[PEN-L:6264] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Louis, Minor detail. A deceleration of growth, that is a slowdown in a positive growth rate is not the same thing as "economic decline." That is currently happening in Japan and would be a negative growth rate. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Friday, April 30, 1999 10:38 AM Subject: [PEN-L:6222] Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia In general I find the whole piece being more in the tone of an after dinner talk for foundation liberals than a serious institutional analysis. Wojtek You have to read between the lines and you also have to read the entire article. It makes these basic points, which are interconnected: 1) Agreeing with Robert Brenner and Harry Shutt, the authors, who are military-economic strategic thinkers on the Pentagon payroll, state that the European economy is in decline: "In the past, Western Europe used economic growth to finance expansions and extensions of a variety of social protection programs. Economic growth is, by far, the most effective antidote to most economic problems. But economic growth is no longer what it used to be. During the 1960s, Western Europe's real gross domestic product grew at rates approaching 5 percent annually. In the 1970s, rates were closer to 3 percent per year. During the 1980s, real growth fell below 3 percent. Since 1990, economic growth has been around 1 percent." 2) If this economic decline is not reversed, there will be challenges to the system since European citizens of industrialised nations have a sense of "entitlements": "So long as the new sociopolitical framework of Europe guaranteed unlimited prosperity, the end of ideology seemed a blessing. Unlike the 1930s, the crisis of the last decades has been a slow, incremental process. The rub was that once the system began to sputter, there was no real policy alternative presented by mainstream parties. The resulting crisis of political systems was a slow one, and this slowness and the tenacity of existing political institutions are as noteworthy as the existence of the crisis. Popular discontent with governments in a democratic regime usually leads to alternation of power, but alternation of power will not produce relief if the new government follows policies similar to those of the old. When that happens, citizens increasingly tend to abstain from the political process, look to extremist parties or support new or nonestablishment political parties and movements, and may even go to the street. Ideology, which appeared to depart from politics through the front door, returns through the back door. In the last analysis, established parties can founder and the system can even collapse." and "A truly apocalyptic scenario for Europe could unfold as a result of failure to arrest the processes described so far in this study. The implications of each of these crises would be sufficiently adverse to warrant action, but taken together, they could produce a negative synergy with overwhelming consequences. At some point, cumulative quantitative change could become qualitative and visible. The pressure to cut welfare state programs at a time of increasing unemployment would certainly undermine social stability, intensifying the impact of joblessness. A conflict of "haves" and "have-nots" could result, either along new, perhaps unpredictable, dividing lines or taking the old forms of class conflict. Massive labor unrest not witnessed for decades could reappear; the resulting economic and social friction might spread to several of Europe's regions, especially those burdened by persistent, long-term unemployment and continuous flows of political and economic refugees. The failure of mainstream political parties to manage problems of such magnitude could eventually lead to elections of extremist leaders as heads of government with unpredictable consequences for Europe, both internally and externally." When you consider that this analysis is coming from the intellectual servants of the ruling class, it is remarkable that there has been so little effort among Marxists or "progressive economists" to understand things in the same sort of systematic fashion. As I have stated, Sean Gervasi and Michel Chussodovsky have put forward excellent analyses that tie together economics, politics and history. That should be our point of departure. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6265] Re: Compounding folly: the Kelvinator fetish
Tom Walker wrote: Doug is not going to like my questioning of bourgeois statistics. It's fine with me. Bourgeois economic statistics are designed to measure life under capitalism, and they do a fairly good job of it. They don't tell you anything about alienation, atomization, overwork, or ecological ruination. Well you can see some of that in crime, poverty, and environmental stats, but you know what I mean. A 4.5% rise in real GDP means what it says it means; it doesn't say the stock of human happiness has increased by 4.5%. Doug
[PEN-L:6266] Re: Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
Doug, How much of this stuff would Clinton have done if the Dems had retained control of the US Congress? (quite a bit of it, I think, but not all of it) Barkley -Original Message- From: Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Friday, April 30, 1999 12:18 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6231] Re: Happy Days Are Here Again Max Sawicky wrote: Greetings to all you born-again Republicans, relieved we don't have more Bernie Sanders' and fewer Pat Buchanans, lest the air war vote have been decided in favor of the Clinton Administration. Actually, if I had a vote I might have voted nay as well, in protest over Clinton's conduct of this operation, as some of the 26 Democrats might have. But there should be little doubt that most Republicans voted nay because they are the party that officially doesn't give a shit. Naiman must be smoking loco weed to characterize this as some kind of victory for the left, not least because the chief audience for his work on trade is the same liberals-in-quotes he is excoriating for being soft on the IMF and "Empire." Lemme get this straight, Max. The Dems are now the party of the IMF and imperial war. The Republicans are full of folks who, for the wrong reasons, want to throw a monkey wrench into the imperial financial and military machine. But finding any good in this is a symptom of having smoked "loco weed." Further...Clinton's trying to revive the all-but-dead Social Security "reform"; he committed money for the deployment of Star Wars (something Reagan and Bush never did); he put an end to welfare as an entitlement; he's presided over the gutting of the Endangered Species Act and the clear-cutting of national forests (something again that Reagan and Bush never dared); he signed the hideous crime bill and the Defense of Marriage Act and bragged about it; and he's probably killed more people (figuring in the Iraqi sanctions) than Reagan or Bush did. And, miraculously, he's managed to silence liberal opposition to any of this, whether we're talking about the enviro establishment or, I'm sorry to say, the Economic Policy Institute. Try some loco weed, Max - it might be revealing! Doug PS: Speaking of Clinton administration pigginess, I highly recommend the hard-to-find documentary Waco: Rules of Engagement http://www.waco93.com. It shows how the ATF and FBI, led by Janet Reno, massacred the Branch Davidians and then lied about it. Chuck Schumer, whom liberal New Yorkers cheered when he defeated Al D'Amato last November, comes off as a totally evil asshole.
[PEN-L:6252] Re: Vaclav Havel
It should be borne in mind that Havel has no credibility any more among people who know what is happening in the Czech Republic. He was courageous in his opposition to the communist regime; now he fronts for those who have looted his country. Any hypocrisy in international affairs is merely icing on the cake. Peter Ricardo Duchesne wrote: Date sent: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 00:25:28 +0200 Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: "Konstantin Borodinsky" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:citation Originally to: "WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK" [EMAIL PROTECTED] This might be curious in contents. And more so, who says this. * OTTAWA, April 29 (AFP) - Czech President Vaclav Havel said here Thursday that human rights supersede the rights of states and justify NATO's attack on the "genocidal regime" of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. In a wide-ranging address to a joint meeting of Canada's two houses of parliament, Havel said events of the past century were "gradually bringing the human race to the realization that the human being is more important than the state." Speaking in English, Havel said the North Atlantic Treaty Organization had no option but to take on the "genocidal regime of Slobodan Milosevic" and that the air campaign against Yugoslavia was "in the interest of principles and certain values." NATO is "fighting for humanity," Havel said, adding that though the 19-nation alliance did not have a formal UN mandate for its action, it "has acted out of respect for the law which recognizes humanity rather than the state." Havel criticized Russia for its position on Kosovo, urging it to regard NATO as a partner rather than an adversary. He also noted that the recent enlargement of NATO to embrace his country, Hungary and Poland had been "far from easy" because of "the opposition on the part of the Russian Federation." Havel maintained that the world was moving away from the nation-state concept to regional and global responsibility and this, in turn, meant major reforms were necessary, especially within the United Nations. "The Security Council can no longer maintain the power of the conditions of when it was formed," he said. Among the reforms he suggested was a review of the veto power of each of the five permanent members of the Security Council -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States. He also called on the United Nations to be "less bureaucratic and more effective," saying it must be identifiable by people around the world as their representative body rather than a collection of state governments. Havel is half-way through a state visit to Canada, his first as president of the Czech Republic. He made a state visit nine years ago as president of Czechoslovakia. I personally find these ideas refreshing and promising. A new dimension for the concept of globalization and a solid foundation for the coming millenium, which will not last long, I guess, with such ideology. Respectfully, Konstantin Borodinsky
[PEN-L:6267] Re: Another Note---severed heads in the garden
Actually I just read that Representative Blagojevich from Ilinois is of Serbian descent. He was the one who early on was floating a partition proposal. He is part of some delegation that is going over there. Again, I would reserve the word "partition" for the idea of dividing up Kosovo-Metohija somehow, not a separation of some sort of the whole province from Serbia. This would keep our discussion clear. The example to think of is Bosnia-Herzegovina which has been effectively partitioned and I suspect that the fact that a half-baked peace has been maintained there is one of the reasons that people keep talking up partition, even though it is much less obvious how to do it in Kosmet than it was in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where it was weird enough. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Friday, April 30, 1999 12:23 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6232] Another Note---severed heads in the garden Received this, this am from a little-bit of an Ohio politician that I had no idea was of Yugo Serbian ancestry... Tom, "Thanks for sending along your posts on the crisis in the Balkans. I have seen some of them, but not others...so I appreciate your periodic messages. This tragedy has special significance for me being of Serbian and Montenegran extraction. Both parents were born there and I grew up hearing about Kosovo, the Ustasha, Tito and the Balkan wars. Relatives I have heard from there have said NATO bombings have only solidified Milosevic's strength and have driven the democratic opposition into silence."
[PEN-L:6272] Re: Re: Re: U.S. HOUSE REJECTS NATO'S WAR
At 06:23 PM 4/29/99 -0400, Michael Hoover wrote: watching the debate and vote on this matter on C-SPAN last evening, I couldn't help but notice that 'socialist' Bernie Sanders voted for the resolution to sanction the bombing...how fortunate that there aren't more leftists like him in the assembly casting their lot in favor of war credits...Michael Hoover Michael, I am somewhat nonplussed that US-ers still get excited about such maneuvers. I think we, Eastern Europeans are more street wise in this respect - we simply do not trust politicians no matter what they profess, because it is quite clear to us that whatever they profess serves only one goal - advancement of their own political careers. Wojtek no surprise on my part, I was just noting what I saw on tv...several posts this week were about folks occupying BS's office...Michael Hoover
[PEN-L:6276] Re: Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Charles to Wojtek: Again I do not think that there is an overall master plan or capitalist conspiracy to take over CEE. I view it as a rather incoherent process of muddling through, with no master plan, no coherent strategy, conflicting interests, great uncertainty, and even greater short-term opportunism. Yea, the bourgeoisie are crazy like a fox. Amazing how they keep coming up winners. Would you describe WWI, WWII and most capitalist war this way or is this war different , some new phenomenon ? How about capitalist economics ? Hasn't capitalist war always been significantly anarchistic like capitalist production ? Charles Brown I take it that Wojtek is an empiricist, not a Hegelian. Yoshie
[PEN-L:6283] Re: Re: Another Note---severed heads in the garden
"J. Barkley Rosser, Jr." wrote Again, I would reserve the word "partition" for the idea of dividing up Kosovo-Metohija somehow, not a separation of some sort of the whole province from Serbia. This would keep our discussion clear. The example to think of is Bosnia-Herzegovina which has been effectively partitioned and I suspect that the fact that a half-baked peace has been maintained there is one of the reasons that people keep talking up partition, even though it is much less obvious how to do it in Kosmet than it was in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where it was weird enough. Bosnia-H is basically an old-style colonial goverment. The central bank and the economic/finance departments are by law not allowed to be Bosnians or citizens of neighboring countries. I suspect that's what will happen in Kosovo and Yugoslavia if NATO gets its way. Sam Pawlett
[PEN-L:6280] Re: Compounding folly: the Kelvinator fetish
Tom Walker wrote: Doug is not going to like my questioning of bourgeois statistics. Doug replied: It's fine with me. Bourgeois economic statistics are designed to measure life under capitalism, and they do a fairly good job of it. They don't tell you anything about alienation, atomization, overwork, or ecological ruination. Well you can see some of that in crime, poverty, and environmental stats, but you know what I mean. A 4.5% rise in real GDP means what it says it means; it doesn't say the stock of human happiness has increased by 4.5%. What I'm saying, though, is that B.E.S. DON'T do a good job of measuring life under capitalism, by the definition of bourgeois economics. Labour supply and wage theory hinge on treating leisure as a -commodity- not as some hypothetically ubiquitous 'free good' like air and water or amorphous state of being like alienation. For GDP to be measureable, all commodities would have to be measured and accounted for. Presumably crime, poverty, human happiness and environmental quality are not commodities. Fine. But you can't lump leisure with those without throwing out the bourgeois political economy of labour. Let me repeat a quote from Enrico Barone that underlies the MAINSTREAM conception of a "social welfare function": "It is convenient to suppose -- it is a simple book-keeping artifice, so to speak -- that each individual sells the services of all his capital and re-purchases afterwards the part he consumes directly. For example, A, for eight hours of work of a particular kind which he supplies, receives a certain remuneration at an hourly rate. It is a matter of indifference whether we enter A's receipts as the proceeds of eight hours' labour, or as the proceeds of twenty-four hours' labour less expenditure of sixteen hours consumed by leisure." regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6268] Into the sunset...
