[PEN-L:12200] FAST TRACK ALERT; Heads Up: Son of NAFTA
THE PRESIDENT WILL INTRODUCE FAST TRACK THIS WEEK! he wants the Congress to give him authority to negotiate trade pacts (starting with NAFTA expansion and eventually the MAI) in a way that excludes congressional participation in the process (limited debate, no amendments, up-or-down vote). Call Your Representative or his/her "Trade Staffer" ASAP. CAPITOL SWITCHBOARD**1-888-723-5246 Declare Your Opposition to NAFTA Expansion and "Fast Track" Here's three talking points: 1)NAFTA has created new problems. Our food supply is less safe. Due to the increase in border traffic in meat and produce, more food with dangerous pesticide residues or bacteria is getting to our kitchens. Less than 1 percent of the imports of fruit and vegetables coming from Mexico is inspected at the border. The diminished inspection rates along our border has resulted in an unprecedented flow of illegal drugs. Along our southern border, the drugs and uninspected foods are coming across in over-large, often unsafe trucks, which have increased access to U.S. highways under NAFTA. 2)None of the promises of NAFTA's supporters have been fulfilled. Instead of creating jobs, as the pro-"free trade" corporate lobbyists predicted, NAFTA is responsible for the loss of nearly half-a-million U.S. jobs. Instead of cleaning up the environment along the U.S.-Mexico border, water and air pollution have increased. A massive increase of industries has pushed the border ecology to the breaking point. 3)"Fast track" authority for the President is unnecessary and outdated. The Administration regularly brags that they have completed over 200 trade agreements -- but never mentions that only two (NAFTA and GATT) -- needed "fast track." It made more sense when Nixon created it to deal with the Japanese on bilateral, sector-intensive (e.g., autos, steel) issues. But today, so many issues -- labor rights, environmental protection, food safety -- are tied up in these multilateral deals, Congress should take a more meaningful, balanced role in the formulation of our trade policy. The delegation of congressional authority to regulate foreign commerce, and craft and ratify treaties, is illogical in the global economy. Under "fast track," Congress abdicates to the President its power to thoroughly review or fix bad trade deals. ***Instead of EXPANDING NAFTA we should be FIXING IT!*** At Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch, we know that when you're headed in the wrong direction, a fast-track is the last thing you need. That number again: 1-888-723-5246 It is urgent that you call your congress member this week. Keep calling until s/he or the Trade L.A. (legislative aide) writes down your name and address in the district and allows you to make all three of the important foregoing points. AND you must get others to do this too. Please distribute widely. ** /s/ Mike Dolan, Field Director, Global Trade Watch, Public Citizen Join the Global Trade Watch list server. We will keep you up to date on trade policy and politics. To subscribe, send this message: "SUBSCRIBE TW-LIST" [followed by your name, your organizational affiliation and the state in which you live] to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Then check out our web-site --- www.citizen.org/pctrade - FAST TRAK UPDATE FROM LABR.PARTY NEWSGROUP I'm glad to see interest in this topic. A quick summary of what I know about what's happening: Clinton introduces "fast-track" legislation on Sept 10, along with a dog-and-pony show. This legislation gives the White House authority to negotiate new trade agreements similar to NAFTA but not part of NAFTA per se, and ram them through Congress with little or no opportunity for legislators or the public to digest and react to the contents. As things stand, a large majority of Democrats in Congress (2/3rds or so) will oppose this legislation, including Reps Gephardt and Bonior in the House. It can only pass with Republican support. The price for this support, which Clinton will gladly pay, is the exclusion of any possibility of labor and/or environmental standards in the trade agreements. The AFL-CIO is engineering various events but little or nothing in the way of demonstrations. An exception is a rally in front of the White House Wednesday led by the Teamsters and including George Becker and Ralph Nader (10 a.m. to 11 a.m.). This is the only demo scheduled at the moment. There is a teach-in on Capitol Hill Thursday (1 pm to 3pm) with Members of Congress and labor leaders will speak. UNITE is planning some kind of outdoor 'Peoples' Hearing' Thursday at the Capitol. The AFL will be running advertisements around the country, targeted at specific Members of Congress. In sum, there is a fair amount going on, though
[PEN-L:12201] Re: jobs, jobs, jobs
Jim Divine wrote: Third, it suggests that globalization has played a big role, even if we don't see globalization as either natural or the whole story. To Dornbusch I would add that intranational competition has increased along with international competition, due to anti-trust, deregulation, etc. What it suggests to me is that the reason why the US sees little or no inflationary acceleration despite sub-5% unemployment rates is that the economy-wide institutional power of labor has been sapped. I'm all in favor of unions and increasing labor's institutional power (including the welfare state). But the fact is that the capitalists still have the whip-hand and can punish us with inflationary acceleration or unemployment if we use that power in a way that goes against profits. With globalization, they have additional options. The same type of argument is developed by Dani Rodrik in "Has globalization gone too far?" In itself the book contains nothing shocking, but I still found it useful because he is (and calls himself) a neo-classical economist, and shows from within how even in the orthodox models about trade globalization can/does lead to increasing social inequality and unemployment. And although he writes again and again that we have to abandon ideas about protectionism, he critizes main-stream economist who don't take seriously or dismiss worries about the conseqences of globalization (like the strike movement in France in December 1995, supported by the overwhelming majority of the population) and has to relativize himself the holy free trade gospel. Robert Went = Drs. Robert Went Faculty of Economics and Econometrics University of Amsterdam Roeterstraat 11, k 9.03 1018 WB Amsterdam The Netherlands Tel: 31-20-525.4189 E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] =
