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Surprising Occupy Surprises Even Cynical Me

From the very beginning, the Occupy movement has been one surprise after another. The scale of the turnout in lower Manhattan is said to have stunned the AdBusters crew. The scale of peripheral support that came to the major protests surprised the activist core. The scale of the police response surprised the major media that wanted to ignore the story. And the speed with which the movement swept across the country surprised everyone.

But more than anything, the biggest surprise has been the movement’s staying power. Despite virtually all the US encampments being raided or voluntarily abandoned, the movement continues to offer up – you guessed it – surprises.

Occupy the SEC

Last weeks’ 325-page letter to the SEC et al from an Occupy Wall Street working group that supports the Volcker Rule portion of Dodd-Frank, came as a shock to the financial community. This was no rambling left wing polemic (such as you might be reading now), but a carefully considered expression of the broad ranging benefits of controls on the largest institutions. It was the kind of thing that could only be constructed by people who come from inside those large financial institutions.

To decode, this was Wall Street occupying Wall Street. Well and truly the 5th Column.

Surely, it is dawning on even the most strident radical capitalist that it is in their own self-interest to come to grips with the basics of this movement. It’s one thing when left wing radicals are talking about income inequality. It’s something else altogether different when it’s a major topic at the World Economic Forum in Davos!

This doesn’t need to make sense; only fiction needs to make sense. It is what it is, and I am very pleasantly surprised.

Reestablishing Solidarity

As the winter weather kept many people indoors and away from Occupy actions, I’ve become a bit concerned that the potentially fractious nature of hardcore activist collaborations would create an atmosphere that might discourage or alienate the large mass of peripheral supporters like me. While it’s true that I haven’t seen much evidence of this, I also haven’t seen much evidence of the opposite.

For this reason, I’ve suggested to every Occupier I know that it would be helpful to us on the periphery if Occupy created a series of regular, low-risk protests scheduled at such a time and constructed in such a way that so-called “regular people” could feel safe in coming out and showing solidarity with the core of the movement. The model that I keep pointing to is the regular Monday night protests held in 1989 in Berlin on both sides of the Berlin Wall.

Don’t Screw This Up

I’ve heard from many in and around the core of the movement their concern about some issues and ideas taking precedent over others. If that line of thinking becomes  prevalent, this movement will fail.

To be sure, it is crucial that the movement remain open to and aware of ALL the various viewpoints, issues, communities, etc. that make up this remarkable collection. But it is equally crucial that ALL these communities recognize that is the solidarity among themselves that attracts the large mass of peripheral supporters. And it is that large mass on the periphery that will force the change – NOT the hardcore at the center. The relationship is symbiotic; the periphery needs the center and vice versa.

To succeed – that means radically altering the dialog, awakening the apathetic and driving for real change – this movement can’t let itself get ripped apart. Everything needs to be focused on maintaining solidarity and attracting supporters.

Solidarity is the Goal

I’ve spent the last 30 years wondering what the hell was wrong with people in the US. Didn’t they see where this country was heading? Didn’t they understand that we couldn’t just keep growing on leverage without it eventually biting us in the ass? Didn’t they see that we were becoming an empire with our military spread far and wide? Didn’t they see that this nation was rapidly driving itself deep into the “bad guys of history” category?

Surprisingly, Occupy has shown that many more people than I had thought do seem to understand.

So don’t let us down, Occupy. We don’t want to go down on the wrong side of history. You are our last, best chance to pull the US back from the brink of catastrophe.

If we blow it now, we won’t get another opportunity like this in our lifetime.

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One More Step Toward Prop 8’s Doom


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In the summer of 2010, when I skimmed Judge Walker’s ruling on Prop 8, I said, “It’s all over but the crying.” The 9th Circuit’s decision on February 7, 2012 was another inevitable move in the legal end-game of marriage equality.