Brother and sister Genossen, the time has come (a tad early because I'm presently telnetting from a cyber-cafe' that's awash in pseudo-Sinatra yuppie music). Let's hope I do this right. Further comment to the list will be infrequent, and posted at the whim of the member to whom it's sent. Thank you, Michael, for letting me be noisy, irrelevant and pseudonymous for so long. And I thank the rest of you for not demanding that I get a doctorate first. What a bloody waste of time and space that would be. Coming up: 1 unsubscription (or maybe 2 or 3)! I hope your revolution never becomes a competitor of mine. valis 1 day and counting
[PEN-L:6263] Compounding folly: the Kelvinator fetish
1. The general picture over the past ten to fifteen years has been one of failure to accomplish the growth-rates of the post-WWII period. 2. BOOMING CONSUMPTION AGAIN LEADS GROWTH In both cases, the numbers rely on the book keeping fiction that for one particular "commodity" n = -n. Doug is not going to like my questioning of bourgeois statistics. But the basic error explains a lot. Let's call it the Kelvinator fetish, firstly after Lord Kelvin -- whose dictum that science is measurement graced the title page of Econometrica for the first 20 years of its existence -- and secondly after Marx's analysis of the fetishism of commodities. The commodity in question is 'leisure', or more precisely the free time of employed labour force participants. The error can best be shown with a simple example: let's assume that maximum total output can be achieved over the long run with a standard length of working day of, say, eight hours. Given a standard day of eight hours, output in any one day can be increased by working longer hours but such a short term increase will be more than offset by losses in output on subsequent days. Competitive pressures on employers and the short-sightedness of some workers may tend to lengthen the working day beyond its hypothetical optimum for output. That is to say, that normally hours may be somewhat longer and output somewhat less than they could otherwise be. However, this less-than-maximum output could have as easily been achieved with a working day shorter than the optimal day. For simplicity, let's assume that output for a day that is one hour "too long" is the same as that for a day that is half an hour "too short". Using the example of an optimal eight hour day, then, output during seven and a half hours would be equal to output during nine hours. Out of the 24 hours in a day, that leaves sixteen and a half hours of free time if the worker works a too-short day and fifteen hours of free time if the worker works a too-long day. If workers are paid in proportion to the value of their total output, the daily wage for the two situations should be the same. The hourly wage would be correspondingly higher for the shorter day and lower for the longer day. In the real world, it is difficult to know exactly what the optimal length of the working day is, so it is difficult to say whether a day of any given length is too long or too short, from the perspective of maximizing output. For the sake of "convenience", the political economy of growth assumes that the given work day -- whatever it is -- is optimal. The convenient assumption incorporates the anomaly that, considered as a commodity, fifteen hours of leisure is "worth the same" as sixteen and a half hours. In the same vein, fourteen hours might be worth the same as seventeen and thirteen might be worth the same as eighteen. One could go on to the end of the day adding to one side and subtracting from the other and growth economics would take no notice. Workers are assumed to be indifferent between a lower wage with less free time and a higher wage with more free time. The grossness and simplicity of this fundamental conceptual error at the base of post-WWII economic thought is so extreme that people cannot accept that such a flaw could exist. Oh sure, we'll all admit the world is going to hell in a handbasket. But to suggest that there is a simple, obvious programming error driving the thing is unthinkable. Even more unthinkable is the idea that the introduction of the programming error can be precisely documented. Growth? Relative to what? regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6208] WPost: Colorado and Serbia
I was going to do a column today on the connections between NATO's war and the massacre in Colorado, using Clinton's speech on teaching our children that violence is not an acceptable way to resolve conflict and Hillary's statement on violent video games where you get more points based on how many people you kill. Then I saw the front page of today's Washington Post, and decided it was old hat: Portrait of a Teen at War Colorado Killer Craved Violence; Medication Barred Enlistment in Marines By Joel Achenbach and Dale Russakoff Washington Post Staff Writers Thursday, April 29, 1999; Page A01 LITTLETON, Colo., April 28Eric Harris thought about war, fantasized about war and wrote about war. He was thrilled when he heard, one morning in philosophy class, that the United States was on the verge of bombing Yugoslavia. Rebecca Heins, who sat next to him, remembers Harris saying, "I hope we do go to war, I'll be the first one there." He wanted to be in the front lines, he said. He wanted, as he put it, to "shoot everyone," Heins recalls. Harris said that morning that he hoped he would get drafted. But then he took direct action to improve his chances of becoming a real warrior: He tried to enlist in the Marines. He seemed a good candidate, physically trim and extremely smart. But he was not destined to storm a beach or parachute behind enemy lines in the uniform of his nation. On a visit to his home April 15, Marine recruiters learned from Harris's parents that their son took a powerful antidepressant called Luvox. Harris had explicitly stated on his application that he did not take any prescription drugs, so the Marines rejected him. Five days later, Harris and his buddy Dylan Klebold staged their own private war at Columbine High School, killing 13 people before they finally killed themselves. In hindsight there were many clues, many peculiar signs, that Harris, who has emerged as the leader of the rampage, and Klebold, the follower, were actively dangerous, that they weren't just rebels, or juvenile delinquents, or "Goths" who liked to wear black and listen to German rock bands. There is now a trail of evidence that the two telegraphed their actions. But they also operated under the general camouflage of teenage life, when dark moods and obsessive thoughts and sudden changes in clothing and beliefs are not all that strange. The Columbine case shows how difficult it is to separate the rebels and individualists and creative people from the serious menaces to society -- until something horrible happens. In a childhood memoir he composed for a creative writing class one day in early April, Harris re-created a world in which he and his older brother, Kevin, were young boys, sons of an Air Force pilot, playing a war game in his back yard in small-town Plattsburgh, N.Y. But the war game wasn't just a game. In the memoir, the boys were Rambo-like heroes, caught in a genuine battle for survival. Armed with M-16s, Eric and his brother were fending off an entire army of assailants. "It sounded like they were in Vietnam," says classmate Domonic Duran. "They were running away from the enemy, diving under logs, hiding from helicopters, throwing pine cones that were like grenades. It was shocking because it was so good." So good, in fact, that when it was read aloud to the class by a friend -- Harris declined the honor -- the students snapped their fingers vigorously, the class sign of approval. No one could have known that the high school literary triumph prefigured the horror to come, with Klebold cast as the brother and all of Columbine High as the emeny. Not only friends were fooled by Harris and Klebold. So were law enforcement authorities and counselors who dealt with the two after they were arrested for burglarizing a car. When a judge asked Eric Harris what kind of grades he got, Harris answered, "A's and B's, your honor" -- which was true. When a neighbor heard a racket at
[PEN-L:6209] Re: RE: humor and sensitivity
Max Sawicky wrote: I've gotten worse from HCKL in the past and didn't complain, but I'm not gonna bother him any more; he takes the fun out of it. Give an example or evidence what you got from me in the past that justifies your making fun of my name. BTW, if you had pronounced my name LIU properly, you silly pun would not have worked. The name is not LU, it is LIU, accent of the i, as in li-u. It is a very famous name in China. It belongs not just to me personally but to my family the history for which traces back to the 7th century. Anyone slightly familiar with Chinese history would recognized the name and know its proper pronounciation. Your idea of fun is offensive. HCKL
[PEN-L:6224] Re: Re: U.S. HOUSE REJECTS NATO'S WAR
At 06:23 PM 4/29/99 -0400, Michael Hoover wrote: watching the debate and vote on this matter on C-SPAN last evening, I couldn't help but notice that 'socialist' Bernie Sanders voted for the resolution to sanction the bombing...how fortunate that there aren't more leftists like him in the assembly casting their lot in favor of war credits...Michael Hoover Michael, I am somewhat nonplussed that US-ers still get excited about such maneuvers. I think we, Eastern Europeans are more street wise in this respect - we simply do not trust politicians no matter what they profess, because it is quite clear to us that whatever they profess serves only one goal - advancement of their own political careers. Yoshie's posting on Vuk Draskovic is a classic example. We used to call those people "nomenklatura" - implying a list of names that would pop up whenever a political opportunity arises, and saying the most opportune things for the occasion (Milan Kundera's novel _The Joke_ contains a nice study of such a character). Some newer terms are "radishes" (the idea is "red outside, white inside" - which sounds like an accurate description of Rep. Sanders) or an acronym TKM which roughly translates as "now is our fucking turn" (the idea is that those who have been finally admitted to the halls of power now have the chance to do their worst - think of it as the Eastern European version of the King-Sun's saying "after me, deluge.") Wojtek
[PEN-L:6214] Re: an A-Z of US aggression
Date sent: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 02:51:39 EDT Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:Re: an A-Z of US aggression Originally to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] An A-Z of US aggression By Zanny Begg Angola -- 1975: civil war breaks out after Portugal is forced to withdraw. The US backs the right-wing Union for the Total Liberation of Angola in its counter-revolutionary war against the radical Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola. Angola is invaded several times by South Africa with covert support by the US. Bolivia -- 1967: around 100 US advisers are part of the military force which murders Che Guevara in Bolivia. Cuba -- 1899: US occupies with 18,000 marines. 1902: Cuba is forced to sign the Platt Amendment, giving the US the orightoe to intervene in Cuba's internal affairs at any time. 1906, 1916 and 1917: US troops invade and occupy Cuba. 1933: US government overthrows Cuban government. 1959: Cuban revolutionaries take power. 1961: US attempts to invade Cuba to overthrow the revolutionary government. 1999: the US still maintains a blockade against Cuba and an illegal military base at Guantssnamo. Dominican Republic -- 1965: 4000 US marines invade to overthrow a left-wing government. El Salvador -- 1981-92: US backed a right-wing military dictatorship in its war against the left-wing Farabundo Marto National Liberation Front. Fiji -- 1987: The US offers tacit support to the leaders of the military coup against the Fiji Labour Party government. Grenada -- 1983: US forces invade Grenada when conflicts within the revolutionary government, including the murder of Prime Minister Maurice Bishop, created an opportunity to install a pro-US regime. Haiti -- US invades in 1915 and 1918. In 1994, 6000 US marines invade Haiti to restore President Aristide to power. Iraq -- 1991: US uses its dominance of the United Nations to launch a war for oil profits in the Persian Gulf. At least 200,000 Iraqi civilians are killed. US-imposed sanctions cause the death of more than 1 million people. oNo-fly zonesoe continue to be enforced over northern and southern Iraq. Japan -- 1945: US drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Kosova -- 1999: the US-led NATO alliance bombs Serbia and Kosova. Lebanon -- 1958: 10,000 US marines invade. 1982-84: US sends troops to expel Palestine Liberation Organisation fighters and Arab rebels. Mexico -- 1914: US troops occupy Vera Cruz province. Nicaragua -- 1927-33: US forces occupy Nicaragua to fight revolutionary leader Augusto Sandino's liberation army. 1979: the revolutionary movement inspired by Sandino, the Sandinista National Liberation Front, overthrows the US-backed Somoza dictatorship. Washington backs a covert war against the new government. 1990: the Nicaraguan government loses elections after years of fighting a war against contras sponsored and funded by the US. Oman -- 1962: US oil companies discover oil in Oman. 1965: the people of Oman rise up and form the Liberation Front for the Occupied Arabian Gulf. The US pressures Iran to intervene. It is subsequently revealed that the sultan of Oman had signed a secret deal with the Iranian monarchy to aid the anti-guerilla war. Panama -- 1901: After engineering Panama's separation from Colombia, Washington takes control of the Canal Zone. 1918: US forces invade five cities in Panama. 1964: US troops attack protesters who attempt to fly the Panamanian flag in the Canal Zone. In December 1989 the US invades Panama, killing 2000 people. Qatar -- 1995: US stores equipment to supply armoured brigades in Qatar. Rwanda -- 1994: the French-backed Interahamwe government commits one of the worst massacres in this century. During the 1980s, the CIA helped funnel arms to the Interahamwe through Zaire. US officials now admit that the US tried to cover up the extent of the massacre. Somalia -- 1995: under the guise of a ohumanitarian missionoe, 35,000 US-led troops occupy Somalia. Troops land on a beach in Mogadishu to coincide with prime time TV broadcasts. Timor -- 1975: the US dramatically increases its military aid to Indonesia, enabling
[PEN-L:6227] from SLATE
(copyright 1999, Microsoft) today's papers China Syndrome By Scott Shuger For the first time in weeks, the domestic economy leads at one of the majors. The LAT leads with the government's report that the first quarter's growth of wages, salaries and benefits was unexpectedly slow, which is surprising because the economy is flat-out booming. But the war still dominates the news. The NYT lead corrals several unnamed American and NATO military sources who argue that, despite official Pentagon pronouncements to the contrary, NATO's bombing campaign is not seriously diminishing the Yugoslav Army's fighting ability--primarily because NATO's attack-the-air-defenses-first strategy gave it plenty of time to disperse and hunker down--and in fact has even strengthened it politically. According to the USAT lead, the military that's being weakened by the air campaign is...America's. The story says that according to a soon-to-retire Air Force general, the Pentagon's ability to respond to hot spots elsewhere in the world is being degraded because combat squadrons are being stripped of their best personnel and equipment. The top non-local story at the WP is a detailed account of the Serb-on-Kosovar-Albanian atrocities that took place in Djakovica on April 1st. The paper says the murders there of at least 55 people, including 20 women and children, are particularly well-documented because the Albanians in the town had set up an elaborate neighborhood watch system. So elaborate that international war crimes investigators are now using survivors' accounts to map out a murder-by-murder account. The LAT says that first quarter wage growth was barely half of what had been expected. Or even more dramatically: for the first time in two years, the latest wage and benefit gain was basically canceled out by inflation. As the WSJ points out in its story on the report, this is confounding because the U.S. labor market is the tightest it's been in 30 years, and basic supply and demand reasoning entails that workers should therefore become higher priced. Reading these two stories side by side in search of the explanation leaves one with more than a few doubts about economic spot reporting. For instance, the LAT says the wage growth rate is low because it doesn't generally reflect compensation increases achieved through bonuses and stock options, while the Journal says the index was dragged down because of a drop in bonuses awarded to financial service workers during the first quarter. And the LAT says the rate of raises has been braked by widespread employee insecurity lingering from the layoffs of the early 1990s: workers' fears of losing their jobs keep them from asking for too much. But the Journal says that "one popular theory" is that "workers' wage demands are no longer pumped up by fears that escalating prices will erode their paychecks." The essential confusion of the discussion is on particular display in one brief stretch of the LAT story. Within the space of two paragraphs, the story "explains" that such a small rise in income could add to pressure for bigger wage increases, but also that it is fresh evidence that inflation remains tame. The problem is the essential indeterminacy of economic facts. Are wage demands where they are because of fear or because of the absence of fear? Does a small rise in income increase the pressure for raises or relieve it? The papers get in trouble when they try to write as if such questions have determinate answers. They should instead do much shorter stories on these topics that stick to the basic quantitative information. The contemporary discussion of the effectiveness of the military campaign against Yugoslavia is also dogged by this sort of indeterminacy. Does the fact that the Yugoslavian Army now enjoys more political support than it did before U.S. bombs fell bode well or ill for U.S. war aims? The answer isn't obvious. More political involvement could mean more political generals with less military acumen (this is essentially what happened to the old German general staff under the rise of Nazism). The LAT and NYT report that a NATO warplane inadvertently fired a missile into a suburb of Sofia, Bulgaria, hitting an empty house and killing no one. Although this episode runs inside at both papers, it's not inconsequential: NATO is now bombing the wrong *country.* NATO's explanation is not without interest: the missile was targeting a Serb surface-to-air-missile radar, which then was turned off. "Without the guidance of an active signal," the LAT explains, the missile would have flown the length of its 30-mile range before falling." (The NYT says 50 miles.) Can this really be right? If so, NATO weapons have, in the course of their modernization, been disimproved. Once upon a time, a pilot could detonate an errant missile from the cockpit while it was still in the air. A politically useful feature, no? The papers should look into this. ... The WP and NYT run stories
[PEN-L:6229] Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
In fact, in one of my posting to lbo-talk I hypothesized that the Euro social democrats willingness to go to a war on "human rights" issue was an effort to divert the public attention from their inability to deliver on their electoral promises of changing the neo-liberal policies. Afraid that the the history or Mitterand socialists may repeat itself, the decided to "change the subject" and score what they mistakenly thought to be some easy points on "defending human rights." Wojtek Or, alternatively to this "Wag the Dog" sort of interpretation, there is that moldy fig Marxist analysis that the war is about expansionism, making Eastern Europe, Russia and China safe for capitalist investment. One of the things that should be factored into a global analysis is the Chinese government's retreat from privatizing the state firms, which surprised me more than anybody. I suspect that the furor over "spying" has a lot to do with this. If China had behaved more pliantly in recent WTO discussions, I suspect that this would be a non-issue. This, by the way, is one of the reasons I am somewhat leery of Republican opposition to the Balkans war, since they are "interventionist" when it comes to China. The other thing to keep in mind is that Yeltsin won't live forever. There has to be some concern about Russia's political identification with the Serbs. I suspect that what is driving this is residual "Stalinist" animosity toward western imperialism. The goal of Nato and western imperialism is to remove every last vestige of crypto-Stalinist or nationalist opposition to its global designs. That is why so much is at stake in this Kosovo adventure. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6234] Re: Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
Doug, While you are at it, don't forget Clinton's encouragement of the re-emergence of Japanese militarism, the selling of arms to Taiwan, and authorized the Asia TMD (Theatre Missile Defense) system, sparking a new arms race. The Dems has been accused as being the party of war, but they do live up to the reputation. Someone on this list fondly called Max a progressive Social Democrat. NATO is full of those types, but at least they wear their badges openly. Henry Doug Henwood wrote: Max Sawicky wrote: Greetings to all you born-again Republicans, relieved we don't have more Bernie Sanders' and fewer Pat Buchanans, lest the air war vote have been decided in favor of the Clinton Administration. Actually, if I had a vote I might have voted nay as well, in protest over Clinton's conduct of this operation, as some of the 26 Democrats might have. But there should be little doubt that most Republicans voted nay because they are the party that officially doesn't give a shit. Naiman must be smoking loco weed to characterize this as some kind of victory for the left, not least because the chief audience for his work on trade is the same liberals-in-quotes he is excoriating for being soft on the IMF and "Empire." Lemme get this straight, Max. The Dems are now the party of the IMF and imperial war. The Republicans are full of folks who, for the wrong reasons, want to throw a monkey wrench into the imperial financial and military machine. But finding any good in this is a symptom of having smoked "loco weed." Further...Clinton's trying to revive the all-but-dead Social Security "reform"; he committed money for the deployment of Star Wars (something Reagan and Bush never did); he put an end to welfare as an entitlement; he's presided over the gutting of the Endangered Species Act and the clear-cutting of national forests (something again that Reagan and Bush never dared); he signed the hideous crime bill and the Defense of Marriage Act and bragged about it; and he's probably killed more people (figuring in the Iraqi sanctions) than Reagan or Bush did. And, miraculously, he's managed to silence liberal opposition to any of this, whether we're talking about the enviro establishment or, I'm sorry to say, the Economic Policy Institute. Try some loco weed, Max - it might be revealing! Doug PS: Speaking of Clinton administration pigginess, I highly recommend the hard-to-find documentary Waco: Rules of Engagement http://www.waco93.com. It shows how the ATF and FBI, led by Janet Reno, massacred the Branch Davidians and then lied about it. Chuck Schumer, whom liberal New Yorkers cheered when he defeated Al D'Amato last November, comes off as a totally evil asshole.