[PEN-L:12202] Re: Dark humor posted to Chinese Christian Newsgroup
I first heard this story during the Iraq-Iran War when the Iranians were reported to be using soldiers to clear land mines by just marching through the fields. Then it was a flat out joke: Ali sees Mohammed walking ten feet behind his wife and says "Mohammed, don't you know that according to the Koran your wife should be walking ten feet behind YOU?" And Mohammed replies: "Ah, yes. But that was before land mines." My guess is that the story originated in that period and circulated as part of the then rabid anti-Islamic humor/ideology that flowered during the post-1978 hostage conflict. On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, Michael Eisenscher wrote: A journalist had done a story on gender roles in Kuwait several years before the Gulf War, and she noted then that women customarily walked about 10 feet behind their husbands. She returned to Kuwait recently and observed that the men now walked several yards behind their wives. She approached one of the women for an explanation.. "This is marvelous," said the journalist. "What enabled women here to achieve this reversal of roles?" Replied the Kuwaiti woman: "Land mines" Harry Cleaver Department of Economics University of Texas at Austin Austin, Texas 78712-1173 USA Phone Numbers: (hm) (512) 478-8427 (off) (512) 475-8535 Fax:(512) 471-3510 E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cleaver homepage: http://www.eco.utexas.edu/faculty/Cleaver/index.html Chiapas95 homepage: http://www.eco.utexas.edu/faculty/Cleaver/chiapas95.html Accion Zapatista homepage: http://www.utexas.edu/students/nave/
[PEN-L:12208] Re: Real social change
In the spirit of hard-headed science, Max, how about quantifying the respective influences of Abbie and Diana? While we're at it, why not throw in some multiple regression analysis? Abbie got people into the streets for explicitly political, mostly constructive purposes. You don't need regression analysis. All you need is arithmetic. Wouldn't it make more sense simply to say "I like Abbie Hoffman and his views/values better than those of Diana? That wasn't the issue. I have nothing against Diana, never have. Her public elevation to sainthood is simply without foundation. I heard a local representative of an organization fighting to have an anti-land mine treaty put in place this morning on CBC radio. Given your statement, I guess there's nothing his contention and that of other folks fighting against the use of anti-personnel mines in places like Angola and Cambodia that the deployment of these armaments changed drastically in the 1980s, that the new deployment was designed to inflict damage and terror on local populations instead of targeting armed combatants. Nothing to their thanks to Diana's efforts for helping to publicize this fact via things like documentaries filmed in Angola with the civilian victims of these mines. I'm firmly against little kids being blown to smithereens, and I commend the efforts of activists in all noble causes, including the suppression of land mines. I simply don't believe it means a god-damned thing. Can't I do that without being associated with "inflicting damage and terror on local populations"? Call me crazy, but I think the working class is going to be the agency for curbing the use of land mines, not the forces that could be attributed to Diana's activities. Since you have declared that any change in the disposition of land mines won't have any effect on the conduct of war, etc. I guess that settles it. No point in trying to raise public awareness or to change public opinion on the subject. In any event, that wouldn't be _real_ social change, would it? I'm not on any crusade against do-gooders about whose projects I have skepticism. But sooner or later we all have to consider the best use of scarce political resources. Don't we? I am struck by the contrast between your indulgence of the Diana cult and your hard- headedness with respect to the extensive labors of trade union and social-democratic forces to move the EU to the left. Cheers, MBS === Max B. SawickyEconomic Policy Institute [EMAIL PROTECTED] 1660 L Street, NW 202-775-8810 (voice) Ste. 1200 202-775-0819 (fax)Washington, DC 20036 http://tap.epn.org/sawicky Opinions above do not necessarily reflect the views of anyone associated with the Economic Policy Institute other than this writer. ===
[PEN-L:12209] Re: jobs, jobs, jobs
In his last book "The Future of Capitalism" Thurow is deeply pessimistic and has a chapter comparing the present to the Dark Ages--total breakdown of public goods. He writes "Internal reform is very difficult in capitalism, since it has a set of beliefs that deny the need for conscious institutional reforms." Ironically, he flat out says capitalism needs a coherent competitor on the left in order to be prodded into making the reforms he wants. Thad At 05:52 AM 9/9/97 -0700, Phil Kraft wrote: It does seem remarkable (or at least noteworthy) that mainstream economists and business gurus are publicly fretting about the political consequences of globalization and winner-take-all capitalism. The latest expression is in a column by Lester Thurow in today's Boston Globe. Thurow, the former MIT management school dean, sniffs a neo-fascist backlash. Such talk a few years ago was reserved to the hysterical left. Now even the WSJ occasionally casts a worried look over its shoulder. I have a digital version of Thurow's column if anyone wants it. Phil Content-Type: text/x-vcard; charset=us-ascii; name="vcard.vcf" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Description: Card for Philip Kraft Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="vcard.vcf" Attachment Converted: C:\INTERACT\data\download\vcard.vcf Thad Williamson National Center for Economic and Security Alternatives (Washington)/ Union Theological Seminary (New York) 212-531-1935 http://www.northcarolina.com/thad
