[Marxism-Thaxis] More Boston Tea Party of a New Type
Message: 11 Date: Sun, 21 Feb 2010 06:57:47 -0800 (PST) From: ken hanly norths...@yahoo.com Subject: [Pen-l] Left on this, Right on that. To: lbo talk lbo-t...@lbo-talk.org, pen-l pe...@lists.csuchico.edu Message-ID: 459617.19739...@web111513.mail.gq1.yahoo.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii While the CPAC people are supposed to be conservatives they chose as their presidential favorite Ron Paul who on many foreign policy issues would be regarded as leftist and even radically anti-war in spite of (or because of?) his free market, small government views: http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat/532523/print The good news from the Conservative Political Action Conference -- and it really is very good news -- is that the assembled activists have identified as their preferred choice for the presidency a militant opponent of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq who has voted against the Patriot Act, opposed free-trade deals, condemned the expansion of executive power and warned about collusion between too-big-to-fail bankers and the government regulators who are supposed to keep an eye on them. No, the CPAC crowd did not name Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold as their preferred pick to oppose President Obama in 2012. But they did vote, rather overwhelmingly, for the one Republican who shares the views of Feingold -- and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders -- on the aforementioned issues. The CPAC presidential straw poll, in which a record 2,400 conservative conferees voted, was won with ease by Congressman Ron Paul, the Texas Republican and 2008 presidential candidate whose backers like to refer to their campaign as a revolution. Cheers, ken hanly ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] General Motors roaring out of bankruptcy (?)
General Motors roaring out of bankruptcy http://detnews.com/article/20100224/AUTO01/2240333/General-Motors-roaring-out-of-bankruptcy Since July, automaker has recalled workers, invested in facilities Robert Snell / The Detroit News General Motors Co. has invested $1.4 billion in more than a dozen plants and created about 5,500 jobs since emerging from bankruptcy court in July. The investment and job moves are a stark contrast to last year, when GM shed factories, implemented unprecedented production cuts and slashed thousands of jobs in bankruptcy. GM emerged from bankruptcy with about $50 billion in federal aid. Advertisement It is a lot more fun to work on this stuff than what we were doing a year ago, Diana Tremblay, GM's vice president of manufacturing and labor relations, told The Detroit News. The most recent move came Tuesday when GM announced it was recalling 1,200 laid-off hourly workers and adding a third shift of production at its Lordstown complex in Ohio. Workers there will help build the 2011 Chevrolet Cruze, which goes on sale in the third quarter. We're real fortunate, said Dave Green, president of UAW Local 1714, which represents Lordstown workers. GM may start hiring lower-paid union workers at Lordstown if the automaker is unable to fill the positions with the 5,000 to 6,000 laid-off union members nationwide, Tremblay said. Under the terms of the United Auto Workers collective bargaining agreement reached in 2007, new hires receive $14 an hour and less-generous benefits. Tremblay suspects most of the 1,200 jobs will be filled by laid-off workers, however. About 300 workers from the Lordstown area will be brought back first, and it is possible other jobs could be filled by UAW members laid off from plants in Pontiac, Orion Township and Detroit-Hamtramck, she said. GM needs sales to improve and the economy to recover further before it can hire any large numbers of lower-paid workers, said industry analyst Erich Merkle of Autoconomy.com. Sooner or later, manufacturers have to hire, but I think that's still going to be a ways out, he said. The $1.4 billion investment has been spread among 18 facilities nationwide, including at factories in Flint, Detroit-Hamtramck and a recently opened battery plant in Brownstown Township. rsn...@detnews.com (313) 222-2028 ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Not everybody is on the same page
In a message dated 2/23/2010 10:12:22 P.M. Pacific Standard Time, _jann...@gmail.com_ (mailto:jann...