[PEN-L:6206] Happy Days Are Here Again
Greetings to all you born-again Republicans, relieved we don't have more Bernie Sanders' and fewer Pat Buchanans, lest the air war vote have been decided in favor of the Clinton Administration. Actually, if I had a vote I might have voted nay as well, in protest over Clinton's conduct of this operation, as some of the 26 Democrats might have. But there should be little doubt that most Republicans voted nay because they are the party that officially doesn't give a shit. Naiman must be smoking loco weed to characterize this as some kind of victory for the left, not least because the chief audience for his work on trade is the same liberals-in-quotes he is excoriating for being soft on the IMF and "Empire." Not only are we exalting the foreign policy wisdom of the GOP, we are also being regaled with their "intelligence" findings as well. Never in a million years would our anti-imperialists accept this sort of evidence if it was applied to groups they deemed acceptable, as it has in the past and will be in the future. Have you guys seen these? Any comments? "The Kosovo Liberation Army: Does Clinton Policy Support Group with Terror, Drug Ties?" http://www.senate.gov/~rpc/releases/1999/fr033199.htm "Bosnia II: The Clinton Administration Sets Course for NATO Intervention in Kosovo" http://www.senate.gov/~rpc/releases/1998/kosovo.htm Remind me again, who's left and who's right? Disoriented, mbs
[PEN-L:6236] Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
I don't quite get the connection here between economic stagnation in Western Europe and bombing Belgrade. What do you think it is? Doug Final paragraphs of Sean Gervasi's "Why Nato is in Yugoslavia", at: http://www.mclink.it/assoc/fondpasti/nato/gerv-e.htm When closely considered, the proposal to extend NATO eastward is not just dangerous. It also seems something of a desperate act. It is obviously irrational, for it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. It can lead to a second Cold War between the NATO powers and Russia, and possibly to nuclear war. It must be assumed that no one really wants that. Why, then, would the NATO countries propose such a course of action? Why would they be unable to weigh the dangers of their decision objectively? Part of the answer is that those who have made this decision have looked at it in very narrow terms, without seeing the larger context in which NATO expansion would take place. When one does look at the larger context, the proposal to expand NATO is obviously irrational. Consider the larger context. NATO proposes to admit certain countries in Central Europe as full members of the alliance in the near future. Other East European countries are being considered for later admission. This extension has two possible purposes. The first is to prevent "the failure of Russian democracy", that is, to ensure the continuation of the present regime, or something like it, in Russia. The second is to place NATO in a favorable position if a war should ever break out between Russia and the West. In an age of nuclear weapons, pursuing the second purpose is perhaps even more dangerous than it was during the years of the Cold War, since there are now several countries with nuclear weapons which would potentially be ranged against NATO. The argument that NATO should be expanded eastward in order to ensure the West an advantage in the event of a nuclear war is not a very convincing one. And it would certainly not be convincing to Central European countries if it were openly spoke of. Those would be the countries most likely to suffer in the first stages of such a war. Their situation would be similar to that of Germany during the Cold War, as the German antiwar movement began to understand in the 1980s. The main purpose of expanding NATO, as almost everyone has acknowledged, is to make sure that there is no reversal of the changes which have taken place in Russia during the last five years. That would end the dream of a three-part Europe united under the capitalist banner and close a very large new space for the operation of Western capital. A NATO presence in Central and Eastern Europe is simply a means of maintaining new pressure on those who would wish to attempt to change the present situation in Russia. However, as has been seen, this also means locking Russia, and other countries of the CIS, into a state of underdevelopment and continuous economic and social crisis in which millions of people will suffer terribly, and in which there is no possibility of society seeking a path of economic and social development in which human needs determine economic priorities. What is horribly ironic about this situation is the Western countries are offering their model of economic organization as the solution to Russia's problems. The realist analysts, of course, know perfectly well that it is no such thing. They are interested only in extending Western domination further eastward. And they offer their experience as a model for others only to beguile. But the idea that "the transition to democracy", as the installation of market rules is often called, is important in the world battle for public opinion. It has helped to justify and sustain the policies which the West has been pursuing toward the countries of the CIS. The Western countries themselves, however, are locked in an intractable economic crisis. Beginning in the early 1970s, profits fell, production faltered, long-term unemployment began to rise and standards of living began to fall. There were, of course, the ups and downs of the business cycle. But what was important was the trend. The trend of GDP growth in the major Western countries has been downward since the major recession of 1973-1975. In the United States, for instance, the rate of growth fell from about 4 per cent per year in the 1950s and the 1960s, to 2.9 per cent in the 1970s and then to about 2.4 per cent in the 1980s. Current projections for growth are even lower. The situation was not very different in other Western countries. Growth was somewhat faster, but unemployment was significantly higher. The current rates of unemployment in Western Europe average about 11 per cent, and there is more unemployment hidden in the statistics as a result of various government pseudoemployment plans. Both Western Europe and North America have experienced a prolonged economic stagnation. And capitalist economies cannot sustain employment and living standards
[PEN-L:6239] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
I don't disagree about the main purpose of NATO, but I suspect that the eastward expansion of NATO has a great deal to with the expansion of the demand for American arms manufactures. I understand NATO has been pushing its new members by more U.S. fighter planes. Louis Proyect wrote: The main purpose of expanding NATO, as almost everyone has acknowledged, is to make sure that there is no reversal of the changes which have taken place in Russia during the last five years. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:6215] Re: Re: Columbin High: Community Kills
I thought Milton's heaven had as its materialist basis capitalist free markets and as its pyschological basis self-interest :) Cheers, Ken Hanly Carrol Cox wrote: Thomas Kruse wrote: Here's a very healthy anti-dote to much of the spin on Columbine High. As a non-jock whose school was divided between athletes and non-athletes, this rings true. By pointing attention to the collective culture, it also helps to see how the enemy is in us, not "out there", in the families or psyches of a couple of kids, and without simplistic recourse to video games and tv as expalantory variables. I think a fairly commonplace marxist explanation is possible here. The Community Tom criticizes is a "willed community," one without any material basis. I think that the two most dramatic images of community with a material base are two persons working with a two-handled saw and a chain-gang. A physical activity compels some unity of thought and feeling (the saw will buck like hell if the two are not in some sense "in tune," even *simpatico* as in Spanish). Similarly with chain gangs, the rhythm of whose work has created some wonderful songs/poetry in the 20th century. In contrast what I call a "willed community" (in an advanced capitalist state) merely reinforces the *lack* of any social ties that bind. One can see this in all the touchy-feely efforts at building "community in the class room" that emerged in the '60s. My guess is that most of the professors who really went for this did what one friend of mine at ISU did: retired early because he was so bitter that students given "freedom" didn't perform just as his dream said they should. There are bound to be large numbers of people excluded from such a community, and a large amount of bitterness flowing from that exclusion. Most of the politics I call anarchist (and this is doubtless unfair to some who call themselves anarchist) assume a mystic community arising from the concordance of individual souls with no material basis.. Milton's heaven is like that. Carrol
[PEN-L:6243] Re: Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
NATO has always been a conventional arms organization. In the post-Cold War environment strategic nuclear arms control is in danger of becoming nuclear disarmament, a fundamental shift in the role of arms control being the effect deterrent to disarmament. The aggression by NATO against a non-nuclear nation such as Yugoslavia has a special message: that the defense relationship between conventional and nuclear arms has not become obsolete. This is the most significant longterm implication of Kosovo and every government has gotten the message and started revising their defense strategies. HCKL (for defensive purposes against racist humor) Michael Perelman wrote: I don't disagree about the main purpose of NATO, but I suspect that the eastward expansion of NATO has a great deal to with the expansion of the demand for American arms manufactures. I understand NATO has been pushing its new members by more U.S. fighter planes. Louis Proyect wrote: The main purpose of expanding NATO, as almost everyone has acknowledged, is to make sure that there is no reversal of the changes which have taken place in Russia during the last five years. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:6225] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Wojtek wrote: - it is patently false. The current institutional design is based on two developments, the institutional designed developed under central planning and the interplay of occupational and professional interests under the central planning regime (for the primer see Konrad and Szelenyi, _The Intellectuals on the Road to Class Power_, New York: Haracourt Brace Jovanovich, 1979; and Kennedy, _Professionals, Power and Solidarity in Poland, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. Wojtek, Do Konrad and Szelenyi say anything about Oskar Lange's contribution to establishing the economic principles of the central planning regime? regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6232] Another Note---severed heads in the garden
Received this, this am from a little-bit of an Ohio politician that I had no idea was of Yugo Serbian ancestry... Tom, "Thanks for sending along your posts on the crisis in the Balkans. I have seen some of them, but not others...so I appreciate your periodic messages. This tragedy has special significance for me being of Serbian and Montenegran extraction. Both parents were born there and I grew up hearing about Kosovo, the Ustasha, Tito and the Balkan wars. Relatives I have heard from there have said NATO bombings have only solidified Milosevic's strength and have driven the democratic opposition into silence."
[PEN-L:6244] RE: Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
DH: Lemme get this straight, Max. The Dems are now the party of the IMF and imperial war. I don't buy the first premise, so that which follows from it is irrelevant. The principal problem with the IMF is the conditions it attaches to loans. Dems in Congress are not necessarily enthusiastic about this dimension of the IMF. Their main concern stems from Rubin and Summers being able to scare the pants off them with tales of global financial meltdown. You could say they are soft on the IMF, or suckers for it, but they are not crusaders for it either. The latter is an elite occupation. The same goes for 'imperial war.' There is no major Congressional Democratic interest in imperialism. They voted to support the air war because it was Clinton's policy, because they think there is some kind of human rights interest, and only to a extent they buy into the 'America must lead' stuff. In a more overt 'imperial war,' namely the Gulf, most Dems voted nay. The Republicans are full of folks who, for the wrong reasons, want to throw a monkey wrench into the imperial financial and military machine. But finding any good in this is a symptom of having smoked "loco weed." R's hardly want to hamper the military machine. Their menu of appropriate interventions differs from Clinton's, and partly they oppose this operation because it is Clinton's and not their's. As for finance, there would still be an "imperial financial machine" without an IMF, and there is little evidence of Repub opposition to this machine. Further...Clinton's trying to revive the all-but-dead Social Security "reform"; I disagree. He's flogging the R's because they are stuck in an impossible budget position, and his aim is for them to merely ratify the only part of his own plan that he really cares about, the debt pay-down. he committed money for the deployment of Star Wars (something Reagan and Bush never did); he put an end to welfare as an entitlement; he's presided over the gutting of the Endangered Species Act and the clear-cutting of national forests (something again that Reagan and Bush never dared); he signed the hideous crime bill and the Defense of Marriage Act and bragged about it; and he's probably killed more people (figuring in the Iraqi sanctions) than Reagan or Bush did. And, miraculously, he's managed to silence liberal opposition to any of this, All of this could have been worse under a Republican president. Some of it was opposed by Dems in Congress. As a depiction of Democratic interests, as opposed to Clinton's machinations, the preceding is just a distortion. Not without elements of truth, but on the whole a distortion. whether we're talking about the enviro establishment or, I'm sorry to say, the Economic Policy Institute. I just work here. If you don't like our policy, go complain to Jeff Faux. Just don't tell him I sent you. Try some loco weed, Max - it might be revealing! Mushrooms are my hallucinogen of choice. That and mailing lists. mbs
[PEN-L:6233] Re: Re: Vaclav Havel on NATO's attack
Interesting that Havel claims that the world is moving away from the naton-state concept while he is president of a newly minted Czech state that resulted from the division of a larger nation state. How does this brilliant observation fit in with the division of Yugoslavia into umpteen nation states and a resurgence of movements to form separate states all over the world? Of course what he is doing is apologetics for a globalisation that makes him irrelevant except as a literary mouthpiece for capitalist interests who can be awarded symbolic tokens of gratitude for leading part of Eastern Europe away from the Evils of Communism. Cheers, Ken Hanly P.S. Are there any recent surveys of public opinion in East European countries that measure satisfaction with present regimes as contrasted with earlier communist regimes and/or the same in Russia and independent republics of the former USSR? Ricardo Duchesne wrote: Date sent: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 00:25:28 +0200 Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: "Konstantin Borodinsky" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:citation Originally to: "WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK" [EMAIL PROTECTED] This might be curious in contents. And more so, who says this. * OTTAWA, April 29 (AFP) - Czech President Vaclav Havel said here Thursday that human rights supersede the rights of states and justify NATO's attack on the "genocidal regime" of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. In a wide-ranging address to a joint meeting of Canada's two houses of parliament, Havel said events of the past century were "gradually bringing the human race to the realization that the human being is more important than the state." Speaking in English, Havel said the North Atlantic Treaty Organization had no option but to take on the "genocidal regime of Slobodan Milosevic" and that the air campaign against Yugoslavia was "in the interest of principles and certain values." NATO is "fighting for humanity," Havel said, adding that though the 19-nation alliance did not have a formal UN mandate for its action, it "has acted out of respect for the law which recognizes humanity rather than the state." Havel criticized Russia for its position on Kosovo, urging it to regard NATO as a partner rather than an adversary. He also noted that the recent enlargement of NATO to embrace his country, Hungary and Poland had been "far from easy" because of "the opposition on the part of the Russian Federation." Havel maintained that the world was moving away from the nation-state concept to regional and global responsibility and this, in turn, meant major reforms were necessary, especially within the United Nations. "The Security Council can no longer maintain the power of the conditions of when it was formed," he said. Among the reforms he suggested was a review of the veto power of each of the five permanent members of the Security Council -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States. He also called on the United Nations to be "less bureaucratic and more effective," saying it must be identifiable by people around the world as their representative body rather than a collection of state governments. Havel is half-way through a state visit to Canada, his first as president of the Czech Republic. He made a state visit nine years ago as president of Czechoslovakia. I personally find these ideas refreshing and promising. A new dimension for the concept of globalization and a solid foundation for the coming millenium, which will not last long, I guess, with such ideology. Respectfully, Konstantin Borodinsky
[PEN-L:6238] Re: Re: Re: U.S. HOUSE REJECTS NATO'S WAR
Yoshie's posting on Vuk Draskovic is a classic example. We used to call those people "nomenklatura" - implying a list of names that would pop up whenever a political opportunity arises, and saying the most opportune things for the occasion (Milan Kundera's novel _The Joke_ contains a nice study of such a character). Some newer terms are "radishes" (the idea is "red outside, white inside" - which sounds like an accurate description of Rep. Sanders) or an acronym TKM which roughly translates as "now is our fucking turn" (the idea is that those who have been finally admitted to the halls of power now have the chance to do their worst - think of it as the Eastern European version of the King-Sun's saying "after me, deluge.") Have you ever read A. Zinoviev _The Yawning Heights_ and _The Radiant Future_ as well as Elster's commentary in _Sour Grapes_? What do you think? I find his approach interesting combining formal logic and satire though I might disagree with quite a bit of it. Sort of a _Catch-22_ for the USSR. Sam Pawlett
[PEN-L:6211] Re: US/Nato Motives
The following is an expanded version of remarks I made a few days ago on the marxism list. I think I have mentioned Sartre's "On Genocide" in other posts. His core argument was that the Vietnam War was fought not primarily over Viet Nam but over Latin America, which is and always has been the very core and foundation of U.S. Imperialism. In contrast to the French in Algeria, the labor and economic wealth of which was at the heart of the conflict, Vietnam had little intrinsic interest to the Empire, and thus the U.S. could follow a genocidal policy there with the primary purpose of teaching the people of Latin America a lesson. The ferocity of the U.S. response to the tiniest anti-imperialist developments in Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Panama, Haiti, etc. (not to mention the large threats such as Chile) is an index to how impossible it will be (has been) for any Latin American country to declare even partial or limited independence without being prepared for the most god-awful response from the U.S. Could it be that the current attack on Yugoslavia fits Sartre's analysis? That wherever U.S. bombers or infantry or CIA spooks go, it is really Latin America which is at stake? Carrol ___ I have a feeling that the design here must be much greater than just keeping Latin America in line, which is pretty much in line to begin with. The risk that US/NATO has taken in this operation has been the greatest--much greater than the Gulf War. This whole operation must have been in making for a long time. We need a comprehensive geo-political as well as cost-benifit analysis from US/NATO point of view to understand this phenomenon. Cheers, ajit sinha
[PEN-L:6235] Russia: Down Not Out?
Pen-l Friends, While agreeing with much of Richter's commentary beow, I think he overlooks the geopolitical implications of another Russia debt default to Western creditors, who want to avoid a replay of the financial crisis last August. Such a strategy must surely be related to an expanded Russian role in a peace settlement for the war over Kosovo. As the IMF irons out the details of a new agreement with Russia, I wouldn't be surprised to see at the same time NATO also agree to Russia's expanded peacekeeping role in the Balkans. Could this be the first glimpse of a new global financial architecture, opening the door to a debtors' cartel against the West? Seth WSWS : News Analysis : Europe : Russia Russia: The end of a world power What lies behind the domestic crisis? By Patrick Richter 30 April 1999 The arrogant attitude of Washington towards the Russian government during the bombardment of Serbia marks a turn in relations with Russia and gives cause to assess the real character of the liberal reforms which have been carried out there since 1991. These policies were aimed at completely destroying the Russian economy as a potential competitor and turning the country into a market and source for cheap raw materials. With the many big collective corporations bought by Western businesses--above all in the food, chemical and pharmaceutical industries--productive plants were closed while the retail networks were retained as an outlet for Western products. Following the financial crisis last summer, apart from the chocolate factory "Red October", no larger profit-making "Russian" factories have survived. Coal and steel companies are subsidised by the government and the contracts for the arms industry have dropped dramatically. Only the raw materials industry is able to yield a profit. The type of future perspectives regarding foreign investment, in which so much hope is still invested by the Central European countries, has been summed up by the American banker and industrialist Thomas Wainwright: "Where should they [the foreign investors] go with their money? Who would they produce for? The international market is in a depression and foreign competitors would reject products manufactured in Russia with all sorts of protectionist measures." Steel and aluminium are already now being threatened by such anti-dumping measures. Last August's financial crisis burst the bubble of the overblown Russian credit market, which on the one hand expressed the boundless and naive illusions in a capitalist upturn but which was also consciously inflated in order to increase Russia's dependence on the West. The credit policies of the IMF since 1991 served the purpose of strengthening particular layers in Russia whose job was to carry out such a policy. Its chief supporters were chosen amongst the most corrupt and ruthless economic and political climbers who, under the leadership of President Boris Yeltsin, could bring the most profitable parts of the economy under their control--the finance and oil sector--and then build up very influential media empires. At the height of their power these men were reputed to control over 90 percent of the economy and were known as the so-called oligarchs: Boris Berezovsky (who built his empire with LogoWAS, the Lada distribution network; owns newspapers, television stations and shares in oil companies and the Russian airline Aeroflot), Vladimir Potanin (of Oneximbank; one of the richest men in Russia, according to Forbes, with $1.6 billion), Alexander Smolensky (SBS-Agrobank), Vladimir Gussinsky (Mostbank group), Vladimir Vinogradov (Inkombank), Vagit Alekperov (Lukoil) and Michael Chodorovsky (Yukos-Oil), to name just a few of the most important ones. Their elevation came relatively easily. During perestroika the mathematics graduates and young members of the Communist Party's youth organisation founded private banks with party money, or just took over privatised parts of the national banking system. In the unstable situation in the first years after 1991 they were given cheap state credits which they could use to speculate during a period of hyperinflation. On this basis they were able to rack up their first millions of dollars. In the following period, the oligarchs gradually acquired shares in industry through their banks--nearly always at underrated market value--above all in the raw materials sector. In 1995 the head of privatisation at the time, Anatoli Chubais, enabled them to carry out their biggest coup with the help of the so-called "shares against credit" privatisation program, which privatised the most profitable key industries. In the name of a few of the oligarchs, Oneximbank head Potanin organised a loan of $2 billion in exchange for shares of the Berezovsky company due to be privatised. This is how Berezovsky and Smolensky gained the majority of shares of Russia's seventh biggest oil company, Sibneft. After the
[PEN-L:6213] Veterans , Revenge
This is forwarded: Reply-To: "Ray Bristow" [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: "Ray Bristow" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Terry Riordon - died this morning. Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 22:17:24 +0100 Terry Riordon, 45 year old Gulf War Veteran. The first Canadian Veteran to be tested for Uranium 238. Tested Positive, about the same levels as the top couple of British Veterans. He got his results a couple of days ago - died this morning. Killed by the USA UK's use of Uranium 238 weapons. Please pause and think of this Brave Soldier, his wife and children who served his country in faith and then was abandoned and left to rot die by the Canadian Government Military ((( There have been so many posts on the Iraq and Yugoslavian wars, I don't know if the following issues have been touched on: 1) The U.S. has an atrocious record of refusing to take care of war Veterans who are diseased by the effects of US. (socalled "friendly" fire) on them. The victims of Agent Orange fought the niggardliness of the U.S. Government refusing to admit fault for many years. The Gulf War syndrome has been denied 2) By continuing to bomb other countries the U.S. is setting up the likelihood of revenge against U.S. citizens , AMERICANS, many people on these lists ! How long can the U.S. get away with creating thousands of orphans without causing someone to grow up with revenge on their mind for the miserable lives they have to live. This is a pragmatic reason to oppose the war for every American.