[PEN-L:12211] Re: Real social change
I'm not on any crusade against do-gooders about whose projects I have skepticism. But sooner or later we all have to consider the best use of scarce political resources. Don't we? The implication is that resources generated by Diana's campaign against land mines would otherwise be used for better purposes if she wasn't distracting people. I wish that were the case, but I don't believe it is. I am struck by the contrast between your indulgence of the Diana cult and your hard- headedness with respect to the extensive labors of trade union and social-democratic forces to move the EU to the left. I think that Diana's efforts have had positive effects. If that constitutes "indulgence of the Diana cult," so be it. On the other hand, I think that union and social democratic efforts to move the EU to the left is a classic instance of efforts that would be more likely to bear fruit if they were expended on different tactics and strategies. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree once more, Max. Sid
[PEN-L:12214] Re: Piece on Mike Davis in _Lingua Franca_
As a refugee from my native Los Angeles, I strongly recommend City of Quartz to any Penners who want a very insightful analysis of the history and politics of L.A. I learned more from reading the book than I knew from having been raised there. Sid Shniad Following coffee-sipping Louis P's suggestion, I checkout out _Lingua Franca_. The latest issue (September 1997) has a longish piece on Mike Davis, author of _City of Quartz_, by Adam Shatz. Shatz concludes a bit sadly, along with Tariq Ali, that Davis has started an unfortunate slide toward "millennial catastrophism"---anomic partner to the healthy "grassroots reporting" in _City of Quartz_. I have yet to read through _City of Quartz_, but I've now had my appetite re-whetted. There's also a blurb on Foucault that Doug (and others) might find interesting. I'm too busy at the moment to summarize it, so you'll have to steal a read at the nearest coffee shop/bookstore. Bill
[PEN-L:12216] Re: FAST TRACK ALERT; Heads Up: Son of NAFTA
Blaming Mexicans for bad food and drugs is a reactionary approach. Blaming NAFTA for job losses implies capitalism without NAFTA would be just fine. Citing 'border ecology' against industry in Mexico is incredible hypocracy. These are yuppie Perot arguments - lets oppose NAFTA for **good** reasons! Bill Burgess What are *good* reasons if not the protection of our food supply? Mexican farmers use pesticides that are banned in the United States and their food safety and environmental protection regulations, where they exist, are largely unenforced (as are their labor laws). The Clinton administration does not even want to include side agreements on labor and the environment in the new round of "free trade" talks. Why should we let foreign producers cut corners, compromise safety regulations and export questionable food into the United States, allowing them to undercut domestic producers who are regulated? Also, if Perot had connected with the yuppies, he'd be president today. -- Jim Cullen THE PROGRESSIVE POPULIST James M. Cullen, Editor P.O. Box 150517, Austin, Texas 78715-0517 Phone: 512-447-0455 Internet: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Home page: http://www.eden.com/~reporter
[PEN-L:12217] Drake International document (fwd)
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The following document - quaint spelling mistakes faithfully preserved - was recovered from the wall of Drake International's offices in Charles House, Regent St., London during the occupation by Reclaim the Streets in support of the Liverpool dockers on 8 Sept. Drake International is the Canadian company that provides the scabs at Liverpool docks. "After hearing the plight of the poor down troden Liverpool dockers the World Wildlife Fund have decided to declare the dockers an endangered species. "After an extensive survey It has been discovered that there are only 350 breeding pair left world wide. The World Wildlife Fund are going to set up a captive breeding program in Knowsley safari park where they can breed succesfuly without hinderance from the public and the prying media. "These poor unfortunate creatures of very low inteligence are beleived to be decendants from a branch of dinosaur called Dickheadasaurus. They are now under the protection of the 1984 Wildlife Act. Any person caught physicaly abusing or extracting urine out of them will be subject to the full force of the law. "Any donations will be gratefuly recieved as the breeding and education program is going to be very expensive. yours sincerely Willy Eckerslike"
[PEN-L:12223] End to Listing Under-funded Pensions
Pension Agency Ends Public Listing of Under-Funded Plans By Frank Swoboda Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, September 4, 1997; Page E01 The Washington Post The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., the federal pension insurance agency, announced yesterday that it no longer would publicly list the 50 companies with the largest under-funded retirement plans. The agency said the eight-year-old practice was no longer needed. "With full implementation of the retirement Protection Act reforms, we now have better enforcement tools in place," said PBGC Executive Director David Strauss. The 1994 pension reform act requires all companies with under-funded pension plans -- those with less than 90 percent of the money required to pay off the companies' benefit promises -- to report the under-funding to workers and retirees every year. In past years, the agency would use its annual list as a way to alert employees of what it considered to be serious under-funding of their pension plans. At