QuoteOccupy turns 2 today
Thoughts on an incomplete movement
BY REBECCA SOLNIT
I would have liked to know what the drummer hoped and what she expected. We'll never know why she decided to take a drum to the central markets of Paris on October 5, 1789, and why, that day, the tinder was so ready to catch fire and a drumbeat was one of the sparks.
To the beat of that drum, the working women of the marketplace marched all the way to the Palace of Versailles, a dozen miles away, occupied the seat of French royal power, forced the king back to Paris, and got the French Revolution rolling. Far more than with the storming of the Bastille almost three months earlier, it was then that the revolution was really launched — though both were mysterious moments when citizens felt impelled to act and acted together, becoming in the process that mystical body, civil society, the colossus who writes history with her feet and crumples governments with her bare hands.
She strode out of the 1985 earthquake in Mexico City during which parts of the central city collapsed, and so did the credibility and power of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, the PRI that had ruled Mexico for 70 years. She woke up almost three years ago in North Africa, in what was called the Arab Spring, and became a succession of revolutions and revolts still unfolding across the region.
Such transformative moments have happened in many times and many places — sometimes as celebratory revolution, sometimes as terrible calamity, sometimes as both, and they are sometimes reenacted as festivals and carnivals. In these moments, the old order is shattered, governments and elites tremble, and in that rupture civil society is born — or reborn.
In the new space that appears, however briefly, the old rules no longer apply. New rules may be written or a counterrevolution may be launched to take back the city or the society, but the moment that counts, the moment never to forget, is the one where civil society is its own rule, taking care of the needy, discussing what is necessary and desirable, improvising the terms of an ideal society for a day, a month, the 10-week duration of the Paris Commune of 1871, or the several weeks' encampment and several-month aftermath of Occupy Oakland, proudly proclaimed on banners as the Oakland Commune.
Those who doubt that these moments matter should note how terrified the authorities and elites are when they erupt. That fear is a sign of their recognition that real power doesn't only lie with them. (Sometimes your enemies know what your friends can't believe.) That's why the New York Police Department maintained a massive presence at Occupy Wall Street's encampment and spent millions of dollars on punishing the participants (and hundreds of thousands, maybe millions more, in police brutality payouts for all the clubbing and pepper-gassing of unarmed idealists, as well as $47,000 for the destruction of the OWS library, because in situations like these a library is a threat, too).
Those who dismiss these moments because of their flaws need to look harder at what joy and hope shine out of them and what real changes have, historically, emerged because of them, even if not always directly or in the most obvious or recognizable ways. Change is rarely as simple as dominoes. Sometimes, it's as complex as chaos theory and as slow as evolution. Even things that seem to happen suddenly turn out to be flowers that emerge from plants with deep roots in the past or sometimes from long-dormant seeds.
It's important to ask not only what those moments produced in the long run but what they were in their heyday. If people find themselves living in a world in which some hopes are realized, some joys are incandescent, and some boundaries between individuals and groups are lowered, even for an hour or a day or — in the case of Occupy Wall Street — several months, that matters.
The old left imagined that victory would, when it came, be total and permanent, which is practically the same as saying that victory was and is impossible and will never come. It is, in fact, more than possible. It is something that participants have tasted many times and that we carry with us in many ways, however flawed and fleeting. We regularly taste failure, too. Most of the time, the two come mixed and mingled. And every now and then, the possibilities explode.
In these moments of rupture, people find themselves members of a "we" that did not until then exist, at least not as an entity with agency and identity and potency. New possibilities suddenly emerge, or that old dream of a just society reemerges and — at least for a little while — shines.
Utopia is sometimes the goal. It's often embedded in the insurrectionary moment itself, and it's a hard moment to explain, since it usually involves hardscrabble ways of living, squabbles, and eventually disillusionment and factionalism, but also more ethereal things: the discovery of personal and collective power, the realization of dreams, the birth of bigger dreams, a sense of connection that is as emotional as it is political, and lives that change and do not revert to older ways even when the glory subsides.
Sometimes the earth closes over this moment and it has no obvious consequences; sometimes it's the Velvet Revolution and the fall of the Berlin Wall and all those glorious insurrections in the East Bloc in 1989, and empires crumble and ideologies drop away like shackles unlocked. Occupy was such a moment, and one so new that its effects and consequences are hard to measure.
I have often heard that Freedom Summer in Mississippi registered some voters and built some alliances in 1964, but that its lasting (if almost impossible to measure) impact was on the young participants themselves. They were galvanized into a feeling of power, of commitment, of mission that seems to have changed many of them and stayed with them as they went on to do a thousand different things that mattered, as they helped build the anti-authoritarian revolution that has been slowly unfolding, here and elsewhere, over the last half century or so. By such standards, when it comes to judging the effects of Occupy, it's far too soon to tell — and as with so many moments and movements, we may never fully know.
Preludes and Aftermaths
If aftermaths are hard to measure, preludes are often even more elusive. One of the special strengths of "Thank You, Anarchy," Nathan Schneider's new book about Occupy Wall Street, is its account of the many people who prepared the fire that burst into flame on September 17, 2011, in lower Manhattan, and that still gives light and heat to many of us.
We know next to nothing about that drummer girl who walked into a Parisian market where many people were ready to ignite, to march, to see the world change. With every insurrection, revolution, or social rupture, we need to remember that we will never know the whole story of how it happened, and that what we can't measure still matters. But Schneider's book gives us some powerful glimpses into the early (and late) organizing, the foibles and characters, the conflicts and delights, and the power of that moment and movement. It conveys the sheer amount of labor involved in producing a miracle — and that miraculousness as well.
Early in "Thank You, Anarchy," Schneider cites a participant, Mike Andrews, talking about how that key tool of Occupy, the General Assembly, with its emphasis on egalitarian participation and consensus decision-making, was reshaping him and the way he looked at the world: "It pushes you toward being more respectful of the people there. Even after General Assembly ends I find myself being very attentive in situations where I'm not normally so attentive. So if I go get some food after General Assembly, I find myself being very polite to the person I'm ordering from, and listening if they talk back to me."
This kind of tiny personal change can undoubtedly be multiplied by the hundreds of thousands, given the number of Occupy participants globally. But the movement had quantifiable consequences, too.