[PEN-L:6262] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Wojtek Sokolowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/30/99 03:55PM Again I do not think that there is an overall master plan or capitalist conspiracy to take over CEE. I view it as a rather incoherent process of muddling through, with no master plan, no coherent strategy, conflicting interests, great uncertainty, and even greater short-term opportunism. ( Yea, the bourgeoisie are crazy like a fox. Amazing how they keep coming up winners. Would you describe WWI, WWII and most capitalist war this way or is this war different , some new phenomenon ? How about capitalist economics ? Hasn't capitalist war always been significantly anarchistic like capitalist production ? Charles Brown
[PEN-L:6220] Re: peacekeepers and partition
Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/29/99 05:50PM An army of occupation (whether in South Korea or the Balkans) basically exists to keep restive workers, students, and other uppity elements under control, in case they demand even a tiny degree of real self-determination (through reforms or revolutions). Your own country's standing army is bad enough, if you are an advocate for workers' rights, not to mention a socialist; foreign soldiers who may lack sympathy with natives, I cannot but argue, are likely to be much worse. ( Charles: I agree with Yoshie. This is a main basis for the system of capitalism, if not individual companies, specifically identifiable now, insuring profiteering and ripe conditions for exploitation will result from the NATO attack and conquest. The specific newspeak is Conquest = Peacekeeping. Charles Brown
[PEN-L:6218] Vaclav Havel on NATO's attack
OTTAWA, April 29 (AFP) - Czech President Vaclav Havel said here Thursday that human rights supersede the rights of states and justify NATO's attack on the "genocidal regime" of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. In a wide-ranging address to a joint meeting of Canada's two houses of parliament, Havel said events of the past century were "gradually bringing the human race to the realization that the human being is more important than the state." The Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 30, 1995 RIGHTS GROUPS ATTACK CZECH CITIZENSHIP LAW By ELIZABETH SULLIVAN; EUROPEAN CORRESPONDENT DATELINE: PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC A law denying automatic citizenship to most of this nation's 250,000 Gypsies has drawn sharp criticism from the United States and other western governments. The Czech Republic denies the law is anti-Gypsy, saying provisions restricting citizenship to those with Czech ancestry or a crime-free record are in line with Western policies. The law makes thousands of Gypsies, including hundreds of abandoned children, vulnerable to deportation if they cannot establish citizenship. No Gypsies have yet been deported but adoptions of the abandoned children - most the offspring of Gypsy prostitutes who never bothered to apply for citizenship - are reportedly on hold while Czech and Slovak authorities debate their fate. The law does not mention Gypsies by name. But its requirements on residence, ancestry and petty criminality exclude mainly Gypsies, say lawyers and diplomats who want the law changed. The law was adopted after Czechoslovakia split into two nations in 1993. Slovakia gave citizenship to all former passport holders on its soil. But despite the espoused liberalism of Czech President Vaclav Havel, recently announced as Harvard University commencement speaker, the Czech Republic welcomed only those who said they were Czech in communist times when such a declaration was mostly meaningless. All others - notably Gypsies - had to go through a lengthy, bureaucratic process to apply. Most Czech Gypsy families came as laborers from Slovakia after World War II. A survey among 460 Gypsies in one Czech town found four percent were unable to obtain citizenship because of petty crime convictions or not having a permanent address. Most of the others spent months proving eligibility, even though the majority were born on Czech soil. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6246] Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Doug: I'm still mystified about the connection between Eurostagnation - which is in large part a creation of policymakers, who've imposed tight money and tight budgets to make the Euro hard and to break European labor - and cruise missiles. And this: You are describing a Europe that is being forced to be more competitive. The question is why this happened in the 1980s rather than the 1950s. Isn't the answer that the post-WWII boom had ended? Isn't that the most fundamental economic fact that precedes everything else in importance? just isn't an accurate description of the U.S. economy in 1999. Just this morning, the BEA released their first estimate of first quarter growth - 4.5%, right in the middle of Sean's golden age range: This seems much too short-term to me. The general picture over the past ten to fifteen years has been one of failure to accomplish the growth-rates of the post-WWII period. In the overall decline, there will be occasional upticks. Each of these upticks has taken place with substantial costs. For example, decreases in corporate taxes might have fueled capital spending but taxation shortfalls exacerbates what O'Connor calls the "second contradiction" of capital. This means that while there are more millionaires than ever before, the life expectancy in Harlem is lower than Bengladesh. What the ruling classes are searching for is a formula that will keep the working class bought off, while keeping businesses profitable. In the 1950s, these two needs did not clash. As the 21st century draws near, the US and Western European ruling classes will by necessity become more "expansionary" in order to keep these contradictions from boiling over. I buy the political analysis - suppressing recalcitrants in Eastern Europe and preparing for a resurgent Russia - but I find the economic rationale unconvincing. I think you are looking for a dotted-line, which almost inevitably can't be found in these sorts of matters. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6247] Re: RE: Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
Max Sawicky wrote: The principal problem with the IMF is the conditions it attaches to loans. But that's their raison d'etre! It's like saying the problem with bloodletting is the overuse of leeches. Doug
[PEN-L:6212] Re: Columbin High: Community Kills
Thomas Kruse wrote: Here's a very healthy anti-dote to much of the spin on Columbine High. As a non-jock whose school was divided between athletes and non-athletes, this rings true. By pointing attention to the collective culture, it also helps to see how the enemy is in us, not "out there", in the families or psyches of a couple of kids, and without simplistic recourse to video games and tv as expalantory variables. I think a fairly commonplace marxist explanation is possible here. The Community Tom criticizes is a "willed community," one without any material basis. I think that the two most dramatic images of community with a material base are two persons working with a two-handled saw and a chain-gang. A physical activity compels some unity of thought and feeling (the saw will buck like hell if the two are not in some sense "in tune," even *simpatico* as in Spanish). Similarly with chain gangs, the rhythm of whose work has created some wonderful songs/poetry in the 20th century. In contrast what I call a "willed community" (in an advanced capitalist state) merely reinforces the *lack* of any social ties that bind. One can see this in all the touchy-feely efforts at building "community in the class room" that emerged in the '60s. My guess is that most of the professors who really went for this did what one friend of mine at ISU did: retired early because he was so bitter that students given "freedom" didn't perform just as his dream said they should. There are bound to be large numbers of people excluded from such a community, and a large amount of bitterness flowing from that exclusion. Most of the politics I call anarchist (and this is doubtless unfair to some who call themselves anarchist) assume a mystic community arising from the concordance of individual souls with no material basis.. Milton's heaven is like that. Carrol
[PEN-L:6278] IMF: 'Loans' and Conditions (was Re: Happy Days Are Here Again)
Doug to Max: The principal problem with the IMF is the conditions it attaches to loans. But that's their raison d'etre! It's like saying the problem with bloodletting is the overuse of leeches. Now the IMF doesn't even make a gesture of 'making a loan'; it merely imposes conditions. For instance: * Copyright 1999 The Washington Post April 29, 1999, Thursday, Final Edition SECTION: FINANCIAL; Pg. E01 HEADLINE: IMF Ready To Resume Russia Aid; $4.5 Billion Loan Tied to Reforms BYLINE: Paul Blustein, Washington Post Staff Writer Moreover, the IMF loan is structured as a virtual "bookkeeping operation" in which money would barely flow through Russian hands before being sent safely back to IMF headquarters in Washington. Of the $ 4.5 billion the IMF intends to lend over the next 18 months, $ 3 billion is to be disbursed in the first year, meaning that Russia will receive less from the IMF than it owes to the IMF during the term of the loan, according to officials familiar with the arrangement. To pay the full amount that it owes to the IMF, Moscow would have to use some other reserves of foreign currencies that it holds * Workers in the Third World have been reduced to the conditions under which they have to pay to earn the privilege of working in the capitalist world market (in Russia, without regular payments of wages). This is not even free wage labor. Nay, it's worse than slavery. Yoshie
[PEN-L:6217] Re: Vaclav Havel on NATO's attack
Date sent: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 00:25:28 +0200 Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: "Konstantin Borodinsky" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:citation Originally to: "WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK" [EMAIL PROTECTED] This might be curious in contents. And more so, who says this. * OTTAWA, April 29 (AFP) - Czech President Vaclav Havel said here Thursday that human rights supersede the rights of states and justify NATO's attack on the "genocidal regime" of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. In a wide-ranging address to a joint meeting of Canada's two houses of parliament, Havel said events of the past century were "gradually bringing the human race to the realization that the human being is more important than the state." Speaking in English, Havel said the North Atlantic Treaty Organization had no option but to take on the "genocidal regime of Slobodan Milosevic" and that the air campaign against Yugoslavia was "in the interest of principles and certain values." NATO is "fighting for humanity," Havel said, adding that though the 19-nation alliance did not have a formal UN mandate for its action, it "has acted out of respect for the law which recognizes humanity rather than the state." Havel criticized Russia for its position on Kosovo, urging it to regard NATO as a partner rather than an adversary. He also noted that the recent enlargement of NATO to embrace his country, Hungary and Poland had been "far from easy" because of "the opposition on the part of the Russian Federation." Havel maintained that the world was moving away from the nation-state concept to regional and global responsibility and this, in turn, meant major reforms were necessary, especially within the United Nations. "The Security Council can no longer maintain the power of the conditions of when it was formed," he said. Among the reforms he suggested was a review of the veto power of each of the five permanent members of the Security Council -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States. He also called on the United Nations to be "less bureaucratic and more effective," saying it must be identifiable by people around the world as their representative body rather than a collection of state governments. Havel is half-way through a state visit to Canada, his first as president of the Czech Republic. He made a state visit nine years ago as president of Czechoslovakia. I personally find these ideas refreshing and promising. A new dimension for the concept of globalization and a solid foundation for the coming millenium, which will not last long, I guess, with such ideology. Respectfully, Konstantin Borodinsky
[PEN-L:6261] Re: An International Protectorate in Kosovo
Yoshie, Maybe "self-determination" is an illusion, but I don't see why some kind of limited "autonomy" would be so. As your post notes there is disagreement over the nature of any peacekeeping force (or whatever term you would prefer to use) that would be there. But we now see a lot of de facto limited autonomy in former ethnic war zones. That is what Chechnya has, still officially part of Russia in the eyes of the world but de facto independent. To a lesser degree, and probably more comparable to the situation in Kosovo-Metohija, that is what we have with the Srpska Republika in Bosnia, which is also recognized by the world to be a part of the nation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, but which has considerable if clearly limited autonomy within its zone of control, limited by presence of peacekeepers who have indeed intervened in its internal politics, but who have nevertheless succeeded in largely keeping the peace since 1995, despite the numerous continuing problems in the area. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Thursday, April 29, 1999 7:33 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6199] An International Protectorate in Kosovo Those leftists who use words like 'autonomy' and 'self-determination' for Albanians in Kosovo as if such things could ever be achieved under USA/NATO suffer from the worst kind of illusion or delusion to which even the New York Times seems immune. Yoshie * The New York Times April 29, 1999, Thursday, Late Edition - Final SECTION: Section A; Page 16; Column 1; Foreign Desk HEADLINE: CRISIS IN THE BALKANS: NEWS ANALYSIS; Clinton's Quandary: No Approach to End War Is Fast or Certain of Success BYLINE: By JANE PERLEZ DATELINE: WASHINGTON, April 28 ...For their part, the Administration and NATO insist for now that they will stick to their five conditions. The most contentious of these are the composition of the international security force that would take Albanian refugees back to Kosovo and the character of an international protectorate that the Administration has said it favors carving out in Kosovo *
[PEN-L:6273] Foreign Policy In Focus: Bombs Away
Foreign Policy In Focus: Bombs Away May 1999 Vol.4, No.13 Written by Tom Barry, Codirector, Foreign Policy in Focus Program Edited by Martha Honey (IPS) Key Points o The bombing of Yugoslavia was not authorized by the UN. o The dynamics of conflict and intervention in the Balkans embody many of the new peace and security challenges of the post-cold war era. o The U.S.-led NATO command-caught up in its own credibility crisis and lack of strategic mission-has made the Balkans a more volatile, dangerous place. By calling for air strikes against Serbian targets the Clinton administration made good on its threat to Yugoslavia's president Slobodan Milosevic: either accept NATO peacekeeping forces or face the wrath of the West. On March 24, 1999, "smart" laser-guided bombs began falling over the provinces of Serbia and Kosovo to demonstrate NATO's resolve to stabilize the region. Well into the second month of the bombing campaign, Serbian forces have managed to continue their own campaign to assert ethnic control over Kosovo by ridding the province of the insurgent Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and hundreds of thousands of Kosovar Albanians (who constitute 90% of the province's population). Failing to achieve a quick fix, NATO has steadily expanded the range of its bombing missions. The high-tech onslaught targets not only military facilities and forces but also Serbia's entire public infrastructure. In the face of unexpected Serbian resolve, NATO is introducing Apache attack helicopters and has intensified the bombing campaign. Increasingly, NATO strategists are considering the introduction of ground troops. The launching of NATO's bombing campaign came on the eve the alliance's 50th anniversary. Functioning during the cold war as a U.S.-led defensive alliance to protect Western Europe against Soviet aggression, NATO in the post-cold war years has sought to recreate itself as the main guardian of regional interests and stability. Rather than disbanding with the demise of the Soviet Union, NATO has expanded its membership and mission at the urging of Washington. As predicted by NATO critics, the revived NATO has seriously undermined security relations with Russia and has further degraded the UN's authority. Unlike the bombing campaign against Iraq in response to its occupation of Kuwait, the bombing of Yugoslavia was not authorized by the UN. The Serbian forces made no extraterritorial advances but were pursuing within their own country a counterinsurgency campaign against an emerging guerrilla army. Citing the need to preserve stability in Europe and to protect the Kosovar Albanians against Serbian ethno-fascism, NATO-led by Washington-initiated an offensive operation against a sovereign European state. It is the latest and most aggressive of the U.S.-led "humanitarian interventions" of the post-cold war period. The dynamics of conflict and intervention in the Balkans embody many of the new peace and security challenges of the post-cold war era. The containment, revolutionary, and rollback strategies that characterized the bipolar security environment of the cold war decades have given way to a situation in which civil wars, ethnic and religious conflicts, humanitarian crises, failed states, and looming environmental problems are the leading challenges to maintaining global peace and stability. Strutting on the world stage with the arrogance of power (and liberal rhetoric) so typical of the U.S. foreign policy establishment, the Clinton administration decided to demonstrate the U.S. and NATO's determination to rid Europe of its most persistent challenge to stability. Although world opinion (with the prominent exceptions of China and Russia) largely applauded this latest U.S.-led "humanitarian intervention" (earlier cases include Somalia, Haiti, and Bosnia), the bombing campaign raises an array of troubling questions about the action's legal, moral, institutional, military, and political implications. Clearly, the bombing circumvents the authority of the United Nations and thereby violates international law. An argument can be made that when international human rights norms are grossly violated by sovereign nations, the necessity for swift intervention offsets the need to respect international laws and institutions. Yet even accepting this argument, questions remain about whether the severity of the humanitarian crisis in Kosovo warranted this abrogation of international law and the further degradation of the UN. Also of concern is Washington's increasing practice, reinforced by its new stature as the world's single superpower, to regard itself as the final arbiter of when and where intervention is needed to enforce international norms. Having NATO-as the world's most powerful military alliance-available to enforce the U.S. vision of international stability, heightens this concern. Aside from these important questions of law and
[PEN-L:6230] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Louis Proyect wrote: When you consider that this analysis is coming from the intellectual servants of the ruling class, it is remarkable that there has been so little effort among Marxists or "progressive economists" to understand things in the same sort of systematic fashion. As I have stated, Sean Gervasi and Michel Chussodovsky have put forward excellent analyses that tie together economics, politics and history. That should be our point of departure. I don't quite get the connection here between economic stagnation in Western Europe and bombing Belgrade. What do you think it is? Doug
[PEN-L:6242] five-cent cigar
"'We're not inflicting pain on these fuckers,' Clinton said, softly at first. 'When people kill us, they should be killed in greater numbers.' Then, with his face reddening, his voice rising, and his fist pounding his thigh, he leaned into Tony [Lake, then his national security adviser], as if it was his fault. 'I believe in killing people who try to hurt you.. And I can't believe we're being pushed around by these two-bit pricks.'" -- Bill Clinton ordering the bombing of civilian targets in Somalia, as quoted in All Too Human, by George Stephanopoulos "We do know that we must do more to reach out to our children and teach them to express their anger and to resolve their conflicts with words, not weapons," -- Bill Clinton on the carnage at Columbine High regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6260] Re: Query Re: partition?