I also predicted that the US Supreme Court would decline to hear the case. I’m sticking to my guns. Here’s why…

Walker’s Opinion Mostly Not an Opinion

The bulk of Walker’s opinion is not an opinion at all; it consists of findings of fact. And they are crushing. In order for a law to treat different classes of people differently, the legislating body must demonstrate a compelling interest in doing so. In this case, the basic argument that “traditional marriage” should be upheld is based primarily on religious concepts that have no standing in a court of law. By the “traditional” reasoning, segregation should have been allowed to continue; it’s the way it had always been in the South.

Similarly, the argument that homosexuality is a personal choice also had no evidentiary support. Nor did the assertion that children are better off with opposite-sex parents.

In fact, nothing that the defendants brought to the table passed muster. It was a rout.

The Juriprudence is Clear

Many, many cases along these basic lines have been heard in the US Federal Courts, producing a wealth of precedents on which Walker could base his ruling. The main precedent here is Brown vs Board of Education, which ruled that “separate but equal is inherently unequal”.

Brown had overturned Plessy vs Ferguson, a late 19th century decision that allowed for segregation so long as states provided equal facilities. Brown found that the act of separation invariably produced unequal results. The bar for creating distinct legal classes is exceptionally high.

I should note that the dissenter in the 9th Circuit’s decision did say, “The optimal parenting rationale could conceivably be a legitimate governmental interest”. This argument was clearly refuted in Walker’s findings of facts and, while I haven’t read the dissent, it would be a pretty big deal if the appellate court were to overrule a finding of fact.

It’s all in the language. “Could conceivably…” Not a particularly ringing endorsement. It’s like he needed to throw the anti-equality side a bone.

Walker’s Sexuality Not an Issue

The 9th Circuit also found nothing in the argument that Walker’s sexuality had biased his opinion. That is such a legal loser that it’s just laughable. By that logic, nobody could have ruled on Brown vs Board because they were all either white or black!

Like the dissent’s weak tea with the optimal parenting line, this is a sign of increasing desperation from the anti-equality camp. Here’s why they’re desperate…

US Supreme Court Won’t Hear This Case

This is actually an easy call, because it’s a no-win situation for the court. If they take this case, they have two basic options, 1) uphold marriage equality with a Federal precedent that will instantly obsolete all other state efforts in to ban same-sex marriages or 2) be the court that overturned Brown vs Board of Education. Neither of those two things will occur.

Despite their protestations to the contrary, this is a spectacularly political and activist court. The conservative forces are out to put their stamp on the jurisprudence and pull the court back from what they see as an overreaching authority. If the Scalito brothers thought for one hot second that they could uphold this blatantly unconstitutional ban without overturning Brown, they would. But they can’t, and they know it.

And they’ll be damned if they’re going to put their seal of approval on marriage equality. They’ll be happy to watch years of legal shenanigans as state after state goes through this same process with this same result. Perhaps they’re hoping that other facts will be found or some new legal argument will be invented to demonstrate a compelling governmental interest in creating this class of citizens with limited rights. That also is not going to happen.

The most likely outcome is that the court will refuse to hear the case. It will sting the anti-equality camp, no doubt, but it will leave them to fight another day. I suppose it’s possible that the court will use some obscure option to hear the case without having to rule or something like that. It seems virtually impossible that this US Supreme Court will rule on this case.

So cry all you want, Righty. It’s over.

 

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Random Observations from Amsterdam

Image of a high-end loudspeaker system in metallic white with goldOur trip to Amsterdam was a great success. We previewed a new product line, and we expect to be building a good number of them up at the factory. As you can see from the photo, it’s an industrial design / high fit-and-finish approach that puts us in a league by ourselves. And all that glossy, shiny stuff comes from New England shops. Only the wood, the transducers and the few electronic sub-assemblies come from overseas – most of it from Europe. The “value” is added in Whitinsville, MA.

It was my first trip to Holland, and it left some strong impressions on me. The following are just random observations of what I encountered. As you’ll see, everything and everywhere has it’s pros and cons.

You Cannot Imagine How Many Bicycles There Are

Seriously, no matter where you’ve been – even China – you’ve never seen a greater concentration of bicycles than in Amsterdam. There are great piles of them. At the Central Station, there is a multi-story parking facility just for bikes. And it’s jammed full.