Almost as soon as Occupy Wall Street appeared in the fall of 2011, it was clear that the national conversation had changed, that the brutality and obscenity of Wall Street was suddenly being openly discussed, that the suffering of ordinary people crushed by the burden of medical, housing, or college debt was coming out of the shadows, that the Occupy encampments had become places where people could testify about the destruction of their hopes and lives. California passed a homeowner's bill of rights to curtail the viciousness of the banks, and in late 2012 Strike Debt emerged as an Occupy offshoot to address indebtedness in creative and subversive ways. Student debt suddenly became (and remains) a topic of national discussion, and proposals for student loan reform began to gain traction. Invisible suffering had been made visible.
Change often happens by making the brutality of the status quo visible and so intolerable. The situation everybody has been living in is suddenly described in a new way by a previously silenced or impacted constituency, or with new eloquence, or because our ideas of what is humane and decent evolve, or a combination of all three. Thus did slavery become intolerable to ever more free people before the Civil War. Thus did the rights of many groups in this country — women, people of color, queer people, disabled people — grow exponentially. Thus did marriage stop being an exclusive privilege of heterosexuality, and earlier, a hierarchical relationship between a dominant husband and a submissive wife.
When the Silent Speak
Occupy Wall Street allowed those silenced by shame, invisibility, or lack of interest from the media to speak up. As a result, the realities behind our particular economic game came to be described more accurately; so much so that the media and politicians had to change their language a little to adjust to — admit to — a series of previously ignored ugly realities. This, in turn, had consequences, even if they weren't always measurable or sometimes even immediately detectable.
Though Occupy was never primarily about electoral politics, it was nonetheless a significant part of the conversation that got Elizabeth Warren elected senator and a few other politicians doing good things in the cesspit of the capital. As Occupy was, in part, sparked by the vision of the Arab Spring, so its mood of upheaval and outrage might have helped spark Idle No More, the dynamic Native peoples' movement. Idle No More has already become a vital part of the environmental and climate movements and, in turn, has sparked a resurgence of Native American and Native Canadian activism.
Occupy Wall Street also built alliances around racist persecution that lasted well after most of the encampments were disbanded. Occupiers were there for everything from the Million Hoodie Marches to protest the slaying of Trayvon Martin in Florida to stop-and-frisk in New York City to racist bank policies and foreclosures in San Francisco. There, a broad-based housing rights movement came out of Occupy that joined forces with the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) to address foreclosures, evictions, corrupt banking practices, and more. Last week a conservative warned that "Occupy may soon occupy New York's City Hall," decrying mayoral front-runner Bill de Blasio's economic populism, alleged support for Occupy, and opposition to stop and frisk (while Schneider warns that the candidate is a liberal, not a radical).
Part of what gave Occupy its particular beauty was the way the movement defined "we" as the 99%. That (and that contagious meme the 1%) entered our language, offering a way of imagining the world so much more inclusive than just about anything that had preceded it. And what an inclusive movement it was: the usual young white suspects, from really privileged to really desperate, but also a range of participants from World War II to Iraq War veterans to former Black Panthers, from libertarians to liberals to anarchist insurrectionists, from the tenured to the homeless to hip-hop moguls and rock stars.
And there was so much brutality, too, from the young women pepper-sprayed at an early Occupy demonstration and the students infamously pepper-sprayed while sitting peacefully on the campus of the University of California, Davis, to the poet laureate Robert Hass clubbed in the ribs at the Berkeley encampment, 84-year-old Dorli Rainey assaulted by police at Occupy Seattle, and the Iraq War veteran Scott Olsen whose skull was fractured by a projectile fired by the Oakland police. And then, of course, there was the massive police presence and violent way that in a number of cities the movement's occupiers were finally ejected from their places of "occupation."
Such overwhelming institutional violence couldn't have made clearer the degree to which the 1% considered Occupy a genuine threat. At the G-20 economic summit in 2011, the Russian Prime Minister, Dmitry Medvedev,said, "The reward system of shareholders and managers of financial institution(s) should be changed step by step. Otherwise the 'Occupy Wall Street' slogan will become fashionable in all developed countries." That was the voice of fear, because the realized dreams of the 99 percent are guaranteed to be the 1 percent's nightmares.
We'll never know what that drummer girl in Paris was thinking, but thanks to Schneider's meticulous and elegant book, we know what one witness-participant was thinking all through the first year of Occupy, and what it was like to be warmed for a few months by that beautiful conflagration that spread across the world, to be part of that huge body that wasn't exactly civil society, but something akin to it, perhaps in conception even larger than it, as Occupy encampments and general assemblies spread from Auckland to Hong Kong, from Oakland to London in the fall of 2011. Some of them lasted well into 2012, and others spawned things that are still with us: coalitions and alliances and senses of possibility and frameworks for understanding what's wrong and what could be right. It was a sea-change moment, a watershed movement, a dream realized imperfectly (because only unrealized dreams are perfect), a groundswell that remains ground on which to build.
On the second anniversary of that day in lower Manhattan when people first sat down in outrage and then stayed in dedication and solidarity and hope, remember them, remember how unpredictably the world changes, remember those doing heroic work that you might hear little or nothing about but who are all around you, remember to hope, remember to build. Remember that you are 99 percent likely to be one of them and take up the burden that is also an invitation to change the world and occupy your dreams.
http://www.salon.com/2013/09/16/occupy_turns_two_today_partner/ (http://www.salon.com/2013/09/16/occupy_turns_two_today_partner/)
A few years ago I read a book called "Nuclear Rites" by Hugh Gusterson, who was an anti-nuclear weapon activist and an anthropologist. In his book he explores, as an anthropologist, both the no nukes activists and weapon scientists. In the chapters on the activists he keeps referring to the success of the no nukes movement. That puzzled me as I couldn't think of a single changed policy that the no nukes movement had ever brought (and he provided no examples.) It took me about halfway through the book to realize that the success he meant was participation in the movement and the demonstrations were successful simply by reason of their occurrence even though they didn't accomplish policy changes.
I think that's what the Occupiers wanted to accomplish as well, but even by that definition it's hard to see Occupy Wall Street as having been successful movement.
It did however give Miley Cyrus a minor hit presented here in its full auto-tuned glory: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5aVa9YfsNY (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5aVa9YfsNY)
Quotebecause in situations like these a library is a threat, too
I stopped reading at this point in the article. Was the rest just as bad?
I thought the article was extremely well written. I don't see how someone could try to put a positive spin on Occupy and do a better job than this.
Movements like no-nukes or Occupy are not about achieving anything but about being completely retarded. As such they have been highly successful.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 20, 2013, 06:04:38 PM
I thought the article was extremely well written. I don't see how someone could try to put a positive spin on Occupy and do a better job than this.