Carrol, Sure. Kosovo-Metohija is by far the poorest part of the current Serbia (Vojvodina is the richest part). The only things Kosmet has are those mines, a lot of historical and religious monuments, and a bunch of unruly and resentful and rebellious people. Frankly, the Serbs ought to say, "good riddance!" Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Carrol Cox [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Thursday, April 29, 1999 6:54 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6193] Query Re: partition? Does anyone know enough about Serbia toanswer this question. Would Serbia be a viable political and economic unit without Kosovo? Carrol
[PEN-L:6274] Re: Senate Republican Policy Papers on Kosovo
Have you guys seen these? Any comments? "The Kosovo Liberation Army: Does Clinton Policy Support Group with Terror, Drug Ties?" http://www.senate.gov/~rpc/releases/1999/fr033199.htm Yoshie if anybody can recognize a drug running operation used to finance armaments, it should be the Republican Policy Committee in light of the Contras...Michael Hoover
[PEN-L:6259] Re: Re: Re: (Fwd) Letter from Belgrade
Paul, Thanks. That about does it. I did not remember that Milosevic was president of Yugoslavia prior to this term, but maybe he was. I think that the current president of Serbia is MIlan Milutinovic (sp?), if I have that right, who switched positions with Milosevic a while ago. What about Djindic? He has been the "liberal opposition" throughout the current stuff. I know that he and Draskovic were allied in the demos against Milosevic back in 1996-97 and that Djindic was elected mayor of Beograd. But he and Draskovic fell out and Djindic was somehow removed from office. I gather his party has no reps in any of the assemblies, or do they have some in one of them but not the other? I have also read that he has a history of being very opportunistic and all over the map in terms of his postitions in the past. Likes to play to the western media. Strikes me as a candidate to be a puppet if NATO were to really do the "take Belgrade" and overthrow Milosevic" strategy, although I suppose Draskovic would also be a candidate for such a position. Honestly, if I were in Serbia, I don't know who the hell I would vote for. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Thursday, April 29, 1999 6:28 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6188] Re: Re: (Fwd) Letter from Belgrade Barkley, The President of Yugoslavia is elected as is the Yugoslav assembly which has approximately the same powers vis-a-vis the two constituent republics as the old Yugoslav govt had with respect to the 6 republics. (The difference is that the president is elected at large and is not a 'presidency' i.e rotating collective as it was under the old system.) The president can only serve I believe for one (or is it two) terms. In any case, Milosevic was the first president of Yugoslavia and could not run in the last election. His party ran a Milosevic associate (I forget his name) who was elected president while Milosevic ran for president of Serbia, which he won with the majority you mentioned (see below). When I was last in Beograd and discussing these issues and the inflation and monetary policy with economists in Serbia I was told that within the urban, middleclass, professional and intellectual class circles, Milosevic was quite unpopular (hence the opinion of the lady I forwarded from Sid's post). However, his political and electoral strength is among the rural peasant and working class people who still look up to a strong leader -- a new Tito. You will also note that in the other posting about Vuk Draskovic, he rose to influence on a right-wing nationalist appeal, only to be outflanked on the right-nationalist wing by Seselj. I have good Serbian friends who were 'ethnically cleansed' twice from Kosovo by the Albanians who, though moderately left-liberals here, are pro-Seselj in Yugoslavia precisely because they have been/feel they have been oppressed by the Albanian minority in Yugoslavia. But I am straying from your question. To the best of my knowledge, Kosovo and Vojvodina are represented in the Yugoslav parliament but not as autonomous provinces, only as regional constituency representatives (in the same sense as congresspersons from Vermont or any other state are representated in Congress.) Have I answered all your questions? Paul Paul Phillips, Economics, University of Manitoba From: "J. Barkley Rosser, Jr." [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:[PEN-L:6162] Re: (Fwd) Letter from Belgrade Date sent: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 13:22:54 -0400 Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Paul, Hmmm. This woman has a name that is very similar to that of His Excellency's wife. But, more seriously I would ask you if you could really clarify the nature of the current political system in Yugoslavia. This is triggered by this letter writer's lament that she (and her friends) did not elect this government. But there clearly are quite a few elections in Yugoslavia, even if His Excellency tried to resist the results of some local ones a few years ago. Clearly the repeated labeling by NATO of His Excellency as a "dictator" is seriously inaccurate. Some specific questions: 1) Is there a Yugoslavia-wide parliament? I know that Serbia and Montenegro have their own parliaments. I know that the Albanians in Kosmet have largely boycotted those elections. I know that the breakdown in the Serbian parliament is that 115 are either in His Excellency's party or his wife's party, that about 80 are in the right-wing chauvinist party of Seselj and about 40 or so are in Draskovic's party. I don't think Djindic's party (His Excellency's most severe "liberal" critic") has any. 2) How is the Yugoslav president selected? Is there a nationwide election or is he appointed by some body? If the latter, who is that body? 3) If there is no
[PEN-L:6249] UN on human rights
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 13:42:13 -0400 (EDT) Reply-to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: "Vaik Yousefi" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To:Multiple recipients of list [EMAIL PROTECTED] GENEVA (Associated Press, April 30) The U.N.'s human rights chief today denounced Serb forces for committing atrocities in Kosovo and also launched some of the harshest U.N. criticism to date against NATO for bombing Yugoslavia. ``What we are in effect seeing is that war-making has become the tool of peacemaking,'' Mary Robinson said in a speech to the closing session of the U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva. NATO needed to consider whether its use of force was excessive, Robinson said, citing Yugoslav figures showing that 500 Yugoslav civilians have been killed and more than 4,000 injured by the airstrikes. ``In the NATO bombing ... large numbers of civilians have been incontestably killed, civilian installations targeted on the basis that they are or could be of military application,'' she said. ``And NATO remains the sole judge of what is or is not acceptable to bomb,'' she said. Robinson appealed to the U.N. Security Council - which includes Yugoslavia's ally, Russia - to make its own determination as to whether a prolonged bombing campaign would be legal under the U.N. charter. She also stressed that the international war crimes tribunal in The Hague was authorized to investigate actions by all participants in the conflict - including NATO - if serious violations of international humanitarian law occur. Her speech marked one of the most outspoken attacks by a top U.N. official against NATO and reflects growing unease at the plight of the Yugoslav population after more than a month of bombardments.
[PEN-L:6277] Re: Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Doug wrote: I'm still mystified about the connection between Eurostagnation - which is in large part a creation of policymakers, who've imposed tight money and tight budgets to make the Euro hard and to break European labor - and cruise missiles. Won't a prolonged Balkan war, especially if it spreads, make the Euro soft and Euro labor rise up against soc-dem-cum-neoliberals? Yoshie
[PEN-L:6286] House Rejection of NATO's War Shows Power of Opposition
I did not see a list of who voted yes and no in the Post. Was there a list in the NYTimes? Or can someone post an easy web address for the vote? I'd like to see how Bernie Sanders voted, for one. http://clerkweb.house.gov/evs/1999/index.asp Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6207] RE: humor and sensitivity
Henry made a useful point. Get a K Liu is clever, but it can also be insulting. I've gotten worse from HCKL in the past and didn't complain, but I'm not gonna bother him any more; he takes the fun out of it. And Hoover called me icky. Get it? Icky Sawicky. Big guys have feelings too. mbs Some people come on the list blasting away, shooting from the hip. Louis P. is an example. I hope that it is fair to say that although his politics are serious, his demeanor is playful and he is thick skinned enough to take ribbing. Others are more easily insulted. We need more attention to such matters. We should also be careful about attributing views to others.
[PEN-L:6251] Re: Query Re: partition?
Does anyone know enough about Serbia toanswer this question. Would Serbia be a viable political and economic unit without Kosovo? Carrol I'm sure that I don't know enough but: Kosovo has always been the poorest region in Yugoslavia despite having considerable mineral and fuel reserves...30 years of federal economic assistance and higher-than-average investment did not change this situation...emphasis remained on traditional, labor-intensive, low- wage production such as agriculture, handicrafts, and textiles... Slovenia had always objected to federal policies such as the Fund for Underdeveloped Regions intended to lessen rgional disparities and halted its contribution in 1990...Croatia followed suit shortly thereafter...Michael Hoover
[PEN-L:6289] Kosovo and EMU redux
While it's becoming increasingly clear that the domestic imperatives in the US with regards to Kosovo are to placate Arms sales, we've paid little attention to realpolotik issues of immediate concern to the US, Britain and Germany; all of whom will suffer from full EMU 1/1/2002. Rants about imperialism, rogue empires etc. are adrenalizing but don't give credit to the deliberating strategies of fiscal and monetary cartels. In this regard, Kosovo provides a useful context for achieving a much more difficult task; destabilizing confidence in a market of 400 million consumers and their bank accounts and portfolios. Ian Murray Seattle, WA "EMU - ECONOMIC MONETARY UNION The introduction of the euro could destabilise the economies of participating countries unless they tackle the problem of labour market inflexibility, said the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The benefits of the single currency are neither automatic nor likely to come quickly. They would take years to achieve and and will require new policies from European governments. The OECD adds that it can find no example of a monetary union that has succeeded without political union. Labour mobility is seen as the key to the success of monetary union in America. But in the European Union only 5.5 million live outside there own state, including those seconded to Brussels. (Daily Telegraph 25 March 1999) A European directive requires countries to include earnings from illegal as well as black economy activities in national accounts. This includes prostitution, drug dealing, illegal gambling, etc. Fencing stolen property should be included but not the theft itself. This will add a further 2.5% to our Gross Domestic Product. (Guardian 8 August 1998) German production workers are some 50% more expensive than those in any other member of the Group of Seven leading industrial countries. Worse, because of economic and monetary union, there is little Germany can do about it on its own. The powerhouse of Europe has fallen into a trap. It's only escape is a week he Euro. German output per hour in manufacturing is not high enough to offset the cost disadvantage. Since companies must earn an internationally competitive return on capital, it is dispense with jobs in which workers are not productive enough to offset their cost. Companies are adjusting to high costs by dispensing with less productive activities and workers. And there has also been a huge rise in the stock of German investment abroad. Germany needs a weak Euro. It also needs sterling to enter the Euro-zone at as high a rate as possible. Few analysts noticed that Europe's most important economy was about to lock itself in at what seems to be a significantly overvalued real exchange rate. France, Germany's chief rival and prtner, has won game and set. But whether it goes on to win the match depends on how Germany responds to its plight. (Financial Times 31 March 1999) In a survey by the respected polling organisation ICM, only 41% of businesses favoured joining the Euro. More than half of businesses said they saw no benefit in the larger markets that the Euro might provide, or in savings on exchange costs and avoiding foreign currency risks. Only 34% said the ability to compare prices across Europe would be a big advantage. (Financial Times 31 March 1999) The fundamental structure of EMU is completely unsound. In its present form, lacking a centralized control over fiscal spending in each state, a single currency cannot possibly survive. Some might dispute this, however, there are those among the political elite of Europe with whom we have discussed this matter and they admit that this statement is fact. Nonetheless, EMU in its current form is not intended to be a final version of their grand design - only a mere stepping stone along the way to a fiscal union as Phase II followed by a political union in perhaps 20 years away. Their primary reason for not disclosing such a grand scheme is their fear that popular support has not yet been acquired. It is believed that with time, the people will grow accustomed to the idea and that a federalized EMU will indeed emerge by 2007 if not by 2004. It is this calling in the wild that has lured Tony Blair to surrender the proud British tradition for the grand idea of one Europe. (Martin A. Armstrong Princeton Economic Institute March 12th, 1999) "The crunch will come in 3-4 years time. We have until then to persuade the City that joining the Euro will be bad for Britain. We have to persuade them that the City has always thrived on being independent and working successfully through global capitalism. Staying out of the Euro will give Britain stability in its economy which is better than pursuing stability in the markets through monetary union. The single currency would plunge us into boom and bust cycles as inappropriate single interest
[PEN-L:6226] Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
At 11:30 PM 4/29/99 -0700, Max wrote: Remind me again, who's left and who's right? Disoriented, you have to remember that most leftists on this list long ago rejected the vision of tellingthe sheep to chant "Democrats GOOD, Republicans BD." To kill a simile I use too often, the GOPsters can be like a stopped clock, right twice a day. So we can't dogmatically assume that they're always wrong. Similar rules apply to our understanding of the Democrats. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/JDevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia now!