@gmail.com) writes: Until health care is seen as a basic right of citizenship (or residence), the government can always deny it to this or that part of the population. These workers will go down fighting for something they think they deserve, not what they think Americans or human beings deserve. Even if they win in their struggle, 40-80 million Americans have already lost. CJ Comment I have not been detained enough in describing the actual struggle and process as it took place. RETIREES FOR SINGLE PAYER HEALTH CARE has as its core Conyers health care bill 676, which proposes to provide health care for everyone in the United States of North America. Our union - UAW, has passively stated in its documents at every Constitutional Convention, its desire for such a system of national health care in America. This call for a system of national health care is perhaps twenty years old. The problem arises because there is never any union activity to realize this goal. I do not want to get lost in all the details but the system of health care for auto workers, was owned and controlled by the auto companies as profits centers. For instance the largest system of hospitals in Detroit remains the Henry Ford hospital to this very day. Thus, there has not been a historic impulse arising from within the organized autoworkers for a all inclusive health care system as an answer to autoworkers health care concerns. When retirees lost our company sponsored eye and dental coverage and as the company pushed to detach retirees from company sponsored health care, retired workers sought to combine together to retain their traditional heath care coverage. This process of combining together is in its first phase and began with four, maybe six people. These older workers retain a sense of organization, militancy and connections with the historic communist current as a part of their age and generations inheritance. What was a hand full of people in six months became meetings of 30 - 40 people, with presidents of Local Union retirees groups meeting. Ten months ago resistance to passing out our literature was faced at various local union meeting in around the city. Some union leaders sought to shout us down in union meetings or prohibit us from disturbing literature in the meetings, although we were polite and respectful and always asked. Then the threat came, which we face and replied we are fuckng armed and can start dying right fucking now. As the crisis deepened and an interest in the new VEBA plans rose we became popular and all was forgiven about our anti-union attitude. The word slowly spread that some of us were meeting on Monday’s at Local 22. People started showing up. We started taking part in all meeting and protest for national health care and began a running education on the health care crisis. The point trying to be made in the same page article by Sam Webb is how to fight things out in real time and why it is impossible to fight on the level of fighting a system. Condemning Obama and the Obama administration is an act of futility and nothing more than sectarianism in the context of actually trying to organize small groups of people to express their struggle for survival. The struggle of the workers - proletarian, always passes through phases embodying how individuals and the collective mind perceives its rights. This perception of rights is shaped by and a product of the era of the bourgeoisie. The struggle of the proletariat in all countries is in fact a struggle over shares of the social products, services and for greater political liberty. As a general rule most strike struggle - not all, go down in defeat but one must fight or die. What is different about this new emerging fight is the perception by these older workers that their struggle is that of a class. Yes, this perception is still fuzzy, but the retired workers combining under the banner of a single payer system means transcending the narrow bound of my individual needs. We are in for exciting and glorious times. Lt us march on til victory is one/won. WL ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] New site
http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Not everybody is on same page
The point trying to be made in the same page article by Sam Webb is how to fight things out in real time and why it is impossible to fight on the level of fighting a system. Condemning Obama and the Obama administration is an act of futility and nothing more than sectarianism in the context of actually trying to organize small groups of people to express their struggle for survival. No, I don't think so. We who stand outside the Democratic Party condemn Obama's warpigism and nonchalance on vital social issues, like health care for all, because we hope it will prod all those people in the Democratic Party to fight in their party to get him to stop his warpigism and to do something about the festering sore that is no health care for tens of millions of Americans. It might be futile but it isn't sectarianism. Indeed, the previous arguments were about choosing Obama over Kucinich or Gravel because the O-man was 'electable'--so was Gore, so was Kerry. At least they were right this time--O was electable. Now the question is: is he movable? Are you sure it isn't something you smoked? I see nothing glorious about these times. We have to remember that the parties are not really mass membership parties in a parliamentary system. So the question for the future is still how do we create alternative realities to this miserable warpig two-party system? If there is an ideological component it is in shattering this delusion that working class America has about its religion being the nation and its transcendance being to serve its warpigism. CJ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