(https://lh3.ggpht.com/_ELFl2_1q7DI/TObn1HnV2fI/AAAAAAAAAaQ/5JkvAtpbv7k/s320/Not_sure_if_serious.jpg)
Ugh it was the significant part of the conversation that got Warren elected, hunt all the fuckers down! :angry:
Serious.
A lot better written than some of the turds you drop in here.
Quote
Occupy turns 2 today
Thoughts on an incomplete movement
*blah, blah, blah...etc*
Filthy hippie. Nothing that some OC Spray and a good beat down wont fix.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 21, 2013, 01:45:23 AM
Serious.
A lot better written than some of the turds you drop in here.
Quote from: 11B4V on September 21, 2013, 01:53:44 AM
Filthy hippie. Nothing that some OC Spray and a good beat down wont fix.
Sorta like this one?
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 20, 2013, 06:04:38 PM
I thought the article was extremely well written. I don't see how someone could try to put a positive spin on Occupy and do a better job than this.
Perhaps they could actually talk about Occupy itself and not just write a paean to Revolution.
QuoteEarly in "Thank You, Anarchy," Schneider cites a participant, Mike Andrews, talking about how that key tool of Occupy, the General Assembly, with its emphasis on egalitarian participation and consensus decision-making, was reshaping him and the way he looked at the world: "It pushes you toward being more respectful of the people there. Even after General Assembly ends I find myself being very attentive in situations where I'm not normally so attentive. So if I go get some food after General Assembly, I find myself being very polite to the person I'm ordering from, and listening if they talk back to me."
:hmm:
Quote from: garbon on September 21, 2013, 07:57:17 AM
QuoteEarly in "Thank You, Anarchy," Schneider cites a participant, Mike Andrews, talking about how that key tool of Occupy, the General Assembly, with its emphasis on egalitarian participation and consensus decision-making, was reshaping him and the way he looked at the world: "It pushes you toward being more respectful of the people there. Even after General Assembly ends I find myself being very attentive in situations where I'm not normally so attentive. So if I go get some food after General Assembly, I find myself being very polite to the person I'm ordering from, and listening if they talk back to me."
:hmm:
That's because Mike Andrews is a shitbird who never learned as a child that people other than him are more than meatbags.
Louis CK was right: http://teamcoco.com/video/louis-ck-springsteen-cell-phone
Shoot the hippies.
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 21, 2013, 06:48:39 AM
Perhaps they could actually talk about Occupy itself and not just write a paean to Revolution.
Then it exposes the fact that Occupy was pretty much a dud.
Young people should do Occupy stuff again so that I have less competition for money and jobs.
Not sure how a movement that pretty much fizzled out in four months can "turn two"
The occupiers I'm still aware of, or the few I'm still in contact with, have migrated to other things, currently chiefly the anti-fracking campaign, so in some ways they're performing the function of a rent-a-crowd.
It's a shame that a movement with a rather valid premise would up being overtaken by the easily-dismissed wackos. The increased role of casino capitalism in our economy is a problem, and will continue being a problem until we have another wake-up call like we had in 1930ies. Hopefully we won't have to waste tens of millions of lives this time to re-learn the lesson that some pockets full of free speech have successfully made us forget.
Quote from: DGuller on September 21, 2013, 06:29:28 PM
It's a shame that a movement with a rather valid premise would up being overtaken by the easily-dismissed wackos. The increased role of casino capitalism in our economy is a problem, and will continue being a problem until we have another wake-up call like we had in 1930ies. Hopefully we won't have to waste tens of millions of lives this time to re-learn the lesson that some pockets full of free speech have successfully made us forget.
I don't see how you can possibly infer that as the premise of Occupy.
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
Like Al Qaeda and the Klan.
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 21, 2013, 06:53:13 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
Like Al Qaeda and the Klan.
As you saying a hijacked airliner couldn't hit a Baptist church?
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:56:46 PM
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 21, 2013, 06:53:13 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
Like Al Qaeda and the Klan.
As you saying a hijacked airliner couldn't hit a Baptist church?
I don't think it would make people more receptive to their message.
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
No. They should make proper use of hunger strikes and self-immolation.
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 21, 2013, 06:53:13 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
Like Al Qaeda and the Klan.
Or the Weather Underground and the Symbionese Liberation Army.
Or Timothy McVeigh.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 21, 2013, 06:37:35 PM
Quote from: DGuller on September 21, 2013, 06:29:28 PM
It's a shame that a movement with a rather valid premise would up being overtaken by the easily-dismissed wackos. The increased role of casino capitalism in our economy is a problem, and will continue being a problem until we have another wake-up call like we had in 1930ies. Hopefully we won't have to waste tens of millions of lives this time to re-learn the lesson that some pockets full of free speech have successfully made us forget.
I don't see how you can possibly infer that as the premise of Occupy.
Wall Street is the biggest symbol of casino capitalism. Occupiers may not have had quite the same nuanced understanding of casino capitalism and the damage it inflicts, but the instincts were right.
Quote from: Phillip V on September 21, 2013, 07:11:54 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
No. They should make proper use of hunger strikes and self-immolation.
:lol: I doubt a Tibetan monk-b-que would even be noticed on Wall Street. Just another day in the Big Apple.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 21, 2013, 07:12:22 PM
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 21, 2013, 06:53:13 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
Like Al Qaeda and the Klan.
Or the Weather Underground and the Symbionese Liberation Army.
Remind me how many people died in Weather Underground attacks.
Quote from: DGuller on September 21, 2013, 07:47:41 PM
Wall Street is the biggest symbol of casino capitalism. Occupiers may not have had quite the same nuanced understanding of casino capitalism and the damage it inflicts, but the instincts were right.
That's about as reasonable as saying the starting premise of Occupy Wall Street was a visceral hatred of suspenders.
I judge their beliefs by what they said, printed on signs, and wrote. They thought their student loan loads were really bad. They thought their inability to get cool jobs was really bad. They thought banks were really bad. They thought unequal income distribution was really bad.
Quote from: Razgovory on September 21, 2013, 07:53:14 PM
Remind me how many people died in Weather Underground attacks.
Plenty of Weather Underground members. :lol:
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 20, 2013, 06:04:38 PM
I thought the article was extremely well written. I don't see how someone could try to put a positive spin on Occupy and do a better job than this.