[PEN-L:6240] Cuban Bank Chief Touts Reforms (fwd)
Forwarded message: From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fri Apr 30 17:36:25 1999 Delivered-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-Id: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Unverified) Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 10:41:37 -0700 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Sid Shniad [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Cuban Bank Chief Touts Reforms Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Associated PressAPRIL 27, 1999 Cuban Bank Chief Touts Reforms By George Gedda WASHINGTON -- In a rare visit to Washington, the Cuban Central Bank president today outlined austerity measures Cuba has imposed since the collapse of the Soviet Union -- steps that in some ways parallel those often recommended by the pro-capitalist International Monetary Fund. President Francisco Soberon said subsidies to state entities have been reduced by 75 percent and that 19 state ministries and other national agencies have been shut down, almost 40 per cent of the total. In addition, Cuba has become far more hospitable to foreign investment, he said. Cuba is one of an extremely small number of countries that do not belong to the IMF and its companion institution, the World Bank. But Soberon, nonetheless, came here as an observer for the semiannual meeting of the two institutions. He attended meetings Monday of an IMF subgroup of 24 developing countries. Soberon spoke today before a group of bankers, academics, government officials and others at a session organized by three local private research groups. He described how Cuba was forced to undertake a series of reforms in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union, its main partner in trade and assistance. He said the number of independent farmers has increased to the 100,000 range and that Cubans who engage in once-forbidden self-employment total about 150,000. The budget deficit, he added, has been reduced to 2.5 percent of the total budget compared with more than 30 percent five years ago. The State Department normally does not grant visas to Cuban officials but makes an exception for those wishing to attend meetings of multinational institutions. A U.S. law requires the president to take steps to block any Cuban bid to join the IMF or the World Bank. Soberon said he's not sure whether Cuba has any interest in joining. He said the IMF generally offers the same formulas to all countries, regardless of differing situations. ``We have a lot of doubts about their policies,'' he said. ``Each country requires a different approach.'' He added that Cuba would feel uncomfortable in an institution, such as the IMF, in which the United States has 15 percent of the voting power. He also suggested that the IMF is insensitive to the social costs of its economic reform policies. The IMF has been known, he said, to claim success even though its policies have led to unemployment rates of 17 percent. ``I'd like someone to explain to me how you can have success with 17 percent unemployment,'' he said. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:6275] Re: Re: Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. wrote: How much of this stuff would Clinton have done if the Dems had retained control of the US Congress? (quite a bit of it, I think, but not all of it) Clinton never did anything to campaign for Congressional Democrats - quite the contrary, he triangulated himself against them. As Hitchens writes in his splendid new book on Clinton: quote Clinton is the first modern politician to have assimilated the whole theory and practice of "triangulation," to have internalized it, and to have deployed it against both his own party and the Republicans, as well as against the democratic process itself. As the political waters dried out and sank around him, the president was able to maintain an edifice of personal power, and to appeal to the credibility of the office as a means of maintaining his own. It is no cause for astonishment that in this "project" he retained the warm support of Arthur Schlesinger, author of The Imperial Presidency. However, it might alarm the liberal-left to discover that the most acute depiction of presidential imperialism was penned by another clever young neoconservative during the 1996 election. Neatly pointing out that Clinton had been liberated by the eclipse of his congressional party in 1994 to raise his own funds and select his own "private" reelection program, Daniel Casse wrote in the July 1996 Commentary. block quote Today, far from trying to rebuild the party, Clinton is trying to decouple the presidential engine from the Congressional train. He has learned how the Republicans can be, at once, a steady source of new ideas and a perfect foil. Having seen where majorities took his party over the past two decades, and what little benefit they brought him in his first months in office, he may even be quietly hoping that the Democrats remain a Congressional minority, and hence that much less likely to interfere with his second term. /block quote Not since Walter Karp analyzed the antagonism between the Carter-era "Congressional Democrats" and "White House Democrats" had anyone so deftly touched on the open secret of party politics. At the close of the 1970s, Tip O'Neill's Hill managers had coldly decided they would rather deal with Reagan than Carter. Their Republican counterparts in the mid-1990s made clear their preference for Clinton over Dole, if not quite over Bush. A flattering profile of Gore, written by the author of Primary Colors in the New Yorker of October 26, 1998, stated without equivocation that he and Clinton, sure of their commanding lead in the 1996 presidential race, had consciously decided not to spend any of their surplus money or time in campaigning for congressional Democrats. This was partly because Mr. Gore did not want to see Mr. Gephardt become Speaker again, and thus perhaps spoil his own chances in 2000. But the decision also revealed the privatization of politics, as did the annexation of the fund-raising function by a president who kept his essential alliance with Dick Morris (a conservative Republican and former advisor to Jesse Helms) a secret even from his own staff. /quote Doug
[PEN-L:6287] Call It Democracy (was IMF: 'Loans' and Conditions)
Now the IMF doesn't even make a gesture of 'making a loan'; it merely imposes conditions. For instance: Yoshie Call It Democracy/Bruce Cockburn padded with power here they come interntional loan sharks backed by the guns of market hungry military profiteers whose word is a swamp and whose is brow is smeared with the blood of the poor who rob life of its quality who render rage a necessity by turning countries into labour camps modern slavers in drag as champions of freedom sinister cynical instrument who makes the guns into a sacrament - the only reponse to the deification of tyranny by so-called "developed" nations' idolatry of ideology north south east west kill the best and buy the rest it's just spend a buck to make a buck you don't really give a flying fuck about the people in misery IMF dirty MF take away everything it can get always making certain that there's one thing left keep them on the hook with insupportable debt see the paid-off local bottom feeders passing themselves off as leaders kiss the ladies shake hands with the fellas and its open for business like a cheap bordello and they call it democracy and they call it democracy and they call it democracy and they call it democracy see the loaded eyes of the children too trying to make the best of it the way kids do one day you're going to rise from your habitual feast to find yourself staring down the throat of the best they call the revolution IMF dirty MF takes away everything it can get always making certain that there's one thing left keep them on the hoo with insupportable debt and they call it democracy and they call it democracy and they call it democracy and they call it democracy _ Michael Hoover
[PEN-L:6250] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Why is it that with the West locked in an intractable economic crisis, stock markets set new records from day to day? For countries such as the US and Canada there doesn't seem to be any huge economic crisis. Shouldn't it be the Asian tigers expanding into Eastern Europe ) I really don't think expansion of NATO is an out of desperation so much as simply the standard tendency to seek new areas for investment and ensure that socialism cannot rear its ugly head again in former communist states and of course for NATO to find a new role for itself before someone suggests it be disbanded. Enter the lead Global Cowboy Clinton ready to ride herd on all the restive cattle in the Balkans with eager little doggy Blair running around yapping and the whole NATO gang nipping at the heels of any of the restive herd who should balk at being forced into the great corral run by the IMF and World Bank,. Cheers, Ken Hanly I don't quite get the connection here between economic stagnation in Western Europe and bombing Belgrade. What do you think it is? Doug Final paragraphs of Sean Gervasi's "Why Nato is in Yugoslavia", at: http://www.mclink.it/assoc/fondpasti/nato/gerv-e.htm When closely considered, the proposal to extend NATO eastward is not just dangerous. It also seems something of a desperate act. It is obviously irrational, for it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. It can lead to a second Cold War between the NATO powers and Russia, and possibly to nuclear war. It must be assumed that no one really wants that. Why, then, would the NATO countries propose such a course of action? Why would they be unable to weigh the dangers of their decision objectively? Part of the answer is that those who have made this decision have looked at it in very narrow terms, without seeing the larger context in which NATO expansion would take place. When one does look at the larger context, the proposal to expand NATO is obviously irrational. Consider the larger context. NATO proposes to admit certain countries in Central Europe as full members of the alliance in the near future. Other East European countries are being considered for later admission. This extension has two possible purposes. The first is to prevent "the failure of Russian democracy", that is, to ensure the continuation of the present regime, or something like it, in Russia. The second is to place NATO in a favorable position if a war should ever break out between Russia and the West. In an age of nuclear weapons, pursuing the second purpose is perhaps even more dangerous than it was during the years of the Cold War, since there are now several countries with nuclear weapons which would potentially be ranged against NATO. The argument that NATO should be expanded eastward in order to ensure the West an advantage in the event of a nuclear war is not a very convincing one. And it would certainly not be convincing to Central European countries if it were openly spoke of. Those would be the countries most likely to suffer in the first stages of such a war. Their situation would be similar to that of Germany during the Cold War, as the German antiwar movement began to understand in the 1980s. The main purpose of expanding NATO, as almost everyone has acknowledged, is to make sure that there is no reversal of the changes which have taken place in Russia during the last five years. That would end the dream of a three-part Europe united under the capitalist banner and close a very large new space for the operation of Western capital. A NATO presence in Central and Eastern Europe is simply a means of maintaining new pressure on those who would wish to attempt to change the present situation in Russia. However, as has been seen, this also means locking Russia, and other countries of the CIS, into a state of underdevelopment and continuous economic and social crisis in which millions of people will suffer terribly, and in which there is no possibility of society seeking a path of economic and social development in which human needs determine economic priorities. What is horribly ironic about this situation is the Western countries are offering their model of economic organization as the solution to Russia's problems. The realist analysts, of course, know perfectly well that it is no such thing. They are interested only in extending Western domination further eastward. And they offer their experience as a model for others only to beguile. But the idea that "the transition to democracy", as the installation of market rules is often called, is important in the world battle for public opinion. It has helped to justify and sustain the policies which the West has been pursuing toward the countries of the CIS. The Western countries themselves, however, are locked in an intractable economic crisis. Beginning in the early 1970s, profits fell, production faltered, long-term unemployment began to rise and standards of
[PEN-L:6205] RE: Re: Re: Re: A note of thanks to all
Carrol Cox wrote: S Pawlett wrote: All arguments are subject to counter-arguments. One person's modus tollens is another persons modus podens. One person's transcendental argument is another's petitio principii. As a mere empirical observation that in every situation there is bound to be one asshole, this holds. But does anyone wish seriously to debate the following proposition: It is harmless whether a homeowner plants a violet or a daisy in his backyard. (If there is something special, seriously so, about either plant that I don't know of, substitute your own two plants.) A botanist, agronomist, soil scientist, ecologist, landscaper or gardener might be interested. Sam Also proctologists.
[PEN-L:6285] U.S. FIRMS POISED TO RUN BRITAIN'S BENEFITS SYSTEM - The Times (fwd)
Forwarded message: From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fri Apr 30 23:50:43 1999 Delivered-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-Id: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Unverified) Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 14:32:51 -0700 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Sid Shniad [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: U.S. FIRMS POISED TO RUN BRITAIN'S BENEFITS SYSTEM - The Times Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable The Times (London) April 30, 1999 Britain: U.S. FIRMS POISED TO RUN BENEFITS SYSTEM Deloitte Consulting has administered the controversial=20 Wisconsin Works programme, which has removed five million=20 claimants from the welfare rolls in the past three years.=20 By Adam Sherwin Tony Blair has approved plans for the biggest privatisation yet=20 by inviting companies to run the =A3110 billion benefit system.=20 The Government wants people to make a single application for=20 all the benefits they are claiming and to receive one cheque in=20 return. The initiative - called the Single Work-Focused Gateway -=20 will be Labour's key welfare reform proposal at the next general=20 election and is likely to lead to American companies running large=20 swaths of the benefit system.=20 A restricted document, leaked to The Times, reveals that two=20 American-based companies, Arthur Andersen and Deloitte=20 Consulting, are shortlisted to run four pilot operations which will=20 begin in November and are then expected to go nationwide. In a=20 foreword to the confidential document, Mr Blair dismisses the=20 welfare state as a second-class, failed service and urges private=20 sector companies to help to create a modern system. =20 The move, which could see many job losses and thousands of=20 civil servants transferred to the private sector, will infuriate the=20 trade unions, alarm Labour backbench MPs and take important=20 areas of responsibility away from local authorities. But a Whitehall=20 source said: "There are always delays with the public sector and we=20 doubt they can deliver a project of this size. We are looking to the=20 private sector to make it happen."=20 At the moment, claimants must apply to the Employment=20 Service for the jobseeker's allowance, the Benefits Agency for=20 income support and local council offices for council tax benefit. The=20 Government believes this encourages duplication and fraud.=20 Under the Gateway plan, claimants will be given a personal=20 adviser who will create a package for all their needs. Staff at the=20 various benefits agencies will all work for the private operators and=20 ultimately the Government wants all benefit payments to be rolled=20 into one cheque.=20 The four pilot projects will be conducted in Leeds, Cheshire,=20 Nottinghamshire and Suffolk, with Deloitte Consulting and Arthur=20 Andersen on all four shortlists.=20 It is only two years since a Whitehall ban on Andersen bidding=20 for public work was lifted after the Conservative Government sued=20 the firm over its advice on the DeLorean car venture. An auditors'=20 report last year in Canada, where Anderson was contracted to=20 overhaul the Ontario benefit system, claimed that the company=20 charged up to six times more per hour than the previous cost of=20 civil servants.=20 Deloitte Consulting of Philadelphia specialises in turning round=20 failing businesses and has administered the controversial Wisconsin=20 Works programme, which has removed five million claimants from=20 the welfare rolls in the past three years.=20 The Prime Minister is understood to be frustrated with the pace=20 of change in the welfare system. He has chaired meetings of a=20 working group on the Gateway project and urged the Employment=20 Minister Andrew Smith to push ahead with the plan.=20 In a document entitled The Vision: The Single Work-Focused=20 Gateway, distributed to civil servants and potential bidders this=20 month, he wrote: "In the past, the welfare state has too often=20 provided a second-class service. It has failed to do enough to help=20 people into work. We believe that this needs to change. A=20 modernised welfare system should be helping people to become=20 independent, rather than locking them into dependency.=20 "The New Deal has already made an important start. But we=20 want to go further. We want to move to a streamlined and efficient=20 system in which there is a single point of access to welfare."=20 A Whitehall source said: "There has been a lot of drift but Blair=20 has finally grasped this issue. They want it up and running by 2001,=20 but realistically it will begin after the next election."=20 -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:6279] Re: Re: Re: U.S. HOUSE REJECTS NATO'S WAR
Wojtek wrote: Michael, I am somewhat nonplussed that US-ers still get excited about such maneuvers. I think we, Eastern Europeans are more street wise in this respect - we simply do not trust politicians no matter what they profess, because it is quite clear to us that whatever they profess serves only one goal - advancement of their own political careers. Perhaps East Europeans are very much like Americans, and vice versa. Yoshie
[PEN-L:6284] Re: House Rejection of NATO's War Shows Power of Opposition
Robert Naiman wrote: The House vote was as close as could be. The resolution supporting the bombing failed 213-213. Twenty-six Democrats voted against the Administration and against the bombing. This group included some of the most progressive Members of the House, like Dennis Kucinich, Cynthia McKinney, Barbara Lee, Jesse Jackson Jr., and Pete Stark. It also included Members who are less likely to challenge the Administration; these Members voted their districts, which have been pounding their offices with anti-war sentiment. Thus, a handful of activists have succeeded in dealing a significant defeat to U.S. foreign policy. To paraphrase Margaret Mead, never doubt that a handful of committed individuals can damage the Empire. I did not see a list of who voted yes and no in the Post. Was there a list in the NYTimes? Or can someone post an easy web address for the vote? I'd like to see how Bernie Sanders voted, for one.
[PEN-L:6231] Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
Max Sawicky wrote: Greetings to all you born-again Republicans, relieved we don't have more Bernie Sanders' and fewer Pat Buchanans, lest the air war vote have been decided in favor of the Clinton Administration. Actually, if I had a vote I might have voted nay as well, in protest over Clinton's conduct of this operation, as some of the 26 Democrats might have. But there should be little doubt that most Republicans voted nay because they are the party that officially doesn't give a shit. Naiman must be smoking loco weed to characterize this as some kind of victory for the left, not least because the chief audience for his work on trade is the same liberals-in-quotes he is excoriating for being soft on the IMF and "Empire." Lemme get this straight, Max. The Dems are now the party of the IMF and imperial war. The Republicans are full of folks who, for the wrong reasons, want to throw a monkey wrench into the imperial financial and military machine. But finding any good in this is a symptom of having smoked "loco weed." Further...Clinton's trying to revive the all-but-dead Social Security "reform"; he committed money for the deployment of Star Wars (something Reagan and Bush never did); he put an end to welfare as an entitlement; he's presided over the gutting of the Endangered Species Act and the clear-cutting of national forests (something again that Reagan and Bush never dared); he signed the hideous crime bill and the Defense of Marriage Act and bragged about it; and he's probably killed more people (figuring in the Iraqi sanctions) than Reagan or Bush did. And, miraculously, he's managed to silence liberal opposition to any of this, whether we're talking about the enviro establishment or, I'm sorry to say, the Economic Policy Institute. Try some loco weed, Max - it might be revealing! Doug PS: Speaking of Clinton administration pigginess, I highly recommend the hard-to-find documentary Waco: Rules of Engagement http://www.waco93.com. It shows how the ATF and FBI, led by Janet Reno, massacred the Branch Davidians and then lied about it. Chuck Schumer, whom liberal New Yorkers cheered when he defeated Al D'Amato last November, comes off as a totally evil asshole.
[PEN-L:6241] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Louis Proyect wrote: I don't quite get the connection here between economic stagnation in Western Europe and bombing Belgrade. What do you think it is? Doug Final paragraphs of Sean Gervasi's "Why Nato is in Yugoslavia", at: http://www.mclink.it/assoc/fondpasti/nato/gerv-e.htm I'm still mystified about the connection between Eurostagnation - which is in large part a creation of policymakers, who've imposed tight money and tight budgets to make the Euro hard and to break European labor - and cruise missiles. And this: Both Western Europe and North America have experienced a prolonged economic stagnation. just isn't an accurate description of the U.S. economy in 1999. Just this morning, the BEA released their first estimate of first quarter growth - 4.5%, right in the middle of Sean's golden age range: In the 25 years after the second world war, most Western countries experienced rapid growth, on the order of 4 and 5 per cent per year. I buy the political analysis - suppressing recalcitrants in Eastern Europe and preparing for a resurgent Russia - but I find the economic rationale unconvincing. Doug
[PEN-L:6288] another from SLATE
c'right, Microsoft, 1999. chatterbox Conspiracy of Silence By Timothy Noah Does Rotisserie baseball have blood on its hands? In the days since the Littleton, Colo., high-school massacre, the media has blamed the killings on almost every aspect of contemporary life: guns, rock music, bad suburban architecture, atheism, high-school cliques, the Internet, marijuana, homosexuality, homophobia, The Matrix. About Rotisserie baseball, however ... nothing. Chatterbox performed a Nexis search today and found no references to "Rotisserie baseball" coupled with the word "Littleton." There were 21 references to "Littleton" and "fantasy baseball"--which is how many people have come to refer to Rotisserie baseball. But that isn't very many for a story this dominant. And by calling it fantasy baseball, journalists are obscuring Rotisserie baseball's origins. It was a journalist who invented Rotisserie baseball! But Chatterbox is getting ahead of himself in describing a conspiracy at least as complex as any ever perpetrated by the Bilderburg Group, the Freemasons, or the Trilateral Commission. Rotisserie (or fantasy) baseball is a game in which individuals "draft" real ballplayers into imaginary teams, keep track of statistics on the players' performance, and win or lose depending on how well these statistics add up at season's end. (It usually contains a gambling component.) From the few references to fantasy baseball in the Littleton coverage, we know the following: Dylan Klebold, a Red Sox fan, played in Columbine High's Rotisserie baseball league. He took part recently in a Rotisserie baseball draft party. Apparently he was quite a skillful player. On the day he shot up his high school, Klebold's team, the Border Hoppers, was leading its division. "He was awesome," classmate Chris Hooker told USA Today. "He was so awesome we thought he ought to manage a team in real life." How does Rotisserie baseball encourage mass murder? By reducing life to a stack of lifeless statistics. By breaking up social organizations (teams) into components (players) who are interchangeable. By fostering feelings of Raskolnikov-like grandiosity. "Every Man a Steinbrenner" is the headline on a feature about Rotisserie baseball that appeared in the "Tempo" section of today's Chicago Tribune. Curiously, the Tribune piece makes absolutely no reference to the Klebold connection. Some would call this an oversight. Chatterbox smells a conspiracy. As the article makes clear, Rotisserie baseball is played by some of the most powerful people in this country. Mario Cuomo (former New York governor; father of the Clinton administration's current housing secretary) has been playing for 12 years. A Washington, DC, league included many participants who "worked for the Federal Reserve Board." But the Tribune "forgot" to mention the roster of media heavies who in 1980 formed the original group of players at La Rotisserie Francaise, a now-defunct Manhattan restaurant: Lee Eisenberg, the former editor of Esquire; Peter Gethers of Random House; writer Harry Stein; Rob Fleder, executive editor of Sports Illustrated; and Dan Okrent, Time Inc. editor at large, who invented the game. "I feel totally responsible," Okrent admitted when Chatterbox tracked him down in the Time-Life building. ;-) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/JDevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia now!
