they will never apologize for being white, defending the Second Amendment, loving God, etc., as if anyone is asking them to. So it’s the Pretend Oppressed Party to me, or POP: a quick hit of sugar, nutritionally lacking, and I hope soon fizzling out.
The POP is becoming an endangered species, imo. That’s why they seem so oppressed. They are being replaced. For Pete’s sake, how long does racism and sexism and anti-gayism et al dominate this society? I’ve been watching and waiting FOREVER.
Over the past two months actually going all the way back to February 2020, I have been predicting that this is the demise of that old society, the old nasty culture. The night is darkest before the dawn. A cornered animal screams loudest as it dies. That’s what this juvenile silliness looks like to me.
Totes Roland! We are all here to engage in a discussion that sometimes breaks down into anger and frustration but--aside from a few trolls and bots--one of the things I love about this space is that we are all working hard to listen to each other. That happens only rarely these days. The steady plod toward a better future that is happening now, despite the roadblocks being thrown into the path--not all of them by Repugnicans, alas--has a better chance, I think, of being successful than the shiny-object system that throws good ideas up in the air, only to forget about them when they drop to the ground.
Some of the people most revered by the far right--especially the Catholic far right--happen not to be "white": most importantly, perhaps, Augustine of Hippo, who was from Carthage in North Africa and whose family was not Italo-Umbrian (they became "Romans" because of the imperial takeover of North Africa after the Third Punic War). Early medieval depictions of Augustine show him as distinctively Berber. Although not portraits, per se, the accuracy at least of locating Augustine as a person of North African descent was lost by the later period, when he gets whitened, like so many others.
Yeah it’s strange isn’t it? When I was very young I was brought up on Sunday school, and of course I am familiar anyway with all the standard American cultural myths surrounding Christianity, as are all of you. How did it turn from a diverse philosophy and cosmology embraced by members of every Mediterranean culture and every level of society into a stripped and sanitized shell of its former self. Council of Nicaea of course. Censoring all references to reincarnation out of it. Stripping the equal role of women right out of it. It says right in the Bible, clear as daylight, that Joshua was no respecter of persons. Didn’t give a hoot what gender you were, age, how much money you made, what you did for work, status or social standing, slave or Roman citizen, it was all about equality. And then of course the jerks had to come in and turn it into something that it wasn’t. The Vatican, all that money, all that hideous and greasy status symbol and prestige stuff, not to mention the Inquisitions and torture and Crusades. Yech yech yech yech and yech.
And don't forget the all important industry of (chicken bone) relics, garments and splinters! You too can own a sliver of a saint, a torn piece of one's holy garment or a splinter from the cross for a handsome price!
Very good point about Africa's contributions to early Christianity. Alexandria, Cyrene, Hippo and other locales made North Africa a Christian stronghold til the advent of Islam, and Ethiopia is the world's oldest Christian nation after Armenia.
The "Confessions" establish the massively influential Augustinian model of autobiography: that one can remake one's life to give it a dynamic new direction, a purpose previously lacking. It's so pervasive that most Americans don't recognize a leading current example as Augustinian: Malcolm X's "Autobiography." The journey from his early party-animal "creed" to the NOI, and finally more universalist Islam, shows that Augustine's model doesn't need Christianity as the end result.
Roland while I agree with the majority of what you have written but after looking for information on the Dr Seuss book controversy ,that at least appears to have been a decision of the family of Dr Seuss and not some nefarious leftist or GQP move. If it had been I would have thought that they would have gone after the Dr Seuss book The Butter Battle as well. While I am not in favor or censorship in literature I do think at times we need to look at what images we present as acceptable to young children.
Yes of course. I’m not defending the concerns about cancel culture, after all in Germany they have done away with being able to sell anything with Nazi symbolism or nomenclature. I happen to have some of that because I inherited from my father and grandparents, but I couldn’t display it or resell it in Germany. So there’s often a good reason for censorship when it exists. My comment about Dr. Seuss’s books which are being canceled is that Republicans are having a hissy fit about it. The press calls it “culture wars.“ That’s like a German having a major problem because swastika flags have been disallowed. Not a good look.
Marcy, I give up. I spent an hour working in the LA warehouse and I still have no clue what we’re talking about. Let’s have you shine some light into my rock head.
Roland, Right on. I'm here to say that is going to change QUICKLY. The future belongs more to the cultures and religions of ancient indigenous peoples than it does to PMSers (pale, male, and stale) Blog forthcoming on this topic. Not sure it would be appropriate to post here. IM me if interested.
Thank you! Safety is a huge priority, it has to be when you do this every week, min. 4 weekly work shifts of 11-14 hrs. each. I have an intricate and detailed safety program I follow, e.g. a well-honed system for combatting fatigue, in particular, that’s a prime consideration on a night driving schedule.
Perfect summary for the GOP. Wish that they could be confronted with this and made to answer publically for each of your statements. I know some Republicans who are not on social media and keep their head in the sand just vote Republican without seeing what their party has become. They might really have their eyes opened when confronted with such a clear horrifying picture.
GOP senators are behaving outrageously, but there is some consolation in their amateurish incompetence. Apparently not even McTurtle, that "great" parliamentarian, remembered a basic rule of legislating: NEVER leave the chamber wholly in the hands of opponents when in session. It's too bad that this was a procedural matter, not a more significant result, because the GOP is now less likely to make the same blunder. It recalls a famous misjudgment in a major early crisis at the UN. In 1950 the USSR boycotted the vote on authorizing military intervention in Korea, when it could have vetoed action as Permanent Member of the Security Council. They never blundered that way again.
There is an inherent flaw in the otherwise menacing GOP seditionist tendency. They increasingly elect candidates who are disrupters or celebrities, but incompetent at actually governing. Cold comfort, but take it where it's found.
Actually, the USSR boycott had nothing to do with Korea (I wrote a best-selling book about how that fakakte got going, so I know). They began their boycott in January, over the issue of changing the German currency from the Reichsmark, which ultimately led to the financial as well as social break of the two halves of Germany. They didn't think about Korea, because also back in January, Secretary of State Acheson had made a statement about US interests in Asia, where Korea was left off the list. The communists thought that meant the US - which had withdrawn its last occupying troops from South Korea in 1949, no longer considered the peninsula important. That was why, when Kim Il-Sung came to Moscow later in the month to get Stalin's approval of a forcible reunion, Stalin said it was OK with him if it was OK with Mao. Mao happened to be there at the same time for the signing of the Sino-Soviet Pact, and when Kim asked him he said OK, but you should be careful that the Americans really meant that. So, when the invasion came in June (for about 6-7 hours, the US wasn't sure the ROKs hadn't invaded the north), nobody really expected Truman to do what he did. The fact the USSR wasn't at the UN was purely fortuitous. After the initial Security Council decision, everything else the US did at the UN had to be done in the General Assembly, since the USSR made sure to be present ever after.
Especially sweet since Southern politicians have been masters of procedure since the very beginning. Unfortunately they have won many an election with celebrity politicians and the country (and the world and the PLANET) have suffered because of their incompetence and toxic egoism.
Thank you, Dr. Richardson! Really, if you do not vote for the American Rescue Plan, which will cut child poverty in half, then you cannot pretend to believe in “family values” nor can you pretend to be pro—life.
When I get alerts from Biden's FB page (and other such sites) it's interesting to see how many Republicans are trolling and shrieking, "Where's my $1400?" It would be far more effective if they trolled their own Republican lawmakers. Alas, no. Apparently there is scant recognition by Republican voters that their chosen ones in both chambers have nothing other than re-election driving them.
And haven't you heard? The right to life ends at birth
When I mentioned to a very pro-trump "friend" that I figured she might like the $1,400 extra dollars in her pocket. Her response was YES, but I still love tRump and hate Biden.
Honestly, you have to wonder, what motivates people to act so stupid. Here's a guy bending over backwards to try and get things done to help people and the (TQ)Rs are like, "Nope, I love my Donald even though he shat all over me."
I don't get it wither. This friend is a smart woman, and clearly has taken to heart all the bull that Fox has fed her. Just don't get it and never will.
I don't get it either. My oldest and dearest friend of over 55 years is a Fox/TRepublican. We have grown apart as a result. It breaks my heart and mind.
Exactly what has happened with my best friend of 45 years. It's broken my heart. But she has become a different person. A very hateful person. Trump does destroy everything he touches ....
I think that the call of racism and sexism is too powerful. These "True Believers" feel that their very lives are at stake in the world that is evolving into a more diverse and more welcoming place.
That explains some but not all. I have relatives who are not at all hateful people, who get their radical right ideas of reality in church as part of the worldview there.
Yes, I have family who seem to have been persuaded by the more conservative beliefs of their church. They now fall into the Evangelical family of tRump believers. Hard to believe I came from the same gene pool as they did!
They are, for example, consistent about "pro-life", not only wearing masks to forestall covid but also making and distributing them. They like Pence, not Trump. They would not admit that Pence was nearly killed in the Jan. 6 riot, and have accepted the idea that whatever happened that day was somehow the fault (or no worse than) the violence that accompanied some of the summer racial justice protests.
More and more, I think HCR has it right that what determines people's actions is the ideas and narratives they hold as true.
Those who oppose abortion but favor the death penalty and cannot see that their stance is mutually exclusive reveal that their oppositions are punishment for "bad" people that don't look like them.
A colleague used to talk about the lowest common denominator in public discussions. Gets really challenging when the ability to reason has not been cultivated and the absence of logic leaps to the island of conclusion
Yes, if one is pro-life shouldn't that mean beyond birth as well. I like Barbara Bush's stance on abortion that no matter what happens to the fetus God will take care of its soul.
I'm a 'keep your laws off my body' kind of woman. Is it really just all about controlling/repressing heterosexual women? Makes no sense. If you don't like abortion, don't have one.
Most of them don’t even like women— they like power in general and their choice in women— remember the anecdote about McConnell saying that when he married this time she’d have to be really rich— bingo Elaine Chao.
Yep it is all about controlling women--not just straight women because if they had their way there would be no lesbian women who are not being used as incubators for sperm.
I have mixed feelings about unions. I am probably one of the few people that has been both a senior executive in a Fortune 100 corporation and a member of the AFL-CIO Musicians Union. That was before right to work laws so either you were a member of the union or you couldn't be hired by a Symphony Orchestra that was unionized and most of them were. The Fortune 100 corporation I worked for, Digital Equipment Corporation, was a highly ethical corporation and never unionized because it treated its employees and its customers very well. In the blizzard of 1978 where the main commuting highways became parking lots of cars trying when trying get home at rush hour in the brunt of the storm, everything was shut down for a week and no one could go into work. While the unionized General Electric did not pay its hourly employees that week, Digital did their hourly employees for a full 40 hour week. Think it cost them a million dollars but it was frequently cited if unionization came up. Rather than set up unions that put the employees into a rather adversarial position with management I'd rather see employees actually have a substantial share of the ownership of the companies. That way the company is beholden to not just the greedy investors but to the employees as well and gives them a true share of the profits of their work beyond their salary.
Unions have devolved from heroic origins to organizations of rampant bloat, politicking, and incompetence. However, they still function as a safety net and collective force to protect and advance the rights and interests of the work force. If all corporations were ethical good citizens, unions would not be necessary.
If all corporations were ethical good citizens, this country would not need the various federal laws and government agencies that provide for safety regulations of business, safety regulations for infrastructure, and the social safety net to meet people's basic needs. But greed, money, and short term gains continue to intervene.
There are still plenty of working-class heroes in today's unions. They (we) have good success in building locals in underrepresented sectors such as service and hospitality, biotech, adjunct profs, etc. I was in the thick of a wave of adjunct/grad organizing in the 2010s, and believe me, there's nothing more exhilarating than colleagues coming together to form a new institution, a new community. If you want real friends, have union friends. (Did I mention that unions have some of the best parties?)
Until we achieve Utopia, we will ALWAYS need a strong labor movement, one that works for the whole society, not just member benefits and wages. Since unions are labor's main institutions, we need our unions. Now, let's enjoy the weekend, brought to us by our friends, the labor movement.
Morning is the period after we wake up. With Dr R "mailing" LFAA between 12-3am, I'm in danger of becoming a vampire. Please alert me if my image disappears from the mirror.
I agree with both of you. There is a successful appliance store in our county which was privately owned. The couple who had owned it decided to retire. Most of the employees had been with them 10+ years. They got together and bought the company from the couple. They each have a piece of the pie and they make certain no one falters on their promise to deliver. In other words, they police themselves and stay on top of one another. It is a much needed concept for corporations to adopt the same idea. The rewards outweigh the costs.
Yes, we agree on our mixed feelings about unions. And police unions protecting police officers from accountability for harmful conduct is the worst.
When people and corporations govern themselves responsibly and ethically, then the countering force of a union or the regulation by a government is not necessary, and that is the ideal--but sadly not real. The nice exceptions are not the rule.
Police unions also protect officers from really awful things that administration does to them. Mandatory breaks in shift (no working 14 days straight by order), no "at will" firing because an officer refuses to carry out an unlawful order, and more protection from sex discrimination.
I agree that there is often too much power granted to unions, and yet there is still a need to protect officers who find themselves in deadly force situations from both community outcry (in a reasonable and justified instance) and administrative reprisals.
I'm not very articulate this morning. Maybe more coffee will help.
I have been the target of a particular administrator who wanted to get rid of me. My union protected me, and my job assignment.
Ally, I like your comments as much as your tuba, and you seem like the kind of LE officer we need more of. But way back in the last millennium, a couple of years in a CT sheriff's dept pushed me in the opposite direction. They were interested in me b/c I was a rare one with a BA, but the socialization was an education in immorality. Academy training is no match for that Real Training. So I got out.
In 2021 there are two faces to American policing: Eugene Goodman and Derek Chauvin. Angel and devil on each shoulder. Abraham Lincoln told us which one to heed.
Well, they may have evolved into organizations that result in policemen who feel like they can do anything they want like pepper spray a mother in the face in front of her daughter after she was caught shoplifting in Rochester. But the started out being organized to support the men who put their lives on the line to protect us
There are saints out there but far too few. So long as humans are led by self interest (or, to put it differently so long as almost all humans have strong survival instincts and only some have the ability to temper that with a more cerebral assessment of situational complexity and long/wide range vision) then power in the hands of CEOs, management or labor should always be held in check by counter balancing powers ranging from separate interests to laws. Neither is inherently guaranteed to always be the good guys and gals.
I have mixed feelings about Marty Walsh as mayor. He's openly liberal, and did as well as possible with the pandemic last year. But he tried hard (and failed) to force the 2024 Olympics on us; backed reckless Formula One racing downtown; and is pro-development despite worrying about affordable housing in Boston. His strongest union affinity and support is from the building trades who benefit from construction booms and hot housing markets. They are old AFL craft unions, not representative of Boston's unionized workforce. He also helps the police union dodge accountability, -- a serious concern since we lost George Floyd -- though he's not alone there.
Yet here's the deal: I think he'll be a very good Sec of Labor. He is sincerely pro-labor along with a president more committed to workers than any in a long time, including Obama. The Labor Dept will encourage unionization, enforce safety and equity laws, and coordinate well with a Biden-appointed NLRB that will act fairly. Marty (first-name is OK with him) will also help get the ball rolling on infrastructure programs. He has a genuine common touch, is personable and approachable. I know, because in 2015 I gave him an earful about unions who didn't support the Olympics, and he was genial about it. Good choice, Mr President.
Being a MA resident, I've always thought Marty was basically a fair and good mayor. I appreciate your take TPJ, that you can see his faults, but still see his value as labor sec.
So, reading through your comment, it appears that you don't really have mixed feelings about Marty but note a few disappointments concerning his decisions as mayor.
You wrote, "He also helps the police union dodge accountability..." that alone makes me not trust his judgment, especially if he is genial about the dodgy choices you describe. Isn't Boston a harbor? Does his pro-development take into account rising sea levels and increasing storm surge due to the changing gulf stream?
Cathy, Personal experiences are pivotal source in our judgements. I don't think, however, that the Digital Equipment Corporation was typical of most companies then or now. For most workers the role of unions made the difference in achieving economic security, salary levels of the work force, job safety and bargaining. Union busting contributed greatly to the shrinking of our middle-class. As an aside, I wonder how much of Trump's support comes from the abandonment of the working-class by both political parties.
I could not agree more. Courageous unions broke the stranglehold that a wealthy few held in all fields of manual labor at and around the turn of the 20th century. They faced a triumvirate of bitterly opposed governments, factory and mine owners and numerous organs of media. They paid in blood for their right to exist and to have the dignity of having the worth of their labor recognized. It is hard to imagine a broad middle class developing in North America and parts of Europe without the contributions of organized labour.
By the Fifties corporations, in the main, recognized that there was plenty of pie to go around and there were situations where union and management were more or less in collusion, leading to corruption at the top as unions became their own kind of corporation. Nonetheless each generation could rightfully expect that their lot would be better than that of their parents. The playing field, while not equal, was at the least less tilted and America enjoyed golden years.
Many factors contributed to the downfall of unions, particularly competition from less wealthy countries who did the same work for far less. But union busting began in earnest under Reagan in the 80s. The Air Traffic Control strike and his ruthless handling of it signaled to the business community at large that they now had a clear run at weakening and dismantling unions. Through a combination of outsourcing, offshoring and right to work legislation (bought and paid for), unions were crippled to the point that America began to compete *internally* for work. Factories moved from the North to the South where wages were slashed and unions defanged or non-existent.
Forty years of this and America (and parts of Canada) now live in a grossly unequal world. We have regressed a hundred years. The world is a different place of course, so of course millions of people have the “choice” to earn a hardscrabble living of sorts by working 60-80 hours a week in what is cutely called the gig economy. And each generation now has no expectation of doing better than that of their parents - except for the gilded few.
We are destined it seems to reach the society that Anatole France described over a century ago: “The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal loaves of bread”.
Perhaps Bessemer Alabama will represent the beginning of a long road block. May they vote to unionize and then may it spread.
Much thanks Eric for the history lesson! You retold it from the days of empty kitchen tables and bare refrigerators; picket lines, union halls, bargaining sessions and hands piled with cash hidden from view to the present day featuring abandoned factories; desolate industrial spaces; empty main streets, except for a church or two, a bar and a coffee shop, along with the furious working-class.
That is so brilliant that you dragged my words down to the level of such harsh realities. Brilliant.
I was the primary negotiator for my teachers’ union in the late 90s. Had more trouble with my own team than with management! Now that’s a long story. :)
Thanks for putting such vivid color into old union days.
You're a good, concise teacher, Eric; was that your profession? I'd locate the transition later, in the 1930s with the New Deal and NLRA. Irving Bernstein, Turbulent Years, is an outstanding account.
Brilliantly said, Eric. Put so concisely and well. Unionization transformed this country---but as you say it was bought with blood (I think of the vanished textile mills in North Carolina and the struggle there.) If Bessemer votes yes, that will be an wonderful victory. Now I realize why I'm seeing all these beautiful Amazon ads about the need for 15$ an hour that are proliferating on Axios news. :-) :-(
When I started teaching, I was grateful to step into the structure of a union contract. I didn't need to negotiate salary, benefits, et al. I just needed to write my syllabus, order the books and walk into the classroom. It allowed me to focus on the job and the students.
Yes, I feel quite fortunate to have worked for an ethical company. Even a Fortune 100 corporation can be an ethical one if it has ethical leadership. But, I want unions to evolve out of its patriarchy framework and be part owners of the companies so they are stakeholders not just an expense to cut to the bone. Also have the issue that technology will displace humans in many jobs so we will probably need a new economic system. I think the U.S. Senate is a great example of what is wrong with too many rules like many unions become. Stagnates the whole system. Going back to the old union model will not be what we need now or in the future. We need a new model for unions.
New models for every large enterprise and crisis the world faces. Progressivism, tempered by reasoned conservatism, is required - and soon. Right now we have neither in positions of power - Canada or the U.S.
I am quite terrified for what sort of future my children and grandchildren are going to be subjected to. Climate weirdness now - full on climate change in a decade. And no will to wrestle with it.
The climate thing is really poorly comprehended by many. We don't know how rapidly change will accelerate, given an ocean current here, rise in salinity there, cold blob up there...serious potential for sudden shifts...I say put Greta in charge of the world effort to address the injuries we have knowingly inflicted upon our Mother. IMHO, radical change is required urgently; there is no time for fiddling around, so to speak.
Kim, Your comment is very strong. I would give Greta a few years before putting her 'in charge of the world effort...' Let's consider other candidates for the time being.
Ms Thunberg deserves the chance to graduate from college before assuming more responsibility. Still, if "world government" means she has actual power, I'm all for it.
On a related note, our electric company is an electric cooperative and is just wonderful. At the end of the year any surplus profit is divided among the customers who are automatically part owners and deducted from the electric bill. It's not ever much, but it's a reminder. We can vote on the board of directors, attend their meetings, and get numerous updates as to their policies which probably as a result are far far more environmentally friendly than the other major electric company in the wider area which is, imho one of the more dastardly ones. Not just direct employees but customers in some cases can be part owners.
You might want to be sure your electric cooperative uses some surplus profit to winterize or update the system. Do they spend enough money on trimming tree limbs from power lines? California power company did not prepare for winds that downed power lines and started fires.
LOVE my electric cooperative, and their/our solar array on properties they/we own! It has still been a struggle pushing fir wind and other renewables, but we sure missed last spring's hot dog roast annual meeting last year. Hopefully this year it will be safe to celerate again.
Yes, Cathy, and we need a new model of governing as well and an examination of social media's business algorithms toward a way to regulate them. We are going through a very difficult transition in our work, use of energy; distribution of wealth, social justice and so on. Hopefully, we may be at the beginning of the rebirth of unionization. That as practically everything else needs to function as the circumstances dictate.
Thank you Fern for bringing up "the abandonment (of unions) by both political parties." Al Gore Turned his back on labor unions during his campaign for president 2000. Gore almost lost in Michigan and Wisconsin. The last Democrat that embraced unions was Paul Welstone from Minnesota who died with his wife in a mysterious small plane crash 2002.
I have some mixed feelings too, but I must agree they were instrumental in moving workers into the middle class. I grew up between Gary and Chicago; everyone worked in the mills or oil refineries. Unions made it possible in the 50s and 60s for those without a college education to have a good middle class life.
As HCR has said in her writings and FB talks, one of the prongs of the Movement Conservatives in their battle plan was to defang unions.