I thought Peter Beinart's piece on the new new left was interesting:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/09/12/the-rise-of-the-new-new-left.html
Goddamn that's a long article.
Quote from: mongers on September 21, 2013, 06:22:37 PM
The occupiers I'm still aware of, or the few I'm still in contact with, have migrated to other things, currently chiefly the anti-fracking campaign, so in some ways they're performing the function of a rent-a-crowd.
Like hired mourners. :cry:
I read that earlier this month in France the anti-gay marriage protestors became anti-war protestors over the concern that if Assad fell Syrian Christians would meet the same unhappy fate as the Copts. The French equivalent of the Occupy movement, Printemps Français also opposed the war; so the far-right and the far-left united and held protests together.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 21, 2013, 07:12:22 PM
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 21, 2013, 06:53:13 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 21, 2013, 06:50:03 PM
Occupy won't mean anything until they figure out the proper use of explosives. Movements tend to get taken more seriously when body counts start climbing.
Like Al Qaeda and the Klan.
Or the Weather Underground and the Symbionese Liberation Army.
Or the Bolsheviks. OH WAIT.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 22, 2013, 03:20:59 AM
Goddamn that's a long article.
I liked it. It's 90-100% correct, with a caveat only that it doesn't draw the logical conclusion: the GOP is effectively finished as a national party for the next decade or more.
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 20, 2013, 06:03:05 PM
Quotebecause in situations like these a library is a threat, too
I stopped reading at this point in the article. Was the rest just as bad?
Most of it continues along in the same style.
Al Jazeera ran an article of the Icons of OWS. The People's Library was the first icon named; beating out even the kid with the dollar bill over his mouth:
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/multimedia/ows-icons-where-are-they-now.html (http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/multimedia/ows-icons-where-are-they-now.html)
QuoteMelissa Gira Grant's account of the Occupy Wall Street People's Library, Take This Book, begins, "No one founded the library. The library founded itself"—a quotation from librarian Jaime Taylor.
In the beginning was the word
Interesting article, Sheilbh. If turns out to be correct, it'll be interesting to see if the American left can hold it together or whether the transition leftwards will be as strained as the current tea-party driven strife in the GOP.
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 06:47:18 PM
Interesting article, Sheilbh. If turns out to be correct, it'll be interesting to see if the American left can hold it together or whether the transition leftwards will be as strained as the current tea-party driven strife in the GOP.
Maybe I missed it (as like Yi said it was a large article) but was there ever any comparison of thoughts of different generations when they were at the same points in their life?
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 06:57:58 PMMaybe I missed it (as like Yi said it was a large article) but was there ever any comparison of thoughts of different generations when they were at the same points in their life?
Yes:
QuoteThere is more reason to believe these attitudes will persist as Millennials age than to believe they will change. For starters, the liberalism of Millennials cannot be explained merely by the fact that they are young, because young Americans have not always been liberal. In recent years, polls have shown young Americans to be the segment of the population most supportive of government-run health care. But in 1978, they were the least supportive. In the last two elections, young Americans voted heavily for Obama. But in 1984 and 1988, Americans under 30 voted Republican for president.
QuoteNor is it true that Americans necessarily grow more conservative as they age. Sometimes they do. But academic studies suggest that party identification, once forged in young adulthood, is more likely to persist than to change. There's also strong evidence from a 2009 National Bureau of Economic Research paper that people who experience a recession in their plastic years support a larger state role in the economy throughout their lives.
Gotcha. I guess I'm just an artifact. :(
That said, I wonder why people lean more towards the government managing things. It isn't like it has shown a great capacity for change.
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 07:04:55 PM
Gotcha. I guess I'm just an artifact. :(
:console:
QuoteThat said, I wonder why people lean more towards the government managing things. It isn't like it has shown a great capacity for change.
I'm guessing because the cut back in government management has produced plummeting incomes and standards of living with prospects for more of the same.
Quote from: Savonarola on September 24, 2013, 04:46:10 PM
Quote from: mongers on September 21, 2013, 06:22:37 PM
The occupiers I'm still aware of, or the few I'm still in contact with, have migrated to other things, currently chiefly the anti-fracking campaign, so in some ways they're performing the function of a rent-a-crowd.
Like hired mourners. :cry:
I read that earlier this month in France SOME anti-gay marriage protestors became anti-war protestors over the concern that if Assad fell Syrian Christians would meet the same unhappy fate as the Copts. The French equivalent of the Occupy movement, Printemps Français also opposed the war; so the far-right and the far-left united and held protests together.
Fixed it for you. :)
Funny thing is the pro-homo marriage crowd was only described as provincial catholic bourgeois by the pro-homosexual marriage media while there were other religions present, namely muslims with veiled women. Also protestants, jews, orthodox, you name it. The same "progressive" media called it "marriage for all" which is obviously wrong, otherwise the Brain would have come to France to formalise his relationship with sheep.
The Printemps français is linked to the extreme-right in a bizarre nod to Arab revolutions (unwilling perhaps Prague Spring it is I think) so it's not surprising they're defending Assad like Marine does or her father did with Saddam Hussein.
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 07:08:29 PM
I'm guessing because the cut back in government management has produced plummeting incomes and standards of living with prospects for more of the same.
I guess that is one narrative.
Quote from: Duque de Bragança on September 24, 2013, 07:11:56 PM
Fixed it for you. :)
Thanks, my French is far from perfect (as is my understanding of the French.)
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 07:15:00 PMI guess that is one narrative.
That's the narrative the article describes as being on the ascendant.
If you want to counter it with a more Conservative alternative you can trade on the distrust of government, but you will likely - if the article is correct - have to provide a more concrete plan for improving people's lives than cutting government services and privatizing the delivery of public goods in a way that leaves the average person worse off (as per our student debt discussions).
There may be a Conservative alternative for improving peoples' lives, but I don't see even the potential outline of one being offered. I don't even see a clear analysis of the problems being put forth, to be honest.
Except that I'm not taking the position that you need to push for more cuts in gov't services. What I am skeptical of, is the notion that if we just increase the amount of gov't oversight, spending, etc, that we'll see long-term improvements. I see no evidence that the Warrens and de Blasios will lead us to a happier, sustainable future.
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 06:47:18 PM
Interesting article, Sheilbh. If turns out to be correct, it'll be interesting to see if the American left can hold it together or whether the transition leftwards will be as strained as the current tea-party driven strife in the GOP.
Nah. Middle, mainstream America, as a whole, has always had a substantial degree of loathing for left-wing activism in any form, going back two centuries.