the time, employers were not required to report the under-funding to their work forces. And every year, corporations named on the agency list would cry foul, claiming that the under-funding had no bearing on the economic health of the company. Unionized companies, for example, would always be behind in their funding because they would make a promise of improved pension benefits at the start of a contract, but actually would make payments to the fund over the life of an agreement, assuring a payment lag. The PBGC ensures what are known as defined benefit plans, in which an employer promises to pay a certain level of benefits regardless of cost. The calculation of the future cost is what the government uses to determine the proper level of funding. Defined contributions plans such as 401(k) retirement savings plans, which do not come with such promises, are not insured by the federal government. In addition to the new reporting requirements, the 1994 law stiffens financing requirements for corporations. Strauss said the combination of the new reporting and funding requirements negates the need for the public list. © Copyright 1997 The Washington Post Company
[PEN-L:12225] Re: FAST TRACK ALERT; Heads Up: Son of NAFTA
Bill and List: I would appreciate it if, when you reply to an article I have posted, you identify the author rather than me or make clear that I am not the author but only the person who posted the article. To read Bill's response, one would think I wrote the comments on NAFTA. I will take full responsibilty for my own thoughts and comments. I don't want to be held responsible for the range of views expressed in articles I repost. The alternative is that I simply cease posting other people's material to the list. Thanks, Michael At 08:59 AM 9/9/97 -0700, Bill Burgess wrote: On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, Michael Eisenscher quoted: 1)NAFTA has created new problems. Our food supply is less safe. Due to the increase in border traffic in meat and produce, more food with dangerous pesticide residues or bacteria is getting to our kitchens. Less than 1 percent of the imports of fruit and vegetables coming from Mexico is inspected at the border. The diminished inspection rates along our border has resulted in an unprecedented flow of illegal drugs. Along our southern border, the drugs and uninspected foods are coming across in over-large, often unsafe trucks, which have increased access to U.S. highways under NAFTA. Instead of creating jobs, as the pro-"free trade" corporate lobbyists predicted, NAFTA is responsible for the loss of nearly half-a-million U.S. jobs. Instead of cleaning up the environment along the U.S.-Mexico border, water and air pollution have increased. A massive increase of industries has pushed the border ecology to the breaking point. Blaming Mexicans for bad food and drugs is a reactionary approach. Blaming NAFTA for job losses implies capitalism without NAFTA would be just fine. Citing 'border ecology' against industry in Mexico is incredible hypocracy. These are yuppie Perot arguments - lets oppose NAFTA for **good** reasons! Bill Burgess
[PEN-L:12215] re: jobs, jobs, jobs
Robert Went notes that an argument similar to the one I made under the
above title was presented by a neoclassical, orthodox, economist, Dani
Rodrik. I see nothing surprising about the source. Neoclassical economics
is not the same thing as Chicago economics. On the micro-level, there are
all sorts of openings for more progressive conclusions than come out of the
usual neoclassical research, because neoclassical assumptions of perfect
competition, perfect information, etc. can be weakened. Sophisticated NC
economics can be useful, though often its practitioners are excessively
concerned with form (math) rather than content (e.g., criticism of markets).
What NC economics misses, IMHO, is an understanding of the _totality_, of
how our society is is dominated by capitalism, by capital. The NCs have
some understandaing of how the parts create the whole, but usually stop
there, clinging to reductionism or methodological individualism. They miss
the way in which the totality -- capitalist class society -- feeds back to
affect micro-processes ("whole makes parts"). The totality for most is
Walrasian general equilibrium, which mostly simply aggregates individual
processes. Thus, class conflict in the workplace is treated as a bilateral
bargaining process or a "collective goods problem" (in which disobedient
workers are free riders) or the efficiency-wage model (using wage scales to
evoke effort, etc.) or something similar. Conflict (wildcat strikes, etc.)
is seen as a market failure rather than an inherent aspect of capitalism.
The potential for worker solidarity and the actuality of capitalist
divide-and-rule are missed.
Because of its avoidance of the issue of how the whole constitutes the
parts, they also miss a lot of what's going on with how the parts make the
whole. This is especially true when we think about time. For NC economics,
time is really an embarrassment. They want to treat it as completely
analogous to space. Irreversabilities and uncertainties about the future
are anathema. To use the phrase "individual processes" in the same sentence
with "Walrasian general equibrium," as I did above, is a theoretical
mistake, since the Walrasian GE system is timeless (except nominally). They
NCs miss the way in which competition and class struggle are time-bound
processes or battles rather than static states, equilibria.
enough sermonizing for the day,
in pen-l solidarity,
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://clawww.lmu.edu/fall%201997/ECON/jdevine.html
Econ. Dept., Loyola Marymount Univ.
7900 Loyola Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90045-8410 USA
310/338-2948 (daytime, during workweek); FAX: 310/338-1950
Economic theories "have become little more than vain attempts to revive
exploded superstitions, or sophisms like those of Mr. Malthus, calculated
to lull the oppressors of mankind into a security fo everlasting triumph."
-- adapted from Percy Bysshe Shelley.