[PEN-L:6281] Re: Re: Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: Won't a prolonged Balkan war, especially if it spreads, make the Euro soft and Euro labor rise up against soc-dem-cum-neoliberals? The euro had a bad day today, falling to an all-time low against the dollar. A short-lived peace rumor caused it to rally, but it sank again when the alleged peace plan was said to be nothing new. So far the euro is suffering from "failure to thrive," and the war doesn't seem to have helped. It's a lot harder to tell what the European working class will do if this persists than it is to follow the foreign exchange markets. Doug
[PEN-L:6245] GDP BYTE by Dean Baker 4/30/99
GDP BYTE 4/30/99 BOOMING CONSUMPTION AGAIN LEADS GROWTH The growth in consumption again outpaced income, producing another quarter of very strong GDP growth. The overall rate of GDP growth in the first quarter was 4.5 percent. This is down from the 6.0 percent rate in the previous quarter, but still quite rapid for this stage in a business cycle. Consumption spending, measured in 1992 dollars, grew at a 6.7 percent rate, and now stands 5.5 percent above its level a year ago. Consumption continues to far outpace income growth. The savings rate, which had already hit zero in the previous quarter, fell to -0.5 percent in the first quarter. Consumers are clearly both spending based on their capital gains in the stock market and adding to their debt burdens. The debt burden measured as a share of disposable income is already at a record level, more than 5.0 percentage points above the previous peak of 19.3 percent reached in 1990. Also, many new cars are now leased rather than purchased with loans. If these lease payments were factored in, the implicit debt burden would be at least two percentage points higher. While investment is reported as growing at a 10.0 percent annual rate, most of this growth is attributable to the rate of price decline that the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) reports for computers. While investment in computers fell at a 3.2 percent annual rate, in 1992 dollars it rose at a 26.7 percent annual rate. Regardless of the accuracy of the BEA's measure of computer prices, demand is only affected by nominal expenditures. Measured as a share of nominal GDP, investment has been falling gradually since the second quarter of 1998. This means that investment is lagging rather than driving growth. Residential housing boosted GDP growth by two- thirds of a percentage point. Recent data on new home sales suggest that the housing boom has peaked. While housing expenditures may remain at high levels, it is unlikely that they will continue to add to growth in the rest of the year. Another surge in the trade deficit acted as a major brake on growth. In 1992 dollars, the deficit increased by $55.6 billion, knocking 2.4 percentage points off of GDP growth. Measured in nominal dollars the impact was not as large, an increase of $39.6 billion. The main reason for the difference is that computers are increasingly being imported. The BEA's measure of computer prices causes the same dollar volume of nominal imports to appear as a considerably larger volume of imports in 1992 dollars. Measured as a share of GDP, the investment portions of GDP (investment plus net exports) are actually lower than they were at the peak of the last business cycle in 1989. Investment plus net exports came to 8.77 percent of nominal GDP in the first quarter, compared to 8.93 percent in 1989. This means that the effort to stimulate investment through deficit reduction has clearly failed. The increase in public saving implied by the movement from large budget deficits to surpluses has been completely offset by a decline in private saving. The consumption share of GDP now stands at 68.65 percent, more than 2.5 percentage points above its 1989 level. The heavy dependence of the expansion on consumption points to the fragility of the economy at this point in the business cycle. As long as the stock market continues to rise, consumption is likely to grow. But with price- to-earnings ratios already at more than twice their historic levels, it is not clear how much longer it can keep rising. If price-to-earnings ratios fell back to just 1.5 times their historic levels, the resulting decline in consumption would be enormous. The higher the market goes, the larger the eventual correction. The bubble has already grown so large that its bursting will have a very serious negative impact on the economy. - Dean Baker The Preamble Center's GDP Byte is published quarterly upon release of the Bureau of Economic Analysis' report on the Gross Domestic Product. For more information or to subscribe by fax or email contact the Preamble Center at 202 265- 3263 x274 or [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Robert Naiman [EMAIL PROTECTED] Preamble Center 1737 21st NW Washington, DC 20009 phone: 202-265-3263 fax: 202-265-3647 http://www.preamble.org/ ---
[PEN-L:6258] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
At 01:05 PM 4/30/99 -0400, Lou wrote: I don't quite get the connection here between economic stagnation in Western Europe and bombing Belgrade. What do you think it is? Doug Final paragraphs of Sean Gervasi's "Why Nato is in Yugoslavia", at: http://www.mclink.it/assoc/fondpasti/nato/gerv-e.htm I have problems with their argument. Assuming that the claim of systemic criss in Western Europe is true and that the ruling elite is determined to do something about it - how does the eastward expansion of NATO solve that problem for the ruling elite, and why does that that expansion have to be military? I do no not see a connection there. 1. There is no need for any intervention that would allow the West a direct control over Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries. The policies of the central planning regime were hioghly protectionis of the domestic industries, so back then a direct control made sense, as it would brek the protectionist barriers. But after 1989 is CEE countries that are bending backwards to attract Western capital - and being frustrated with what they seee as insufficient interest in investing in their countries. More generally, direct control over CEE could serve strategic goals of x-USSR pursuing a 2nd World War stretegy of building a buffer zone around its border. But today such buffer zone has little significance - both militarly and economically. Why would anyone want to extend a direct control over terriotory when there is little to gain militarily from from that control (CEE might have usefulness as a buffor zone in 1920s to contain the Soviet Russia - but not today) and these countries can be exploited economically without the necessity of direct foreign rule? 2. Assuming Rosa Luxemburg's argument that capitalism constantly needs underdeveloped zones to maintain its expansion - that may justify the eastward expansion of western economies. But if that is so, bringing NATO to the picture is counterproductive, because it re-divides CEE politically and militarly, and thus erects obstacles to further economic expansion. In other words, the colonisation of CEE by capitalist economy would be more far reaching without than with NATO. Again I do not think that there is an overall master plan or capitalist conspiracy to take over CEE. I view it as a rather incoherent process of muddling through, with no master plan, no coherent strategy, conflicting interests, great uncertainty, and even greater short-term opportunism. Wojtek
[PEN-L:6237] Economic Consequences of Bombing etc.
Here is a piece detailing some of the economic consquences of the war. I should think that unless the fuel situation improves there will be problems not only with fertilizer in the agricultural area but also fuel for planting. Dinkic neglects to mention the devastation of livestock in Kosovo as well. He is obviously a good urban Yugo liberal. His future is assured when the IMF and the World Bank and the privatisers return. He has a bright future unless of course he happens to die from NATO bombing. Cheers, Ken Hanly Title: The Serbs: Economists Find Bombing Cuts Yugoslavia's Production in Half April 30, 1999 THE SERBS Economists Find Bombing Cuts Yugoslavia's Production in Half Related Articles The Military: Bombing Unites Serb Army as It Debilitates Economy Issue in Depth: Conflict in Kosovo Forum Join a Discussion on The Conflict in Kosovo By STEVEN ERLANGER ELGRADE, Yugoslavia -- The Zastava factory in Kragujevac made cars and trucks, as well as munitions. NATO strikes destroyed it completely, putting more than 15,000 people out of work, along with an additional 40,000 who worked at 120 subcontractors. The Sloboda factory in Cacak made vacuum cleaners and ovens, as well as ammunition. In five NATO raids, the factory has been ruined, and 5,000 people are out of work. In Krusevac, the 14 Oktobar factory made heavy construction equipment and bulldozers, as well as reconditioning tank engines. NATO bombs have left it a complete ruin, putting more than 7,000 people, a quarter of the town's workforce, out of their jobs. The oil industry, a profitable part of the economy and a prime candidate for early privatization, has been almost completely devastated, with the two refineries in Yugoslavia and most of their storage tanks destroyed. The five-week air campaign, intended to change President Slobodan Milosevic's policies toward the southern Serbian province of Kosovo, is also destroying the country's civilian industrial capacity and public works, including its highway, rail and communications networks. The air war has halved economic output and thrown more than 100,000 people out of work, Western-trained and independent economists said. Although it is difficult to estimate the cost of replacements and repairs if the war stopped today, the economists said, the damage has had greater effects on the gross domestic product than the Nazi and then the Allied bombing of Yugoslavia, which was a much more rural country during World War II. The bombing has added to the problems of the past decade like economic mismanagement, cronyism, the hyperinflation of 1992 and 1993, the Bosnian War trade embargo from 1992 to 1995, eight years of virtually no foreign investment and almost constant war. "Politics aside, this is an economic and humanitarian catastrophe," Mladjan Dinkic, a professor of economics at Belgrade University, said. "While the Serbs won't die of hunger -- agricultural production will continue, even without fertilizers -- our industrial base will be destroyed and the size of the economy cut in half." Dinkic coordinates Group 17, a group of economists, some from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, who had American financing to promote a market economy. They estimate that gross domestic product per capita, $3,000 in 1989, before economic sanctions were imposed in May 1992, dropped to $1,650 in 1997. But because of the large black market, or so-called shadow economy, that figure was probably closer to $2,000, Dinkic said. It will drop below $1,000 if the Kosovo conflict stops now, he said. And unemployment, officially 27 percent last year, is quite likely to double, he added, with up to 500,000 people laid off or out of work and 100,000 or so seeking to emigrate from a country of 10 million people. Although he readily concedes that considerable guesswork goes into all the figures -- damage estimates range from $40 billion to $100 billion -- Dinkic said that no matter when the conflict ended, the future will be difficult. NATO says its air strikes are intended to force Milosevic to change his policies in Kosovo and to "degrade and destroy" the military ability to carry them out. But NATO is increasingly ignoring the civilian-military distinction, going after "high value targets" that are dear to Milosevic, his government, his family and his friends, who control sectors like cigarette production. But the targets, like a major cigarette factory in Nis that NATO recently destroyed, are not essentially military, but civilian or psychological. The lines for cigarettes are now enormous in Belgrade, and that may be NATO's point. And NATO officials will be pleased with the new limits on gasoline rations, which on Tuesday were cut from 10 gallons a month to five. Although markets are still full of produce, people worry, too, about the quality of the food and the produce being
[PEN-L:6257] We've got to make the Balkans safe from Serbia
The Washington Post December 19, 1995, Tuesday, Final Edition U.S. Builds Arc of Alliances to Contain Serbia's Power BYLINE: John Pomfret, Washington Post Foreign Service DATELINE: Belgrade In an effort to ensure that war does not return to the Balkans during or after a year-long peacekeeping mission by U.S. and NATO troops, the United States has adopted one of the principal measures it used to stabilize Europe after World War II: Cold War-style containment. Just as Washington built alliances, including NATO, to prevent Soviet communism and influence from spreading in the 1950s and '60s, it is now quietly forging military bonds with every country that borders on Yugoslavia, the Serbian-led state that triggered the last four years of war and remains the region's most threatening military power. Hungary, Romania, Macedonia and Albania are all participants in NATO's Partnership for Peace, the U.S.-designed program for joint training and other military ties. All four, as well as Croatia, have signed bilateral defense documents with Washington. Croatia's army is helped by American advisers; Bosnia has been promised arms and training, either by U.S. forces or through third parties. American soldiers and spies could be spotted all over the Balkans in recent months. CIA agents and Army personnel were at an air base in northern Albania, south of Serbia, launching pilotless spy planes. A detachment of 650 U.S. soldiers is spending its third winter shivering in the mountains of northern Macedonia, east of Serbia, in a peacekeeping mission. North of Serbia, in southern Hungary, U.S. military teams are patching together two huge logistics depots for the Bosnian operation atop the foundations of former missile sites of the defunct, Soviet-led Warsaw Pact. While Serbia is the focus of the new arc of containment, U.S. officials stress that other states, including Croatia, with its vastly improved army, or Albania, with its nascent territorial ambitions, could also bear the brunt of U.S. economic and military pressure if they threaten their neighbors. The evolving network of ties reflects a continuing escalation of U.S. involvement in the Balkans. When war began between Croatia and rebel Serbs in its territory in 1991, the United States refused to become involved, arguing that no American interest was at stake. After 1992, when war began in Bosnia among Serbs, Croats and the Muslim-led government, the Clinton administration tried to use airpower to support a failing U.N. peacekeeping mission but otherwise remained on the sidelines. Now, after stepping in to broker the Dayton agreement that has halted the war, the United States is sending 32,000 troops to the region to conduct and support a peacekeeping mission, including 20,000 to Bosnia. While debate continues in Washington over whether the deployment of the force serves U.S. interests, it has dramatically raised the stakes in the Balkans. The outcome of the mission, and of the evolving U.S. security initiatives elsewhere in the region, could now set the pattern for U.S. relations with both Europe and Russia in the post-Cold War world, senior officials say. "The U.S. role in Europe and NATO's future and our bilateral relationships with all the major countries in Europe are all going to be determined by Bosnia," said Richard C. Holbrooke, the assistant secretary of state who led the U.S. negotiating team at Dayton. The peace mission, he argues, has replaced plans for the expansion of NATO to include former Soviet Bloc countries, or initiatives to promote democracy and capitalism in Russia, as the key determinant of what U.S. relations with Europe and Russia will be like after the Cold War. If the U.S. forces see the year-long mission through despite casualties and hardships, and the peace holds, the United States will again confirm itself as the key guarantor of security in Europe and the foremost defense partner of Britain, France, Germany and other European countries. That development would end a period of uncertainty after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 in which those states explored -- in part through their own failed mission in Bosnia -- whether they could take responsibility for keeping the peace in the continent without American help. Success in Bosnia could also stabilize relations with Russia, a sometime supporter of the Serbs that has gingerly entered into a new kind of military partnership with NATO by agreeing to deploy forces in Bosnia under the command of a U.S. general. The consequences of failure could be equally momentous. If war resumes in the Balkans and U.S. troops retreat in disorder, the NATO alliance -- the foundation of U.S. and West European security since 1945 -- could unravel amid mutual recriminations among Washington, Paris and Bonn, as it nearly did at the low point of the Bosnian war. An alienated Russia could retreat behind a new Iron Curtain. Some experts even fear a new, fortified East-West frontier
[PEN-L:6255] (Fwd) THE DANGER OF A WIDER WAR AND THE CHANCE FOR A WIDER PEA
--- Forwarded Message Follows --- Date sent: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 15:37:37 -0700 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Sid Shniad [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:THE DANGER OF A WIDER WAR AND THE CHANCE FOR A WIDER PEACE - Robin Blackburn, New Left Review http://www.newleftreview.com/kosovo.html THE DANGER OF A WIDER WAR AND THE CHANCE FOR A WIDER PEACE Those who went to war have torn up the Helsinki agreements and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), with the clear intention of denying Russia a say in the crisis. By Robin Blackburn Kosovan Albanians and Serbian civilians have already paid a sad price for the limited war between NATO and Yugoslavia. Because NATO has not achieved its objectives and has actually made the situation in Kosovo much worse, there is now a lively danger of a wider war. Any move to a land war will be pregnant with further disaster. While a multitude have been forced from their homes, hundreds of thousands remain, to be used as human shields by the Serbian forces. NATO commanders know the huge difficulties of landing a significant force in Kosovo and therefore will be strongly tempted to move against Belgrade directly from their bases in Bosnia and Hungary and with the help of allied local forces. However it is done, a military plunge into Serbia could detonate the political minefields in Macedonia, Bosnia and Montenegro. If Hungary, Rumania or Croatia are given any role then territories such as Vojvodina and Moldavia could be dragged in. Perhaps these dangers are so manifest that NATO will contrive to avoid them. The most acute danger in a wider war stems from its implications for Russia and the Ukraine. When former President Mikhail Gorbachev visited Kings College, Cambridge, in March 1999, he expressed astonishment that the West was prepared to follow up the expansion of NATO by making a bonfire of all the international accords and organisations that had been put in place to safeguard peace and human rights. Those who went to war have simply torn up the Helsinki agreements and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and have done so with the clear intention of denying Russia a say in the crisis, notwithstanding the obvious contribution which the Russian government could make to a settlement. Those who heard Gorbachev, and had the opportunity to speak with him, could not fail to be impressed by the alarm of someone whose words should be weighed both because of his extraordinary historical role and because, with Primakov now the premier, he is once again in touch with government opinion. What follows is strongly coloured by my own reaction to Gorbachev's warnings in Cambridge, given just prior to the bombing. All branches of the Russian government have warned that a NATO invasion will create, at best, a new cold war, with unending instability and the final burial of both nuclear and conventional disarmament. At worst it will create the flashpoints of new hot wars. If NATO occupies most or all of former Yugoslavia with the help of its new Eastern European members, the military encirclement of Russia will be complete. The prospects for conventional forces reduction or missile destruction will be wiped out. All parties will then focus on such new borderlands as the Ukraine, where there is already support for a defence agreement with Russia; indeed the ingredients for a civil war, or for pre- emptive coups, between pro and anti-Western forces are already in place. Have the NATO leaders forgotten about Russia's possession of 3,500 intercontinental ballistic missiles, with their nuclear warheads? Does the fragility of the political order in Russia need to be pointed out to them? Have they failed to notice that Russia and China are exploring economic and military co-operation? For whatever reason, most Western political pundits do not care to talk about such matters, but it would be absurd to suppose that Pentagon or State Department strategists do not register their over- riding importance. US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, with encouragement from Senator Jessie Helms, has certainly managed to focus on such issues even if the US President and Congress have had other matters on their mind. When justifying the size of the US and Western military budget, complicated formulas are put forward about the need to confront two major regional crises at the same time; thinly-veiled hints make it clear that the Western establishment is designed to be able to confront and contain Russia and China, and that with Kosovo, the strategy of containment has moved from diplomacy to fait accompli and unilateral military initiatives. It was at US insistence that Russia was cut out of the process that led to the war. The NATO political directorate, won to the view that the best way to
[PEN-L:6228] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
At 10:37 AM 4/30/99 -0400, Lou Proyect wrote: You have to read between the lines and you also have to read the entire article. It makes these basic points, which are interconnected: Lou, thanks for the clarification. I tend to agree with the point claiming the inability of the existing parties to reverse the economic stangnation and the popular discontent it may produce (I think Juergen Habermas made a similar point some 20 or so years ago in is essay _Legitimation Crisis_). In fact, in one of my posting to lbo-talk I hypothesized that the Euro social democrats willingness to go to a war on "human rights" issue was an effort to divert the public attention from their inability to deliver on their electoral promises of changing the neo-liberal policies. Afraid that the the history or Mitterand socialists may repeat itself, the decided to "change the subject" and score what they mistakenly thought to be some easy points on "defending human rights." Wojtek
[PEN-L:6282] Re: Re: Another Note---severed heads in the garden
Blagojevich arranged the visit to FRY of Rev. Jesse Jackson and other religious leaders. They visited the US. POWs but it seems they will not be able to secure their release. Their arrival was celebrated by the most severe bombing of Belgrade so far. They are meeting also with leaders of religious groups in the FRY. Apparently the Serbian patriarch supports the release of all the POWs unconditionally. Can Milosevic fire him? Cheers, Ken Hanly J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. wrote: Actually I just read that Representative Blagojevich from Ilinois is of Serbian descent. He was the one who early on was floating a partition proposal. He is part of some delegation that is going over there. Again, I would reserve the word "partition" for the idea of dividing up Kosovo-Metohija somehow, not a separation of some sort of the whole province from Serbia. This would keep our discussion clear. The example to think of is Bosnia-Herzegovina which has been effectively partitioned and I suspect that the fact that a half-baked peace has been maintained there is one of the reasons that people keep talking up partition, even though it is much less obvious how to do it in Kosmet than it was in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where it was weird enough. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Friday, April 30, 1999 12:23 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6232] Another Note---severed heads in the garden Received this, this am from a little-bit of an Ohio politician that I had no idea was of Yugo Serbian ancestry... Tom, "Thanks for sending along your posts on the crisis in the Balkans. I have seen some of them, but not others...so I appreciate your periodic messages. This tragedy has special significance for me being of Serbian and Montenegran extraction. Both parents were born there and I grew up hearing about Kosovo, the Ustasha, Tito and the Balkan wars. Relatives I have heard from there have said NATO bombings have only solidified Milosevic's strength and have driven the democratic opposition into silence."