Kurt Anderson's "Evil Geniuses" goes further into the weeds in discussing the financialization of the economy that ties into gutting unions as well as changing laws and norms. Beginning with the famous (infamous?) Lewis Powell memo, his battle plan to Big Business, and carrying through to the deregulation of banks, S&Ls, changing the law to allow stock buy-backs, not to mention Milton Friedman's "shareholder value" con, the rise of the leveraged buy-outs and then hedge funds, it's all been designed to put Wall St. in charge of everything.
Ever wonder why there is so little re-investment in companies, and almost no R&D anymore, compared to the '50s and '60s? Because those profits are being plowed into stock buy-backs. And how do CEOs get compensated these days? The IRS rules were changed to make stock options as compensation more attractive than salaries, plus the recipient gets a lower tax hit, too. Win-win! And when all the CEO cares about is the quarter-to-quarter reports to Wall St. to keep that stock price up, why would they care about 1, 5, or 10 years hence? It's no longer about making a good product, or providing jobs, it's about making 'the numbers' so Wall St. doesn't punish you.
Bringing back unions might help, but with the Big Business guys, it will take more than that, by a long shot.
You are exactly right there. I grew up in a mill town. My mother was a meat wrapper in a grocery store. Her union took care of us and we had many things we never would have. It made us middle class. My father had an 8th grade education and worked hard jobs. But his pay was abysmal and he often worked 3 jobs to make what my mother did.
I remember when I turned 30 and I had a big pay raise to 30k a year, in 1988. My mother told me my father didn’t make that much and he’d been working at the same company for over 30 years. I was shocked. He was a hard worker.
I’m currently reading “Rust, A Memoir of Steel and Grit” by Eliese Colette Goldbach about growing up in Cleveland and the mills’ and union’s effects on the people.
Cathy, I understand your mixed feelings. Unions are institutions and, like all institutions they are vulnerable to corruption. However, as someone who was in a union in my youth and one who has consistently seen the differences between universities and colleges with a unionized faculty and those that don't, I have to say that, with all their faults, unions are probably a much safer bet than relying on the paternalism of a benevolent corporation or executive. Hear me out about this:
AGMA, as Candace has pointed out, is a very powerful union for musicians and most of the orchestras in the US are union shops. It also is the union that supports dancers of the major ballet and modern-dance companies in the USA. The base pay for dancers is less than half that for the orchestras that are playing in the pit. No lie. But without a union, dancers would be far worse off. The support for health care for dancers alone is worth the union wages. And I have seen ballet companies try to break unions several times, not because they can have any effect on what they are paying the orchestras in the pit (they are contract workers borrowed from other orchestras usually) but because they have to treat dancers as people. This is an issue for me because ballet and modern dance (but especially ballet) is a woman-dominated field where the overwhelming majority of executives and managers are male. While orchestras until recently were overwhelmingly male and white--and so are able to negotiate from a position of privilege--often dancers are disadvantaged because of gender from gaining things like a living wage, rehearsal pay, and other essentials that union contracts require.
Universities that have unions have higher salaries for faculty and more job security for non-tenured instructors. Even though you might find administrations pushing out raises and so on when confronted by the possibility of unionization, they quickly reverse themselves once the threat is ended. I have seen this time and again because my jobs have been in non-union shops with union shops literally next door and the differences have been stark, especially in downturns and times of trouble. The vision and treatment of a given corporation's labor force by its executive and board is subject to change with the change of leadership. I don't trust corporate leadership to be "benevolent" toward their labor force except when compelled to be so. This is kinda what unions do. And Bezos found that out when he tried to lure the Distribution Center in Alabama away from forming a union with pay rises. It didn't work because the labor force had already experienced the downside of a paternalistic system.
You have hit the nail on the head. I see unions as reinforcing the patriarchy and going backwards -- make America Great again for the old white males. I so tired of patriarchy, the OR system, the only way someone can be one up is to have others that are one down. I want to evolve society into an AND system, an egalitarian system. My suggestion is that if unions were also stakeholders, part owners of the company, the employees would receive benefit from the profits from their work. Perhaps another example would be with police unions that are now protecting themselves more than their communities than perhaps we need the community to be a stakeholder within the police unions. They wouldn't be purely an expense that needs to be cut as far as possible even when it means people aren't making a living wage. There is also the issue that technology is going to displace jobs in the near future and we need a new economic system. My third concern is unions tend to stagnate an organization because like the old medieval guild system, there are too many rules, too many restrictions and the institution atrophies eventually. The U.S. Senate is a great example of union rules gone amok. And, gerrymandering is a two-edged sword -- you might get your candidate elected but then they are trapped into the thinking of their extreme base of voters.
Of course you are correct companies that take care of their employees have nothing to fear from unions or unionizing. Unions come into play when CEO's don't value their employees but rather see them as a means to short term profit.
I think the best thing about unions growing again under labor secretary who’s former mayor of Boston is that people for instance in manufacturing might start to make more of a live able wage.
It may go even farther. As an ED physician I lived through the transition from when actual practicing physicians managed groups staffing ED's to the current more common situation where a corporation run by business men contract with hospital groups run by businessmen to provide bodies with MD degrees to staff.
There is a palpable difference in the feeling and actuality of working in these departments. It has to do with how a patient is valued or not valued, viewed as and individual or viewed as a problem to solve. There is just something different about being considered a 'unit' rather than a person. It translates through from the worker to the product no matter what that product is.
I have worked in the healthcare field for 47 years now, never worked in a hospital that had union membership for staff other than nurses and the housekeeping personnel , but I watched the corporate take over of hospitals with the rise of their bean counters and the loss of caring about both the patients and the staff. I left hospital work because of that, and have worked in the private sector for the majority of my 47 years. I don't care how many feel good ads a medical corporation runs about their "mission" etc, it is always about the bottom line and the patients and the staff always come out at the bottom.
Absolutely. I had a parallel experience as a mental health professional. At first, the directives we worked under were developed and administered by professionals in our field. But then, managed care (what an ironic term) came in, and we were micro managed from afar by business executives who had no knowledge of working in the field of mental health.
Totally agree— it occurs often in any enterprise that hires consultants to try and increase efficiency or profits. Then before u know it people have become expendable widgets.
The industrialization of "health care" and the profit-taking on the backs of patients and caring workers (care-giving is not a mistake: not valued) has denatured the very idea of health. Mandated to care.
Nurses have unions. Doctors are not allowed. My thought this morning after stewing about Texas (state after my own heart) and other states who dropped public health measures: time for ICU nurses to strike. "Thank you" not enough anymore. Now, they are being disrespected and shit upon IMHO. Is anyone else mad as hell? This is what happens when politicians make public health policies instead of doctors.
I think nurses are abused to the extent that many of them have to care for very large numbers of patients which result in huge stress and the great possibility that they’ll make a mistake. MA tried to vote on this question in a recent election but it didn’t pass.
Actually, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 20.4% percent of RNs and 10 percent of LPNs and LVNs in the U.S. are union members.
I am a retired RN. In the 70’s and 80’s I spent 19 of my 43 year career in a unionized public county hospital (now closed).
Many nurses have mixed feelings about unionization as do I. While I appreciated a higher wage and excellent healthcare benefits, I balked at the union president’s perks of fully paid for childcare. Members had no such benefit. Her salary was double the average full time RN. Nurses’ repeated poor job performance was not enough to term him/her. A transfer to another unit was the solution. Not acceptable in any employment setting.
Currently, I am very concerned that nurses and valuable support staff are being pushed beyond their limits with the pandemic. But, the outcry for better staffing and nurse-patient ratios began long ago, mostly to deaf ears.
I worry that many nurses will abandon hospital nursing.
After this pandemic, IMHO, I believe the outcry will be huge and rightly so.
A lot of nurses have been leaving the profession because their management is ignoring their needs. It’s extremely difficult to become an RN these days — the levels is science and math they have to master are quite high. I know because I have a niece who followed this path for a while.
Can't speak to your location, but I do know that doctors in California and West Coast states, to my understanding, are allowed in Public Service jobs and when employed. And private practice groups have something that is sort of a practice association. Union of American Physicians and Dentists is one such Union. www.uapd.com
Thank you for this interesting perspective, Cathy. Being a private music teacher and working as an adjunct at a local college branch for some years, I've been in a position of fending for myself. For several seasons I was singing in a union house so was required to join AGMA. The dues were most of what I earned in that occasional work so I let my membership lapse after that brief but heady time. But it did give me insight into the big things that the union was doing for us: regular breaks, safety oversight (and believe me, in an opera production all sorts of dangers lurk), and advocacy for things like flying with instruments. Had I not been in a union house I would not have been required to join, but I would have kept the membership if it were not so expensive relative to the short time I worked for them each year.
In 1975 I joined the Michigan Nurses Association union as required to work in the rural hospital in my new town. We RNs were "professional" and in addition to pay and benefits, we bargained for patient safety and things like blanket warmers since the bath blankets we took off the patients' window sills were often frigid. The LPNs (with 1 year of training) were represented by The Steelworkers, and made a higher starting wage than the RNs (with 2 to 4 years of education). Plus, in their contract they were not required to stay even 1 minute after their 8 hour shift to give report to the incoming nurse. Nor did they address patient welfare at all. The LPN's bargaining sessions were nasty. Our MNA sessions were never easy, but they were collegial and productive (and we eventually got a decent raise). We RNs literally and figuratively wore the white hats.
Fast forward 30 years. I am hired by MNA to improve their image with the legislature, government and public. In those intervening years, AFL-CIO, SEIU and other major unions, losing a big financial grip on industry, had identified nursing as their next cash cow. And they were vicious about the conquest. MNA was now affiliated with one of these unions, while flirting with another. That viciousness included "goons" at our convention, threatening the non-union presidential candidate (who happened to be me), and denial of secret ballots. Worst of all, it affected the atmosphere and culture of our nursing practice.
As an Appalachian granny-midwife once told me, "Whatever Pappaw is feeling will be felt all the way down to the cradle." In our case, the union anger and resentment was felt at the patient's bedside. Much of that hostility was warranted: Being told at 6 pm that, No, you could not go to your son's piano recital that evening because the hospital was short staffed and you were required to stay and work mandatory overtime. And, while LPNs no longer made more money than RNs, there were NO LPNs working in hospitals to help you anymore. Plus, the CEO and all NON-union employees were getting a 5% raise when you had to settle for 2% (clearly a union-busting tactic). Then COVID-19 hit.
The real demons in this dilemma though, are way above "Papaw's" level, and include the way our country does not value or pay enough for healthcare; how the rich can donate $millions for more hospital wings (needed or not) with their names over the entrance rather than paying taxes on those funds; and most hospital boards are still not welcoming union representation at the highest levels.
I left MNA to start the new state nursing Association, ANA-Michigan, joining with our original 100 year old national organization. Our PAC supported Joe Biden for President because the solution to this healthcare dilemma requires a President who has the experience, sense and heart to do it - for all of us this time: for the union and non-union nurses, the healthcare facilities, the insurers, the other providers and, especially, for the patients.
MaryPat, that is quite a saga. Yes, our healthcare system is not what it needs to be. I have quite a sage to tell myself. I had a massive pulmonary embolism in 2013. I was within a couple hours of death and was lucky to have survived that long with all the misdiagnoses and failures of communications among the doctors, nurses, techs, and with me. It was not any individual who was jeopardizing my life, it was the system but nevertheless my life was being jeopardized! Finally I was sent to the ICU after hours of delay and tPA started and I survived. I was invited to be on their Patient Family Advisory Board for a couple of years because they felt I might sue them...and win. I didn't believe that was in the best interests of the hospital nor for myself. Instead, I presented a case study to their Director of Quality and the Physicians' Quality Adviser on all the ways I felt they could improve the systems and save lives. I have since presented it to nursing students and other medical professionals. They finally fired me for being too passionate and for having too many ideas, in other words I scared the hell out of them. Our goals were not compatible. I wanted to save lives; they wanted a better score on the HCAHPS survey. They had no idea what patient-centric care which they advertised meant to the patient. Being that close to death was an amazing experience. The doctor in the ICU saved my life for which I am very grateful. I loved the ICU nurse coming to me after the doctor had told me she had to give me a drug that could kill me in order to save my life. I had immediately assented. The ICU nurse said she didn't think I understood the seriousness of my situation... She was probably right except for the fact I was having the Feeling of Doom and my souls were talking to me. But, the system came very close to failing me that day. Bottom line is I believe we have to change from a money as wealth based system (patriarchy, money is the only value, what I call an "OR" mentality) to a system of well-being for all, an "AND" mentality. Instead of a GDP we have a Well-Being Index. Your words confirm my belief we need a quite different system!! Thank you!
Oh, Cathy! Thank goodness you survived. And how wonderful - and important- that you served on the hospital's patient family advisory board and educated the public. I am sure your work made a significant impact. You are exactly right - we need to change the mindset (well-being!) as well as the structure of our healthcare system. Mayo Clinic comes close (structurally anyway) with physician specialists on salary, and team consultations the norm.
I had a similar hospital experience to yours in 2004, but with the opposite diagnosis, hemmorrhage. The doctors and nurses would not believe I had a bleeding disorder because no doctor had officially diagnosed it. I nearly died 3 times in 4 days from physician ordered procedures and medications. Among colleagues calling to check on me were the Governor's Chief Advisor on Health & Human Services, and the state's Surgeon General, but I still could not get the hospital to believe me! Afterwards, the hospital was quick to offer me a check for my troubles (and I advise folks to take it - their insurance covers it - but do consult an attorney first to get compensation commeasurate with the injuries and costs). At that time, in addition to my lobbying work, I was also an adjunct nursing instructor for the University of Michigan satellite site in our region. So I had some clout, and asked the hospital Director of Nursing, to set up a meeting for me with the Hospital CEO, Medical Chief of Staff, Patient Liaison and others to "educate" them on their systemic problems. I brought a flip chart, and through stick figures (and ghosts with nursing caps, indicating how short staffed they were), I gave a brilliant presentation. The doctor slept through it, then at the end patted my shoulder and said he hoped I felt better. The CEO took copious notes and thanked me. And the risk manager offered me the check. One nursing supervisor was fired which was the opposite of what I had requested. Since then, though, significant changes have been made, and the quality of the care has greatly improved (and I am in awe of our new Medical Chief of Staff! She really gets it!). But the system, based on wealth as you say, hasn't.
A few years later I went back to the University of Arizona for a class on setting up my own RN patient advocacy practice. Once I put up my website, I was flooded with requests for help from all over the country. There is so much to be fixed, and I agree, it begins with a change in the system from a goal of wealth to one of well being, for all of us this time.
So glad you survived. I took Dr. Peter Pronovost's Science of Safety in Healthcare online course which gave examples of even doctors not being believed when they are the patient in the ED. Now if I go to the ED I call my retired RN friend to come. It is quite a different experience when you bring your own RN with you! Here's a link to my case study if you are interested. The three words I hate most now are "No Distress Noted". I couldn't move even enough to put the X-ray plate behind my back without going into respiratory distress and was having the Feeling of Doom if I moved even a bit. So I was highly motivated to stay quite still. I was in critical condition and all they put in the nurses's notes was No Distress Noted.
Ohhhh! Amazing you lived to tell it. And amazing what you recommended and did to fix that system. From your excellent case study it looks like nearly every weakness (too nice a word) in the hospital system was triggered, and mulitplied. Hopefully no nurse ever writes "No distress noted" again. What is especially powerful is adopting a "Culture of Respect", and it is something you can feel when you enter a facility, and why ANA developed the "Magnet" Certification program for hospitals (they should be a magnet for nurses thanks to the mutual repect and teamwork). My ER nurse's note read, "Patient very dramatic. Claims she cannot complete history sheet but ambulated to bathroom independently." With a hemaglobin so low I could not see the sheet! I couldn't feel my hands! The nurse had told me to change into a gown, left the room, and I nearly passed out several times getting to and from the bathroom. That note set the stage for the whole debacle. One RN friend who visited right before I was discharged, said she reviewed my chart and I should have died of a heart attack, except I was in "olympic shape" before the hemmorhaging. Yes, be sure to have your RN friend with you if ever you need to go to a hospital. That's one of the most important services my patient advocacy practice provided. Just need insurers to pay for it. (Guardian Nurses out of Boston, MA, have an excellent business revenue model - unions negotiate for RNPA coverage along with insurance. Insurance costs have since dropped dramatically for the Boston Police!). Stay Well!
I should add that the X-ray tech offering me a warm blanket felt like someone had just thrown me a life perserver. Somebody actually cared for me, the person. It was a quite profound and caring act from my perspective.
I agree completely, Cathy. Marx would say that without a seat at the table workers are nothing but slaves. (Not sure if it's ok to use that word.... ):
Using “enslaved people” in every instance can sometimes seem awkward, but it does place the onus and focus on those doing the enslaving, rather than making the person’s enslavement fundamental to their being. I’m sure others can explain this better.
Lynell, I'm not sure what the right model is. I know of examples like the Vienna Philharmonic which is now owned by the musicians and it is working quite well. I do think they would be considerably more effective than the unions.
The harsh truth is that the American Executive (trained at some of our finest institutions) is a money machine without wisdom. It will never welcome worker participation in any form but the most meaningless. Through their glaring non-support of workers and their campaign contributions they strive to control every sector of local, state, and national governing, and covertly disable the safety nets, infrastructure improvements, and the essential regulation of businesses in the USA. If we want to understand why America is faltering, look to the American Executive.
Shelly, yes: this is why Thatcher decided that union busting in the UK was the only way to gut the Labour Party. And she succeeded. And the UK has suffered ever since.
As a former union member and shop steward, Biden's pro labor words and actions are something I thought I'd never hear again from a Democratic President much less a Democrat from Delaware the MBNA state.
Still I'm wondering how this will work at a time when union membership is at an all time low without knocking off the Goliath Amazon? To open the floodgates of unionization in these dark times for average workers will be like nothing this country has seen since the passage of the Wagner Act (National Labor Relations Act) in 1935. Should Bessemer succeed and then all the Amazon warehouses that are now ubiquitous in the American landscape, we will finally see a rising tide that lifts all boats because it will cut the anchors of all the boats of American workers who have for too long been anchored to the bottom and left to drown while the yachts sail off into the sunset.
A wave of unionization will do more to equalize not only the disparity in wealth between the haves and have nots, it will do so also for women and minorities too long subjugated to doing the same for less because union contracts cover all workers.
While labor in the past has had some shady dealings thanks to connections with organized crime, I don't see that happening again in this century and expect Congress to keep on top of unions to make sure they are as powerful as they need to be to protect the wages, hours and working conditions of workers and keep union leaders on their toes.
The other behemoth is Walmart, which is still a privately owned company. Until there is a sea change in the Walton family's imperial takeover of small-town American commerce, it will be very difficult to make real change. However, it is pretty clear the Walton family is alarmed by the union revival because they just announced that they are giving almost half a million employees raises that push them over $15 an hour (they are not raising their corporate minimum, which is still $11/hr). However, they still refuse (as far as I know) to provide healthcare, sick pay, and other benefits that a union would require. And they raked in the billions right into the family's lap in 2020. This is why I will never go to visit their museum in Bentonville AK, even though I would love to see the collection.
🤣 They actually have two: the Walmart Museum (a shrine to Sam himself) and Crystal Bridges, which they built to house their enormous collection of art and artifacts, which has "free" admission and they claim it as a give-back to Arkansas. I would have rather they spent their money on providing health care and free child care to their employees . . .
It's a 3 headed beast: Wages, Hours and Working Conditions. WalMart is hoping they can keep unions out with wages but it is hard to do when union workers have better scheduled, better hours, real overtime and working (safety for example) conditions.
He was not working class in fact. His father owned a car dealership. He has not been friendly to labor particularly in his long career, and did not fight for the $15 minimum wage even in his first 100 days, which is bizarre (making a name for himself as a hypocrite this past week after also giving a pass to the murderous Crown Prince he vowed to ‘make pay’). But the choice of Marty Walsh as head of Labor was a good one, and good will come of it!
Bide your time on Biden - I think he made a clear and clever power play calling the Crown Prince's father - there is more than one way to skin a shiek.
I hope you're right MaryPat! I listened to an hour-long discussion yesterday with experts in the field of Middle East, oil, and Saudi politics. They figured (while bickering) that we're now saddled with a bloody, narcissistic maniac on the Saudi throne for 50 years.
One seemed to think that "one murder was not enough to give up the allince for." As if it were one murder. And as if it wasn't a case of torturing a man to death slowly with a bone saw in an embassy in broad daylight. And as if in a world bent on renewable energy supplies by 2030, 2040 or in the slowest countries 2050, we really need a "friend" in Saudi Arabia. My heart is sick.
Agreed about MBS, who sent an execution squad with a bone saw to murder khashoggi. Biden's tepid response made me angry. 'Democracy dies in darkness' WP
I have heard that opinion and you are probably right. Biden has seasoned and astute geopolitical advisors to guide him. But MBS is a dangerous man, emboldened by 'Special Boy' Kushner and the Trump Administration. I hope that Biden is 'the man with a plan' to effectively 'box' MBS in. So maybe going through his father is the best course. Time will tell.
RDSWU https://www.rwdsu.info. The best way to support unions is to buy union and use union services. I don't know if it's legal to donate to a union, they are self funded through union dues.
Thank you CJ! Some unions allow membership from outside of particular bargaining units, and there must be PACs or organizing committees that accept donations. I belong to so many unions, I usually just tell a president I'm feeling generous, and s/he obliges.
In the early 1960's, I worked for a short time in the Necco candy factory in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was a union shop, perhaps a company union. Women were paid slightly less than the legal minimum wage or even the contracted wage when starting - $1.92/hour although the contract said $2.09 - so that all the workers who left before 6 months never got the difference. Jobs were segregated by gender. Women mostly packed the candy. Men made the candy and swept the floors. They were paid roughly double compared to the women. It was a racially mixed workforce with a clear hierarchy. I was terrible at packing, but I got a fast promotion despite my protests because I was a native English speaker and looked white. (The promotion was temporary because I really was too unco-ordinated for the work, plus I wanted to be put back where I could practise my French with the Haitian women. I was a college kid making some money in the summer.) None of that was remarkable at the time - it was just how things were.
If it was a "company" union that would be outside the NLRA and NLRB. Company unions were outlawed in 1935, so unless you can remember the name of the union, or remember having to or being asked to pay dues, maybe it was something else. There are several types of unions and some have to represent employees who don't join but enjoy all the benefits of the contract the union fought for.