[PEN-L:12219] Re: Piece on Mike Davis in _Lingua Franca_
On Tue, September 9, 1997 at 11:10:59 (-0700) Sid Shniad writes: As a refugee from my native Los Angeles, I strongly recommend City of Quartz to any Penners who want a very insightful analysis of the history and politics of L.A. I learned more from reading the book than I knew from having been raised there. In my haste last night to prepare my wife's dinner (she's been working late on a suit for the city of Austin against Shell and Mobil) I forgot to mention that Davis is a contributor to the Radical Urban Theory site, at http://www.exuberance.com/rut/. I too, am a native of the LA area and learned a great deal just leafing through Davis's book. Bill
[PEN-L:12224] Re: AFIT Call for Participants
shouldn't that be April 15-18, _1998_? Friends, Please circulate the following call for participants. Many thanks. Larry Shute Association for Institutional Thought CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS: The annual meeting of the Association for Institutional Thought (AFIT) will be held April 15 - 18, 1997 Denver, Colorado in conjunction with the 40th Annual Conference of the WESTERN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION AFIT is a national organization dedicated to advancing the discipline of economics and developing contemporary and relevant policy analyses which utilize the perspective of Institutional Economics. The Western Social Science Association is a professional organization dedicated to interdisciplinary scholarship. All interested scholars are cordially invited to participate by submitting complete panel proposals, individual paper proposals, serving as discussants, or as session chairs. Complete panels are particularly welcomed. DEADLINES: November 5th: Proposals (for complete panels no abstracts needed) December 5th: Abstracts for individual papers; discussants, chairs NOTE: Please include your name, affiliation, mailing address, telephone number, FAX number, and e-mail address. All submissions should be sent by the deadlines noted to: Larry Shute Department of Economics California State Polytechnic University, Pomona [Cal Poly Pomona] 3801 West Temple Ave. Pomona, CA 91768-4070, USA Telephone: 909-869-3850 FAX: 909-869-6987 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Regards, Tom Walker ^^^ knoW Ware Communications Vancouver, B.C., CANADA [EMAIL PROTECTED] (604) 688-8296 ^^^ The TimeWork Web: HTTP://WWW.VCN.BC.CA/TIMEWORK/
[PEN-L:12222] AFIT Call for Participants
Friends, Please circulate the following call for participants. Many thanks. Larry Shute Association for Institutional Thought CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS: The annual meeting of the Association for Institutional Thought (AFIT) will be held April 15 - 18, 1997 Denver, Colorado in conjunction with the 40th Annual Conference of the WESTERN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION AFIT is a national organization dedicated to advancing the discipline of economics and developing contemporary and relevant policy analyses which utilize the perspective of Institutional Economics. The Western Social Science Association is a professional organization dedicated to interdisciplinary scholarship. All interested scholars are cordially invited to participate by submitting complete panel proposals, individual paper proposals, serving as discussants, or as session chairs. Complete panels are particularly welcomed. DEADLINES: November 5th: Proposals (for complete panels no abstracts needed) December 5th: Abstracts for individual papers; discussants, chairs NOTE: Please include your name, affiliation, mailing address, telephone number, FAX number, and e-mail address. All submissions should be sent by the deadlines noted to: Larry Shute Department of Economics California State Polytechnic University, Pomona [Cal Poly Pomona] 3801 West Temple Ave. Pomona, CA 91768-4070, USA Telephone: 909-869-3850 FAX: 909-869-6987 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:12220] Picking up on Thurow
On Tue, 9 Sep 1997, Thad Williamson wrote: In his last book "The Future of Capitalism" Thurow is deeply pessimistic and has a chapter comparing the present to the Dark Ages--total breakdown of public goods. I wonder if that makes lists such as this one the effective equivalent of the monasteries then, or would that be those raggedyass cyberpunk 'zines? He writes "Internal reform is very difficult in capitalism, since it has a set of beliefs that deny the need for conscious institutional reforms." Well, sure, market mechanisms will conquer all woes: extricate the bottom 20% from the garbage can, lift the middle 30% off the cross of marginal solvency, enable the rest of us to buy books and also eat rye bread. Why should anyone's faith waver? Ironically, he flat out says capitalism needs a coherent competitor on the left in order to be prodded into making the reforms he wants. Ah me, that little word "coherent" contains worlds within worlds of windswept improbables, unfortunately. He doesn't mean us folks, does he? If so, I'd say that what capitalism really needs is to feel the press of a hard, cold gun barrel against its fevered brow. Anyone up for marching 100,000 students into the Idaho panhandle in April, and not just as a healthy alternative to spring break in Fort Lauderdale? It's time for the two wings of populism to properly meet, and end the era of default dominance by the Buchanan-Limbaugh sound bite empire. Am I kidding? Never. valis Occupied America "The French people are incapable of regicide." -- Louis XVI (1789)
[PEN-L:12221] Fast Track: Bill's Knees Buckling?