Right-wing activism? Gawd bless Amurrica, love it or leave it, yew Commie. But left-wing activism never gains any traction. Never has, never will.
We'll see.
Wait a minute, the core of the Populists and Progressives was middle America. So too the Socialists.
I had fun yelling at the Occupy Cincinnati shitheads each time I drove by.
Quote from: derspiess on September 24, 2013, 08:22:21 PM
I had fun yelling at the Occupy Cincinnati shitheads each time I drove by.
All 6 of them
Quote from: Ideologue on September 24, 2013, 08:20:25 PM
Wait a minute, the core of the Populists and Progressives was middle America. So too the Socialists.
Yah for Prohibition.
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 07:04:55 PM
That said, I wonder why people lean more towards the government managing things. It isn't like it has shown a great capacity for change.
I think it is because they believe that it is the only power capable of holding back the depradations of "them," and they feel that they have some control over government, while they have none over "them."
Whoever "they" are.
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 07:35:08 PM
Except that I'm not taking the position that you need to push for more cuts in gov't services. What I am skeptical of, is the notion that if we just increase the amount of gov't oversight, spending, etc, that we'll see long-term improvements. I see no evidence that the Warrens and de Blasios will lead us to a happier, sustainable future.
I don't think the notion is that if "we just increase the amount of gov't oversight, spending, etc, that we'll see long-term improvements." I'm pretty sure the notion is that if we provide well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements.
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 08:44:55 PM
I don't think the notion is that if "we just increase the amount of gov't oversight, spending, etc, that we'll see long-term improvements."
I'm confident we will. :smarty:
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 08:44:55 PM
I'm pretty sure the notion is that if we provide well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements.
:lol:
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 08:48:40 PM
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 08:44:55 PM
I'm pretty sure the notion is that if we provide well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements.
:lol:
Exactly the attitude that got you a piss poor medical system.
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 08:55:51 PM
Exactly the attitude that got you a piss poor medical system.
America: fuck 'em or leave it!
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 08:55:51 PM
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 08:48:40 PM
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 08:44:55 PM
I'm pretty sure the notion is that if we provide well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements.
:lol:
Exactly the attitude that got you a piss poor medical system.
Maybe but then I don't think any of our politicians is really putting together these great "well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements."
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 09:01:36 PM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 08:55:51 PM
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 08:48:40 PM
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 08:44:55 PM
I'm pretty sure the notion is that if we provide well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements.
:lol:
Exactly the attitude that got you a piss poor medical system.
Maybe but then I don't think any of our politicians is really putting together these great "well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements."
Perhaps that is because so many voters react with a :lol: when it is suggested.
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 09:08:25 PM
Perhaps that is because so many voters react with a :lol: when it is suggested.
Or we get to watch Congress vote against it 40 times.
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 09:08:25 PM
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 09:01:36 PM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 08:55:51 PM
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 08:48:40 PM
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 08:44:55 PM
I'm pretty sure the notion is that if we provide well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements.
:lol:
Exactly the attitude that got you a piss poor medical system.
Maybe but then I don't think any of our politicians is really putting together these great "well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements."
Perhaps that is because so many voters react with a :lol: when it is suggested.
That's because it just sounds like a platitude. I don't think I'd be laughing if I saw something with some substance and an explanation of how it would work. I've yet to see that.
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 24, 2013, 09:09:38 PM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 09:08:25 PM
Perhaps that is because so many voters react with a :lol: when it is suggested.
Or we get to watch Congress vote against it 40 times.
Or vote for it but divert most of the funds to various state projects like funding poets in SF!
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 09:18:04 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 24, 2013, 09:09:38 PM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 24, 2013, 09:08:25 PM
Perhaps that is because so many voters react with a :lol: when it is suggested.
Or we get to watch Congress vote against it 40 times.
Or vote for it but divert most of the funds to various state projects like funding poets in SF!
Sounds like win-win to me.
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 09:01:36 PMMaybe but then I don't think any of our politicians is really putting together these great "well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements."
Is there nothing the government does right, in your view?
Quote from: Jacob on September 25, 2013, 12:20:40 AM
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 09:01:36 PMMaybe but then I don't think any of our politicians is really putting together these great "well targeted programs we'll see long term improvements."
Is there nothing the government does right, in your view?
We're generally pretty safe and its inertia dampens out many of the crazies who could get elected. :)
Yi feels their pain.
QuoteAIG CEO: Anger over AIG bonuses 'just as bad' as lynchings
By Ezra Klein, Washington Post
Updated: September 24, 2013
AIG's CEO Robert Benmosche — who came in to rescue the company after the 2008 financial crisis — told the Wall Street Journal that the outrage over the bonuses promised to AIG's members was just as bad as when white supremacists in the American South used to lynch African Americans:
The uproar over bonuses "was intended to stir public anger, to get everybody out there with their pitchforks and their hangman nooses, and all that — sort of like what we did in the Deep South [decades ago]. And I think it was just as bad and just as wrong."
Yes, enduring some public criticism for receiving multimillion-dollar bonuses after helping crash the global economy is a lot like being hanged from a tree by your neck until you die.
These kinds of sentiments don't emerge in a vacuum. Benmosche is expressing a view that was pretty common back in 2010 and 2011, when it was kind of a thing for members of the besieged 1 percent to compare public anger over their compensation to the way Nazi Germany treated the weak. There was supermarket mogul John Catsimatidis:
"Taxes are going to go up regardless. What I'm afraid of is, we shouldn't punish any one group. Whether we're punishing people who are wealthy," he said. "New York is for everybody; it's for the poor, it's for the middle-class, it's for the wealthy. We can't punish any one group and chase them away. We – I mean, Hitler punished the Jews. We can't have punishing the '2 percent group' right now."
Blackstone's chairman Steven Schwarzman had this to say:
"It's a war," Schwarzman said of the struggle with the administration over increasing taxes on private-equity firms. "It's like when Hitler invaded Poland in 1939."
I was in an off-the-record meeting with top Wall Street folks where similar comparisons to Nazi Germany were tossed around. It really was a meme on Wall Street that the singling out of the wealthy for criticism — and, more to the point, taxation — had a direct historical precedent in Nazi Germany, where the Jews were first demonized, then taxed, and then, well, you know. The sense was that the rich in general, and Wall Street in particular, weren't just being criticized, but that they were being turned into a dangerously despised minority.