Almost all the bikes are the same – single-speed, upright style. This is because the city is dead flat with canals creating great arcs that reach more than a mile in from The Dam.

The record-setting cold was no impediment to the cyclists. You see them at all hours of the day and night pedaling along with no gloves and no hats. Bicycle helmets are unknown.

The bike lanes are all over – in the street, on the sidewalk, in separated areas – and it’s easy to find yourself accidentally walking in one of them. Big. Mistake. Bike lanes also carry scooter traffic. More than once I found myself leaping for the safety of the pedestrian zone.

It’s Not Particularly Clean

I was struck by the high amount of litter in Amsterdam. There are lots of public trash receptacles, but they’re not always used. Trash collection itself is just bags and piles left on the sidewalk. And I didn’t see a pattern of which neighborhoods got trash collected which days. It seems like they just put the stuff out whenever they feel like it.

Since so many people smoke, there are cigarette butts all over the place. Perhaps it was that I was there during a particularly cold and windy period, but newspapers were also blowing all over the place. Food waste didn’t get any special treatment, either, and I’m somewhat surprised that they don’t have a serious problem with rats.

It’s More Diverse Than You Might Expect

The ethnic make up seemed more-or-less in line with what you’d see in the US. Many Middle Eastern, North African and sub-Saharan faces, and in a range of places. Tram conductors and drivers, fork-lift operators, shop keepers, cabbies all showed that it’s not just Whitey over there. Or, um, Van Whitey, I suppose.

In my scant non-sleeping downtime, I managed to find two different hipster neighborhoods. In the one with the restaurants, we found an excellent place that served Turkish and Iranian fare. Tiles for the interior were commissioned out of Iran, and the ones in the men’s room are to die for.

The Dutch seem to have a predilection for Argentinean stake houses, although the one we went to in a tourist district was nothing special and highly overpriced. They also have a lot of Indonesian Restaurants, but I didn’t get the opportunity to go.

It’s 24/7…NOT

What we do at these tradeshows essentially amounts to theatrical production, so you find that you need this or that and you need it NOW! Holland is not a good place to find yourself in this situation. Most shops – and I mean coffee houses, convenience stores, etc. – open at 9am and close at 6pm. Some of them push the envelope and open at 8am.

There’s one place – ONE – that opens at 7am, and that is such a big deal there that the name of the shop is “At 7”. Want to get a pack of smokes at 2am? You’re out of luck.

They Like Being Dutch

It should come as no surprise that the Dutch think that being Dutch is awesome. Most cultures think well of themselves. They’re not too keen on remonstrations from pompous travelers from the US who are shocked and annoyed that no hardware stores will be open on Sunday and that if you want a coffee at 5:30am, you had damn well better have a percolator in your hotel room.

My colleague and I actually got the double-scolding of “tisk-tisk-tisk” PLUS the finger wag for bringing to-go coffees onto the tram.

It’s Good to Be Home

On balance, I could live in Amsterdam – I’d just have to up my planning to ensure that I have everything I need for the overnight and Sunday shutdown periods. I’d bike – like them – in the cold and rain and snow. I’d shop the open air stalls on the Albert Cuypstraat.

But it’s always great to come home to everything that’s familiar. As we say in my family: Home is the place that, when you have to go there, they have to let you in.

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Hard Talk About an Ugly Economy

Job Sector Contribution to the RI EconomyAfter several months of more-or-less positive jobs numbers in RI, the last two months have been anything but. And the December numbers were, frankly, horrific. While it is certainly true that a wonk could parse [spin] the recent down-turn toward neutral, the same could be done with the previous up-cycle.

As the wonk that could do either, let me tell you this: the jobs scene in RI is bad. Damn bad. Later, I’ll parse these numbers to show how bad things really are.

Unlike my usual polemics, I’m not going to rant as if there were some obvious course of action on which pols are unwilling to act [even though that’s been true for decades]. At this point, I don’t have a lot of answers, just one brutal, ugly question: where do we go from here?

So, enough with the introductory niceties; let’s have at.