Latest hot rumor about fast track legislation, previously scheduled to be released Sept 10: The White House is reportedly alarmed by the volume of Democratic opposition to fast track piling up, not least for the presidential prospects of VP Al Gore. They are talking to union leaders about some kind of version which Democrats could support (and which the GOP would thus reject). The likelihood is that such a bill would not pass and we would have no bill. There is a slim possibility that some kind of mongrelized form could get majorities in Congress if all those folks forget about party politics (yeah, right). A re-engineering of the legislation will require a delay in its introduction, which by itself would be a major admission of weakness by Clinton. ANY 'fast track' procedure is inherently anti-democratic. One could imagine a bill that would be strong on labor and environmental standards, but this takes quite a bit of imagination. Support for any such bill would also undercut any claims by the left to favor popular participation in trade legislation. On balance my own bias is to oppose any fast track, its redness or greenness notwithstanding. A failure of the effort would stimulate a national debate about what fair trade ought to mean, a natural setting for promotion of progressive goals. Let the ruckus rise. MBS === Max B. SawickyEconomic Policy Institute [EMAIL PROTECTED] 1660 L Street, NW 202-775-8810 (voice) Ste. 1200 202-775-0819 (fax)Washington, DC 20036 http://tap.epn.org/sawicky Opinions above do not necessarily reflect the views of anyone associated with the Economic Policy Institute other than this writer. ===
[PEN-L:12212] Striking workers occupy PC World! (fwd)
Strikers occupy PC World plant CAW members vow to stay until contract is signed and 8-month walkout ends By Susan Bourette The Globe and Mail TORONTO - Nearly 100 striking workers barricaded themselves in PC World's main plant in Toronto yesterday, hoping to force an end to an eight-month strike in which the computer parts maker has been found to be bargaining in bad faith. Members of the Canadian Auto Workers union, who have been on strike since early January, stormed the plant early yesterday and vowed to continue the occupation until a collective agreement has been signed. "They've been using every trick in the book to make sure that we don't get an agreement here," said Bob Cernicki, a union spokesman. "What they're trying to do is bust the union, and damn it, we're not going to let them do it." Hundreds of unionists from surrounding communities picketed the plant in support of the striking PC World workers. The company, which makes circuit boards for companies such as Honeywell Inc., Northern Telecom Ltd. And Celestica Inc., has hired 140 replacement workers. PC World, a division of Toronto-based Circuit World Corp., said in a press release that the plant's occupation contravenes a court order that limits the number of pickets at the plant to 24. The company said it has been granted an emergency hearing before the Ontario Court of Appeal to try to have the order enforced. The company declined to comment further. A recorded message at PC World's headquarters said its telephone lines are temporarily out of service. Wage rollbacks and concessions sought by the company have been the major stumbling blocks between union and employer. Workers, who have been without a contract since December, initially asked for wage increases of about 40 cents an hour, but recently told the company they would agree to wage freezes over the life of a three-year deal. The CAW said the average wage for PC World's production workers was $12 an hour before the strike. It said the company wants to roll back 43 employee's wages by between 10 cents and $4.78 an hour. The Ontarion Labour Relations Board ruled in July that PC World had "breached its duty to bargain in good faith by failing to meet with the union to bargain for a new collective agreement" and by tabling an inadequate proposal in April. The union agreed to wage freezes when the company sought bankruptcy protection in 1995. In its ruling, the labour board said the company is now "doing well [and] it is therefore difficult to see how the employer can maintain that it must, for financial reasons, seek the concessions it is seeking." Some union members charged that the company is pushing to decertify the CAW at the plant under new labour legislation. Under Ontario's new laws, a union can be decertified if a walkout stretches beyond 12 months. Eduaardo Luna, a striking worker employed by the company for the past 10 years, said his family has been having difficulty making ends meet on the $175 he receives in strike pay each week. He was last making $14 an hour. His wife, a nurse, was laid off in April. "We work like an animal inside there," Mr. Luna said, gesturing toward the brown brick building. "We're tightening our belts, but it's really hard for my wife and kids to live like this." Mr. Luna said many of the striking workers have failed to find jobs elsewhere because employers are concerned that they might try to form a union in their shops. By late yesterday, there had been no violence at the plant and no arrests. Police monitored the occupation throughout the day.
[PEN-L:12213] Re: FAST TRACK ALERT; Heads Up: Son of NAFTA
Bill Burgess wrote: Blaming Mexicans for bad food and drugs is a reactionary approach. Blaming NAFTA for job losses implies capitalism without NAFTA would be just fine. Citing 'border ecology' against industry in Mexico is incredible hypocracy. These are yuppie Perot arguments - lets oppose NAFTA for **good** reasons! I don't think people are blaming Mexicans. Mexican regulations are weaker. U.S. companies take advantage of these weak regulations. The bad food argument makes sense. For example, trade regulations have made it difficult for Europeans to regulate their food in the sense that the World Trade Organization will not let them keep out meat and milk produced with steroids or bovine growth hormones. To make such an assertion is not blamining Americans. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 916-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:12210] Re: FAST TRACK ALERT; Heads Up: Son of NAFTA