That's the context of Benmosche's comment. I would bet he's made the same point a number of times in private rooms to appreciative nods. When you say and hear that kind of thing often enough, however, you forget how insane and offensive it is — and then you say it to the Wall Street Journal.
:lol:
I'm surprised they didn't lead with "AIG's white CEO" just to underscore how out of touch he is.
Quote from: Jacob on September 24, 2013, 07:03:22 PM
Quote from: garbon on September 24, 2013, 06:57:58 PMMaybe I missed it (as like Yi said it was a large article) but was there ever any comparison of thoughts of different generations when they were at the same points in their life?
Yes:
QuoteThere is more reason to believe these attitudes will persist as Millennials age than to believe they will change. For starters, the liberalism of Millennials cannot be explained merely by the fact that they are young, because young Americans have not always been liberal. In recent years, polls have shown young Americans to be the segment of the population most supportive of government-run health care. But in 1978, they were the least supportive. In the last two elections, young Americans voted heavily for Obama. But in 1984 and 1988, Americans under 30 voted Republican for president.
QuoteNor is it true that Americans necessarily grow more conservative as they age. Sometimes they do. But academic studies suggest that party identification, once forged in young adulthood, is more likely to persist than to change. There's also strong evidence from a 2009 National Bureau of Economic Research paper that people who experience a recession in their plastic years support a larger state role in the economy throughout their lives.
I don't think that you can draw a general rule from comparing the Obamaniacs to the Reaganauts.
Holy cats! An occupier actually ran for public office:
QuoteSocialist in Seattle: City councilor expects not to be a rarity for long
by Cedar Burnett November 25, 2013 6:00AM ET
Kshama Sawant, rising from the Occupy movement, hopes to be the first of many new anti-corporate politicians in America
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Famerica.aljazeera.com%2Fcontent%2Fajam%2Farticles%2F2013%2F11%2F25%2Fsocialist-in-seattlenewcitycouncilorseesmorelikeher%2Fjcr%3Acontent%2Fmainpar%2Fadaptiveimage%2Fsrc.adapt.960.high.1385404119373.jpg&hash=78771e0226d8c27704d2bae7c0c3ed8b243ee39b)
SEATTLE — Kshama Sawant, Seattle's new socialist City Council member, bears little resemblance to the conventional image of a modern U.S. politician whose appearance and policies are often burnished by legions of advisers and focus groups.
A small, whip-smart Indian-American woman in faded jeans with a makeup-free face, she holds a Ph.D. in economics and was an early participant in the Occupy protest movement.
Sawant is not shy about her left-wing party affiliation — despite America's modern habit of reacting with extreme hostility to the word "socialism," which is freely demonized on the right and treated with extreme caution even in progressive circles.
Yet Sawant is a clear exception. She told Al Jazeera that she was already going against convention by siding with the groups she sees as typically shut out of the political conversation — low-wage workers, women, immigrants and people of color — and so chose to identify her socialist affiliation to gain distance from a two-party system she sees as broken.
Now, having won office with a surprise result that captured national headlines, she is triumphant in tone and feels that being a socialist in America is not necessarily a ticket to electoral disaster, as it has been so many times in the past.
"We've shown that it's possible to succeed in an openly socialist campaign, not taking any money from big business, not currying favor from the establishment and openly rejecting business as usual," said Sawant, speaking from a victory rally in Seattle that more closely resembled a religious revival than the glossy parties typically seen in modern politics.
Somewhere between the calls to "my brothers and sisters," the booing and the clapping, supporters rose to pledge donations — or, in the case of one elderly gentleman, denounce the actions of the rich to the rapt crowd. "I just want to say that I'm a member of the 1 percent and I'm ashamed of my compatriots," said J.P. Shapiro, a retired attorney who forked over the maximum legal contribution for an individual.
A 41-year-old emigre from Mumbai, Sawant grew up observing the consequences of the caste system and abject poverty — though she was part of a middle-class family from the Brahman caste. She said such exposure shaped her views and eventual conversion to socialism after her move to Seattle in 2006.
She said Seattle, like many major cities, is controlled by the Democratic Party establishment, which has abandoned the interests of its constituents and left people hungry for an alternative. She campaigned on leftist policies like raising the minimum wage to $15 per hour, taxing the rich and implementing rent control, and her narrow victory shocked her opponents and local media, which confidently expected four-time incumbent Richard Conlin to emerge as the victor.
Ever since Conlin's concession on Nov. 15, Sawant's supporters have continued to knock on doors and validate challenged signatures to account for every vote. While the final tallies will be announced later on Monday, the gap has continued to grow in Sawant's favor, with more than 90,000 votes cast for the college economics professor.
"People who have never voted before not only voted but also volunteered for this campaign," said Ted Virdone, a Sawant volunteer himself. "Kshama's campaign means something completely different than the politics we've seen before."
For Sawant, "completely different" includes donating much of her new $120,000 salary, leaving her with "an average worker's wage." It also means talking about swinging hard left and attacking the capitalist economy as a failed experiment, unable to deliver the most basic needs for human survival — rare words in American politics.
"We have billions of workers doing backbreaking work all over the world who generate this phenomenal productivity the system enjoys," she said. "These workers only get a little sliver of the wealth generated, and much of that wealth is siphoned off to the tiny global elite at the top."
Sawant said Americans are looking outside the two-party framework and aren't afraid of socialism anymore. "The American public is well to the left of what the media will tell you and well to the left of Congress. That's why the popularity of Congress is at an all-time low," she said.
American socialists have a long history to look back on. The Socialist Party of America won more than 900,000 votes in the presidential elections of 1912 and 1920 and elected two members to Congress, as well as winning many lesser posts in cities across the U.S. But since then, the political fortunes of U.S. socialists have dramatically declined and — especially during and since the Cold War — the ideology has been routinely demonized and portrayed as unpatriotic.
It is doubtful that Sawant's election in Seattle marks a sudden reversal of fortune. But her staff is adamant that times are changing, especially in the wake of the Great Recession, which spawned a debate about economic inequality and saw the rise and fall of the Occupy protest movement.
Devin Matthews, a staff member for Sawant's campaign, points to a recent Pew research poll showing that the majority of people ages 18 to 29 have a more favorable view of socialism than capitalism. "When they grow up seeing (right-wing media commentator) Glenn Beck screaming about socialists, they think, 'I don't know what socialism is, but if Glenn Beck hates it, maybe I should check it out,'" Matthews said.