I workedf or Safeway in the early 70's. Even as a PT I had to join the union. Thre was a male & female scale....supposedly because women couldn't lift heavy weight. I wondered who they thought was putting the large bags of dog food on the cart for the customer!?
About fifty years ago, I knew a woman who worked in the post office in San Francisco, slinging 50 lb mail bags all day. She was paid considerably less than the men, who "lifted" 150 lbs using fork-lift trucks, sitting comfortably, pushing buttons.
We The People, All Of Us This Time, Including Alabama, For All Time.
History is being made in 2021. First Georgia, now Alabama will rejoin the Union thanks to the good people of Bessemer. And it supercharges the labor movement. You heard it here first.
Union wages alway affect the prevailing wages in the region. Non-union employers have to be competitive to stay in business. This is an example of a rising tide raising ALL the boats, not just the yacht owners.
Union contracts are good for managerial compensation too. Who'd be a low or mid-level supervisor when being in the bargaining unit brings more benefit? Employers have to match contracts to keep managers managing.
Page refresh, over and over, and suddenly, there you are. Astounding reportage, fact after fact. And then the wondrous community and erudite conversation. They say it will come to a halt at 100 days of the Biden administration. I cannot imagine the losses.
De Santis selling out the vaccine, insurrection revelations leading closer to the congress and White House, the R fear of Garland, the ego-laden Manchin throwing his wrench into the works, a union potentially arising in the matrix of Amazon, and Van Hollen rescuing the ARP from endless shenanigans…
We do live in interesting times. Apparently, the level of fear has risen a couple of degrees in the R camp. A reckoning awaits. That arc of history and the promise of leaning toward justice. Tonight, I feel hope. I know that is not something I can cite with a reference, however, perhaps truth, integrity, and compassion will slowly and quietly carry forward into the lives of ordinary Americans.
The filibuster should be ended so Democrates can use legislation rather than executive orders to establish laws that can't be easily undone by a subsequent president. The Supreme Court has said many times that law making should be done in the Congress, not in the courts. Moving the country in a serious and committed globally savvy direction is key to winning the vote of young people. McConnell needs the filibuster together with the Republican packed Supreme Court to hog-tie Democrats and stop them from getting the country past Reaganomics and isolationism to show young people the future is ahead of us, not behind. McConnell's strategy is to buy time so as to favor the political rise of younger Republicans like Jim Jordan, Josh Gaetz, Tom Cotton, and the Trump kids, to name a few; a political class with no deep educational backgrounds and experience in government, who are only interested in power politics, not governing, who can be expected to be dependent upon their handlers as the Reagan Boomers leave the table. Without the filibuster, Washington and Porto-Rico can be made states, protection of the vote can be accomplished, and healthcare can be put on a more solid footing. Even if Republicans do manage to win a Senate majority in 2020, having accomplished some solid legislation will speak for itself with forward-looking younger voters who are increasingly more educated and skillful and can see that opportunity lies with expanding prospects of global productivity and organization. In a post-World War II world predicated on a global scale community of concern the clear risk to the planet of mindless productivity, proliferation of nuclear weapons, and old-style display behaviors aimed at minority advantage and dominance. Conservatives have no legacy to pass on to the new mass of experience growing evermore distant from our global war defined age and present reality. Their increasing incoherence is science obvious: entropy in action. The risk of dragging on short-term thinking by keeping the filibuster will do greater damage than taking out the filibuster. A 60 vote majority is not majority rule.
There are reams of possible names for these followers of Salazar—António de Oliveira Salazar—the Portuguese dictator and his heroic rearguard action against Change, against even the clock. Stopped. Or turned backwards.
Those who—like all Putin’s horses and all Putin’s men—want to eternalize that sublime moment of EATING AND HAVING, even if it means no one else having or eating when there’s no more bread left to go with the circuses and the telescreens turn black.
YES. Government of Zombies, by Zombies and for Zombies.
“They have no bread… Let them eat ideology!”
Those adman’s ideas that snap, crackle and pop.
>>><<<
Either America moves fast to entomb the Thing from Mar-a-Lago, together with its biggest trolls and cohorts, in cells padded or without padding, or all Americans will find themselves entombed in the Zombies’ madhouse.
Then the ghouls waiting in the world’s wings will gloat… and do their damnedest to follow the enlightened example of that unique genius who found out how to run a-casino-that-goes-bankrupt.
Thank you for putting Eating and Having in the logical order, most people do not. R eaters don't ever want to see anyone other than themselves supping or even snacking, even as the food rots in the storehouse*. Even when they starve themselves to death as a result of their wanton waste they'll die happy knowing they kept the other from eating.
*How long can government surplus cheese and butter remain in storage before it's tossed in the garbage? Apparently never.
I have to admit, I admire his wife for saving him from the pie in the face. No one deserves to suffer that awful moment before it's clear they're not being murdered.
Actually, as I was reading your post, I immediately thought of Jared Kushner's comment to the states last spring that the PPE belonged to them (the Feds) not to the states for distribution to the caregivers.
Very good morning, Lynell! Hope all is well with you and yours as well. 🌷 (My husband is cooking homemade sausage & pancakes as I write. Pure delight!)
When the Soviet Union collapsed, I had a nasty feeling—don’t ask me why—that we in the West would soon be inheriting Cominform propaganda, suitably dolled up in bright new clothes.
Sure enough, it happened, complete with prefabricated jargon inculcating predigested thought. To make it worse, Western brainwashing washes grey matter far, far whiter, without any need to shoot and imprison people by the million.
I'd have added more, but we have an allergic reaction to a Covid vaccine here....
Terrific phrasemaking, Peter. Salazar is arguably the most overlooked 20C fascist tyrant, and not the least important. His influence lasted even beyond his 1970 death, since Portugal didn't disgorge its African empire until 1975. Macau had to wait til 1999 and, as part of China, will never enjoy independence.
Salazar is a fascinating case, he attempted not only to seal Portugal off from the world and its malign influence but from the century. The regime was extraordinarily repressive but did not need to engage in mass killing. Franco had provided a most effective demonstration just next door. The PIDE was an extraordinarily intrusive secret police, spying on everyone... maybe even more than the East German STASI.
I met an exiled Portuguese nuclear physicist in London in the early 1960s. Exiled because she'd caricatured the rector of Coimbra University. If she'd not been a Marquesa, she'd have been in jail... As for nuclear physics...
A Dutch friend liked to take his holidays in the backwaters of Northeast Portugal. The PIDE had him in and not only did they interrogate him, they had a very complete file on him. A "potential spy" because he worked for the Netherlands Foreign Ministry as a translator...
Portugal itself escaped, but its mass killings were displaced to Africa, especially Mozambique. Here's a review I wrote for the ALA. The author's sequel is still more impressive, but this has a better summary of events.
Dhada, Mustafah. The Portuguese massacre of Wiriyamu in colonial Mozambique, 1964-2013. Bloomsbury Academic, 2015 (c2016). 233p bibl index ISBN 9781472511980, $120.00; ISBN 9781472512000 ebook, contact publisher for price.
The jacket copy calls Wiriyamu Portugal's "most famous" colonial massacre, but "infamous" is more suitable. Casualty figures are appallingly precise: 385 named individuals dead; livestock slaughtered, houses and bodies burned; victims' memory desecrated by Portuguese denials. In 1972, the Wiriyamu area became a flashpoint due to rising FRELIMO infiltration and local chiefs' fraught attempts to chart a middle course between guerrillas and the colonial state. Though short, the book is thorough. Historian Dhada (California State Univ., Bakersfield) details the massacre and its antecedents, the official cover-up, and the saga of the story’s emergence in UK media. Marnia Lazreg notes that empires that resort to torture—and terror—seek to redeem the irredeemable and inevitably fail (Torture and the Twilight of Empire, 2008). The consequences here were severe, shattering Portugal’s credibility as anticommunist stalwart, provoking a 1974 coup by alienated army officers. Democratic resurgence ended four decades of fascism and five centuries of Portuguese colonialism. Revisiting such awful events must be harrowing for survivors, but assisted by a sensitive chronicler like Dhada, their full story is available at last. Lest we forget. Summing Up: Recommended. Academic and larger public libraries; undergraduates and above.
What is the likelihood of the Democrats loosing a couple of Senators if they go after the filibuster, like Manchin and Sinema going Independent or Republican?
I understand the urge to get down and dirty and play to the populist gallery like the Republicans struggling with the pitiful specter of their approaching political death, but the short term satisfaction, as usual, will be short lived because there are no time-outs with following the reality-judged demands of principle. If legislative power is returned to Congress where creative governance belongs under our Constitution, anything the Supreme Court does can be legislated around and brought into line with the will of the people. Technically speaking, presidential encroachment on legislation needs rethinking for a new postwar global community with a common destiny (planetary survival) made up of old national communities with new extra-national obligations not allowed for in the Constitution when the president was granted unquestioned powers over national community concerns lying outside national the geographical limits determining nation-centered hegemony. With the World Wars, community self-determination is materially affected by extra-national factors structuring community responsibility and, more positively, opportunity. Young people are born into a reality ordered by moral and practical conditions of global citizenship and shared, cooperative governance. Our planetary habitat obeys conditions of planetary reality, which means the earth will one day be swallowed up by the expanding, dying sun, and life-forms will go a long time before that days arrives—so there is nothing inevitable, or self-correcting about the conditions necessary for organic life on planet Earth. Exploiting the natural world under conditions of actual material scarcity was self-limiting, and the legitimate "reward" for success was life; getting stuck on exploitation of nature through open-ended consumerism rewards narcissism which is not only destructive to threshold conditions for physical life on Earth, it's a poster-child of a towering lack of imagination. I'm not bad mouthing a "productive" planetary future of pointy towers, golf-courses, body-materialism gyms and the gambling Disneylands of get-rich dreams for pensioners looking to redistribute the wealth by getting fleeced.
It is very tempting for me to highlight every point made in Heather's Letter today. Even more than usual, each point she raises refers to our future as Americans. A good deal of it conveys the tremendous level of support The Rescue Plan will provide to poor Americans.
The Letter notes the role that labor may play given efforts to unionize Amazon's plant in Bessemer, Alabama. What's more, a union man from Boston has been nominated by Biden to be secretary of labor. That is exciting. It will be fun to hear the Boston accent of its former mayor, Tony Walsh, if he gets through to become our labor secretary.
In terms of labor, Heather did not bring up the defeat, thus far, of Bernie Sanders' amendment to the Rescue Plan of a minimum wage hike to $15.
A meaningful minimum hike is so crucial, I will be on this necessary hike until it happens. My heart will never forget the delivery people, the hospital workers, the grocery clerks, cleaners and home care aides that have been taking care of us through the pandemic and before.
URGENT:
Yesterday, the Senate defeated Sander's bill to gradually increase the Minimum Wage to $15, but the fight is not over. Some who voted against it were not ruling out an eventual 'yes' vote..
BERNIE SANDERS WON'T GIVE UP.
Please contact residents you know, organizations, etc., in the pertinent states, so that the Senators know of constituent support for the MINIUM WAGE HIKE.
Here is a list of senators voting 'no':
— Sen. Angus King of Maine (Independent) — opposed
Democratic Sens. opposed:
Tom Carper of Delaware,
Chris Coons of Delaware,
Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire,
Joe Manchin of West Virginia,
Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire,
Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona,
Jon Tester of Montana
Background: 'Seven states and Washington DC have passed legislation to raise their minimum wages to $15, but $7.25 an hour remains the minimum wage in 21 other states. Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Tennessee don’t have a state-set minimum wage, instead relying on the federal rate. Georgia and Wyoming have set their minimum to just $5.15, lower than the federal rate. The Economic Policy Institute reported that the minimum wage, if adjusted for inflation, should have already exceeded $15. “Yet since the late 1960s, lawmakers have let the value of the minimum wage erode, allowing inflation to gradually reduce the buying power of a minimum wage income,” according to a 2019 report. The group has reported that the minimum wage would have been $21.69 in 2020 and $23.53 by 2025 if it kept pace with economic gains; instead, $7.25 is worth 30 per cent less than it did 50 years ago, the group found.'
LET'S WORK TO MAKE THIS HAPPEN!
'The vote on Friday revealed that Senate Democrats are nowhere near having the support they need to raise the wage to $15. The disappointing roll call for progressives suggested that bipartisan negotiations with Republicans are the only way forward in the near-term on the wage, and the White House is entertaining that approach. Several Republicans, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, have expressed openness to a wage increase.' (Politico)
In my opinion, $15 an hour is so little after so long, not since 2009 has the minimum wage been raised, that WE MUST ACT. This social negligence highlights the extent to which so many of us in the USA are imprisoned by poverty.
Fern McBride! Thank you for your emphasis on $15/hr minimum wage. And your explanation. And your list of anti-increasers. Go Bernie. Let’s do what we can. ❤️🤍💙
I am part of a Coop Grocery Store. We the Members are Owners of the Coop. We very much want to increase the minimum wage to $15 but the actual cost of doing so has been prohibitive to the overall budget of maintaining the store. We have opted over the past several years to gradually move toward the $15 minimum and are hopeful that we will get there before much longer.
You've hit the key point, and the one that most of the No votes were (or should have been) based on. There are a lot of places where, as you say, $15/hour is nowhere near a living wage but, there are also places like SW Indiana, where I live, that $30,000/year is a fairly comfortable living, especially for a single person or small family. I'm in favor of a general rise in the Federal minimum as the floor but the states should be encouraged to update their minimum wage programs as should cities like SF, LA, Chi, NY, etc. where the cost of living is well beyond what most people can afford. In combination with an enhanced support program for children such as Sen. Romney is advocating, there would be a better system for everyone.
Imagine where 'they' think this could lead, a bit more money out of the pockets of businesses, unionization, lessening the enormous wealth gap, raising taxes on rich... oh, my God, it would be catastrophic as in the pre-Reagan days!
It’s true that there is a disparity in what money can buy you from state to state. No one was worried about that when farmers got billions from the Fraud45 bailout because of his China tariffs. Owing a home is the American dream and one of the first things Nasty45 attacked when he raised part of the FHA interest rate that Obama had lowered. $15hr in 5 years is an insult and keeps people in substandard apartments with greedy landlords. What is the reasoning behind the Dems voting no? Food, clothing and shelter level pay and they are still expected to pay income tax.
“The popularity of that bill spells trouble for Republicans.” How I wish this was true. Because, if it was, some Republicans would be voting for it now (especially those up for election in 2022). We know Republicans only care about retaining power. So, it’s pretty clear that they think remaining in power means they should oppose the covid relief bill. Why? Are they so protected by the undemocratic distortions of the system (voter suppression, gerrymandering, etc) that they are confident they can ignore the popularity of this bill? Or are they confident that their voters aren’t paying attention, or don’t care about policy? One thing is clear - Republicans believe they can oppose this very popular bill and be re-elected. Why is that?
I'm gutted, GUTTED I TELLS YA, because of the "de-genderization" of Mr. Potatohead. I mean, DEAR GOD, WON'T SOMEBODY JUST THINK OF WHAT WE'RE DOING TO THE CHILDREN?!?!?
Exactly! They won't know any more that you can tell men from women by the shape of their eyeglasses. They will think - gasp! - that vegetables have no gender! It's only a small step from there to - to - it's too horrible to think what could be next!
I mean, you know? I saw an article where they cited that Fox News had devoted over 4 hours of air time last week going on about these "cancel culture outrages", while other networks like CNN spent a total of 40 minutes in the whole week because, well DUH, it is simply NOT an issue. With all the other issues facing us and they're whingeing on about sh!t like this???
It’s in my post from today, the big one. Their precious old society is dying, bit by bit. We can’t be proud of our racism anymore at NASCAR, no confederate flags. Mr. Potato Head going gender neutral, what a national tragedy. They’re like the wicked witch of the west: “Our culture of racism and sexism is melting, it’s meeelllttting . . . “
And of course the biggest insult of all, an African-American President. They despise and they detest that most of all. Anything to cancel the reality of having Obama as president. Anything to eliminate his legacy, anything to forget he happened. Is it any wonder that the one-term guy was so appalled that Obama’s Inauguration was so massive? No surprise. Just another obvious, in-your-face sign that the old society is no longer wanted, and that Republicans are being left behind as the social lepers they are.
Fruit tree sex has variations that would definitely be censored by the radical right:
"Self-pollinating fruit trees include apricots, nectarines, peaches, and sour cherries; whereas fruit trees that require pollinators include apples, pears, plums, and sweet cherries. Trees requiring a pollinator may seem like additional work, however, it's really just a strength in numbers game." (google search result)
We’re really in a LGBTQ revolution that can’t be ignored. I taught some transgender students and at first I was fairly inept at it— later I understood better. My gay son mentioned the Mr. Potatohead controversy and I cracked up because I had that toy growing up and I thought maybe there might be a Mrs Potato head.
The problem with all of the speculations below is that you are all a bunch of intelligent, and extraordinarily well-informed citizens. Most voters are far below the average intelligence of this group, and nearly all of them have no knowledge or interest in the subject matter. They defer their choices to group-think, which is dominated by family, close neighbors, their church, and the propaganda from Fox and right-wing media. They simply don't KNOW they are voting against their interests.
Erase from your mind every bit of information you've learned from reading history, listening to HCR, browsing the web, and bring your total of your political knowledge down to things said by Tucker Carlson and the late Rush Limbaugh. You don't care about the makeup of the Senate. You don't KNOW the makeup of the Senate. You don't know anything about your Senator, except that he/she has been in power for a long time, meaning he/she has "seniority" in the Senate, and lots and lots of power. Power for YOUR state. Working for YOU.
You're white, you don't know what "voter suppression" is, and you've never even heard the word "gerrymander."
Sadly, I sat down in my seat at a little table top booth during a years ago election and the person who sat down next to me asked the attendant who had shown them to their seat a question about the people on the ballot, not about how to fill it out. The attendant told them they could not discuss the actual election with them. The person next to me proceeded to read off the names, then came back to one of them and said "I recognize that name. I've heard of him before. That must mean he's well known. I guess I should vote for him?" and of course the attendant very properly demurred from response. I too remained properly silent and pretended not to be listening, though I had suddenly gone rigid with outraged shock - the reason they had heard of the candidate just might have been the horrific news reports about abuse of power, unjustified pursuit of personal targets using the advantages of their office etc. I support the right of everyone to vote, but we really do need to do something about the poison in the entertainment "news" media and to increase the ability of more people to assess their sources more easily (since laziness plays into it too).
Some folks support mandatory voting. That’s a frightening thought. A,B,C, or D? Of course it can’t get any worse than the last 4 years, even with multiple choice
I think it’s because the people who support their re-election coffers in the biggest way want them to continue to obstruct. After all they probably don’t need any $
Very true. But that’s only half of the equation. Yes, Republicans are funded by plutocratic elites. But they still need to win votes to stay in office. Ironically, they need the votes of MAGA folks who despise elites. Folks who will benefit from the covid stimulus. Folks who should refuse to vote for politicians who don’t vote for the stimulus. Those dots don’t connect.
A logical person connects the dots and can move forward but when folks have thrown logic out the window in order to ignore their own dilemmas, (health, financial, etc.,) they get stuck in a labyrinth if their own making where the dots don't connect. Sometimes a life event happens that's extreme enough for A person to snap out of it. But now, as in the 30s people have been swallowed by 2 things, hatemongering and the cult of personality. A dangerous combination.
Daria is on the right track. JR, your logic is impeccable, but after a certain point is lost on the illogical. The pols give the Deplorables something else that they value. It's the classic argument of Thomas Frank in "What's the Matter with Kansas?" Then the distractions were god, guns and abortion, i.e. the culture wars. Now it's white supremacy, and the feeling of power gleaned from licensing normally forbidden aggression and cruelty: open racism, sexism, lying, cheating, violence against the weak. The trend toward violence is particularly alarming.
I have to believe that it's the final thrashing about of an ugly beast in its death throes. Tragically, it will take other lives before it expires. Hard work is necessary to hasten its demise.
Respectfully TPJ, words like deplorables sunk Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Let’s stick to the facts and put name calling aside. We’ve got such a steep hill to climb, let’s not create more obstacles.
I hope so too but I'm not holding my breath. One would think a logical person would not rail against the common sense practices of mask wearing, social distancing and hand washing yet millions upon millions of people have done so based on one man's refusal to don a mask and not hold large gatherings indoors. It's as though they checked their brains at the ballot box in 2016 and forgot that they had done so.
I may be dense, but I don’t see it. Dot 1 - Republican politicians are funded by corporations and wealthy plutocrats. These donors want Republicans to cut taxes on the wealthy, shrink government, gut regulations, cut government spending and benefits, etc. So Republicans in Congress dance accordingly, including fighting to kill the covid relief bill. Dot 2 - the covid relief bill is immensely popular with voters, including Republican voters. These voters want the covid bill to pass. Dot 3 - Republican pols want more than anything to be re-elected. Dot 4 - Republican pols are not concerned that they’ll lose votes for opposing the covid bill.
I can’t connect those dots. Why would Republican voters, who want and need the covid relief bill, vote for the very politicians who are trying to kill it? Why would Republican voters, who are diametrically opposed to pretty much everything the corporate and wealthy donors want, vote for the Republican politicians who deliver for corporations and the wealthy, and screw the voters? What am I missing?
Cognitive dissonance. Decades of propaganda have made Democrats the enemy. Anything that contradicts that belief is simply rejected as a lie. As Obama used to say, “they won’t even take yes for an answer.”
Therein lies the entire theme of HCR's book, "How the South Won the Civil War.". The boss with 7,592 cookies, convinces the poor white who has been given 3 cookies, that the lazy black stole the one cookie he has from you. Relief package will again be seen as transfer of your wealth to the worthless, and a righteous entitlement to the white. There is no winning in thst game.
No matter how popular the bill is, it is the antithesis of the current GOP. Today’s GOP will drop dead before they will lift a finger for “all the people”
1. Plenty of people vote their values, not their wallets. That’s behind the years of artificial culture wars. 2. If state legislatures can stop all but Republicans from voting, a majority of remaining voters will vote R.
So for Republican voters, it doesn’t matter what legislation their representatives support, or block? Meaning that there’s no connection between Republican voters and their congressional representatives, beyond value-signalling? No wonder they’re so happy with destroying democracy, it serves them no purpose.
how long has it been that these dotless folks have been voting against their own interest? TPJ hit that nail: it is without logic. Currently the tools are as stated: hatred, white supremacy, 'all the nasties' as TPJ said.