The object of the previous post's wrath was a single, partial info sheet, part of a sea of material that is being developed and circulated. Blaming Mexicans for bad food and drugs is a reactionary approach. The blame is on unregulated markets, not Mexicans. This choice of translation mirrors the mainstream media's characterization of anti- NAFTA sentiment as xenophobic and racist. Blaming NAFTA for job losses implies capitalism without NAFTA would be just fine. Self-evident rubbish. It implies there would be jobs without NAFTA that are gone as a result of NAFTA. Nobody thinks the left's work is done if NAFTA goes down. Sheesh. Citing 'border ecology' against industry in Mexico is incredible hypocracy. Why? Because there is ecological destruction within the US proper? The greens, which means Public Citizen, the source of the leaflet, are no less committed to that issue as well. You might want to argue that labor's focus on this is self-serving. On the whole, labor in the U.S. is more in favor of environmental regulation than against it. Certainly the consortium fighting NAFTA reflects narrower interests than that of the workers of the world. Doesn't every social struggle, at least at the start? These are yuppie Perot arguments - lets oppose NAFTA for **good** reasons! Such as? The sheet you criticized spoke to legitimate issues, albeit partially and not in technical econo-speak. If you can do better, by all means make your contribution. It will be appreciated, if it proves of any use. Cheers, MBS === Max B. SawickyEconomic Policy Institute [EMAIL PROTECTED] 1660 L Street, NW 202-775-8810 (voice) Ste. 1200 202-775-0819 (fax)Washington, DC 20036 http://tap.epn.org/sawicky Opinions above do not necessarily reflect the views of anyone associated with the Economic Policy Institute other than this writer. ===
[PEN-L:12207] Re: FAST TRACK ALERT; Heads Up: Son of NAFTA
On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, Michael Eisenscher quoted: 1)NAFTA has created new problems. Our food supply is less safe. Due to the increase in border traffic in meat and produce, more food with dangerous pesticide residues or bacteria is getting to our kitchens. Less than 1 percent of the imports of fruit and vegetables coming from Mexico is inspected at the border. The diminished inspection rates along our border has resulted in an unprecedented flow of illegal drugs. Along our southern border, the drugs and uninspected foods are coming across in over-large, often unsafe trucks, which have increased access to U.S. highways under NAFTA. Instead of creating jobs, as the pro-"free trade" corporate lobbyists predicted, NAFTA is responsible for the loss of nearly half-a-million U.S. jobs. Instead of cleaning up the environment along the U.S.-Mexico border, water and air pollution have increased. A massive increase of industries has pushed the border ecology to the breaking point. Blaming Mexicans for bad food and drugs is a reactionary approach. Blaming NAFTA for job losses implies capitalism without NAFTA would be just fine. Citing 'border ecology' against industry in Mexico is incredible hypocracy. These are yuppie Perot arguments - lets oppose NAFTA for **good** reasons! Bill Burgess
[PEN-L:12206] Anti-racist workshop goes on-line! (fwd)
-- Forwarded message -- Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 16:58:30 +0200 (MET DST) From: Marianne Brun [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Stefan Brun [EMAIL PROTECTED], Michael Brun [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: George Bridges [EMAIL PROTECTED], Danielle Chynoweth [EMAIL PROTECTED], Mark Enslin [EMAIL PROTECTED], Lisa Fay [EMAIL PROTECTED], Laurdella Foulkes-Levy [EMAIL PROTECTED], Andre Gunder Frank [EMAIL PROTECTED], Mark Freeman [EMAIL PROTECTED], Rachel Rubin [EMAIL PROTECTED], Peter Kwiek [EMAIL PROTECTED], Chris Mann [EMAIL PROTECTED], Debby Langerman [EMAIL PROTECTED], William Gillespie [EMAIL PROTECTED], RGT [EMAIL PROTECTED], Sam Markewich [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Anti-racist workshop goes on-line! (fwd) -- Forwarded message -- Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 10:19:24 -0400 (EDT) From: Mark V Sullivan [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: manni brun [EMAIL PROTECTED], mat opple [EMAIL PROTECTED], arun chandra [EMAIL PROTECTED], maria pease [EMAIL PROTECTED], dick peterson [EMAIL PROTECTED], Stephen L Esquith [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Anti-racist workshop goes on-line! (fwd) Forwarded message: From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Tue Sep 9 08:34:56 1997 Date: 08 Sep 1997 06:52:44 Reply-To: Moderator of conference "ipr.forum" [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Anti-racist workshop goes on-line! To: Recipients of ipr-forum [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-Gateway: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Errors-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Precedence: bulk Lines: 66 Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Dear ipr.forum newsgroup, White privilege is a major barrier to building the kind of social movements that could bring fundamental change to the United States. = Social justice activists have a real-stake in tearing down this barrier. = Committed anti-racist activists are working hard to create an anti-racist agenda, and the Challenging White Supremacy Workshop helps to educate and train those working toward social justice. This fall, we will put the workshop on-line, and we thought you may be interested in participating. Thank you for taking the time to read and share the following announcement. This will be a one-time posting to your newsgroup. In Solidarity, The Challenging White Supremacy Workshop ** PLEASE POST PLEASE ANNOUNCE PLEASE POST= ** You are invited to participate in The Challenging White Supremacy Workshop on-line! The Challenging White Supremacy Workshop for Activists will go on-line on or around November 1, 1997. The goals of the new cyberspace workshop are to: ** Use the computer to recruit, educate and motivate anti-racist activists; ** Create a =93virtual=94 anti-racist community on-line, which potentiall= y can be transformed into a real life anti-racist community; and ** Contribute towards building a national anti-racist movement. All cyberspace workshop participants will be expected to participate in a grassroots anti-racist activity, preferably focused in one of the following areas: Police accountability, Prisons, Immigrant rights, Indigenous sovereignty, Environmental Justice, and Economic Justice organizing in communities of color. For more information about the Challenging White Supremacy Workshop goals, political perspectives and topics, please see our WebPage at http://www.cwsworkshop.org/. If you would be interested in participating in the workshop, please email us at [EMAIL PROTECTED] Challenging White Supremacy: A Workshop for Activists and Organizers = ** PLEASE POST PLEASE SHARE PLEASE POST= ** -- Associate Professor and Area Chair, Music Composition Director, Computer Music Studios Michigan State University School of Music, 305 Music Practice Building E. Lansing, Michigan 48824-1043 U.S.A. 517-355-7653 [office phone]; 517-432-2880[FAX] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL] http://web.msu.edu/user/sullivan [WEB PAGE] MSU Computer Music Studios Web Site: http://www.msu.edu/compmus/index.html