But not all are convinced. Joel Grus, a Seattle voter and data scientist, disagrees with Sawant's ideas. He says her policies will make it harder for low-skilled people to find jobs in Seattle and harder to attract entrepreneurial talent.
"I expect her term to be greatly entertaining," he said, "particularly if she follows through on her threat to seize a Boeing factory and retool it to produce transit buses or whenever she floats the idea of collectivizing Amazon."
'Anointed by big business'
However, Sawant doesn't consider her goals particularly outrageous and said there is a disconnect between public opinion and what the Democrats and Republicans are willing to deliver. Her campaign was launched with the help of Socialist Alternative, a political party active in at least 20 major U.S. cities; she was supported by unions, the Green Party and the influential local weekly The Stranger. Many of her volunteers and staff were involved in the Occupy movement in Seattle and elsewhere across the country.
"Corporate politicians get people to vote for them, but in reality they're anointed by big business," she said. "They are not going to vote to tax the wealthy because they're serving the wealthy."
While her primary focus is on Seattle and its struggles with transportation, housing and wages, Sawant said she is unwilling to completely isolate the local fight from the global struggle in her discussions of the issues. She views the Occupy movement as a precursor to her election, both philosophically and in a literal sense as a generator of volunteers. She said the movement ended a public silence on a lot of things people were angry about, particularly the bailout of banks widely blamed for the financial collapse, high unemployment and an epidemic of foreclosures and evictions.
Those people are becoming increasingly vocal. Chris Gray, an organizer who drove out with a group from Minneapolis to help Sawant after a slim loss there for a socialist candidate, thinks there's nothing special about Seattle or Minneapolis.
"The conditions exist in every city for challenges like this," he said.
While getting a socialist elected to the city council of a major U.S. city is hardly a political earthquake that will herald the rebirth of socialism in the mainstream of American politics, Sawant does not think it will be an isolated event.
"That's not how history works," she said. "This is a continuum where people learn lessons and progress to the next level. Their political consciousness evolves, and they gain confidence to fight for bigger things.
"Unless we relish the idea of our children being subjected to an endless battle for the same reforms over and over again and seeing the expansion of poverty between every fight for reforms, we have to look for an alternative to capitalism."
Good. I prefer my far lefties be open & honest about their views.
Quote from: derspiess on November 25, 2013, 02:38:44 PM
Good. I prefer my far lefties be open & honest about their views.
Indeed and I prefer them to get elected. :D
She sounds awful.
Ours is not a system that you can change from within like that. :) Good luck to her I guess, though.
Let a hundred flowers bloom, let a hundred schools of thought contend.
What are these $15 minimum wage places going to do when people show up from all over the country?
Milwaukee elected a Socialist mayor.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on November 25, 2013, 03:08:24 PM
Let a hundred flowers bloom, let a hundred schools of thought contend.
What are these $15 minimum wage places going to do when people show up from all over the country?
Does it make a difference what the minimum wage is if you are unemployed? Would you move cross country to somewhere where the minimum wage was higher without having a job lined up first?
Quote from: frunk on November 25, 2013, 03:16:05 PM
Does it make a difference what the minimum wage is if you are unemployed? Would you move cross country to somewhere where the minimum wage was higher without having a job lined up first?
People move without having something already lined up all the time.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on November 25, 2013, 03:27:55 PM
People move without having something already lined up all the time.
Sure they do...but typically not for a minimum wage job. Besides a part of the country with a higher minimum wage probably costs more to live in so it would probably not do you much good.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on November 25, 2013, 03:27:55 PM
People move without having something already lined up all the time.
So they might have a slightly higher number of unemployed for a while. I don't think they are going to get a huge influx of higher minimum wage hunters.
I just saw this article about the aforementioned Kshama Sawant and I thought Ide would appreciate it:
QuoteSeattle City Councilmember-elect shares radical idea with Boeing workers
By Gary Horcher
SEATTLE — Seattle City Councilmember-elect Kshama Sawant told Boeing machinists her idea of a radical option, should their jobs be moved out of state
"The workers should take over the factories, and shut down Boeing's profit-making machine," Sawant announced to a cheering crowd of union supporters in Seattle's Westlake Park Monday night.
This week, Sawant became Seattle's first elected Socialist council member. She ran on a platform of anti-capitalism, workers' rights, and a $15 per-hour minimum wage for Seattle workers.
On Monday night, she spoke to supporters of Boeing Machinists, six days after they rejected a contract guaranteeing jobs in Everett building the new 777X airliner for eight years, in exchange for new workers giving up their guaranteed company pensions.
Now Boeing is threatening to take those jobs to other states. "That will be nothing short of economic terrorism because it's going to devastate the state's economy," she said.
Sawant is calling for machinists to literally take-possession of the Everett airplane-building factory, if Boeing moves out. She calls that "democratic ownership."
"The only response we can have if Boeing executives do not agree to keep the plant here is for the machinists to say the machines are here, the workers are here, we will do the job, we don't need the executives. The executives don't do the work, the machinists do," she said.
Sawant says after workers "take-over" the Everett Boeing plant; they could build things everyone can use.
"We can re-tool the machines to produce mass transit like buses, instead of destructive, you know, war machines," she told KIRO 7.
Sawant says she was referring to "drones" when speaking of war machines. Still, she says even as they work on the lines, building airplanes daily, she believes Boeing workers are under siege.
"Workers have to realize, they have more power than they think," she said.
VICTORY THROUGH MASS TRANSIT!
Commemorate your Occupy experience with this (http://www.walmart.com/ip/32626555?adid=1500000000000027727740&wmlspartner=TnL5HPStwNw&sourceid=08031999650209960638&oid=183959.1&affillinktype=10&veh=aff) Zucotti Park photo from Wal-Mart!
For kshama.
Quote from: MadImmortalMan on December 18, 2013, 03:47:36 PM
Commemorate your Occupy experience with this (http://www.walmart.com/ip/32626555?adid=1500000000000027727740&wmlspartner=TnL5HPStwNw&sourceid=08031999650209960638&oid=183959.1&affillinktype=10&veh=aff) Zucotti Park photo from Wal-Mart!
:lol: Awesome; I hope it's made in China.
Quote from: Savonarola on December 18, 2013, 03:44:00 PM
"We can re-tool the machines to produce mass transit like buses, instead of destructive, you know, war machines," she told KIRO 7.
Yep, just push a couple of buttons, flip a switch or two, and pull that lever over there and you'll be churning out Greyhounds in no time. :)
A real socialist. And she got elected. In the US.