[PEN-L:6256] (Fwd) ANNAN HITS AT NATO RAIDS, SAYS SOLUTION MUST BE POLITICA
--- Forwarded Message Follows --- Date sent: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 17:19:49 -0700 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Sid Shniad [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:ANNAN HITS AT NATO RAIDS, SAYS SOLUTION MUST BE POLITICAL Agence France PresseApril 28, 1999 ANNAN HITS AT NATO RAIDS, SAYS SOLUTION MUST BE POLITICAL BERLIN UN chief Kofi Annan on Wednesday implicitly criticised NATO's air strikes on Yugoslavia and warned "a lasting political solution (to the Kosovo crisis)... cannot be won on the battlefield." In a statement issued towards the end of a three-day visit to German, the UN secretary general said he had heard "fresh, reliable reports of the deteriorating humanitarian situation" in Yugoslavia. "The civilian death toll is rising, as is the number of displaced. There is increasing devastation to the country's infrastructure, and huge damage to the nation's economy," Annan said. Since the start of the conflict, the international community had been "consumed by the tragedy of the Kosovo Albanians," Annan said. But the conflict was escalating and was now claiming lives throughout Yugoslavia, he said. "The human cost of the violence is unacceptably high," Annan said. "We must be bold and imaginative in the search for a lasting political solution, which cannot be won on the battlefield."
[PEN-L:6253] Lightenin' up Max
Max Sawicky [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/30/99 02:38PM On another front, anybody remember HeCKeL and Jeckel? mbs Hey Max, remember when you asked me to "lighten up" because you were feeling vicitmized by my joke about you (see below). In your own words, "lighten up", Max, "lighten up". Dr. Jekyll Max Sawicky [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/29/99 10:25AM Why don't you whistle her a few bars of Dixie , while you are at it , Max. Y'all don't see no necessary connection to racism in it. Oh, my people, my people. Lighten up, Chaz. mbs
[PEN-L:6248] RE: Re: RE: Re: Happy Days Are Here Again
Max Sawicky wrote: The principal problem with the IMF is the conditions it attaches to loans. But that's their raison d'etre! It's like saying the problem with bloodletting is the overuse of leeches. Doug The object of your critique was not the IMF but Democrats. If most Democrats talked about the IMF the way Rubin and Summers do and attached similar emphasis to it, it would be fair to call the Dems "the party of the IMF." But they don't. To most of them it's a) not a great concern; and b) prone to some dubious practices which *may* be justifiable. On another front, anybody remember HeCKeL and Jeckel? mbs
[PEN-L:6221] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: partition?
At 01:13 PM 4/29/99 -0700, Jim Devine wrote: At 03:14 PM 4/29/99 -0500, Ken wrote: ... I think the solution is simple. Milosoevic should use the southern sites as shields for tanks or guns. NATO will destroy both site (collateral damage) and military object (legitimate target). Milosevich will be able to use this as ant-NATO propoganda but the way will be cleared, so to speak, for a settlement :) has anyone considered the possibility of leveling the the entire province and putting up a WalMart and time-share condos? Jim, and do not forget paving the parking lots. I guess we can do all that and be back before Christimas. Wojtek
[PEN-L:6223] Russian trade union leader on war on Yugoslavia
MESSAGE TO THE WORKERS OF EUROPA AND THE USA From VALERY POPOV, vice-president of the union committee of factory TMZ Yaroslavl, Russia March 31 1999 As a simple worker from one of the big factories of Russia I want to speak to our brothers and sisters, to the workers from USA, from England, from France, Germany, Spain and also to the workers from Eastern Europe. But especially to make a call to the workers from the Nato countries. NATO has begun a brutal aggression against workers from Yugoslavia. Today we witness an aggression that involves an unprecedented destructive force in Europe greater than any force since the Second World War. Airplanes, missiles, bombs form a colossal war machine that is bombing Yugoslavian towns continuously and NATO does not have intention of stopping. Among the popular masses of Russia indignation and desperation is growing as the devastating threatens everyone. Because of this we are making a call so that we can act together to stop this barbarism, this ignominious intervention that kills thousands of innocent victims' of all the nationalities and religions. This military intervention doesn't solve the just claim of the people of Kosova They also suffer from these terrible bombings, it is not the politicians or the military who suffer. For that reason it will not be the politicians or the military who solve the conflict. The solution is in the hands of the workers to end the genocide! We propose that you meet in factories, neighborhoods, union assemblies. We propose that you organize marches and meetings in front of the aerodromes to stop to those airplanes that take death loaded in their wings! That you demonstrate in front of the ports from where they are sending supplies in order to launch missiles against factories, refineries and schools. We, the Russian workers, for our part know that the NATO, with its wild provocative aggression, is generating a confrontation that embraces our country and all Europe. Many politicians from Russia make the game and they want to go to a war of international proportions. They only think of filling their pockets from selling weapons. All this can lead to a new world war. The workers from Russia and the former Soviet Union will not allow it! With our unity each factory we will demonstrate that we won't serve as canyon fodder for a new massacre. We take a fight against the parasites, thieves and agents of the international capital in our country. In every year of power Yeltsin the country was plundered, ruined and the industrial and technical potential destroyed. President Yeltsin is a misfortune for Russia and also for the peoples of the region, especially of the former-USSR. These governments will sink us bit by bit. They sell out, one after another, to the USA and they tie us to the loan sharks of the IMF. Today we see that behind the whole "patriotic" demagogy, premier Primakov and the vice-premier Masliukov swallowed bait of the IMF all in one go. That means hunger and misery for all us. The task urgent to remove Yeltsin and the government from power! We should get rid of this pest! I believe that we have enough forces to do it. The unit and solidarity between us and the workers of the rest of Europe will help make victory quicker. Together we will conquer!
[PEN-L:6219] Re: Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
At 04:05 PM 4/29/99 -0400, Louis Proyect wrote: prevailed. The process of democratization was based either on historical experience (the Czech Republic from 1918 to 1938), the record of resistance to Communist rule (Solidarity in Poland), or the origins of a genuine multiparty system under Communist rule (Hungary). Neither Poland nor the That is an example of writing about Eastern Europe that may sound good to American audiences but is quite devoid of substance. What the hell does the quoted sentence mean? If taken for its face value i.e. that the current institutional design of Poland is based on the Solidarity movement - it is patently false. The current institutional design is based on two developments, the institutional designed developed under central planning and the interplay of occupational and professional interests under the central planning regime (for the primer see Konrad and Szelenyi, _The Intellectuals on the Road to Class Power_, New York: Haracourt Brace Jovanovich, 1979; and Kennedy, _Professionals, Power and Solidarity in Poland, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. In general I find the whole piece being more in the tone of an after dinner talk for foundation liberals than a serious institutional analysis. Wojtek
[PEN-L:6222] Why Nato needs to destroy Serbia
In general I find the whole piece being more in the tone of an after dinner talk for foundation liberals than a serious institutional analysis. Wojtek You have to read between the lines and you also have to read the entire article. It makes these basic points, which are interconnected: 1) Agreeing with Robert Brenner and Harry Shutt, the authors, who are military-economic strategic thinkers on the Pentagon payroll, state that the European economy is in decline: "In the past, Western Europe used economic growth to finance expansions and extensions of a variety of social protection programs. Economic growth is, by far, the most effective antidote to most economic problems. But economic growth is no longer what it used to be. During the 1960s, Western Europe's real gross domestic product grew at rates approaching 5 percent annually. In the 1970s, rates were closer to 3 percent per year. During the 1980s, real growth fell below 3 percent. Since 1990, economic growth has been around 1 percent." 2) If this economic decline is not reversed, there will be challenges to the system since European citizens of industrialised nations have a sense of "entitlements": "So long as the new sociopolitical framework of Europe guaranteed unlimited prosperity, the end of ideology seemed a blessing. Unlike the 1930s, the crisis of the last decades has been a slow, incremental process. The rub was that once the system began to sputter, there was no real policy alternative presented by mainstream parties. The resulting crisis of political systems was a slow one, and this slowness and the tenacity of existing political institutions are as noteworthy as the existence of the crisis. Popular discontent with governments in a democratic regime usually leads to alternation of power, but alternation of power will not produce relief if the new government follows policies similar to those of the old. When that happens, citizens increasingly tend to abstain from the political process, look to extremist parties or support new or nonestablishment political parties and movements, and may even go to the street. Ideology, which appeared to depart from politics through the front door, returns through the back door. In the last analysis, established parties can founder and the system can even collapse." and "A truly apocalyptic scenario for Europe could unfold as a result of failure to arrest the processes described so far in this study. The implications of each of these crises would be sufficiently adverse to warrant action, but taken together, they could produce a negative synergy with overwhelming consequences. At some point, cumulative quantitative change could become qualitative and visible. The pressure to cut welfare state programs at a time of increasing unemployment would certainly undermine social stability, intensifying the impact of joblessness. A conflict of "haves" and "have-nots" could result, either along new, perhaps unpredictable, dividing lines or taking the old forms of class conflict. Massive labor unrest not witnessed for decades could reappear; the resulting economic and social friction might spread to several of Europe's regions, especially those burdened by persistent, long-term unemployment and continuous flows of political and economic refugees. The failure of mainstream political parties to manage problems of such magnitude could eventually lead to elections of extremist leaders as heads of government with unpredictable consequences for Europe, both internally and externally." When you consider that this analysis is coming from the intellectual servants of the ruling class, it is remarkable that there has been so little effort among Marxists or "progressive economists" to understand things in the same sort of systematic fashion. As I have stated, Sean Gervasi and Michel Chussodovsky have put forward excellent analyses that tie together economics, politics and history. That should be our point of departure. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6216] Re: Rambouillet agreement was a set-up - like Czechoslova
Date sent: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 15:32:46 -0400 (EDT) Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Joanne Naiman [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject:Rambouillet "agreement" was a set-up - like Czechoslovakia in 1938! (fwd) So many articles have appeared on this list recently re Yugoslavia that I can no longer recall whether the issue addressed below has previously been raised. Sorry if it's repetitive. The "teach-in" referred to will be at the University of Toronto this Sunday. Cheers, Joanne Naiman Toronto -- Forwarded message -- Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 12:22:47 -0400 From: Eric Fawcett [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: sfp lists [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Rambouillet "agreement" was a set-up - like Czechoslovakia in 1938! From: Jon Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED] There is a very important aspect of the war that has received no coverage in the mainstream media. In the Rambouillet negotiations, Yugoslavia was set up, in the manner of Czechoslovakia in 1938. Already in February, a month before the bombing, it was demanded that Yugoslavia surrender its sovereignty and submit to military occupation of its ENTIRE territory: Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo, not just Kosovo. Thus they could not reasonably have been expected to sign the Rambouillet document, nor indeed have any faith in the people supervising the 'negotiations' once they read Appendix B to Chapter 7. The entire document was released by "Le Monde diplomatique" on April 17. Among the key clauses are paragraphs 6, 8 15 of Appendix B to Chapter 7: par. 8 gave NATO forces the right to travel anywhere, by any means and carry out any NATO assignments, throughout Yugoslavia; par. 15 gave NATO unrestricted access to all telecommunications channels throughout Yugoslavia; and par. 6 gave NATO and its forces complete immunity from prosecution, criminal or otherwise, throughout Yugoslavia. For the complete document, the web address is http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/dossiers/kosovo/rambouillet.html I have written a letter to my MP, Andy Scott asking for an explanation, and a shorter one to "The Globe and Mail" (copied below). I don't think you have previously made this information available to SfP members. I urge you to do so, and also to raise it with Eggleton at the teach-in. Everyone have an opportunity to read the Rambouillet document. And the USA, Canada and others should all be asked to explain the purpose of Appendix B to Chapter 7. Sincerely, Jon Thompson To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] April 26, 1999 The Editor, The Globe and Mail, Toronto Re: "Kosovo: where do we go from here?" (page A13, April 26, 1999) Aurel Braun makes many important points, but omits mention of the central issue: the Rambouillet proposal of February 1999 which the USA and its dependents insisted the state of Yugoslavia sign, as an 'equal' partner with an armed separatist organization. This 'diktat' contains an Appendix B to its Chapter 7 which has been largely ignored by the mainstream western media. The provisions of the appendix require Yugoslavia to surrender its sovereignty, and submit to military occupation over its ENTIRE territory, not just Kosovo. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Yugoslavia was set up for this war, in a manner similar to Czechoslovakia in 1938. If your newspaper is serious about its motto, attributed to Junius, it will run a news story on Appendix B of Chapter 7 (paragraphs 6, 8 and 15 especially) along with an editorial stating whether you agree with Prime Minister Tony Blair's shrill characterization of the Rambouillet demands as "reasonable." For the convenience of your staff and readers, the full Rambouillet document can be accessed (in English) on the web site of the Paris monthly, "Le Monde diplomatique," http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/dossiers/kosovo/rambouillet.html Yours truly, Jon Thompson 178 Odell Ave., Fredericton, NB, E3B 2L5 tel 506 453 4768 (o) 506 455 9425 (h)
[PEN-L:6210] Re: Re: A Delhi Story
Ever heard of a monkey going bananas over booze? Here's the story about one. Every day, for the past six months, a small yet distinguished simian has been coming to the Gole market area of New the bus conductor's feet and then disappears into the crowd To show up the next day at Liquor vend in Gole Market. So, Ajit, are there intimations of reincarnation in this story for most Indian readers? Is it the equivalent of a bleeding crucifix or a weeping Mother Mary? valis 2 days and counting __ Oh! not at all. He is just being a Delhi monkey! Cheers, ajit sinha