For one thing, you are assuming the voters even have the dots. Many of them never get handed number one by the highly cherry picked skewed media of their choice. For another, you are forgetting the very very short memories and the very blindfolded tribal loyalty of the voters. Your dots are data and connecting them requires processing and neither are relevant to that particular subset of the voting public.
I forgot to include that the wealthy 1% who donate all that money to Republican politicians are also only 1% of voters. The wealthy can give Republicans a huge financial advantage, but they can’t give them votes. Republicans need to get the votes of at least 45% of all American voters (they don’t need 51% because the system is tilted in their favor) to hold onto power. Most of those 45% are middle class and working class Americans. Americans who really need the covid relief bill to pass.
Thats what I was asking myself - read the link (somewhere here) to 538(?) They dont have to worry - gerrymandering, voter suppression, etc etc etc ! I hope Stacy Abrams & her crew are thinking ahead & working on this for 2022!
Somewhere in this country, right now, a journalist is probably gathering material for a book, sure to make the NYT best seller list, with the working title of "Insurrectionists Among Us."
It will be interesting to see how cases against the Teflon Don at the top intersect with action against accomplices, especially in Congress, in the Pentagon, etc. etc.
The wheels of justice grind slowly, but it is important that they should not grind too slowly. That is how Berlusconi succeeded in keeping out of prison, a sort of judicial filibuster kept running until the statute of limitations put an end to all cases brought against him. Other Trump prototypes have used similar tactics...
It has been weird watching a once respectable political party, first hijacked by conspirators, then gradually transformed into one gigantic conspiracy against the nation, acting in full view of the whole world to overthrow US institutions wherever those institutions failed to yield to its proprietorial diktat. For a long time, the Wolf in a zoot suit swallowing Little Red Riding Hood’s grandma looked like a smart alternative to uniformed storm troopers with swastika armbands. Now we all know who lays claim to ownership of the land and all that therein is, while according no place and no rights to citizens whose skin color or political persuasion displeases the Herrenvolk.
I agree with HCR that the Alabama Amazon union vote is a big deal, and not just because President Biden invested significant political capital in the outcome. (Good for him!)
The real value of wages has steadily declined over the last few decades. That trend is not going to turn around by itself. Witness the fate of the recent $15/hr minimum wage initiative. Workers have been weakened by race-baiting, immigrant bashing, etc. that divide and conquer. A strong vote to unionize a huge employer would go a long way to undermine efforts to keep workers divided and weak.
There is also the lesson Jeff Bezos could take from Henry Ford, who gave his workers a wage raise so they could afford to buy one of his cars, cars they worked to make. (Ford also had an eye to keeping the union out of his factories with that raise, another lesson Bezos may be too late in learning.) More disposable income means more money available to buy things on Amazon.
Further note; while unionization has driven many jobs overseas, retail distribution centers cannot be exported. They can and will be automated, but that is a trend that will continue with or without worker union pressure.
Thank you Ralph Averill for recalling the one thing Henry Ford did that was admirable and enabled him to have build his business. I often wonder why biz leaders (and Democratic politicians) don’t lean on that decision and it’s consequences. ❤️🤍💙
I come from the land of James Hoffa and Walter Reuther. I had limited but personal experience with unions when employed for summer jobs. First, in a steel plant and longer working in a chemistry lab of a county sewage plant. Both unions took money from my check for 3 month a year. Both, I was told by older workers, would never let me join. I was “too educated”.
The greatest problem we face in procuring good government and good unions is finding people of good character to do the lawful and ethical daily work that the job requires. This is true of all human institutions. It is our fault that we have institutional racism. It is our fault that we have sanctioned corporate greed (Joe Minchin’s daughter and Jeff Bezos serve conveniently). We have child abuse by clergy. The list of human failings is endless.
Despite the failings of the Robert’s court, we still have our greatest weapon in the fight for human justice. The vote. It is under attack by members of a dying system and culture. We must vote. Every time.
The Republicans aren't governing. They're play-acting. They don't care a whit about people who are suffering. What they care about is stoking outrage about things they want people to think are outrageous but are manufactured out of nothing. They only care about doing whatever it takes to regain power.
I don’t think any brain power is involved when somebody says “front runner.” [Hell, you could make the case that there’s never any brain power involved, but I digress]. The Republicans with the highest national profile are automatically front runners. Any 4th grader who reads the news could make the call.
I wasn’t insulting you, Ian. I gave your comment a ❤️ because of course I agree with everything you are saying. You wrote “DeSantis is increasingly seen as a Republican front runner . . . “ and then I insulted the right wing media, and the Republicans who see him as a viable candidate. Ron DeSantis is a blatantly self-serving and corporate-sponsor-serving individual. Based on what he has shown me and everybody else, I have zero respect for him as a public servant. I don’t think he thinks he’s a public servant. I’m sorry if you took my comments personally, they were not intended for you. They were intended as a derogatory view of the man and anyone who thinks he should run for president. Actually I like you, and everything I’ve seen you post
is something that I approve of, so I have no intention of insulting you, on the contrary I would praise you. I’m sorry if I rubbed you the wrong way.
No worries. I’m sorry to put you out. Back in college, back in the very ancient days of my early psychology training, we were taught the %s of the various cues to communication. When judging a communication, we impart large percentages of import to tone-of-voice and facial expression and body language, and a minimal amount of validity to actual words. In fact, on a list of what constitutes effective communication clues, actual words are dead last. Here on this forum, all we have are words unless you use emojis and creative license. In other words, no tone of voice, no facial expressions, no body language. Plus we’ve never met, we don’t know each other, so we have no idea what to expect. Basically it’s the most difficult possible way to communicate effectively and clearly. So if there’s a miscommunication, it’s absolutely natural given the nature of this beast. Miscommunication should be rampant. If it only happens occasionally that’s a miracle. Sarcasm for example is very hard to read, you have to be tuned in just right or already have some knowledge of the person.
What I find is that when I get an emotional reaction here, it’s a Rorschach test of where I’m at in the moment. If I get triggered here by words completely stripped of emotion and the nuance of tone and inflection, there’s usually something going on with me outside of the HCR forum.
You cannot be too transparent in a place like this, nor too honest. Everybody is operating at a major disadvantage, we all have a huge handicap, when it comes to communication here.
Ian, we all have overreacted or misinterpreted posts at times, depending on our experiences or just where our head is at on any given day. I've found this wonderful, wicked smart community is relentlessly kind and honest about clarifying what the message or opinion given was intending to convey. I've misunderstood posts here too many times to count. And the sweet and sassy people here always get me to the right place in the kindest possible way. Just the content given here on how we really communicate is so insightful. No worries...
Online communication has its shortcomings. It lacks volume, tone, inflection, visual clues like body language, and nonverbal vocalization apart from an occasional Argh or Grrrr. Nuance, sarcasm, subtlety and irony are often lost. By now many people know this and will compensate; LFAAers are especially sensitive. We lead the league in apologies and polite qualifications.
Of course the republicans are doing everything they think they can get away with to prevent a competent person to be AG. They are complicit in the attempted coup on January 6th and Merrick Garland will use the law to make sure these treasonous insurrectionists are indicted, tried, and hopefully convicted. Not losing any sleep over the 300+/- who have already been arrested and are maintaining an existence locked up. Speedy trials; not likely! The delay game can be played on all levels.
“Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) is slow-walking the confirmation of Merrick Garland as attorney general, an odd stance at a time when one would think we would want all hands on deck to investigate the insurrection and ongoing domestic terrorism.”
Amazon let's employees sleep in their cars in the parking lot. They can shower inside the building. They can buy a meal in the breakroom. And if more staff are required, they go get some folks out of the breakroom. I heard all of these things when my nephew's significant other kicked him out. Working a full time job days and Amazon at night, my nephew did not earn enough to afford an apartment of his own in the Denver area.
Funny, IMHO, I call Walmart the evil empire. Big box retailers have paid their workforce so little - that many qualify for premium tax credits/Obamacare or Medicaid, food stamps etc. The US taxpayer is subsidizing the "low prices" by picking up the cost of this underpaid workforce. Bargain hunting and the pursuit of low cost of goods, also drive margins of US suppliers lower. The drive for increased corporate profits is at the expense of outsourced jobs in other places that may include: child labor, prison labor and unsafe working conditions. When my teenage daughter points to some cheap shirt she got a deal on, I ask her did the children and political prisoners do a good job on it? I also see how shifts away from traditional defined benefit pension plans played a role in the downward spiral of wages. When individuals in their 401K plan style pension plans are trying to save for retirement, they want investments with high rates of return. Part of what would have been living wages are transferred to shareholders for their profits.
Walmart IS another evil empire...we are drowning in them. And we are supporting them via taxes for benefits for underpaid workers. Dystopian, indeed, not to mention cruel profit-taking on the backs of already marginal and multiply oppressed workers. Intersextionality, anyone? (Intersectionality)
New word! "Intersectionality is an analytical framework for understanding how aspects of a person's social and political identities combine to create different modes of discrimination and privilege."
Thanks Melissa. There's absolutely more than just a couple EEs. American mega-corporations behave like usurpers in Game of Thrones, only with less nudity.
Thank you so much for your continued analysis. Your work is amazing and I look forward to all you do.
Joe Manchin is a legend in his own mind. I feel he opposed Neera Tanden for OMB because she tweeted harshly of Manchin's daughter, Heather Bresch. Bresch was CEO of the Netherlands-based Pharmaceutical company that owns the EpiPen. In 2016 they jacked up the price of the EpiPen from $50 to $600 for a two-pack. She retired at the age of 51 in 2020 with a net worth of more than $31 million dollars.
The fact is he is more conservative about The American Rescue Plan than his own Republican governor.
I had to get that out of my system.
Skip, I am so grateful for folks like you who know the back stories of our lawmakers. Your revelation of the apparent reason for Manchin's opposition to Neera Tanden makes perfect sense.
Ditto what Lynell said. I had no idea, and as a school nurse, I've been fuming about the EpiPen price gouging for years.
The sharp rise and sudden rise in the cost of epi-pens was a corrupt scandal to enrich the pharmaceutical company. Awful.
There was one high-profile bad boy (name forgotten, hah) whose loud mouth earned him conviction and lawsuits. But most other culprits escaped serious consequences, like those responsible for the Great Recession.
Here's the deal, Joe and Marty: punishing corporate criminality is an essential part of supporting workers and the labor movement. Too many pols lack fortitude to do what's needed there. Love y'all so far, but we are watching carefully.
Me too.
Isn't it awful that number of scripts for the pens have multiplied like bunnies?!
I'm not as aware of that as I am of how many parents can't afford to buy an EpiPen for their child at that price, especially since they "expire" after one year! And schools can't really afford to provide many at that price either.
I would also find when I got them from the pharmacy the expiration dates were all over the place, rarely would you even get a year from the prescription. Recently they are doing better on this, or people now know to check more carefully.
Wow! Thank you for that information!
Insurance covers them in many policies
Tis the relatively privileged who have employment-associated insurance of which you speak. I remember them costing $360 and the price kept going up...a rip off for people and insurance. That blatant abuse was litigated
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mylan-epipen-idUSKCN1AX1RW
That sounds more "reasonable" (not a good description) than the current whining about "mean tweets", tho. Considering the past four years of tfg (not even capitalizing) and HIS twit habits? Why could there not be more made out of that comparison? How many of these people nominated are being blackballed because they tweeted something? Remember the old "sticks & stones" saying? Really - these politicians are such fragile flowers that they feel damaged by words? Just galls me!
Indeed such fragile flowers are known as pansies are they not?
Hate to compare a really pretty flower with these guys - theres another word but dont want to compare them to cats either! How about wimps?
You are very welcome, Lynell!
I forgot about Manchin's daughter. Now, it is starting to make sense why he was OK with other people's mean tweets, but not Tandin's tweets
Interesting
Wow. And we the people elect these "representatives"? Crazy, ugly politics.
I pray we have reached our low point. I fear for our entire planet when political decisions are based on simple ugly greed, and fragile egos.
It's been said that when aliens drive by Earth, they lock their doors.
that's a new one for me; can't stop grinning
I'll bet they do.
These days they take a very wide detour around the solar system. They've heard that aliens are locked in cages, babies ripped from their arms.
I hope they don’t get sucked into black holes.
That’s a fun saying.
I pray for the same thing, Lynn. Unfortunately Trump opened Pandora's box and there's no stopping ugly, hate-filled politics. Let's pray Republicans don't regain power in 2022.
Let's WORK to keep Republicans out of power in 2022, And 2024.
YES!!!
A commentator on Washington Week last night asked why the GQP doesn't try to recruit Manchin and the reply was there is no way because Manchin is truly a democrat and will never switch. If Manchin is truly a democrat he is doing a fairly good imitation of being an obstructionist. I don't know that the democrats have much choice but to court him until the 2022 elections when they may have a chance to widen their leads in both the Senate and the House which will take him out of the spotlight and lessen his influence.
Thank you Skip. All you have stated about Joe Manchin and his daughter is entirely correct.
Thank you for this reminder! How quickly details fade from our memory. Truly one of the most heinous pharmaceutical offenses.
I have never forgotten Manchin's hideous daughter's unethical high jacking of EpiPen pricing. She's right up there with Martin Shkreli and Elizabeth Holmes.
Excellent turn of phrase. Thanks.
Thank you. I didn't know that.
Exactly. But as HCR said above, this is what you get with a 50/50 split in the Senate. The only way to remedy this is to elect more Democratic Senators. Then, members like Manchin can be pushed to the sidelines as their votes won't matter. I don't see that (more D-Senators) happening anytime soon unless demographics shift some more. If Dems don't get their act together and invest time and energy into seeing how to get their message out, they risk losing both House AND Senate in '22 and/or '24, and even the Presidency, and we could end up in a political wilderness for years. Eric Levitz for NY Magazine offers some very sage advice for Dems after crunching a lot of the data from the 2020 election. (Not sure if there is a paywall...) Apparently there are some small shifts to the R column from traditionally reliable D groups--Hispanic voters are shifting more to the Rs, as are even some African-American and Asian voters. It is something to keep abreast of, but we could still beat the odds and not lose ground in '22. As Levitz opines, we should have a better idea how Dems might fare by the end of this year. (If necessary, I can copy & paste sections of the NYM article...it's very interesting.)
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/03/david-shor-2020-democrats-autopsy-hispanic-vote-midterms-trump-gop.html?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Intelligencer%20-%20March%206%2C%202021&utm_term=Subscription%20List%20-%20Daily%20Intelligencer%20%281%20Year%29
Also relevant: "Inside the West Virginian Movement to Push Joe Manchin to the Left"
https://newrepublic.com/article/161242/joe-manchin-populist-grassroots-organizing
I should add about the above article I linked, from NYM: "To gain some insight into these matters, Intelligencer turned to our favorite socialist proponent of ruthlessly poll-driven campaigning, David Shor. A veteran of the 2012 Obama campaign, Shor is currently head of data science at OpenLabs, a progressive nonprofit. We spoke with him last week about how his analysis of the 2020 election has changed since November, what Democrats need to do to keep Congress after 2022, and why he thinks the Trump era was great for the Republican Party (in strictly electoral terms)."
I especially like your comment: "Joe Manchin is a legend in his own mind." He seems drunk on his "power" in my opinion.
ego-laden
Agreed.
I thoroughly agree!
thanks for pointing out the connection. As an epi pen consumer, I had issues with that fiasco. Now that you've tied it to Manchin tells me all I need to know. Thank you.
Manchin is a pygmy exalted to giant's status by the 50-50 split. Boy, would LBJ spank his apse back in line!
Well said! We need some real cleanup on Capitol Hill. We're not expelling seditionists for one thing!!!
100% Skip. It is outrageously offensive that any in the Sedition Caucus is still in Congress at all. They're also a national security threat. That's why it's encouraging to read Dr R on progress with the Jan 6 cases. DOJ walls close in; the mills grind slow but fine.; the GQP crumbles to dust.
That a man with such vindictiveness has this much power is sickening. But he had to be placated lest he leave the Democratic Party, thus returning the Senate to majority control by McConnell.
Yes, my comment this morning...."He loves the power he currently holds. He should switch parties if he's so conservative."
I agree 10000%. Thanks.
He’s extremely annoying at this moment but he’s having fun.
Indeed!
I wholeheartedly oppose the nomination of that divisive neoliberal, however bad Manchon’s reason for opposing her.
Mary, I think you are misunderstanding the term "neoliberal". It refers to people who are radical proponents of the 18th-century "liberalism" espoused by Adam Smith and David Riccardo. Neera Tanden is a mouthy person with very clearly lefty ideas but that is not what a neoliberal is. Just to clarify. :-)
No, though you're of course correct about the famous early proponents of what is still called "liberalism" in Europe, I'm not "misunderstanding" the common and much-discussed term neoliberal--a term that covers the politics and policies of both our major parties at least since Reagan and Clinton (not to mention those of Blair and his successors, and the center-right PMs and presidents of France, including the Socialist Holland), and which I'm seriously engaged in working toward alternatives to. Neera Tanden has no affiliation with the actual left, and has expressed herself vituperatively about those who do. Here is a defense of Tanden from the center-left magazine The Nation: https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/neera-tanden-omb/ And here is the opening paragraph of Wikipedia's article about neoliberalism in the last 50 years: "Neoliberalism or neo-liberalism[1] is the 20th-century resurgence of 19th-century ideas associated with economic liberalism and free-market capitalism.[2]:7[3] It is generally associated with policies of economic liberalization, including privatization, deregulation, globalization, free trade, austerity and reductions in government spending in order to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society;[4][12] however, the defining features of neoliberalism in both thought and practice have been the subject of substantial scholarly debate.[13][14] In policymaking, neoliberalism was part of a paradigm shift away from the prevailing Keynesian economic consensus that existed prior to the persistent stagflation of the 1970s."
The G.O.P. is the Good Old-Fashioned Party:
• Good old-fashioned white supremacy, which explains immigration restrictions, opposition to so-called “cancel culture” like ending publication of certain Dr. Seuss books, and outrage for taking down Confederate memorials and symbols. So many examples, so little space.
• Good old-fashioned family, with father as head of household and women in their place. The Good Old-Fashioned Party of male dominance and misogyny, the Good Old Boys Club of that one-term president, plus Ailes, O’Reilly, Epstein, Clinton, Prince Andrew, Dershowitz, Kavanaugh, Clarence Thomas, Cosby, Weinstein.
• Good old-fashioned boy-girl romance. Anything but the alternatives. Don’t change bathrooms. Don’t change Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head. Don’t change old-fashioned weddings, or corporate and business culture pre-1960s, and certainly don’t adopt any of the words in the acronym LGBTQ. We don’t want to do anything to ruin the old-fashioned family model.
• Good old-fashioned popular culture. Cowboys and Indians. But don’t listen to any of that revisionist history. Never mind that few of the original vaqueros were ever white. Never mind that whites invented scalping to get paid bounties on dead Indians without the inconvenience of having to drag around entire corpses.
• Good old-fashioned history of religion. Never mind that the founder of Christianity was Palestinian Jewish. We’ll ignore that. In our view, he’s a white boy painted like the images from the Italian Renaissance. Never mind that the original Saint Nicholas was from the eastern Mediterranean, we are going with the Madison Avenue ad culture which turned him into a jovial old white man resembling Burl Ives or Orson Welles (no offense to those two fine gentlemen, but they’re not descendants of people born in Asia Minor or Ancient Graecia).
Oops, we wanted to demonstrate our love of Christian heritage, but somehow it looks like we managed our own version of cancel culture, because Jews and Palestinians and Turks and even Arabs got erased, except 3 Asians who made a token appearance in the New Testament. Now how did that happen?
And that, dear friends, brings us right back around to where we began:
Good Old-Fashioned White Supremacy Party.
White Supremacy.
Male Supremacy.
Straight Supremacy.
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-racism-authoritarianism/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/03/05/republicans-arent-fighting-democrats-theyre-fighting-democracy/
Vaqueros, cowboys:
https://gregolear.substack.com/p/lone-star-failed-state?r=7mr17&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy
Enjoy. What takes you seconds to read took me hours to produce. What am I thinking.
Are you thinking that it should be obvious that supremacy is in direct opposition to equality? That breaking down democracy is the best way to remain supreme? That fighting for equality is the hallmark of democracy? That we have a lot of work to do day in and day out to keep democracy alive and well, here and throughout the world? That formulating thoughts, getting people on.board, creating forward motion, etc takes time and effort? Unbelievable amounts of time and effort. But it IS worth it. Keep on keeping on, Roland. You aren’t alone in this.
Five times yes. 1000 times yes. Thank you Lena and everyone here. 🙏. Thank you for fighting the good fight together. All my love right back at ya.
Bravo, Roland. I’ve been thinking about the GOP recently as the “pretend oppressed” party, after seeing Facebook posts from people who claim all sorts of indignities imposed on them by our society—saying they will never apologize for being white, defending the Second Amendment, loving God, etc., as if anyone is asking them to. So it’s the Pretend Oppressed Party to me, or POP: a quick hit of sugar, nutritionally lacking, and I hope soon fizzling out.
The POP is becoming an endangered species, imo. That’s why they seem so oppressed. They are being replaced. For Pete’s sake, how long does racism and sexism and anti-gayism et al dominate this society? I’ve been watching and waiting FOREVER.
Over the past two months actually going all the way back to February 2020, I have been predicting that this is the demise of that old society, the old nasty culture. The night is darkest before the dawn. A cornered animal screams loudest as it dies. That’s what this juvenile silliness looks like to me.
Those people are ALL OVER my friends list; many active/retired cops. Sigh.
Totes Roland! We are all here to engage in a discussion that sometimes breaks down into anger and frustration but--aside from a few trolls and bots--one of the things I love about this space is that we are all working hard to listen to each other. That happens only rarely these days. The steady plod toward a better future that is happening now, despite the roadblocks being thrown into the path--not all of them by Repugnicans, alas--has a better chance, I think, of being successful than the shiny-object system that throws good ideas up in the air, only to forget about them when they drop to the ground.
Some of the people most revered by the far right--especially the Catholic far right--happen not to be "white": most importantly, perhaps, Augustine of Hippo, who was from Carthage in North Africa and whose family was not Italo-Umbrian (they became "Romans" because of the imperial takeover of North Africa after the Third Punic War). Early medieval depictions of Augustine show him as distinctively Berber. Although not portraits, per se, the accuracy at least of locating Augustine as a person of North African descent was lost by the later period, when he gets whitened, like so many others.