I always said the Americans wouldn't know a real socialist if they saw one. :D
While Boeing is being rather crappy, playing the ol' "extort states for tax breaks" game, Kshama is also clearly quite naive.
Quote from: Tonitrus on December 18, 2013, 04:08:37 PM
Boeing is being rather crappy, playing the ol' "extort states for tax breaks" game
Are you getting this from this article, or somewhere else?
The only thing I got from this article was that Boeing was threatening to pick up stakes if the union didn't take the deal.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on December 18, 2013, 04:24:07 PM
Quote from: Tonitrus on December 18, 2013, 04:08:37 PM
Boeing is being rather crappy, playing the ol' "extort states for tax breaks" game
Are you getting this from this article, or somewhere else?
The only thing I got from this article was that Boeing was threatening to pick up stakes if the union didn't take the deal.
Tonitrus lived through the years Boeing extorted Washington State
Women. :rolleyes:
Quote from: Admiral Yi on December 18, 2013, 04:24:07 PM
Quote from: Tonitrus on December 18, 2013, 04:08:37 PM
Boeing is being rather crappy, playing the ol' "extort states for tax breaks" game
Are you getting this from this article, or somewhere else?
The only thing I got from this article was that Boeing was threatening to pick up stakes if the union didn't take the deal.
A deal with the union is one aspect, state/local tax breaks and other incentives are another.
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2013-12-15/business/ct-biz-1215-phil-boeing--20131215_1_chicago-based-boeing-teal-group-richard-aboulafia
Negotiating a business deal is extortion?
To be fair, the Boeing Machinists union is probably one of the more unreasonable and intractable unions out there. But that being said, Boeing has often pulled the "give us what we want, or we move to Kansas, South Carolina, etc" game many numbers of times.
And they can never be forgiven for relocating their HQ to Chicago. :mad:
Quote from: crazy canuck on December 18, 2013, 04:05:58 PM
A real socialist. And she got elected. In the US.
I always said the Americans wouldn't know a real socialist if they saw one. :D
They blend in better in some places than in others. Around here they stick out like a sore thumb. Like this dude: http://danlabotz.com/
Quote from: Tonitrus on December 18, 2013, 04:31:59 PM
But that being said, Boeing has often pulled the "give us what we want, or we move to Kansas, South Carolina, etc" game many numbers of times.
Then maybe your beef should be with the state officials who keep giving them what they want rather than with Boeing.
Quote from: The Brain on December 18, 2013, 04:30:22 PM
Negotiating a business deal is extortion?
In the same way when a sports franchise say "build us a stadium, or we move the team" is extortion.
But, while nefarious, the company's actions are also understandable. As there are plenty of politicians out there willing to sell out any and all tax revenue to garner a big company's presence. As voters see jobs as a tangible thing, and don't care that everyone (even those who don't work there) pay more in overall taxes because of it.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on December 18, 2013, 04:36:11 PM
Quote from: Tonitrus on December 18, 2013, 04:31:59 PM
But that being said, Boeing has often pulled the "give us what we want, or we move to Kansas, South Carolina, etc" game many numbers of times.
Then maybe your beef should be with the state officials who keep giving them what they want rather than with Boeing.
Both are to blame.
It's almost certainly impossible, but individual corporate tax breaks should probably be illegal anyway ("equal protection" and all that...or in this case, equal taxation). If the determining factor then become just whatever deal the company can make with their potential workers, so be it.
Quote from: Tonitrus on December 18, 2013, 04:38:02 PM
Quote from: The Brain on December 18, 2013, 04:30:22 PM
Negotiating a business deal is extortion?
In the same way when a sports franchise say "build us a stadium, or we move the team" is extortion.
But, while nefarious, the company's actions are also understandable. As there are plenty of politicians out there willing to sell out any and all tax revenue to garner a big company's presence. As voters see jobs as a tangible thing, and don't care that everyone (even those who don't work there) pay more in overall taxes because of it.
So it isn't extortion at all. You seem to have a strong sense of entitlement.
Quote from: Tonitrus on December 18, 2013, 04:43:31 PM
It's almost certainly impossible, but individual corporate tax breaks should probably be illegal anyway ("equal protection" and all that...or in this case, equal taxation). If the determining factor then become just whatever deal the company can make with their potential workers, so be it.
It should definitely be illegal for Boeing and only Boeing to qualify for tax breaks, but that's not the case. Anyone can go to a state economic development office with a proposal.
The issue then is should states be allowed to give tax breaks to companies engaging in green field investments and bringing jobs with them, and I don't see why not. You stated earlier that other tax payers will have to pay more taxes, but states don't do these deals for prestige, they do them because the increased economic activity increases revenues.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on December 18, 2013, 04:52:54 PM
states don't do these deals for prestige, they do them because the increased economic activity increases revenues.
I think that statement is debatable.
Quote from: Barrister on December 18, 2013, 04:57:48 PM
I think that statement is debatable.
Are you arguing from first premises, or do you have an example or two in mind?
Quote from: Admiral Yi on December 18, 2013, 05:03:34 PM
Quote from: Barrister on December 18, 2013, 04:57:48 PM
I think that statement is debatable.
Are you arguing from first premises, or do you have an example or two in mind?
I think that politicians rarely do a careful econometric analysis to determine whether or not such incentives are a net positive for their jurisdiction. Instead they see "JOBS=VOTES" and then ex post facto try and rationalize their decision.
Quote from: Barrister on December 18, 2013, 05:05:10 PM
I think that politicians rarely do a careful econometric analysis to determine whether or not such incentives are a net positive for their jurisdiction. Instead they see "JOBS=VOTES" and then ex post facto try and rationalize their decision.
Econometrics wouldn't do you any good. The investor tells you how many people they're going to hire at what wages and some scut down at the economic development office plugs them into a spreadsheet to come up with a revenue number.
Seize the factories! Then seize the suppliers' warehouses when you run out of building materials. Then the farmers' produce when you need food. Then install Ide as the Commissar to ensure Ideological Reliability. No thank you.
To be fair, you could do a lot worse than me as a commissar for anything. I'm a pretty mellow dude.
Crunchy for Commisar!
Quote from: Admiral Yi on December 18, 2013, 05:03:34 PM
Quote from: Barrister on December 18, 2013, 04:57:48 PM
I think that statement is debatable.
Are you arguing from first premises, or do you have an example or two in mind?
I know of some local examples. I strongly suspect that there examples of this in other states and across the country.