RI’s Jobs Numbers Since the Economic Collapse

Before we can talk about our numbers since the collapse, we need to appreciate that the mid-00’s were the best economic times RI had seen in decades. Of the main jobs indicators, all of them – labor force, employment and unemployment – topped out in 2006/2007. Being the Biggest Little, we need to accept that we largely rise and fall on the national trend. Or at least, we rise on it.

The lead graphic shows how most industrial sectors were basically flat 2001 to 2008 with these notable exceptions: education and health care exploded while manufacturing continued its decades-long collapse. [Source: BLS]

Ed/Health has held its gains since the collapse while professional services and hospitality, which showed solid gains to 2008, have only modest declines since. Construction, not surprisingly, along with government employment, financial services and trades, transportation and utilities (TTU) have sloped off badly.

It’s important to note that I haven’t parsed the contribution of construction in RI relative to other states, but given the collapse of manufacturing, it is at best a secondary impediment.

Long story short: our problems today are the same as our problems 20 years ago – manufacturing is dying, and we have not yet found a way to replace those jobs.

The Recent Horrors

For most of this year, we followed or even amplified the national trend downward until October, when we hit some kind of top and turned counter-trend. In the fourth quarter of 2011, we diverged almost a full percentage point from the national average.

That, my friends, is some ugly shit.

Granted, I could spin these declines toward neutral, but just as easily could I spin the gains toward neutral. The gains were mostly declines in the labor force – that is, people who say they’re looking for jobs – while the declines were gains in the same.

Long story short: we’re not creating jobs, we’re treading water. People dropped out and then dropped in again.

I probably should have mentioned that we need to create 40,000 jobs to get back to “full employment”. 40,000 jobs on a basis of just over 500,000 employed means 1 new job for every 12.5 that currently exist. It’s a giant number.

But wait…it gets worse.

The Current Situation

Look at this jobs board. Plenty jobs listed, for a certain kind of worker. These are all full-time jobs, and they are recent listings. Even ones from months ago may still be unfilled. This state lacks highly educated workers. In fact, we lack moderately educated workers – we import welders. Not Ruby on Rails developers – welders!

That’s the situation. RI’s historic under-investment in education has yielded a work force ill-prepared to face the current economy, much less the emerging one. [See above under collapse of manufacturing sector.]

To be sure, if you drive an automobile on an elevated highway, it’s important that welders that construct the steel-on-steel joints that support the reinforced concrete substrates that hold the gloriously smooth asphalt on which you drive understand the operational parameters of joint strength relative to weld length and depth as that applies to steel grade and thickness.

“Welder” does not equal “ignoramus”. If it did, you’d be dead. [If welder had ever equaled ignoramus, he or she would be dead. Welding is, you know, dangerous. Go pick up a torch some time…]

So we need a range of workers, and we import some of them from India or Slovakia or Colombia. Meanwhile, we export highly educated workers to such remote locations as Massachusetts.

But none of that does Jack Squat for our unemployment numbers. Why? Sadly, that answer is all too simple.

Our Prospects

Long ago on a blog far, far away, I wrote a post called “Our Prospects for Economic Growth”. And that post was just as cheery as this one. The cold, hard fact is that the RI’s unemployed are poorly suited to those scant jobs our economy is creating.

This state’s historic disinvestment in education has created a self-reinforcing feedback loop in which jobs exist for imports, and local don’t get jobs. I call this phenomenon “government at war with its population”. If you don’t have an advanced degree, they want you to go away…to some other place where people like you live. While the cities of Pawtucket and Woonsocket (and the ex-government of Central Falls) exemplify this trend, the RI state government proves it out, as well.

To the long-term denizens of the State House, “welder” – challenging as that job might be – is not good enough for them. They want you to have an advanced degree in micro-biology, computer science or (choir of angels) business management before they’ll say you’re RI material. [Note: Financial Services is among the employment sectors that collapsed, much to Smithfield’s chagrin regarding the enormously expensive and now only partially occupied Fidelity campus.]