Yeah it’s strange isn’t it? When I was very young I was brought up on Sunday school, and of course I am familiar anyway with all the standard American cultural myths surrounding Christianity, as are all of you. How did it turn from a diverse philosophy and cosmology embraced by members of every Mediterranean culture and every level of society into a stripped and sanitized shell of its former self. Council of Nicaea of course. Censoring all references to reincarnation out of it. Stripping the equal role of women right out of it. It says right in the Bible, clear as daylight, that Joshua was no respecter of persons. Didn’t give a hoot what gender you were, age, how much money you made, what you did for work, status or social standing, slave or Roman citizen, it was all about equality. And then of course the jerks had to come in and turn it into something that it wasn’t. The Vatican, all that money, all that hideous and greasy status symbol and prestige stuff, not to mention the Inquisitions and torture and Crusades. Yech yech yech yech and yech.
And don't forget the all important industry of (chicken bone) relics, garments and splinters! You too can own a sliver of a saint, a torn piece of one's holy garment or a splinter from the cross for a handsome price!
Crusading sure didn't help.
Very good point about Africa's contributions to early Christianity. Alexandria, Cyrene, Hippo and other locales made North Africa a Christian stronghold til the advent of Islam, and Ethiopia is the world's oldest Christian nation after Armenia.
The "Confessions" establish the massively influential Augustinian model of autobiography: that one can remake one's life to give it a dynamic new direction, a purpose previously lacking. It's so pervasive that most Americans don't recognize a leading current example as Augustinian: Malcolm X's "Autobiography." The journey from his early party-animal "creed" to the NOI, and finally more universalist Islam, shows that Augustine's model doesn't need Christianity as the end result.
TPJ, you and Linda and others are just amazing with your knowledge. I especially admire the history about early Christianity 🏆🏆🏆
Thank you
Nice work, Roland! Clear, concise, easy to read, right to the point. Your thoughts flow into this forum like warm maple syrup 🍁
I agree 100% Thank You 😊
You’re very kind Kari 🙏
She is right, also.
🙏 Cathy you are kind as well.
Roland, you should get an hourly rate rather than salary for comments . "The laborer is worthy of his hire."
Roland while I agree with the majority of what you have written but after looking for information on the Dr Seuss book controversy ,that at least appears to have been a decision of the family of Dr Seuss and not some nefarious leftist or GQP move. If it had been I would have thought that they would have gone after the Dr Seuss book The Butter Battle as well. While I am not in favor or censorship in literature I do think at times we need to look at what images we present as acceptable to young children.
Yes of course. I’m not defending the concerns about cancel culture, after all in Germany they have done away with being able to sell anything with Nazi symbolism or nomenclature. I happen to have some of that because I inherited from my father and grandparents, but I couldn’t display it or resell it in Germany. So there’s often a good reason for censorship when it exists. My comment about Dr. Seuss’s books which are being canceled is that Republicans are having a hissy fit about it. The press calls it “culture wars.“ That’s like a German having a major problem because swastika flags have been disallowed. Not a good look.
Yea, I reread my beloved To Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street online last night and...ouch.
Well, it took me minutes but not seconds; that said, thank you for taking the time to produce it!
You’ve taken on Heather’s habits!
Marcy, I give up. I spent an hour working in the LA warehouse and I still have no clue what we’re talking about. Let’s have you shine some light into my rock head.
How long it took you to research your comment compared with how quickly we read it.
Aah, thank you!
Roland, Right on. I'm here to say that is going to change QUICKLY. The future belongs more to the cultures and religions of ancient indigenous peoples than it does to PMSers (pale, male, and stale) Blog forthcoming on this topic. Not sure it would be appropriate to post here. IM me if interested.
Write it and post a link. It will keep your inbox clear.
Neat idea. Will do the first part of next week.
Excellent. Look forward to seeing it.
If you would like I can add you to my occasional mailing list letting folks know when I post/publish something. Email me at cegrantham@gmail.com
You may hear from Mr Lewis.
Nice! You already sold me. I don’t know how to IM on either my laptop at home or this iPhone I take on the road.
Excellent recap, Roland. Unfortunately, I think we have one or two generations to go before the lights brighten.
Hi Roland I missed you.
Hello Liz that’s very sweet of you.
It’s true.
You’re sweet for sharing that with me and you’re sweet for feeling it.
Thanks Roland —a lot of people tell me I’m sweet so I guess I am. Drive safely and be careful at those truckstops
Thank you! Safety is a huge priority, it has to be when you do this every week, min. 4 weekly work shifts of 11-14 hrs. each. I have an intricate and detailed safety program I follow, e.g. a well-honed system for combatting fatigue, in particular, that’s a prime consideration on a night driving schedule.
The entire Bible, cover to cover, does not have one white person in it. Except maybe the anti-Christ, he has orange hair and claims to be a Christian.
Why can’t we separate a post into pieces, and then give up to, say, 10 “likes” for each piece?
Jay I would give you a ❤️ or two for the acknowledgment about no white people in the Bible.
Then the maximum 10 ❤️s for the mention of the orange-haired anti-Christ who fakes being a Christian.
Perfect. Thank you Jay.
Wow Jay, you really get us thinking anew about the Bible.
I used to match your description of the antichrist. Very little orange now.
Perfect summary for the GOP. Wish that they could be confronted with this and made to answer publically for each of your statements. I know some Republicans who are not on social media and keep their head in the sand just vote Republican without seeing what their party has become. They might really have their eyes opened when confronted with such a clear horrifying picture.
'Blessed be the fruit' of your very productive hourly labors. Always interesting. Much thanks
Good post. I appreciate the hours; it took me a bit longer than seconds to enjoy this!
Eloquently stated, as always, Roland.
🙏
Excellent! Thank you for your effort. 💯
GOP senators are behaving outrageously, but there is some consolation in their amateurish incompetence. Apparently not even McTurtle, that "great" parliamentarian, remembered a basic rule of legislating: NEVER leave the chamber wholly in the hands of opponents when in session. It's too bad that this was a procedural matter, not a more significant result, because the GOP is now less likely to make the same blunder. It recalls a famous misjudgment in a major early crisis at the UN. In 1950 the USSR boycotted the vote on authorizing military intervention in Korea, when it could have vetoed action as Permanent Member of the Security Council. They never blundered that way again.
There is an inherent flaw in the otherwise menacing GOP seditionist tendency. They increasingly elect candidates who are disrupters or celebrities, but incompetent at actually governing. Cold comfort, but take it where it's found.
Actually, the USSR boycott had nothing to do with Korea (I wrote a best-selling book about how that fakakte got going, so I know). They began their boycott in January, over the issue of changing the German currency from the Reichsmark, which ultimately led to the financial as well as social break of the two halves of Germany. They didn't think about Korea, because also back in January, Secretary of State Acheson had made a statement about US interests in Asia, where Korea was left off the list. The communists thought that meant the US - which had withdrawn its last occupying troops from South Korea in 1949, no longer considered the peninsula important. That was why, when Kim Il-Sung came to Moscow later in the month to get Stalin's approval of a forcible reunion, Stalin said it was OK with him if it was OK with Mao. Mao happened to be there at the same time for the signing of the Sino-Soviet Pact, and when Kim asked him he said OK, but you should be careful that the Americans really meant that. So, when the invasion came in June (for about 6-7 hours, the US wasn't sure the ROKs hadn't invaded the north), nobody really expected Truman to do what he did. The fact the USSR wasn't at the UN was purely fortuitous. After the initial Security Council decision, everything else the US did at the UN had to be done in the General Assembly, since the USSR made sure to be present ever after.
Ok, I had to look up fakakte. Thought it might be a secret word like covfefe. Urban dictionary says it means “lousy, messed up, dirty.” Good to know.
The German equivalent would be “verkakte” which basically means “all kaka-ed up” as in
“effed up.”
It also means what it sounds like, a stronger version of what the urban dictionary says. :-)
Good Yiddish word usually used when meaning also crazy and dumb. I have never seen it spelled this way, though.
The spelling is just phonetic for verkakte. Say it loud and you'll see.
Toddlers are wiser than we know when saying "kaka."
Perhaps the elders were napping...governance requires woke-ness. You rock, TPJ
Thanks Kim. I've been known to rock on alternate Fridays. Hoping this is one of them.
Woke-ness itself is supremely important. It's what this country needs.
This is definitely one of those Fridays.
Whoops, it's Sat now. Gotta run ... turning into pumpkin.
Right again
He does rock doesn’t he??👏🏻
Umm ... I've been told that I dance like an intellectual. It wasn't a compliment.
it is the intellectual part, darlin
Especially sweet since Southern politicians have been masters of procedure since the very beginning. Unfortunately they have won many an election with celebrity politicians and the country (and the world and the PLANET) have suffered because of their incompetence and toxic egoism.
Gotta love that slip-up! Your assessment of celebrity vs. governance is particularly apt.
Wow, TPJ, you're on a roll today!
Bulkie, poppyseed or multigrain?
Kaiser.
Says the son of German immigrants. I'm glad they came here to help make America great.
must be poppyseed as that tests out positive on drug screens
Have you been talking to my "herbalist?"
Good point TPJ. May this be their undoing!
Thank you, Dr. Richardson! Really, if you do not vote for the American Rescue Plan, which will cut child poverty in half, then you cannot pretend to believe in “family values” nor can you pretend to be pro—life.
When I get alerts from Biden's FB page (and other such sites) it's interesting to see how many Republicans are trolling and shrieking, "Where's my $1400?" It would be far more effective if they trolled their own Republican lawmakers. Alas, no. Apparently there is scant recognition by Republican voters that their chosen ones in both chambers have nothing other than re-election driving them.
And haven't you heard? The right to life ends at birth
When I mentioned to a very pro-trump "friend" that I figured she might like the $1,400 extra dollars in her pocket. Her response was YES, but I still love tRump and hate Biden.
Honestly, you have to wonder, what motivates people to act so stupid. Here's a guy bending over backwards to try and get things done to help people and the (TQ)Rs are like, "Nope, I love my Donald even though he shat all over me."
Sigh.
Or as Judge Judy sez...'pissed on my leg and told me it was raining'
Cult Behavior.
I don't get it wither. This friend is a smart woman, and clearly has taken to heart all the bull that Fox has fed her. Just don't get it and never will.
I don't get it either. My oldest and dearest friend of over 55 years is a Fox/TRepublican. We have grown apart as a result. It breaks my heart and mind.
Exactly what has happened with my best friend of 45 years. It's broken my heart. But she has become a different person. A very hateful person. Trump does destroy everything he touches ....
😞 Sorry, Daria. It's hard to grow apart over something like politics.
I think that the call of racism and sexism is too powerful. These "True Believers" feel that their very lives are at stake in the world that is evolving into a more diverse and more welcoming place.
You are so very right. The threat of diversity is way to much. Sad.
That explains some but not all. I have relatives who are not at all hateful people, who get their radical right ideas of reality in church as part of the worldview there.
Yes, I have family who seem to have been persuaded by the more conservative beliefs of their church. They now fall into the Evangelical family of tRump believers. Hard to believe I came from the same gene pool as they did!
They are, for example, consistent about "pro-life", not only wearing masks to forestall covid but also making and distributing them. They like Pence, not Trump. They would not admit that Pence was nearly killed in the Jan. 6 riot, and have accepted the idea that whatever happened that day was somehow the fault (or no worse than) the violence that accompanied some of the summer racial justice protests.
More and more, I think HCR has it right that what determines people's actions is the ideas and narratives they hold as true.
And then the right to death starts immediately thereafter.
Exactly.
I like both of those rights a lot
Those who oppose abortion but favor the death penalty and cannot see that their stance is mutually exclusive reveal that their oppositions are punishment for "bad" people that don't look like them.
A colleague used to talk about the lowest common denominator in public discussions. Gets really challenging when the ability to reason has not been cultivated and the absence of logic leaps to the island of conclusion
Yes, if one is pro-life shouldn't that mean beyond birth as well. I like Barbara Bush's stance on abortion that no matter what happens to the fetus God will take care of its soul.
Pray that God takes care of body AND soul, because Repugs will not.
She was very cool
"Forced Birthers", as @DrJenGunter says.
Well, as long as they provide the money for care, feeding, housing, and college education for all those fetal beings...
Nope. Once you're out of the womb, the GOP doesn't care. You are on your own.
I'm a 'keep your laws off my body' kind of woman. Is it really just all about controlling/repressing heterosexual women? Makes no sense. If you don't like abortion, don't have one.
Amen, Sista of Mine!
Most of them don’t even like women— they like power in general and their choice in women— remember the anecdote about McConnell saying that when he married this time she’d have to be really rich— bingo Elaine Chao.
You’d think, but men (and it seems mostly to be men) keep looking for new ways to control women’s reproductive capacity.
Men have dominated women since we were living in caves.
Yep it is all about controlling women--not just straight women because if they had their way there would be no lesbian women who are not being used as incubators for sperm.
Exactly!!
In some form this bill will pass
They only care about staying in power and staying profitable
I have mixed feelings about unions. I am probably one of the few people that has been both a senior executive in a Fortune 100 corporation and a member of the AFL-CIO Musicians Union. That was before right to work laws so either you were a member of the union or you couldn't be hired by a Symphony Orchestra that was unionized and most of them were. The Fortune 100 corporation I worked for, Digital Equipment Corporation, was a highly ethical corporation and never unionized because it treated its employees and its customers very well. In the blizzard of 1978 where the main commuting highways became parking lots of cars trying when trying get home at rush hour in the brunt of the storm, everything was shut down for a week and no one could go into work. While the unionized General Electric did not pay its hourly employees that week, Digital did their hourly employees for a full 40 hour week. Think it cost them a million dollars but it was frequently cited if unionization came up. Rather than set up unions that put the employees into a rather adversarial position with management I'd rather see employees actually have a substantial share of the ownership of the companies. That way the company is beholden to not just the greedy investors but to the employees as well and gives them a true share of the profits of their work beyond their salary.
Unions have devolved from heroic origins to organizations of rampant bloat, politicking, and incompetence. However, they still function as a safety net and collective force to protect and advance the rights and interests of the work force. If all corporations were ethical good citizens, unions would not be necessary.
If all corporations were ethical good citizens, this country would not need the various federal laws and government agencies that provide for safety regulations of business, safety regulations for infrastructure, and the social safety net to meet people's basic needs. But greed, money, and short term gains continue to intervene.
There are still plenty of working-class heroes in today's unions. They (we) have good success in building locals in underrepresented sectors such as service and hospitality, biotech, adjunct profs, etc. I was in the thick of a wave of adjunct/grad organizing in the 2010s, and believe me, there's nothing more exhilarating than colleagues coming together to form a new institution, a new community. If you want real friends, have union friends. (Did I mention that unions have some of the best parties?)
Until we achieve Utopia, we will ALWAYS need a strong labor movement, one that works for the whole society, not just member benefits and wages. Since unions are labor's main institutions, we need our unions. Now, let's enjoy the weekend, brought to us by our friends, the labor movement.
Perfect ending to a worthy comment!
Wishing I could "like" your comment 100 times, TPJ.
Me too 😊
That's my friend, TPJ, who said that!
Morning Lynell!! It's afternoon by now, but saying your favorite opening is gratifying. It lives outside of mere time.
The gift of mornings are indeed gratifying!
Morning is the period after we wake up. With Dr R "mailing" LFAA between 12-3am, I'm in danger of becoming a vampire. Please alert me if my image disappears from the mirror.
Party on🥂🍀🎊
I agree with both of you. There is a successful appliance store in our county which was privately owned. The couple who had owned it decided to retire. Most of the employees had been with them 10+ years. They got together and bought the company from the couple. They each have a piece of the pie and they make certain no one falters on their promise to deliver. In other words, they police themselves and stay on top of one another. It is a much needed concept for corporations to adopt the same idea. The rewards outweigh the costs.
Yes, we agree on our mixed feelings about unions. And police unions protecting police officers from accountability for harmful conduct is the worst.
When people and corporations govern themselves responsibly and ethically, then the countering force of a union or the regulation by a government is not necessary, and that is the ideal--but sadly not real. The nice exceptions are not the rule.
The unions of police are all about the racket of protection of the police. Essence of corruption.
Police unions also protect officers from really awful things that administration does to them. Mandatory breaks in shift (no working 14 days straight by order), no "at will" firing because an officer refuses to carry out an unlawful order, and more protection from sex discrimination.
I agree that there is often too much power granted to unions, and yet there is still a need to protect officers who find themselves in deadly force situations from both community outcry (in a reasonable and justified instance) and administrative reprisals.
I'm not very articulate this morning. Maybe more coffee will help.
I have been the target of a particular administrator who wanted to get rid of me. My union protected me, and my job assignment.
Ally, I like your comments as much as your tuba, and you seem like the kind of LE officer we need more of. But way back in the last millennium, a couple of years in a CT sheriff's dept pushed me in the opposite direction. They were interested in me b/c I was a rare one with a BA, but the socialization was an education in immorality. Academy training is no match for that Real Training. So I got out.
In 2021 there are two faces to American policing: Eugene Goodman and Derek Chauvin. Angel and devil on each shoulder. Abraham Lincoln told us which one to heed.
Thank you--good to know about police unions.
Well, they may have evolved into organizations that result in policemen who feel like they can do anything they want like pepper spray a mother in the face in front of her daughter after she was caught shoplifting in Rochester. But the started out being organized to support the men who put their lives on the line to protect us
Before the public employee unions, police and firefighters typically worked seven day weeks with twelve hour shifts.
There are saints out there but far too few. So long as humans are led by self interest (or, to put it differently so long as almost all humans have strong survival instincts and only some have the ability to temper that with a more cerebral assessment of situational complexity and long/wide range vision) then power in the hands of CEOs, management or labor should always be held in check by counter balancing powers ranging from separate interests to laws. Neither is inherently guaranteed to always be the good guys and gals.
True
Workers owning the means of production. What a concept!
Safety nets safe conditions pensions and liveable wage.
Thank you all for inspiration. Mutual support is a great feature of LFAA. The level of discussion here requires that we elevate our game.
Absolutely the bill passed the senate faster than Biden’s goal!
I have mixed feelings about Marty Walsh as mayor. He's openly liberal, and did as well as possible with the pandemic last year. But he tried hard (and failed) to force the 2024 Olympics on us; backed reckless Formula One racing downtown; and is pro-development despite worrying about affordable housing in Boston. His strongest union affinity and support is from the building trades who benefit from construction booms and hot housing markets. They are old AFL craft unions, not representative of Boston's unionized workforce. He also helps the police union dodge accountability, -- a serious concern since we lost George Floyd -- though he's not alone there.
Yet here's the deal: I think he'll be a very good Sec of Labor. He is sincerely pro-labor along with a president more committed to workers than any in a long time, including Obama. The Labor Dept will encourage unionization, enforce safety and equity laws, and coordinate well with a Biden-appointed NLRB that will act fairly. Marty (first-name is OK with him) will also help get the ball rolling on infrastructure programs. He has a genuine common touch, is personable and approachable. I know, because in 2015 I gave him an earful about unions who didn't support the Olympics, and he was genial about it. Good choice, Mr President.
Really appreciate your knowledge shared here.
Me too.
Being a MA resident, I've always thought Marty was basically a fair and good mayor. I appreciate your take TPJ, that you can see his faults, but still see his value as labor sec.
And at a negotiating table he knows how to talk their language and he’s essentially a good guy Pam
Let's be the Three MA Musketeers. Now, who is our D'Artagnan? Volunteers, step up!
Waltham, MA here
We have our fourth MA musketeer! Rapiers or epees, comrades? (Only nonviolent dueling allowed.)
?
So, reading through your comment, it appears that you don't really have mixed feelings about Marty but note a few disappointments concerning his decisions as mayor.
I totally agree—very good choice
You wrote, "He also helps the police union dodge accountability..." that alone makes me not trust his judgment, especially if he is genial about the dodgy choices you describe. Isn't Boston a harbor? Does his pro-development take into account rising sea levels and increasing storm surge due to the changing gulf stream?
Cathy, Personal experiences are pivotal source in our judgements. I don't think, however, that the Digital Equipment Corporation was typical of most companies then or now. For most workers the role of unions made the difference in achieving economic security, salary levels of the work force, job safety and bargaining. Union busting contributed greatly to the shrinking of our middle-class. As an aside, I wonder how much of Trump's support comes from the abandonment of the working-class by both political parties.
I could not agree more. Courageous unions broke the stranglehold that a wealthy few held in all fields of manual labor at and around the turn of the 20th century. They faced a triumvirate of bitterly opposed governments, factory and mine owners and numerous organs of media. They paid in blood for their right to exist and to have the dignity of having the worth of their labor recognized. It is hard to imagine a broad middle class developing in North America and parts of Europe without the contributions of organized labour.
By the Fifties corporations, in the main, recognized that there was plenty of pie to go around and there were situations where union and management were more or less in collusion, leading to corruption at the top as unions became their own kind of corporation. Nonetheless each generation could rightfully expect that their lot would be better than that of their parents. The playing field, while not equal, was at the least less tilted and America enjoyed golden years.
Many factors contributed to the downfall of unions, particularly competition from less wealthy countries who did the same work for far less. But union busting began in earnest under Reagan in the 80s. The Air Traffic Control strike and his ruthless handling of it signaled to the business community at large that they now had a clear run at weakening and dismantling unions. Through a combination of outsourcing, offshoring and right to work legislation (bought and paid for), unions were crippled to the point that America began to compete *internally* for work. Factories moved from the North to the South where wages were slashed and unions defanged or non-existent.
Forty years of this and America (and parts of Canada) now live in a grossly unequal world. We have regressed a hundred years. The world is a different place of course, so of course millions of people have the “choice” to earn a hardscrabble living of sorts by working 60-80 hours a week in what is cutely called the gig economy. And each generation now has no expectation of doing better than that of their parents - except for the gilded few.
We are destined it seems to reach the society that Anatole France described over a century ago: “The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal loaves of bread”.
Perhaps Bessemer Alabama will represent the beginning of a long road block. May they vote to unionize and then may it spread.
Much thanks Eric for the history lesson! You retold it from the days of empty kitchen tables and bare refrigerators; picket lines, union halls, bargaining sessions and hands piled with cash hidden from view to the present day featuring abandoned factories; desolate industrial spaces; empty main streets, except for a church or two, a bar and a coffee shop, along with the furious working-class.
That is so brilliant that you dragged my words down to the level of such harsh realities. Brilliant.
I was the primary negotiator for my teachers’ union in the late 90s. Had more trouble with my own team than with management! Now that’s a long story. :)
Thanks for putting such vivid color into old union days.
When you can, I’d like to know that story.