[PEN-L:12205] The Rent Crunch
Greetings, According to the Tuesday, September 9, 1997 issue of The Buffalo News: Half the renters in the Buffalo and Niagara Falls area are unable to afford the monthly payments for the typical apartment, according to a new national study. Those facing problems with housing finances are forced into substandard apartments or find themselves spending less than the federal standard on things such as food, clothing and health care, housing experts said. The study, which based its findings on federal housing data, shows an increasing number of residents in the state unable to keep their wages growing with their housing costs (Front Page, A1). The report goes on to detail the anti-social trend in several other states. What is needed to reverse and end this anti-social trend? A pro-social program. Elements of a pro-social program include: (1) recognition that all humans have inviolable rights by dint of being human. (2) a moratorium on all debt servicing. (3) nationalization of the banks and wholesale trade. (4) more to be put into the economy than taken out. (5) demilitarization of the economy. (6) the people themselves to decide the direction of society. (7) full and equal citizenship for all irrespective of national origin. (8) democratic renewal of the political process. (9) modern(ized) Constitution based on modern definitions. There is no other way to defeat the anti-social offensive and its effects. Features of the anti-social offensive include: (1) liberalization. (2) privatization. (3) rule by decree. The effects of the anti-social offensive can be felt everywhere, especially in peoples' lack of control over their lives. Shawgi Tell Graduate School of Education University at Buffalo [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:12204] FW: BLS Daily Report
BLS DAILY REPORT, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 1997 __U.S. nonfarm payroll employment grew by a seasonally adjusted 49,000 in August, held down by a massive strike at United Parcel Service. The unemployment rate rose a statistically insignificant 0.1 percent to 4.9 percent. The jobless rate has remained within a narrow range of 4.8 percent and 5 percent since April. In July, the economy created an upwardly revised 365,000 jobs. The apparent August slowdown is overstated because of the effect of the 15-day UPS strike on the employment numbers While it directly involved 185,000 workers, "the net impact of the strike on employment, however, was smaller, perhaps about 155,000, after accounting for hiring elsewhere in the transportation industry and at the U.S. Postal Service to help meet the demand for parcel delivery," said BLS Commissioner Katharine Abraham in a statement to the JEC "We might have been looking at employment growth of 190,000 to 200,000 without the strike, although I would stress that this is a rough estimate," she told the committee (Daily Labor Report, pages D-1, E-1). __The unemployment rate remained less than 5 percent, as jobs were added across nearly every sector of the U.S. economy The total number of jobs increased by about 200,000 during August. That's after adjusting for the effects of the UPS strike, which economists estimated temporarily reduced payrolls by 150,000 workers (Washington Post, Sept. 6, page H1). __The economy created jobs at a slower pace in August as UPS strike curbed hiring. The unemployment rate went up a notch (New York Times, Sept. 6, page 29). __The employment report gave no indication that the economy slowed significantly last month from the rapid pace set earlier in the summer. The job market, meanwhile, remained tight while wages continued to rise (Wall Street Journal, page A2). With investors worldwide awaiting his every word, Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve, cast doubt again on the reliability of key economic statistics but drew no firm conclusions on why the economy has remained inflation-free despite strong growth and low unemployment In his only direct reference to the possibility that the Fed might decide to raise rates later this year to insure against an outbreak of inflation, Greenspan said that "with labor resources currently stretched tight, we need to remain alert" In a speech, he, however, repeated his long-held belief that the most likely explanation for the current puzzle is that the most widely used measures of productivity are not capturing the improved efficiency of American businesses (New York Times, Sept. 6, page 29)_Greenspan said the central bank remains "on alert" for signs of accelerating inflation (Wall Street Journal, page A2). Workers in Geneva and Zurich earn the highest salaries in the world, followed by those in Copenhagen, Tokyo, and New York, according to a study by Union Bank of Switzerland. Workers in Moscow, Bombay, and Nairobi are the lowest paid The report concludes that the world's longest workweeks -- more than 45 hours -- can be found in Asia. Latin American workers also ranked high, with an average workweek of just over 44 hours. The shortest working hours are in Europe, where a workweek averages 39 hours, largely because of longer vacations. The bank's economists also researched the average length of time a person has to work to earn the money for a Big Mac, a product that varies little around the globe. Fast-food fans in North America came out best in the rankings, having to work only 12 minutes to buy the McDonald's hamburger, compared with a global average of 37 minutes (Washington Post, Sept. 7, page H4). The Wall Street Journal's feature "Tracking the Economy" (page A4) has a forecast of an increase of 2.0 percent in productivity when the revised second quarter figures are released The forecast for the PPI is for an increase of 0.3 percent in August, following a decline of 0.1 percent in July. For employees at small firms, the managed care revolution has landed a stinging one-two punch: less choice among physicians and sharply higher out-of-pocket costs. Health insurance premium costs for employees at companies with fewer than 200 workers soared nearly five-fold to $56 a month last year from $12 in 1988, according to a study made by the Center for Survey Research for KPMG Peat Marwick. Costs for family coverage rose even more dramatically, climbing to $175 a month in 1996 from $34 in 1988 This experience contrasts sharply with that of employers who overall have seen the rate of health care inflation plunge in recent years, with annual increases of 1 to 2 percent compared with double-digit cost increases in the early 1990's (Wall Street Journal, page B2) DUE OUT TOMORROW: Productivity and Costs: Revised Second Quarter 1997