Except this: RI has an unemployment rate of 10.8% as of this writing, and those people lack substantial education. What’s to do?

Non-Snarky, Future-Oriented Discussion

This state needs to recognize the fact that we’ve got a serious problem, and it’s not going to fix itself. It requires action – immediate, meaningful action. Here are some things I think we can look to create some jobs at the lower end of the wage/education scale.

Get our heads around the “1099 economy” – Having been self-employed for about a decade, I know that it doesn’t really matter if you have “a job” so long as you have “work”. But the deck is stacked badly against the 1099-ers. From health insurance to FICA, you pay a serious penalty when you try to strike out on your own. The Powers that Be have only recently become aware that there is such a thing as the 1099 economy, so they’re still getting up to speed on what it means and how they can help move it forward. Recent changes to the RI EDC Board of Directors certainly help, but they need to be far more aggressive about making this happen.

Fulfill our “Arts and Entertainment” Promise with a Downcity Casino – Like it or not, Providence is known as a party town, and we should build that out for all it’s worth. Despite all it’s challenges and downsides, I think it’s possible for us to “do a casino right” so that we get maximum benefits. And we should go the whole hog, including the postage. We should take a serious look at developing looser rules around the vice trades in which government oversight and monitoring keeps the criminal element at bay. In simple terms, we take a more Cuban or Dutch approach to the sex trades where pimps are replaced by health services.

Sell “War-on-Joblessness” Bonds that Fund Infrastructure – The same way the US sold War Bonds in the 2oth century, we sell bonds to fund the infrastructure critical to a thriving economy. Because we’re not auctioning bonds on the market but selling them directly, we can set the interest rate where ever we want it. The payoff for investors is more moral than financial. Crazy-talk, I know, but it could happen.

Take Another Look at “Dirty” Industries – The new metals recycling operation on Allens Ave is the kind of “working waterfront” thing we would do well to expand on. Garbage is big business, and it’s the kind of unglamorous industry that nobody goes after. Like the casino, it’s disastrous if done wrong, but brilliant if done right. I’m actually a connoisseur of dumps, so I’ve visited or read about some very advanced operations.

What else? My ideas aren’t the only possibilities. But whatever we talk about doing, it has to focus right down on the kind of jobs we need, not the kind of jobs we want.

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Race Cars and Revolution

In the introduction of my book, I confess embarrassment at the amount of sport stories I produced. Sport fascinates me. It arouses passions that let some sort of larger human narrative be told. Sport anthropomorphizes cultures; a mass of individuals expresses itself as a single person. And the more culturally complex the league is, the more interesting and insightful those anthropromorphized narratives become.

Thus, I most closely follow international soccer and Formula 1 racing. Where the former is a century-plus old, well-established entity in terms of the hierarchy of impact players (nations), Formula 1 has enjoyed a radical reshaping over the past decade. Originally a European deal, F1 is now truly global, but, unlike FIFA, exclusive. There’s a club – a crazy, heterogeneous club – of nations that host F1 races in 2012. These countries now host F1 races:

  • China
  • Turkey
  • India (Frymaster less than several threes back-marker Force India)
  • Malasia (actually, one of the earlier Asian races)
  • Singapore
  • Bahrain
  • Abu Dhabi

Right? 1/3 of the schedule is in Asia. (In 2012, for the first time since 2007, when our disastrous 2005 race on the infield course at Indy finally got us kicked out of the club, the US will host a race at our new track outside Austin, TX. My detailed review of that track is, you know, in that stupid book.)

Bahrain and US Military Power

One of the countries listed above is undergoing a people’s revolution. And I’m sad to report it is not Austin, TX. It’s Bahrain, home to the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet, sent their to keep a close eye on our oil, er, national interests. Oil, USA, racing cars, coincidence…? Nah.

Yeah, so Bahrain’s people aren’t so keen on tyranny. But I guess the government is. And you and I are paying for it. For over a year, the Bahraini people have been protesting their government, and that government has been fighting back.