You're a good, concise teacher, Eric; was that your profession? I'd locate the transition later, in the 1930s with the New Deal and NLRA. Irving Bernstein, Turbulent Years, is an outstanding account.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R20DDQRG6O84KS/ref=cm_cr_srp_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B002ZW81KC
It’s a bit long for a forum entry and of course off the general topic. I’d be happy to share it in an email.
I’ve read your first comment three times now. It is chillingly evocative of decay and futile rage. So well put.
Brilliantly said, Eric. Put so concisely and well. Unionization transformed this country---but as you say it was bought with blood (I think of the vanished textile mills in North Carolina and the struggle there.) If Bessemer votes yes, that will be an wonderful victory. Now I realize why I'm seeing all these beautiful Amazon ads about the need for 15$ an hour that are proliferating on Axios news. :-) :-(
When I started teaching, I was grateful to step into the structure of a union contract. I didn't need to negotiate salary, benefits, et al. I just needed to write my syllabus, order the books and walk into the classroom. It allowed me to focus on the job and the students.
Yes, I feel quite fortunate to have worked for an ethical company. Even a Fortune 100 corporation can be an ethical one if it has ethical leadership. But, I want unions to evolve out of its patriarchy framework and be part owners of the companies so they are stakeholders not just an expense to cut to the bone. Also have the issue that technology will displace humans in many jobs so we will probably need a new economic system. I think the U.S. Senate is a great example of what is wrong with too many rules like many unions become. Stagnates the whole system. Going back to the old union model will not be what we need now or in the future. We need a new model for unions.
New models for every large enterprise and crisis the world faces. Progressivism, tempered by reasoned conservatism, is required - and soon. Right now we have neither in positions of power - Canada or the U.S.
I am quite terrified for what sort of future my children and grandchildren are going to be subjected to. Climate weirdness now - full on climate change in a decade. And no will to wrestle with it.
The climate thing is really poorly comprehended by many. We don't know how rapidly change will accelerate, given an ocean current here, rise in salinity there, cold blob up there...serious potential for sudden shifts...I say put Greta in charge of the world effort to address the injuries we have knowingly inflicted upon our Mother. IMHO, radical change is required urgently; there is no time for fiddling around, so to speak.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/03/extreme-climate-change-history/617793/
Kim, Your comment is very strong. I would give Greta a few years before putting her 'in charge of the world effort...' Let's consider other candidates for the time being.
Ms Thunberg deserves the chance to graduate from college before assuming more responsibility. Still, if "world government" means she has actual power, I'm all for it.
On a related note, our electric company is an electric cooperative and is just wonderful. At the end of the year any surplus profit is divided among the customers who are automatically part owners and deducted from the electric bill. It's not ever much, but it's a reminder. We can vote on the board of directors, attend their meetings, and get numerous updates as to their policies which probably as a result are far far more environmentally friendly than the other major electric company in the wider area which is, imho one of the more dastardly ones. Not just direct employees but customers in some cases can be part owners.
You might want to be sure your electric cooperative uses some surplus profit to winterize or update the system. Do they spend enough money on trimming tree limbs from power lines? California power company did not prepare for winds that downed power lines and started fires.
LOVE my electric cooperative, and their/our solar array on properties they/we own! It has still been a struggle pushing fir wind and other renewables, but we sure missed last spring's hot dog roast annual meeting last year. Hopefully this year it will be safe to celerate again.
I meant "celebrate", like the Celtic monk copying from the original Book of Kells exclaimed, "Oh, it's CELIBRATE, not CELIBATE."
The worst part was having to redo the whole darn book.
Yes, Cathy, and we need a new model of governing as well and an examination of social media's business algorithms toward a way to regulate them. We are going through a very difficult transition in our work, use of energy; distribution of wealth, social justice and so on. Hopefully, we may be at the beginning of the rebirth of unionization. That as practically everything else needs to function as the circumstances dictate.
My brother worked for DEC in the 70s and quit in (moral) disgust.
Thank you Fern for bringing up "the abandonment (of unions) by both political parties." Al Gore Turned his back on labor unions during his campaign for president 2000. Gore almost lost in Michigan and Wisconsin. The last Democrat that embraced unions was Paul Welstone from Minnesota who died with his wife in a mysterious small plane crash 2002.
I have some mixed feelings too, but I must agree they were instrumental in moving workers into the middle class. I grew up between Gary and Chicago; everyone worked in the mills or oil refineries. Unions made it possible in the 50s and 60s for those without a college education to have a good middle class life.
As HCR has said in her writings and FB talks, one of the prongs of the Movement Conservatives in their battle plan was to defang unions.
Kurt Anderson's "Evil Geniuses" goes further into the weeds in discussing the financialization of the economy that ties into gutting unions as well as changing laws and norms. Beginning with the famous (infamous?) Lewis Powell memo, his battle plan to Big Business, and carrying through to the deregulation of banks, S&Ls, changing the law to allow stock buy-backs, not to mention Milton Friedman's "shareholder value" con, the rise of the leveraged buy-outs and then hedge funds, it's all been designed to put Wall St. in charge of everything.
Ever wonder why there is so little re-investment in companies, and almost no R&D anymore, compared to the '50s and '60s? Because those profits are being plowed into stock buy-backs. And how do CEOs get compensated these days? The IRS rules were changed to make stock options as compensation more attractive than salaries, plus the recipient gets a lower tax hit, too. Win-win! And when all the CEO cares about is the quarter-to-quarter reports to Wall St. to keep that stock price up, why would they care about 1, 5, or 10 years hence? It's no longer about making a good product, or providing jobs, it's about making 'the numbers' so Wall St. doesn't punish you.
Bringing back unions might help, but with the Big Business guys, it will take more than that, by a long shot.
Well, put. This needs to be said again and again.
Accurate assessment!
You are exactly right there. I grew up in a mill town. My mother was a meat wrapper in a grocery store. Her union took care of us and we had many things we never would have. It made us middle class. My father had an 8th grade education and worked hard jobs. But his pay was abysmal and he often worked 3 jobs to make what my mother did.
I remember when I turned 30 and I had a big pay raise to 30k a year, in 1988. My mother told me my father didn’t make that much and he’d been working at the same company for over 30 years. I was shocked. He was a hard worker.
😥
I’m currently reading “Rust, A Memoir of Steel and Grit” by Eliese Colette Goldbach about growing up in Cleveland and the mills’ and union’s effects on the people.
Thank you. This looks interesting to me. My father's father worked in the mills in Cleveland.
Amen and wouldn’t that be a welcome trend again
Cathy, I understand your mixed feelings. Unions are institutions and, like all institutions they are vulnerable to corruption. However, as someone who was in a union in my youth and one who has consistently seen the differences between universities and colleges with a unionized faculty and those that don't, I have to say that, with all their faults, unions are probably a much safer bet than relying on the paternalism of a benevolent corporation or executive. Hear me out about this:
AGMA, as Candace has pointed out, is a very powerful union for musicians and most of the orchestras in the US are union shops. It also is the union that supports dancers of the major ballet and modern-dance companies in the USA. The base pay for dancers is less than half that for the orchestras that are playing in the pit. No lie. But without a union, dancers would be far worse off. The support for health care for dancers alone is worth the union wages. And I have seen ballet companies try to break unions several times, not because they can have any effect on what they are paying the orchestras in the pit (they are contract workers borrowed from other orchestras usually) but because they have to treat dancers as people. This is an issue for me because ballet and modern dance (but especially ballet) is a woman-dominated field where the overwhelming majority of executives and managers are male. While orchestras until recently were overwhelmingly male and white--and so are able to negotiate from a position of privilege--often dancers are disadvantaged because of gender from gaining things like a living wage, rehearsal pay, and other essentials that union contracts require.
Universities that have unions have higher salaries for faculty and more job security for non-tenured instructors. Even though you might find administrations pushing out raises and so on when confronted by the possibility of unionization, they quickly reverse themselves once the threat is ended. I have seen this time and again because my jobs have been in non-union shops with union shops literally next door and the differences have been stark, especially in downturns and times of trouble. The vision and treatment of a given corporation's labor force by its executive and board is subject to change with the change of leadership. I don't trust corporate leadership to be "benevolent" toward their labor force except when compelled to be so. This is kinda what unions do. And Bezos found that out when he tried to lure the Distribution Center in Alabama away from forming a union with pay rises. It didn't work because the labor force had already experienced the downside of a paternalistic system.
You have hit the nail on the head. I see unions as reinforcing the patriarchy and going backwards -- make America Great again for the old white males. I so tired of patriarchy, the OR system, the only way someone can be one up is to have others that are one down. I want to evolve society into an AND system, an egalitarian system. My suggestion is that if unions were also stakeholders, part owners of the company, the employees would receive benefit from the profits from their work. Perhaps another example would be with police unions that are now protecting themselves more than their communities than perhaps we need the community to be a stakeholder within the police unions. They wouldn't be purely an expense that needs to be cut as far as possible even when it means people aren't making a living wage. There is also the issue that technology is going to displace jobs in the near future and we need a new economic system. My third concern is unions tend to stagnate an organization because like the old medieval guild system, there are too many rules, too many restrictions and the institution atrophies eventually. The U.S. Senate is a great example of union rules gone amok. And, gerrymandering is a two-edged sword -- you might get your candidate elected but then they are trapped into the thinking of their extreme base of voters.
I hate the length of patriarchy control but I love men.
Of course you are correct companies that take care of their employees have nothing to fear from unions or unionizing. Unions come into play when CEO's don't value their employees but rather see them as a means to short term profit.
I think the best thing about unions growing again under labor secretary who’s former mayor of Boston is that people for instance in manufacturing might start to make more of a live able wage.
It may go even farther. As an ED physician I lived through the transition from when actual practicing physicians managed groups staffing ED's to the current more common situation where a corporation run by business men contract with hospital groups run by businessmen to provide bodies with MD degrees to staff.
There is a palpable difference in the feeling and actuality of working in these departments. It has to do with how a patient is valued or not valued, viewed as and individual or viewed as a problem to solve. There is just something different about being considered a 'unit' rather than a person. It translates through from the worker to the product no matter what that product is.
I have worked in the healthcare field for 47 years now, never worked in a hospital that had union membership for staff other than nurses and the housekeeping personnel , but I watched the corporate take over of hospitals with the rise of their bean counters and the loss of caring about both the patients and the staff. I left hospital work because of that, and have worked in the private sector for the majority of my 47 years. I don't care how many feel good ads a medical corporation runs about their "mission" etc, it is always about the bottom line and the patients and the staff always come out at the bottom.
Absolutely. I had a parallel experience as a mental health professional. At first, the directives we worked under were developed and administered by professionals in our field. But then, managed care (what an ironic term) came in, and we were micro managed from afar by business executives who had no knowledge of working in the field of mental health.
Totally agree— it occurs often in any enterprise that hires consultants to try and increase efficiency or profits. Then before u know it people have become expendable widgets.
The industrialization of "health care" and the profit-taking on the backs of patients and caring workers (care-giving is not a mistake: not valued) has denatured the very idea of health. Mandated to care.
https://suzannecgordon.com/books/
Nurses have unions. Doctors are not allowed. My thought this morning after stewing about Texas (state after my own heart) and other states who dropped public health measures: time for ICU nurses to strike. "Thank you" not enough anymore. Now, they are being disrespected and shit upon IMHO. Is anyone else mad as hell? This is what happens when politicians make public health policies instead of doctors.
I think nurses are abused to the extent that many of them have to care for very large numbers of patients which result in huge stress and the great possibility that they’ll make a mistake. MA tried to vote on this question in a recent election but it didn’t pass.
Actually, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 20.4% percent of RNs and 10 percent of LPNs and LVNs in the U.S. are union members.
I am a retired RN. In the 70’s and 80’s I spent 19 of my 43 year career in a unionized public county hospital (now closed).
Many nurses have mixed feelings about unionization as do I. While I appreciated a higher wage and excellent healthcare benefits, I balked at the union president’s perks of fully paid for childcare. Members had no such benefit. Her salary was double the average full time RN. Nurses’ repeated poor job performance was not enough to term him/her. A transfer to another unit was the solution. Not acceptable in any employment setting.
Currently, I am very concerned that nurses and valuable support staff are being pushed beyond their limits with the pandemic. But, the outcry for better staffing and nurse-patient ratios began long ago, mostly to deaf ears.
I worry that many nurses will abandon hospital nursing.
After this pandemic, IMHO, I believe the outcry will be huge and rightly so.
A lot of nurses have been leaving the profession because their management is ignoring their needs. It’s extremely difficult to become an RN these days — the levels is science and math they have to master are quite high. I know because I have a niece who followed this path for a while.
California Nurses Association (CNA) led the ballot initiative drive to limit patient loads a while back...
Can't speak to your location, but I do know that doctors in California and West Coast states, to my understanding, are allowed in Public Service jobs and when employed. And private practice groups have something that is sort of a practice association. Union of American Physicians and Dentists is one such Union. www.uapd.com
Thank you for this interesting perspective, Cathy. Being a private music teacher and working as an adjunct at a local college branch for some years, I've been in a position of fending for myself. For several seasons I was singing in a union house so was required to join AGMA. The dues were most of what I earned in that occasional work so I let my membership lapse after that brief but heady time. But it did give me insight into the big things that the union was doing for us: regular breaks, safety oversight (and believe me, in an opera production all sorts of dangers lurk), and advocacy for things like flying with instruments. Had I not been in a union house I would not have been required to join, but I would have kept the membership if it were not so expensive relative to the short time I worked for them each year.
In 1975 I joined the Michigan Nurses Association union as required to work in the rural hospital in my new town. We RNs were "professional" and in addition to pay and benefits, we bargained for patient safety and things like blanket warmers since the bath blankets we took off the patients' window sills were often frigid. The LPNs (with 1 year of training) were represented by The Steelworkers, and made a higher starting wage than the RNs (with 2 to 4 years of education). Plus, in their contract they were not required to stay even 1 minute after their 8 hour shift to give report to the incoming nurse. Nor did they address patient welfare at all. The LPN's bargaining sessions were nasty. Our MNA sessions were never easy, but they were collegial and productive (and we eventually got a decent raise). We RNs literally and figuratively wore the white hats.
Fast forward 30 years. I am hired by MNA to improve their image with the legislature, government and public. In those intervening years, AFL-CIO, SEIU and other major unions, losing a big financial grip on industry, had identified nursing as their next cash cow. And they were vicious about the conquest. MNA was now affiliated with one of these unions, while flirting with another. That viciousness included "goons" at our convention, threatening the non-union presidential candidate (who happened to be me), and denial of secret ballots. Worst of all, it affected the atmosphere and culture of our nursing practice.
As an Appalachian granny-midwife once told me, "Whatever Pappaw is feeling will be felt all the way down to the cradle." In our case, the union anger and resentment was felt at the patient's bedside. Much of that hostility was warranted: Being told at 6 pm that, No, you could not go to your son's piano recital that evening because the hospital was short staffed and you were required to stay and work mandatory overtime. And, while LPNs no longer made more money than RNs, there were NO LPNs working in hospitals to help you anymore. Plus, the CEO and all NON-union employees were getting a 5% raise when you had to settle for 2% (clearly a union-busting tactic). Then COVID-19 hit.
The real demons in this dilemma though, are way above "Papaw's" level, and include the way our country does not value or pay enough for healthcare; how the rich can donate $millions for more hospital wings (needed or not) with their names over the entrance rather than paying taxes on those funds; and most hospital boards are still not welcoming union representation at the highest levels.
I left MNA to start the new state nursing Association, ANA-Michigan, joining with our original 100 year old national organization. Our PAC supported Joe Biden for President because the solution to this healthcare dilemma requires a President who has the experience, sense and heart to do it - for all of us this time: for the union and non-union nurses, the healthcare facilities, the insurers, the other providers and, especially, for the patients.
MaryPat, that is quite a saga. Yes, our healthcare system is not what it needs to be. I have quite a sage to tell myself. I had a massive pulmonary embolism in 2013. I was within a couple hours of death and was lucky to have survived that long with all the misdiagnoses and failures of communications among the doctors, nurses, techs, and with me. It was not any individual who was jeopardizing my life, it was the system but nevertheless my life was being jeopardized! Finally I was sent to the ICU after hours of delay and tPA started and I survived. I was invited to be on their Patient Family Advisory Board for a couple of years because they felt I might sue them...and win. I didn't believe that was in the best interests of the hospital nor for myself. Instead, I presented a case study to their Director of Quality and the Physicians' Quality Adviser on all the ways I felt they could improve the systems and save lives. I have since presented it to nursing students and other medical professionals. They finally fired me for being too passionate and for having too many ideas, in other words I scared the hell out of them. Our goals were not compatible. I wanted to save lives; they wanted a better score on the HCAHPS survey. They had no idea what patient-centric care which they advertised meant to the patient. Being that close to death was an amazing experience. The doctor in the ICU saved my life for which I am very grateful. I loved the ICU nurse coming to me after the doctor had told me she had to give me a drug that could kill me in order to save my life. I had immediately assented. The ICU nurse said she didn't think I understood the seriousness of my situation... She was probably right except for the fact I was having the Feeling of Doom and my souls were talking to me. But, the system came very close to failing me that day. Bottom line is I believe we have to change from a money as wealth based system (patriarchy, money is the only value, what I call an "OR" mentality) to a system of well-being for all, an "AND" mentality. Instead of a GDP we have a Well-Being Index. Your words confirm my belief we need a quite different system!! Thank you!
Oh, Cathy! Thank goodness you survived. And how wonderful - and important- that you served on the hospital's patient family advisory board and educated the public. I am sure your work made a significant impact. You are exactly right - we need to change the mindset (well-being!) as well as the structure of our healthcare system. Mayo Clinic comes close (structurally anyway) with physician specialists on salary, and team consultations the norm.
I had a similar hospital experience to yours in 2004, but with the opposite diagnosis, hemmorrhage. The doctors and nurses would not believe I had a bleeding disorder because no doctor had officially diagnosed it. I nearly died 3 times in 4 days from physician ordered procedures and medications. Among colleagues calling to check on me were the Governor's Chief Advisor on Health & Human Services, and the state's Surgeon General, but I still could not get the hospital to believe me! Afterwards, the hospital was quick to offer me a check for my troubles (and I advise folks to take it - their insurance covers it - but do consult an attorney first to get compensation commeasurate with the injuries and costs). At that time, in addition to my lobbying work, I was also an adjunct nursing instructor for the University of Michigan satellite site in our region. So I had some clout, and asked the hospital Director of Nursing, to set up a meeting for me with the Hospital CEO, Medical Chief of Staff, Patient Liaison and others to "educate" them on their systemic problems. I brought a flip chart, and through stick figures (and ghosts with nursing caps, indicating how short staffed they were), I gave a brilliant presentation. The doctor slept through it, then at the end patted my shoulder and said he hoped I felt better. The CEO took copious notes and thanked me. And the risk manager offered me the check. One nursing supervisor was fired which was the opposite of what I had requested. Since then, though, significant changes have been made, and the quality of the care has greatly improved (and I am in awe of our new Medical Chief of Staff! She really gets it!). But the system, based on wealth as you say, hasn't.
A few years later I went back to the University of Arizona for a class on setting up my own RN patient advocacy practice. Once I put up my website, I was flooded with requests for help from all over the country. There is so much to be fixed, and I agree, it begins with a change in the system from a goal of wealth to one of well being, for all of us this time.
So glad you survived. I took Dr. Peter Pronovost's Science of Safety in Healthcare online course which gave examples of even doctors not being believed when they are the patient in the ED. Now if I go to the ED I call my retired RN friend to come. It is quite a different experience when you bring your own RN with you! Here's a link to my case study if you are interested. The three words I hate most now are "No Distress Noted". I couldn't move even enough to put the X-ray plate behind my back without going into respiratory distress and was having the Feeling of Doom if I moved even a bit. So I was highly motivated to stay quite still. I was in critical condition and all they put in the nurses's notes was No Distress Noted.
https://www.slideshare.net/CathyLearoyd/prmc-case-study-no-distress-noted-one-patients-perspective-on-peterson-regional-medical-center
Ohhhh! Amazing you lived to tell it. And amazing what you recommended and did to fix that system. From your excellent case study it looks like nearly every weakness (too nice a word) in the hospital system was triggered, and mulitplied. Hopefully no nurse ever writes "No distress noted" again. What is especially powerful is adopting a "Culture of Respect", and it is something you can feel when you enter a facility, and why ANA developed the "Magnet" Certification program for hospitals (they should be a magnet for nurses thanks to the mutual repect and teamwork). My ER nurse's note read, "Patient very dramatic. Claims she cannot complete history sheet but ambulated to bathroom independently." With a hemaglobin so low I could not see the sheet! I couldn't feel my hands! The nurse had told me to change into a gown, left the room, and I nearly passed out several times getting to and from the bathroom. That note set the stage for the whole debacle. One RN friend who visited right before I was discharged, said she reviewed my chart and I should have died of a heart attack, except I was in "olympic shape" before the hemmorhaging. Yes, be sure to have your RN friend with you if ever you need to go to a hospital. That's one of the most important services my patient advocacy practice provided. Just need insurers to pay for it. (Guardian Nurses out of Boston, MA, have an excellent business revenue model - unions negotiate for RNPA coverage along with insurance. Insurance costs have since dropped dramatically for the Boston Police!). Stay Well!
I should add that the X-ray tech offering me a warm blanket felt like someone had just thrown me a life perserver. Somebody actually cared for me, the person. It was a quite profound and caring act from my perspective.
Wow. Profound and Caring!
I agree completely, Cathy. Marx would say that without a seat at the table workers are nothing but slaves. (Not sure if it's ok to use that word.... ):
Using “enslaved people” in every instance can sometimes seem awkward, but it does place the onus and focus on those doing the enslaving, rather than making the person’s enslavement fundamental to their being. I’m sure others can explain this better.
Are you thinking of co-ops over unions, Cathy? If so, how do you see their potential effectiveness compared to unions?
Lynell, I'm not sure what the right model is. I know of examples like the Vienna Philharmonic which is now owned by the musicians and it is working quite well. I do think they would be considerably more effective than the unions.
I have mixed feelings too having worked my way up at State Street Bank and toiled in the public schools
The harsh truth is that the American Executive (trained at some of our finest institutions) is a money machine without wisdom. It will never welcome worker participation in any form but the most meaningless. Through their glaring non-support of workers and their campaign contributions they strive to control every sector of local, state, and national governing, and covertly disable the safety nets, infrastructure improvements, and the essential regulation of businesses in the USA. If we want to understand why America is faltering, look to the American Executive.