This compendium of stories that relate to the F1 race makes for interesting reading. Last year’s race was postponed – swapped with India’s inaugural – so the government could, you know, get people settled down. The race ran in the fall, not the spring. What are the odds that the stun grenade that smashed that guy’s face in the top story from the first protests was Made in the USA?

This year, well, we’ll have to see what happens. F1 and the auto manufacturers that drive it are, ostensibly, a progressive force in global sport…? F1 is the birthplace of technologies that have massively improved the civilian automotive fleet’s fuel efficiency and safety. Refueling in a race is a thing of the past. Eventually, it will be 100% biofuels, then electric, then on-site produced renewables.

And Mercedes – a “works” team and league-wide engine supplier – has rules about who and what they can be supporting. Tyranny ain’t on the list. If Mercedes and Mercedes-powered teams had to drop out of a race, well, that race wouldn’t mean that much. That nation would probably get kicked out of the club.  (See the devastation that Germany’s democratic socialism has wrought?)

I admit it; I watch sport because it lets the media tell me things about politics and culture that media actually doesn’t want to tell me. So, how about those Bruins?!?

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Ignore POTUS: It’s the McGuffin

Mitt, creating jobs

While I, like all of you political junkies, am practically main-lining the GOP Presidential primaries, they bring to mind a basic criticism I’ve had of almost every “outsider” political movement: they foolishly focus on electing a President. But that really doesn’t matter. It’s the McGuffin.

While so many on the left have expressed outrage at Obama’s ineffectiveness, I for one did not expect all that much to begin with. A cursory skimming of the Constitution makes it clear: the power in this government rests with Congress.

And with the last, oh, 15 Congresses, more’s the pity.

So I have to ask: why are we so fixated on the President if that office doesn’t really have that much power and, more importantly, why _aren’t_ we fixated on Congress? The answer, of course, is that the Congress is complicated and the President…well, there’s only the one. It’s so much easier to rally behind a President but completely useless. It’s the McGuffin.

What is a McGuffin?

The Wikipedia page at the link above includes Alfred Hitchcock’s famous explanation of a McGuffin:

It might be a Scottish name, taken from a story about two men in a train. One man says “What’s that package up there in the baggage rack?”, and the other answers “Oh, that’s a McGuffin”. The first one asks “What’s a McGuffin?”. “Well”, the other man says, “It’s an apparatus for trapping lions in the Scottish Highlands”. The first man says “But there are no lions in the Scottish Highlands”, and the other one answers “Well, then that’s no McGuffin!”. So you see, a McGuffin is nothing at all.

The McGuffin is a plot device designed to distract the audience so that the more important aspects of the thriller come as a complete surprise. The McGuffin dominates the first act, but is completely forgotten by the last. Psycho starts out as a movie about a woman who embezzles a large sum of money from the law firm where she works. But is that what the film is really about? The embezzlement is the McGuffin.

So when it comes to implementing the crucial changes that will make this nation better for all of us, our fixation with electing a sympathetic President only prevents us from getting the job done. Congress made this mess; Congress can fix this mess. The President is the McGuffin.

Who is the “Hitchcock”?

Any good detective knows where to start when trying to unravel a mystery: look for the person or persons who benefit the most from the crime. In this case, it’s obvious that “big business”, particularly those businesses that suckle at the federal teat, benefit from a Congress that has largely abdicated its responsibilities and prerogatives.

Is it any coincidence that the US military/intelligence apparatus now circles the globe with “hot” wars in two one nations and covert ops in dozens of others while Congress has basically given up its Constitutional duty for oversight while simultaneously doling out billions annually in “defense contracts”? Congress has not declared war since 1943, yet the military/intelligence apparatus gets more business every year.

Congress pays for the US military to hire mercenaries and out-source torture! Do you really need any more proof?

These are only the most egregious examples. Look into any industry, any area for which Congress has authority and you’ll find a similar scenario — the good of the nation and the goals of virtually all more-or-less normal people come in a distant second to the venal wants of those who own pay for the campaigns of Congresspeople.