Shelly, yes: this is why Thatcher decided that union busting in the UK was the only way to gut the Labour Party. And she succeeded. And the UK has suffered ever since.
As a former union member and shop steward, Biden's pro labor words and actions are something I thought I'd never hear again from a Democratic President much less a Democrat from Delaware the MBNA state.
Still I'm wondering how this will work at a time when union membership is at an all time low without knocking off the Goliath Amazon? To open the floodgates of unionization in these dark times for average workers will be like nothing this country has seen since the passage of the Wagner Act (National Labor Relations Act) in 1935. Should Bessemer succeed and then all the Amazon warehouses that are now ubiquitous in the American landscape, we will finally see a rising tide that lifts all boats because it will cut the anchors of all the boats of American workers who have for too long been anchored to the bottom and left to drown while the yachts sail off into the sunset.
A wave of unionization will do more to equalize not only the disparity in wealth between the haves and have nots, it will do so also for women and minorities too long subjugated to doing the same for less because union contracts cover all workers.
While labor in the past has had some shady dealings thanks to connections with organized crime, I don't see that happening again in this century and expect Congress to keep on top of unions to make sure they are as powerful as they need to be to protect the wages, hours and working conditions of workers and keep union leaders on their toes.
All eyes on Alabama 👀
The other behemoth is Walmart, which is still a privately owned company. Until there is a sea change in the Walton family's imperial takeover of small-town American commerce, it will be very difficult to make real change. However, it is pretty clear the Walton family is alarmed by the union revival because they just announced that they are giving almost half a million employees raises that push them over $15 an hour (they are not raising their corporate minimum, which is still $11/hr). However, they still refuse (as far as I know) to provide healthcare, sick pay, and other benefits that a union would require. And they raked in the billions right into the family's lap in 2020. This is why I will never go to visit their museum in Bentonville AK, even though I would love to see the collection.
Walmart has a museum?? What's in it, the bleached bones of workers who died maximizing their profits?
🤣 They actually have two: the Walmart Museum (a shrine to Sam himself) and Crystal Bridges, which they built to house their enormous collection of art and artifacts, which has "free" admission and they claim it as a give-back to Arkansas. I would have rather they spent their money on providing health care and free child care to their employees . . .
In the world of the 1%, there are bragging rights for vanity projects but not for fair dealing with workers.
TPJ, I would pay money to read your comments. Oh, wait, I do! :)
Thanks Adker. When does the trickle down effect reach me? There's no rush.
It's a 3 headed beast: Wages, Hours and Working Conditions. WalMart is hoping they can keep unions out with wages but it is hard to do when union workers have better scheduled, better hours, real overtime and working (safety for example) conditions.
Labor has a long way to go to get back. I’m very pleased with Biden’s Scranton working class roots.
He was not working class in fact. His father owned a car dealership. He has not been friendly to labor particularly in his long career, and did not fight for the $15 minimum wage even in his first 100 days, which is bizarre (making a name for himself as a hypocrite this past week after also giving a pass to the murderous Crown Prince he vowed to ‘make pay’). But the choice of Marty Walsh as head of Labor was a good one, and good will come of it!
Bide your time on Biden - I think he made a clear and clever power play calling the Crown Prince's father - there is more than one way to skin a shiek.
'Skin a shiek '!!! Well-played!
I hope you're right MaryPat! I listened to an hour-long discussion yesterday with experts in the field of Middle East, oil, and Saudi politics. They figured (while bickering) that we're now saddled with a bloody, narcissistic maniac on the Saudi throne for 50 years.
One seemed to think that "one murder was not enough to give up the allince for." As if it were one murder. And as if it wasn't a case of torturing a man to death slowly with a bone saw in an embassy in broad daylight. And as if in a world bent on renewable energy supplies by 2030, 2040 or in the slowest countries 2050, we really need a "friend" in Saudi Arabia. My heart is sick.
HORRID. Biden's goal appears to be to get the powers-that-be to push MBS out and put someone else in the family in his place.
Agreed about MBS, who sent an execution squad with a bone saw to murder khashoggi. Biden's tepid response made me angry. 'Democracy dies in darkness' WP
I have heard that opinion and you are probably right. Biden has seasoned and astute geopolitical advisors to guide him. But MBS is a dangerous man, emboldened by 'Special Boy' Kushner and the Trump Administration. I hope that Biden is 'the man with a plan' to effectively 'box' MBS in. So maybe going through his father is the best course. Time will tell.
Yep. Except in this case it was daylight, in a public building.
YES YES YES 👍🏻 🙏🏻❤️🤍💙
Which union are Amazon workers affiliating with, and how do we donate or support them?
RDSWU https://www.rwdsu.info. The best way to support unions is to buy union and use union services. I don't know if it's legal to donate to a union, they are self funded through union dues.
Thank you CJ! Some unions allow membership from outside of particular bargaining units, and there must be PACs or organizing committees that accept donations. I belong to so many unions, I usually just tell a president I'm feeling generous, and s/he obliges.
In the past, at least some union contracts treated men and women very, very differently. I hope you are right that that is no longer true.
I have never heard of that happening. Do you have examples?
In the early 1960's, I worked for a short time in the Necco candy factory in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was a union shop, perhaps a company union. Women were paid slightly less than the legal minimum wage or even the contracted wage when starting - $1.92/hour although the contract said $2.09 - so that all the workers who left before 6 months never got the difference. Jobs were segregated by gender. Women mostly packed the candy. Men made the candy and swept the floors. They were paid roughly double compared to the women. It was a racially mixed workforce with a clear hierarchy. I was terrible at packing, but I got a fast promotion despite my protests because I was a native English speaker and looked white. (The promotion was temporary because I really was too unco-ordinated for the work, plus I wanted to be put back where I could practise my French with the Haitian women. I was a college kid making some money in the summer.) None of that was remarkable at the time - it was just how things were.
Correction: early 1970s
Yup, much too young for work in the early 60s.
Excluding women (and minorities) from the labor market was/is very effective discrimination. Good wages mean nothing without a job.
so, so true.
By the way, we need some better language. The phrase "women and minorities" implies that all women are white and all minorities are men.
If it was a "company" union that would be outside the NLRA and NLRB. Company unions were outlawed in 1935, so unless you can remember the name of the union, or remember having to or being asked to pay dues, maybe it was something else. There are several types of unions and some have to represent employees who don't join but enjoy all the benefits of the contract the union fought for.
Don't get me wrong, I do believe unions have been and continue to be critical to the good health of this country. None of us are perfect.
I did pay dues, they were taken out of my pay. What I remember is my co-workers saying the union was cozier to the management than the workers.
I workedf or Safeway in the early 70's. Even as a PT I had to join the union. Thre was a male & female scale....supposedly because women couldn't lift heavy weight. I wondered who they thought was putting the large bags of dog food on the cart for the customer!?
About fifty years ago, I knew a woman who worked in the post office in San Francisco, slinging 50 lb mail bags all day. She was paid considerably less than the men, who "lifted" 150 lbs using fork-lift trucks, sitting comfortably, pushing buttons.
We The People, All Of Us This Time, Including Alabama, For All Time.
History is being made in 2021. First Georgia, now Alabama will rejoin the Union thanks to the good people of Bessemer. And it supercharges the labor movement. You heard it here first.
Union wages alway affect the prevailing wages in the region. Non-union employers have to be competitive to stay in business. This is an example of a rising tide raising ALL the boats, not just the yacht owners.
Union contracts are good for managerial compensation too. Who'd be a low or mid-level supervisor when being in the bargaining unit brings more benefit? Employers have to match contracts to keep managers managing.
Page refresh, over and over, and suddenly, there you are. Astounding reportage, fact after fact. And then the wondrous community and erudite conversation. They say it will come to a halt at 100 days of the Biden administration. I cannot imagine the losses.
De Santis selling out the vaccine, insurrection revelations leading closer to the congress and White House, the R fear of Garland, the ego-laden Manchin throwing his wrench into the works, a union potentially arising in the matrix of Amazon, and Van Hollen rescuing the ARP from endless shenanigans…
We do live in interesting times. Apparently, the level of fear has risen a couple of degrees in the R camp. A reckoning awaits. That arc of history and the promise of leaning toward justice. Tonight, I feel hope. I know that is not something I can cite with a reference, however, perhaps truth, integrity, and compassion will slowly and quietly carry forward into the lives of ordinary Americans.
Gratitude to you and this community!
Indeed Kim, you have the audacity of hope, which gives hope to us all.
I've tried multiple times on two different browsers ... but no luck. Are there key words you might suggest to find this article? Thanks.
Sorry, what are you pursuing?
"Page refresh, over and over, and suddenly, there you are. Astounding reportage, fact after fact." Re: Sandy's link to a story/article
I was referring to waiting for HCR
Ok - got it. Thanks ...
Ahh, Sandy’s links just non-functional tonight. I want to follow it as well. The frustration...
Same back at y’all
The filibuster should be ended so Democrates can use legislation rather than executive orders to establish laws that can't be easily undone by a subsequent president. The Supreme Court has said many times that law making should be done in the Congress, not in the courts. Moving the country in a serious and committed globally savvy direction is key to winning the vote of young people. McConnell needs the filibuster together with the Republican packed Supreme Court to hog-tie Democrats and stop them from getting the country past Reaganomics and isolationism to show young people the future is ahead of us, not behind. McConnell's strategy is to buy time so as to favor the political rise of younger Republicans like Jim Jordan, Josh Gaetz, Tom Cotton, and the Trump kids, to name a few; a political class with no deep educational backgrounds and experience in government, who are only interested in power politics, not governing, who can be expected to be dependent upon their handlers as the Reagan Boomers leave the table. Without the filibuster, Washington and Porto-Rico can be made states, protection of the vote can be accomplished, and healthcare can be put on a more solid footing. Even if Republicans do manage to win a Senate majority in 2020, having accomplished some solid legislation will speak for itself with forward-looking younger voters who are increasingly more educated and skillful and can see that opportunity lies with expanding prospects of global productivity and organization. In a post-World War II world predicated on a global scale community of concern the clear risk to the planet of mindless productivity, proliferation of nuclear weapons, and old-style display behaviors aimed at minority advantage and dominance. Conservatives have no legacy to pass on to the new mass of experience growing evermore distant from our global war defined age and present reality. Their increasing incoherence is science obvious: entropy in action. The risk of dragging on short-term thinking by keeping the filibuster will do greater damage than taking out the filibuster. A 60 vote majority is not majority rule.
Sadpanic, I want to live in the world you envision.
YES.
PHILENTROPY. PHILENTROPISTS.
There are reams of possible names for these followers of Salazar—António de Oliveira Salazar—the Portuguese dictator and his heroic rearguard action against Change, against even the clock. Stopped. Or turned backwards.
Those who—like all Putin’s horses and all Putin’s men—want to eternalize that sublime moment of EATING AND HAVING, even if it means no one else having or eating when there’s no more bread left to go with the circuses and the telescreens turn black.
YES. Government of Zombies, by Zombies and for Zombies.
“They have no bread… Let them eat ideology!”
Those adman’s ideas that snap, crackle and pop.
>>><<<
Either America moves fast to entomb the Thing from Mar-a-Lago, together with its biggest trolls and cohorts, in cells padded or without padding, or all Americans will find themselves entombed in the Zombies’ madhouse.
Then the ghouls waiting in the world’s wings will gloat… and do their damnedest to follow the enlightened example of that unique genius who found out how to run a-casino-that-goes-bankrupt.
Thank you for putting Eating and Having in the logical order, most people do not. R eaters don't ever want to see anyone other than themselves supping or even snacking, even as the food rots in the storehouse*. Even when they starve themselves to death as a result of their wanton waste they'll die happy knowing they kept the other from eating.
*How long can government surplus cheese and butter remain in storage before it's tossed in the garbage? Apparently never.
As of 2018:
https://brownpoliticalreview.org/2018/05/let-eat-cheese-vulnerable-populations-pay-us-cheese-surplus/
Updated 4 days ago:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_cheese
From 2014, government cheese in popular culture:
https://www.vice.com/en/article/wn7mgq/wtf-happened-to-government-cheese
Thanks, Daria.
Eating people is wrong, but I remember writing in 1997 of the world's premier press baron...
To Mr Moloch
Our Controller
Eating people
is normal
Meat-two-veg-
And-potatoes
Daily
Weekly
Monthly
And forever.
But that was in another country...
Apart from the Big Bad Wolf gobbling Grandma and Grandma's Old Party, there's an English poem about these good people's attitude to their "inferiors":
I want to see them starving,
The so-called working class
Their wages weekly halving
Their women stewing grass.
When I ride out each morning
In one of my new suits
I want to find them fawning
To clean my car and boots.
Philip Larkin
Yes, we must know our place.
Rupert Moloch?
The Great Man himself... to whom we all owe so much...
I have to admit, I admire his wife for saving him from the pie in the face. No one deserves to suffer that awful moment before it's clear they're not being murdered.
Philip Larkin a seriously cringe worthy human.
Ha! Have we ever found out how many little children the old woman who ensnared Hansel & Gretel in ate? Yummy, yummy.
Actually, as I was reading your post, I immediately thought of Jared Kushner's comment to the states last spring that the PPE belonged to them (the Feds) not to the states for distribution to the caregivers.
Morning, Daria! Just wanted to get that in there before I proceed to your links. Hope you and yours are well.
I'm so embarrassed. I had no idea about government cheese.
No way!
Very good morning, Lynell! Hope all is well with you and yours as well. 🌷 (My husband is cooking homemade sausage & pancakes as I write. Pure delight!)
Miss "seeing" you lately. My timing is way off these days! Homemade is the best. Enjoy!
And I miss seeing you too. I took a mini break from media lest my brain explode.
Great comments all around, Peter, but this one got to me: “They have no bread… Let them eat ideology!”
Thank you, Lynell.
When the Soviet Union collapsed, I had a nasty feeling—don’t ask me why—that we in the West would soon be inheriting Cominform propaganda, suitably dolled up in bright new clothes.
Sure enough, it happened, complete with prefabricated jargon inculcating predigested thought. To make it worse, Western brainwashing washes grey matter far, far whiter, without any need to shoot and imprison people by the million.
I'd have added more, but we have an allergic reaction to a Covid vaccine here....
Oh dear, Peter, hope all stays well with you and yours.
Thank you. Hoping this will clear up today, but the reaction was very hard.
Thanks, too for the info about Mozambique.
Thank you for replying, Peter. Hope all is better re allergic reaction by now.
Terrific phrasemaking, Peter. Salazar is arguably the most overlooked 20C fascist tyrant, and not the least important. His influence lasted even beyond his 1970 death, since Portugal didn't disgorge its African empire until 1975. Macau had to wait til 1999 and, as part of China, will never enjoy independence.
Thanks, TPJ.
Salazar is a fascinating case, he attempted not only to seal Portugal off from the world and its malign influence but from the century. The regime was extraordinarily repressive but did not need to engage in mass killing. Franco had provided a most effective demonstration just next door. The PIDE was an extraordinarily intrusive secret police, spying on everyone... maybe even more than the East German STASI.
I met an exiled Portuguese nuclear physicist in London in the early 1960s. Exiled because she'd caricatured the rector of Coimbra University. If she'd not been a Marquesa, she'd have been in jail... As for nuclear physics...
A Dutch friend liked to take his holidays in the backwaters of Northeast Portugal. The PIDE had him in and not only did they interrogate him, they had a very complete file on him. A "potential spy" because he worked for the Netherlands Foreign Ministry as a translator...
Portugal itself escaped, but its mass killings were displaced to Africa, especially Mozambique. Here's a review I wrote for the ALA. The author's sequel is still more impressive, but this has a better summary of events.
Dhada, Mustafah. The Portuguese massacre of Wiriyamu in colonial Mozambique, 1964-2013. Bloomsbury Academic, 2015 (c2016). 233p bibl index ISBN 9781472511980, $120.00; ISBN 9781472512000 ebook, contact publisher for price.
The jacket copy calls Wiriyamu Portugal's "most famous" colonial massacre, but "infamous" is more suitable. Casualty figures are appallingly precise: 385 named individuals dead; livestock slaughtered, houses and bodies burned; victims' memory desecrated by Portuguese denials. In 1972, the Wiriyamu area became a flashpoint due to rising FRELIMO infiltration and local chiefs' fraught attempts to chart a middle course between guerrillas and the colonial state. Though short, the book is thorough. Historian Dhada (California State Univ., Bakersfield) details the massacre and its antecedents, the official cover-up, and the saga of the story’s emergence in UK media. Marnia Lazreg notes that empires that resort to torture—and terror—seek to redeem the irredeemable and inevitably fail (Torture and the Twilight of Empire, 2008). The consequences here were severe, shattering Portugal’s credibility as anticommunist stalwart, provoking a 1974 coup by alienated army officers. Democratic resurgence ended four decades of fascism and five centuries of Portuguese colonialism. Revisiting such awful events must be harrowing for survivors, but assisted by a sensitive chronicler like Dhada, their full story is available at last. Lest we forget. Summing Up: Recommended. Academic and larger public libraries; undergraduates and above.
Choice Vol. 54, Issue 3, Nov 2016 © American Library Association. Contact permissions@ala-choice.org for permission to reproduce or redistribute.
Sadpanic, you GO!! Love to hear more from you!
Thank you for recognizing the urgent need to eliminate the filibuster.❤️🤍💙
What is the likelihood of the Democrats loosing a couple of Senators if they go after the filibuster, like Manchin and Sinema going Independent or Republican?
Thank you for your observation and humor. Fawning over McConnell, that is funny.
I understand the urge to get down and dirty and play to the populist gallery like the Republicans struggling with the pitiful specter of their approaching political death, but the short term satisfaction, as usual, will be short lived because there are no time-outs with following the reality-judged demands of principle. If legislative power is returned to Congress where creative governance belongs under our Constitution, anything the Supreme Court does can be legislated around and brought into line with the will of the people. Technically speaking, presidential encroachment on legislation needs rethinking for a new postwar global community with a common destiny (planetary survival) made up of old national communities with new extra-national obligations not allowed for in the Constitution when the president was granted unquestioned powers over national community concerns lying outside national the geographical limits determining nation-centered hegemony. With the World Wars, community self-determination is materially affected by extra-national factors structuring community responsibility and, more positively, opportunity. Young people are born into a reality ordered by moral and practical conditions of global citizenship and shared, cooperative governance. Our planetary habitat obeys conditions of planetary reality, which means the earth will one day be swallowed up by the expanding, dying sun, and life-forms will go a long time before that days arrives—so there is nothing inevitable, or self-correcting about the conditions necessary for organic life on planet Earth. Exploiting the natural world under conditions of actual material scarcity was self-limiting, and the legitimate "reward" for success was life; getting stuck on exploitation of nature through open-ended consumerism rewards narcissism which is not only destructive to threshold conditions for physical life on Earth, it's a poster-child of a towering lack of imagination. I'm not bad mouthing a "productive" planetary future of pointy towers, golf-courses, body-materialism gyms and the gambling Disneylands of get-rich dreams for pensioners looking to redistribute the wealth by getting fleeced.
It is very tempting for me to highlight every point made in Heather's Letter today. Even more than usual, each point she raises refers to our future as Americans. A good deal of it conveys the tremendous level of support The Rescue Plan will provide to poor Americans.
The Letter notes the role that labor may play given efforts to unionize Amazon's plant in Bessemer, Alabama. What's more, a union man from Boston has been nominated by Biden to be secretary of labor. That is exciting. It will be fun to hear the Boston accent of its former mayor, Tony Walsh, if he gets through to become our labor secretary.
In terms of labor, Heather did not bring up the defeat, thus far, of Bernie Sanders' amendment to the Rescue Plan of a minimum wage hike to $15.
A meaningful minimum hike is so crucial, I will be on this necessary hike until it happens. My heart will never forget the delivery people, the hospital workers, the grocery clerks, cleaners and home care aides that have been taking care of us through the pandemic and before.
URGENT:
Yesterday, the Senate defeated Sander's bill to gradually increase the Minimum Wage to $15, but the fight is not over. Some who voted against it were not ruling out an eventual 'yes' vote..
BERNIE SANDERS WON'T GIVE UP.
Please contact residents you know, organizations, etc., in the pertinent states, so that the Senators know of constituent support for the MINIUM WAGE HIKE.
Here is a list of senators voting 'no':
— Sen. Angus King of Maine (Independent) — opposed
Democratic Sens. opposed:
Tom Carper of Delaware,
Chris Coons of Delaware,
Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire,
Joe Manchin of West Virginia,
Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire,
Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona,
Jon Tester of Montana
Background: 'Seven states and Washington DC have passed legislation to raise their minimum wages to $15, but $7.25 an hour remains the minimum wage in 21 other states. Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Tennessee don’t have a state-set minimum wage, instead relying on the federal rate. Georgia and Wyoming have set their minimum to just $5.15, lower than the federal rate. The Economic Policy Institute reported that the minimum wage, if adjusted for inflation, should have already exceeded $15. “Yet since the late 1960s, lawmakers have let the value of the minimum wage erode, allowing inflation to gradually reduce the buying power of a minimum wage income,” according to a 2019 report. The group has reported that the minimum wage would have been $21.69 in 2020 and $23.53 by 2025 if it kept pace with economic gains; instead, $7.25 is worth 30 per cent less than it did 50 years ago, the group found.'
LET'S WORK TO MAKE THIS HAPPEN!
'The vote on Friday revealed that Senate Democrats are nowhere near having the support they need to raise the wage to $15. The disappointing roll call for progressives suggested that bipartisan negotiations with Republicans are the only way forward in the near-term on the wage, and the White House is entertaining that approach. Several Republicans, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, have expressed openness to a wage increase.' (Politico)
In my opinion, $15 an hour is so little after so long, not since 2009 has the minimum wage been raised, that WE MUST ACT. This social negligence highlights the extent to which so many of us in the USA are imprisoned by poverty.
LET'S GET THIS DONE!
Fern McBride! Thank you for your emphasis on $15/hr minimum wage. And your explanation. And your list of anti-increasers. Go Bernie. Let’s do what we can. ❤️🤍💙
I don't understand why there is such opposition to this, especially since it's "increase to $15/hour over 5 years." Can anyone explain this?
I am part of a Coop Grocery Store. We the Members are Owners of the Coop. We very much want to increase the minimum wage to $15 but the actual cost of doing so has been prohibitive to the overall budget of maintaining the store. We have opted over the past several years to gradually move toward the $15 minimum and are hopeful that we will get there before much longer.
Great objective. You'll get there.
And by the time you get there, $15 will be worth a lot less. I don’t know where you live but in the region I live in, $15 is poverty wages.
You've hit the key point, and the one that most of the No votes were (or should have been) based on. There are a lot of places where, as you say, $15/hour is nowhere near a living wage but, there are also places like SW Indiana, where I live, that $30,000/year is a fairly comfortable living, especially for a single person or small family. I'm in favor of a general rise in the Federal minimum as the floor but the states should be encouraged to update their minimum wage programs as should cities like SF, LA, Chi, NY, etc. where the cost of living is well beyond what most people can afford. In combination with an enhanced support program for children such as Sen. Romney is advocating, there would be a better system for everyone.
Imagine where 'they' think this could lead, a bit more money out of the pockets of businesses, unionization, lessening the enormous wealth gap, raising taxes on rich... oh, my God, it would be catastrophic as in the pre-Reagan days!
It’s true that there is a disparity in what money can buy you from state to state. No one was worried about that when farmers got billions from the Fraud45 bailout because of his China tariffs. Owing a home is the American dream and one of the first things Nasty45 attacked when he raised part of the FHA interest rate that Obama had lowered. $15hr in 5 years is an insult and keeps people in substandard apartments with greedy landlords. What is the reasoning behind the Dems voting no? Food, clothing and shelter level pay and they are still expected to pay income tax.
“The popularity of that bill spells trouble for Republicans.” How I wish this was true. Because, if it was, some Republicans would be voting for it now (especially those up for election in 2022). We know Republicans only care about retaining power. So, it’s pretty clear that they think remaining in power means they should oppose the covid relief bill. Why? Are they so protected by the undemocratic distortions of the system (voter suppression, gerrymandering, etc) that they are confident they can ignore the popularity of this bill? Or are they confident that their voters aren’t paying attention, or don’t care about policy? One thing is clear - Republicans believe they can oppose this very popular bill and be re-elected. Why is that?
How can you even think about covid relief when six less-than-popular children’s books with racist images are going out of print?
Exactly Joan. That’s the kind of thing that keeps me up at night. I don’t think I’d be able to do my job as a senator under those conditions.
I'm gutted, GUTTED I TELLS YA, because of the "de-genderization" of Mr. Potatohead. I mean, DEAR GOD, WON'T SOMEBODY JUST THINK OF WHAT WE'RE DOING TO THE CHILDREN?!?!?
Exactly! They won't know any more that you can tell men from women by the shape of their eyeglasses. They will think - gasp! - that vegetables have no gender! It's only a small step from there to - to - it's too horrible to think what could be next!
I mean, you know? I saw an article where they cited that Fox News had devoted over 4 hours of air time last week going on about these "cancel culture outrages", while other networks like CNN spent a total of 40 minutes in the whole week because, well DUH, it is simply NOT an issue. With all the other issues facing us and they're whingeing on about sh!t like this???
If you concentrate very hard on a tree you can't see the forest
It’s in my post from today, the big one. Their precious old society is dying, bit by bit. We can’t be proud of our racism anymore at NASCAR, no confederate flags. Mr. Potato Head going gender neutral, what a national tragedy. They’re like the wicked witch of the west: “Our culture of racism and sexism is melting, it’s meeelllttting . . . “
And of course the biggest insult of all, an African-American President. They despise and they detest that most of all. Anything to cancel the reality of having Obama as president. Anything to eliminate his legacy, anything to forget he happened. Is it any wonder that the one-term guy was so appalled that Obama’s Inauguration was so massive? No surprise. Just another obvious, in-your-face sign that the old society is no longer wanted, and that Republicans are being left behind as the social lepers they are.
Plant's DNA is practically as close to human's as chips'
Potato Chimps
Ooooh, good one MP
? chips DNA?
Chimps
But fruit trees have sex...at a distance... as one polinates the other...and vice versa
Fruit tree sex has variations that would definitely be censored by the radical right:
"Self-pollinating fruit trees include apricots, nectarines, peaches, and sour cherries; whereas fruit trees that require pollinators include apples, pears, plums, and sweet cherries. Trees requiring a pollinator may seem like additional work, however, it's really just a strength in numbers game." (google search result)
So do some humans. They're called incels.
What's the next outrage -- anatomically correct Barbie and Ken? As dear old Grandmom was fond of saying: Horrors!!!
How about anatomically divergent Barbie and Ken? Or maybe their gender-unknown friend Robin?
Biological trans parts? Who will wash the dishes? Who will take out the trash?? How will anyone know what household chores belong to who???
Gender stereotyping! Shame!
A non binary case no doubt!
Both would be obese !
Modern fashion is becoming more unisex especially in this pandemic when people just want comfort in their clothing.
Deep psychological damage to our 2-3 year olds pending!
We’re really in a LGBTQ revolution that can’t be ignored. I taught some transgender students and at first I was fairly inept at it— later I understood better. My gay son mentioned the Mr. Potatohead controversy and I cracked up because I had that toy growing up and I thought maybe there might be a Mrs Potato head.
When you don't have a wig to help and no make-up, all you have to go by for sexual determination of a head is that the "person's nickname is " spud"!
😂🤣😂🤣
I can hold both things in my mind and thank god the bill passed the senate.
Next thing you know they'll be sanctionning "Little House on the Prairy" !
With GQP anxiety about bathrooms, it's Little House on the Potty. !!!
Touche, Joan!
The problem with all of the speculations below is that you are all a bunch of intelligent, and extraordinarily well-informed citizens. Most voters are far below the average intelligence of this group, and nearly all of them have no knowledge or interest in the subject matter. They defer their choices to group-think, which is dominated by family, close neighbors, their church, and the propaganda from Fox and right-wing media. They simply don't KNOW they are voting against their interests.
Erase from your mind every bit of information you've learned from reading history, listening to HCR, browsing the web, and bring your total of your political knowledge down to things said by Tucker Carlson and the late Rush Limbaugh. You don't care about the makeup of the Senate. You don't KNOW the makeup of the Senate. You don't know anything about your Senator, except that he/she has been in power for a long time, meaning he/she has "seniority" in the Senate, and lots and lots of power. Power for YOUR state. Working for YOU.
You're white, you don't know what "voter suppression" is, and you've never even heard the word "gerrymander."
Who will you vote for?
Of course. And here we are. Civics back in the classrooms anyone?
Sadly, I sat down in my seat at a little table top booth during a years ago election and the person who sat down next to me asked the attendant who had shown them to their seat a question about the people on the ballot, not about how to fill it out. The attendant told them they could not discuss the actual election with them. The person next to me proceeded to read off the names, then came back to one of them and said "I recognize that name. I've heard of him before. That must mean he's well known. I guess I should vote for him?" and of course the attendant very properly demurred from response. I too remained properly silent and pretended not to be listening, though I had suddenly gone rigid with outraged shock - the reason they had heard of the candidate just might have been the horrific news reports about abuse of power, unjustified pursuit of personal targets using the advantages of their office etc. I support the right of everyone to vote, but we really do need to do something about the poison in the entertainment "news" media and to increase the ability of more people to assess their sources more easily (since laziness plays into it too).
Some folks support mandatory voting. That’s a frightening thought. A,B,C, or D? Of course it can’t get any worse than the last 4 years, even with multiple choice
I support mandatory voting. US should follow Australia's good example.
Didn’t Australia kind of do just the opposite from us with Covid? Somehow they seem almost a different species at this point?
You’ve hit the nail on the head.
I think it’s because the people who support their re-election coffers in the biggest way want them to continue to obstruct. After all they probably don’t need any $
Very true. But that’s only half of the equation. Yes, Republicans are funded by plutocratic elites. But they still need to win votes to stay in office. Ironically, they need the votes of MAGA folks who despise elites. Folks who will benefit from the covid stimulus. Folks who should refuse to vote for politicians who don’t vote for the stimulus. Those dots don’t connect.
Hmmm— I think the dots do connect
A logical person connects the dots and can move forward but when folks have thrown logic out the window in order to ignore their own dilemmas, (health, financial, etc.,) they get stuck in a labyrinth if their own making where the dots don't connect. Sometimes a life event happens that's extreme enough for A person to snap out of it. But now, as in the 30s people have been swallowed by 2 things, hatemongering and the cult of personality. A dangerous combination.
Daria is on the right track. JR, your logic is impeccable, but after a certain point is lost on the illogical. The pols give the Deplorables something else that they value. It's the classic argument of Thomas Frank in "What's the Matter with Kansas?" Then the distractions were god, guns and abortion, i.e. the culture wars. Now it's white supremacy, and the feeling of power gleaned from licensing normally forbidden aggression and cruelty: open racism, sexism, lying, cheating, violence against the weak. The trend toward violence is particularly alarming.
I have to believe that it's the final thrashing about of an ugly beast in its death throes. Tragically, it will take other lives before it expires. Hard work is necessary to hasten its demise.
It was always about white supremacy. Panic about white women having fewer babies was concurrent with forced sterilization of minority women.
Respectfully TPJ, words like deplorables sunk Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Let’s stick to the facts and put name calling aside. We’ve got such a steep hill to climb, let’s not create more obstacles.
I am often obliged to explain to my wife that in analysing a political problem she is making a very basic mistake...she is using logic!
Yes I hope many people snap out of irrational thinking. Maybe some will as they start getting checks from the 1.9 trillion.
I hope so too but I'm not holding my breath. One would think a logical person would not rail against the common sense practices of mask wearing, social distancing and hand washing yet millions upon millions of people have done so based on one man's refusal to don a mask and not hold large gatherings indoors. It's as though they checked their brains at the ballot box in 2016 and forgot that they had done so.
A friend of mine explains this by saying that there are some of them that have the hardware but not the software to make it work.
I may be dense, but I don’t see it. Dot 1 - Republican politicians are funded by corporations and wealthy plutocrats. These donors want Republicans to cut taxes on the wealthy, shrink government, gut regulations, cut government spending and benefits, etc. So Republicans in Congress dance accordingly, including fighting to kill the covid relief bill. Dot 2 - the covid relief bill is immensely popular with voters, including Republican voters. These voters want the covid bill to pass. Dot 3 - Republican pols want more than anything to be re-elected. Dot 4 - Republican pols are not concerned that they’ll lose votes for opposing the covid bill.
I can’t connect those dots. Why would Republican voters, who want and need the covid relief bill, vote for the very politicians who are trying to kill it? Why would Republican voters, who are diametrically opposed to pretty much everything the corporate and wealthy donors want, vote for the Republican politicians who deliver for corporations and the wealthy, and screw the voters? What am I missing?
Cognitive dissonance. Decades of propaganda have made Democrats the enemy. Anything that contradicts that belief is simply rejected as a lie. As Obama used to say, “they won’t even take yes for an answer.”
Spot on.
Therein lies the entire theme of HCR's book, "How the South Won the Civil War.". The boss with 7,592 cookies, convinces the poor white who has been given 3 cookies, that the lazy black stole the one cookie he has from you. Relief package will again be seen as transfer of your wealth to the worthless, and a righteous entitlement to the white. There is no winning in thst game.
So interesting to look at Covid relief from this perspective.
No matter how popular the bill is, it is the antithesis of the current GOP. Today’s GOP will drop dead before they will lift a finger for “all the people”
1. Plenty of people vote their values, not their wallets. That’s behind the years of artificial culture wars. 2. If state legislatures can stop all but Republicans from voting, a majority of remaining voters will vote R.
So for Republican voters, it doesn’t matter what legislation their representatives support, or block? Meaning that there’s no connection between Republican voters and their congressional representatives, beyond value-signalling? No wonder they’re so happy with destroying democracy, it serves them no purpose.
how long has it been that these dotless folks have been voting against their own interest? TPJ hit that nail: it is without logic. Currently the tools are as stated: hatred, white supremacy, 'all the nasties' as TPJ said.
For one thing, you are assuming the voters even have the dots. Many of them never get handed number one by the highly cherry picked skewed media of their choice. For another, you are forgetting the very very short memories and the very blindfolded tribal loyalty of the voters. Your dots are data and connecting them requires processing and neither are relevant to that particular subset of the voting public.
You are missing something important maybe someone else can tell you. Thanks for asking though.
What? I’m beginning to suspect you can’t support your opinion.
I forgot to include that the wealthy 1% who donate all that money to Republican politicians are also only 1% of voters. The wealthy can give Republicans a huge financial advantage, but they can’t give them votes. Republicans need to get the votes of at least 45% of all American voters (they don’t need 51% because the system is tilted in their favor) to hold onto power. Most of those 45% are middle class and working class Americans. Americans who really need the covid relief bill to pass.
Thats what I was asking myself - read the link (somewhere here) to 538(?) They dont have to worry - gerrymandering, voter suppression, etc etc etc ! I hope Stacy Abrams & her crew are thinking ahead & working on this for 2022!
Be still my heart
OMG, really? Maybe he wants to avoid the embarrassment of losing an election.
I think that’s usually why they retire. There’s always a baloney story about family time, that’s how you know they think they won’t get re-elected.
Paul Ryan comes to mind.
Somewhere in this country, right now, a journalist is probably gathering material for a book, sure to make the NYT best seller list, with the working title of "Insurrectionists Among Us."
Meanwhile, this litigation tracker was just sent to me:
https://www.justsecurity.org/75032/litigation-tracker-pending-criminal-and-civil-cases-against-donald-trump/
It will be interesting to see how cases against the Teflon Don at the top intersect with action against accomplices, especially in Congress, in the Pentagon, etc. etc.
The wheels of justice grind slowly, but it is important that they should not grind too slowly. That is how Berlusconi succeeded in keeping out of prison, a sort of judicial filibuster kept running until the statute of limitations put an end to all cases brought against him. Other Trump prototypes have used similar tactics...
It has been weird watching a once respectable political party, first hijacked by conspirators, then gradually transformed into one gigantic conspiracy against the nation, acting in full view of the whole world to overthrow US institutions wherever those institutions failed to yield to its proprietorial diktat. For a long time, the Wolf in a zoot suit swallowing Little Red Riding Hood’s grandma looked like a smart alternative to uniformed storm troopers with swastika armbands. Now we all know who lays claim to ownership of the land and all that therein is, while according no place and no rights to citizens whose skin color or political persuasion displeases the Herrenvolk.
Fingers crossed....
I don't know, he's been awfully busy getting directions from the Russians, might not have time for local boys.
Boy, I heard that too somewhere. Talk about an under-the-radar announcement. This is not a small thing.
I agree with HCR that the Alabama Amazon union vote is a big deal, and not just because President Biden invested significant political capital in the outcome. (Good for him!)
The real value of wages has steadily declined over the last few decades. That trend is not going to turn around by itself. Witness the fate of the recent $15/hr minimum wage initiative. Workers have been weakened by race-baiting, immigrant bashing, etc. that divide and conquer. A strong vote to unionize a huge employer would go a long way to undermine efforts to keep workers divided and weak.
There is also the lesson Jeff Bezos could take from Henry Ford, who gave his workers a wage raise so they could afford to buy one of his cars, cars they worked to make. (Ford also had an eye to keeping the union out of his factories with that raise, another lesson Bezos may be too late in learning.) More disposable income means more money available to buy things on Amazon.
Further note; while unionization has driven many jobs overseas, retail distribution centers cannot be exported. They can and will be automated, but that is a trend that will continue with or without worker union pressure.
Thank you Ralph Averill for recalling the one thing Henry Ford did that was admirable and enabled him to have build his business. I often wonder why biz leaders (and Democratic politicians) don’t lean on that decision and it’s consequences. ❤️🤍💙
Lessons can be had from company founders Heinz and George Westinghouse as well.
I come from the land of James Hoffa and Walter Reuther. I had limited but personal experience with unions when employed for summer jobs. First, in a steel plant and longer working in a chemistry lab of a county sewage plant. Both unions took money from my check for 3 month a year. Both, I was told by older workers, would never let me join. I was “too educated”.
The greatest problem we face in procuring good government and good unions is finding people of good character to do the lawful and ethical daily work that the job requires. This is true of all human institutions. It is our fault that we have institutional racism. It is our fault that we have sanctioned corporate greed (Joe Minchin’s daughter and Jeff Bezos serve conveniently). We have child abuse by clergy. The list of human failings is endless.
Despite the failings of the Robert’s court, we still have our greatest weapon in the fight for human justice. The vote. It is under attack by members of a dying system and culture. We must vote. Every time.
Thank you Bill Manor for reminding us about the VOTE. HR-1. S-1. End the Filibuster NOW. Restore voting rights which are under ASSAULT. ❤️🤍💙
I would add that we all must do whatever we can to help progressives in their campaign up to the election. Then, we can of course vote.
Frederick, James Carville stated that we voters deserved HAZARD PAY for enduring this last election.!
Good to hear from you. Hope you (and all of HCR community) are well.
UAW guy here. Walter Reuther 1000%. He spoke shortly before Rev Dr King at the Lincoln Memorial in 1963. American democracy at its finest.
The Republicans aren't governing. They're play-acting. They don't care a whit about people who are suffering. What they care about is stoking outrage about things they want people to think are outrageous but are manufactured out of nothing. They only care about doing whatever it takes to regain power.
And yet DeSantis is increasingly seen as a Republican front runner in 2024. He’s an absolutely terrible person.
I don’t think any brain power is involved when somebody says “front runner.” [Hell, you could make the case that there’s never any brain power involved, but I digress]. The Republicans with the highest national profile are automatically front runners. Any 4th grader who reads the news could make the call.
Thanks for that, Roland. Any other insults you want to lob my way?
I wasn’t insulting you, Ian. I gave your comment a ❤️ because of course I agree with everything you are saying. You wrote “DeSantis is increasingly seen as a Republican front runner . . . “ and then I insulted the right wing media, and the Republicans who see him as a viable candidate. Ron DeSantis is a blatantly self-serving and corporate-sponsor-serving individual. Based on what he has shown me and everybody else, I have zero respect for him as a public servant. I don’t think he thinks he’s a public servant. I’m sorry if you took my comments personally, they were not intended for you. They were intended as a derogatory view of the man and anyone who thinks he should run for president. Actually I like you, and everything I’ve seen you post
is something that I approve of, so I have no intention of insulting you, on the contrary I would praise you. I’m sorry if I rubbed you the wrong way.
Ah! My mistake! Sorry that I overreacted!
No worries. I’m sorry to put you out. Back in college, back in the very ancient days of my early psychology training, we were taught the %s of the various cues to communication. When judging a communication, we impart large percentages of import to tone-of-voice and facial expression and body language, and a minimal amount of validity to actual words. In fact, on a list of what constitutes effective communication clues, actual words are dead last. Here on this forum, all we have are words unless you use emojis and creative license. In other words, no tone of voice, no facial expressions, no body language. Plus we’ve never met, we don’t know each other, so we have no idea what to expect. Basically it’s the most difficult possible way to communicate effectively and clearly. So if there’s a miscommunication, it’s absolutely natural given the nature of this beast. Miscommunication should be rampant. If it only happens occasionally that’s a miracle. Sarcasm for example is very hard to read, you have to be tuned in just right or already have some knowledge of the person.
What I find is that when I get an emotional reaction here, it’s a Rorschach test of where I’m at in the moment. If I get triggered here by words completely stripped of emotion and the nuance of tone and inflection, there’s usually something going on with me outside of the HCR forum.
You cannot be too transparent in a place like this, nor too honest. Everybody is operating at a major disadvantage, we all have a huge handicap, when it comes to communication here.
Ian, we all have overreacted or misinterpreted posts at times, depending on our experiences or just where our head is at on any given day. I've found this wonderful, wicked smart community is relentlessly kind and honest about clarifying what the message or opinion given was intending to convey. I've misunderstood posts here too many times to count. And the sweet and sassy people here always get me to the right place in the kindest possible way. Just the content given here on how we really communicate is so insightful. No worries...
Online communication has its shortcomings. It lacks volume, tone, inflection, visual clues like body language, and nonverbal vocalization apart from an occasional Argh or Grrrr. Nuance, sarcasm, subtlety and irony are often lost. By now many people know this and will compensate; LFAAers are especially sensitive. We lead the league in apologies and polite qualifications.
And downright stupid as well.
He sure fits in in FL
Of course the republicans are doing everything they think they can get away with to prevent a competent person to be AG. They are complicit in the attempted coup on January 6th and Merrick Garland will use the law to make sure these treasonous insurrectionists are indicted, tried, and hopefully convicted. Not losing any sleep over the 300+/- who have already been arrested and are maintaining an existence locked up. Speedy trials; not likely! The delay game can be played on all levels.
“Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) is slow-walking the confirmation of Merrick Garland as attorney general, an odd stance at a time when one would think we would want all hands on deck to investigate the insurrection and ongoing domestic terrorism.”
He loves his power
Amazon let's employees sleep in their cars in the parking lot. They can shower inside the building. They can buy a meal in the breakroom. And if more staff are required, they go get some folks out of the breakroom. I heard all of these things when my nephew's significant other kicked him out. Working a full time job days and Amazon at night, my nephew did not earn enough to afford an apartment of his own in the Denver area.
The New York Yankees aren't the only Evil Empire in America.
Funny, IMHO, I call Walmart the evil empire. Big box retailers have paid their workforce so little - that many qualify for premium tax credits/Obamacare or Medicaid, food stamps etc. The US taxpayer is subsidizing the "low prices" by picking up the cost of this underpaid workforce. Bargain hunting and the pursuit of low cost of goods, also drive margins of US suppliers lower. The drive for increased corporate profits is at the expense of outsourced jobs in other places that may include: child labor, prison labor and unsafe working conditions. When my teenage daughter points to some cheap shirt she got a deal on, I ask her did the children and political prisoners do a good job on it? I also see how shifts away from traditional defined benefit pension plans played a role in the downward spiral of wages. When individuals in their 401K plan style pension plans are trying to save for retirement, they want investments with high rates of return. Part of what would have been living wages are transferred to shareholders for their profits.
Walmart IS another evil empire...we are drowning in them. And we are supporting them via taxes for benefits for underpaid workers. Dystopian, indeed, not to mention cruel profit-taking on the backs of already marginal and multiply oppressed workers. Intersextionality, anyone? (Intersectionality)
New word! "Intersectionality is an analytical framework for understanding how aspects of a person's social and political identities combine to create different modes of discrimination and privilege."
Thanks Melissa. There's absolutely more than just a couple EEs. American mega-corporations behave like usurpers in Game of Thrones, only with less nudity.