Thus the “Hitchcock” here, the director that distracts us so masterfully, is these money interests — amoral non-humans (or worse, amoral humans) that have become absurdly wealthy through the largesse of a long series of Congresses that serve their interests and their interests alone. My film-oriented metaphor is not random; the major media are high on the list of those who benefit from a store-bought Congress and thus high on the list of villains in this drama.

Occupy the Second Act

Like all McGuffins, the meaninglessness of electing a sympathetic President will eventually become known, and this nation will wake up to its responsibilities. Indeed, this is happening already, and no force today is more meaningful to this cause than Occupy. Occupy does all the things necessary to put this into action except run for Congress.

First, Occupy is national at a minimum. Ultimately, this is a global movement, but let’s just focus with what’s on our plates right now. Occupy serves to bring the same basic message of solidarity and direct action to every city of meaningful size as well as towns and hamlets in the most remote areas. Everywhere it goes, it brings a message of civic and political activism. This is the only way for the progressive movement to develop the national groundswell necessary to become a force in Congress.

Second, Occupy breaks through the major media narratives about who we on the left are. I’m not a child. I don’t live in my parents’ basement. In fact, I’m a “job creator”; when I succeed, people in the Blackstone Valley get manufacturing jobs. Occupy Youngstown (OH) is dominated by senior citizens. By forcing itself into the national consciousness, Occupy shows how diverse, intelligent, active, articulate and, above all, how capable we are. We are not to be scorned; we are not to be feared. We are admirable. We are the future.

Third, Occupy jump-starts the national discussion about the truly important issues, and it shows as trivial the issues that The Director wants to keep front and center. Poor people are not millionaires that failed; homelessness is not a function of laziness. In fact, the current severity of both of these issues is a direct result of national policies instituted by Congresses over the past 30 years or more. As long as Occupy can hold itself together, these narratives will become harder and harder to ignore.

Finally, by using the tried-and-true approach of provocative, non-violent direct action, Occupy forces the villains to show their hands. From nonchalant, pepper-spraying UC Davis cops to obsequiously pandering so-called “liberals”, street-level action forces those in authority to prove out their credentials. And, as the Occupiers like to remind us all: The Whole World is Watching. For any more-or-less normal human, it’s obvious which side they’re on.

Act 3: TBD

I don’t doubt for a minute that The Director will develop a counter-attack, a reassertion of the McGuffin. (Wait, did Mitt Romney just do something foolish? Oh, that’s awesome!) Sorry…what was I saying?

If we really want to see change happen, we need to double-down on our program. And it needs to be local first, state second, Congress third and the McGuffin.

At this point, we can quibble around the edges. Does city councilor X need to be replaced, or can he or she find the guts to vote rightly? Is Congressperson Y really in the pocket of the donors, or can a strong, left wing primary candidate make the message clear. (You _know_ what I mean, guest writer, when I say: Apparently NOT!)

RI Future’s own Libby Kimzey is running for RI House 8 against a known villain who takes semi-legal means to destroy historic structures that his own district is trying to preserve (and who drives his preposterous pickup truck like a positive ass-hat). With luck, others will announce against Gordon (H71) and Ottiano (S11). And those are just the ones that come to mind.

The election season is just getting going, and we have more questions than we have answers. But this much is clear — the time to move is now. Progressives have more openings, more opportunity than I’ve ever seen in my political memory. And I remember Nixon vs. McGovern.

Get up. Get out. Get moving.

Somebody asked me recently: How can I vote Progressive for my GA members? I told him, “I’m not sure, but the Progressive candidate in your district might just be you.”

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The Mythology of Radical Capitalism

One reason that radical capitalism has won the hearts of so many is that it is highly plausible; it sounds great. A world of abstract morality where the anonymous ‘market’ expertly and without pity, favoritism or error decides the ultimate value of goods and services and delivers those goods and services with maximum efficiency, the highest good. A world where shared ownership shifts corporate responsibility to a plebiscite to which the corporation answers; the interests of the shareholders will echo the interests of humanity. A world where capital flows continuously from the corporate class back to the entrepreneurial class, endlessly cycling value into new innovations that serve humanity. Continue reading “The Mythology of Radical Capitalism”


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