Re: Greens For Nader Update: Rigged Convention Divides Green Party (Sign and Forward This)
At 1:03 AM -0400 8/11/04, Michael Hoover wrote: The best way to highlight unequal/unjust ballot access procedures is to actually run a campaign that runs afoul of them -- then, there is a practical struggle. Who cares if ballot access procedures are unequal and unjust if there is no candidate other than the Democratic and Republican ones to begin with? of course, my point was that nader people have not - and will not - raise equal protection matter (although they'll - no doubt, and rightly so - complain about being exluded from prez debates)... Have you actually looked into all the lawsuits that the Nader campaigns have filed? Here are a couple of lawsuits (probably among many more) that the Nader campaigns this year and in the part have filed, singly or jointly with other parties: blockquoteV.T.C.A., Election Code §§192.032(a), 192.032(b)(3)(A), 192.032(c), and 192.032(d), as applied to the Plaintiffs herein for the 2004 Texas General Election and all subsequent General Elections in Texas, and the facts and circumstances relating thereto, are illegal and unconstitutional, in that they are violative of the rights of the Plaintiffs under the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, and Title 42, United States Code, § 1983, in that the aforesaid statutes are not framed in the least restrictive manner necessary to achieve the legitimate State interests in regulating ballot access for a Presidential election, particularly as relating to the fact that the relatively earlier filing deadline for the current election year (viz.: May 10, 2004), shorter petitioning time, and higher number of required petition signature of 64,077 for Independent presidential candidates as opposed to the later petition signature deadline for the current election year (viz.: May 24, 2004), longer petitioning time, and lower petition signature requirement of 45,540 for recognition of new political parties in Texas constitutes an invidious discrimination against Independent presidential candidates in violation of their rights and the rights of their potential supporters under the equal protection clause to the United States Constitution, their right to political association for the advancement of political beliefs, and the right to cast their votes effectively; and, as applied to Independent presidential candidates, Texas' relatively early signature deadline, combined with the significantly higher signature requirement for Independent candidates as opposed to new political party candidates, and other particular circumstances herein, establishes an unreasonable and undue burden on Independent candidates for President of the United States seeking ballot access in Texas. http://www.gwu.edu/~action/2004/nader/nadertxsuit.html/blockquote blockquote1. This is a civil action for declaratory and injunctive relief arising under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Plaintiffs challenge the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's requirement at 25 P.S. §§ 2873, 2911, 2913, and 2914 that all candidates for elected office pay a filing fee in order to gain access to the ballot, with no provision for a waiver of such fee or alternative means of ballot qualification. This filing fee system violates Plaintiffs' fundamental rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. http://www.nvri.org/library/cases/Belitskus/Belitskuscomplaint.pdf/blockquote blockquoteOhio had authority to list the name of presidential candidate Ralph Nader on the November 2000 ballot without his Green Party affiliation, a federal appeals court ruled yesterday. Ohio officials said the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling upholds the state's position that it has authority to impose reasonable requirements for ballot listings to ensure orderly, fair elections. The Green Party and Nader had argued that keeping the party's designation off the ballot violated their constitutional rights of free speech, free association and equal protection of law. http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/news.aspx?id=4245/blockquote As a matter of fact, in his writing, Nader indicted violations of the equal protection clause as early as in 1958 in the context of noting the court's turning a blind eye to them: blockquoteFor example, the Illinois statute states that a petition to nominate candidates for a new political party must be signed by at least 25,000 qualified voters, including at least 200 from each of the 102 counties in the state. The New York statute compels even greater omnipresence. It reads:An independent nominating petition for candidates to be voted for by all the voters of the state must be signed by at least 12,000 signatures of whom at least 50 shall reside in each county of the state The Illinois law was challenged by the Progressive Party just before the 1948 elections. The case reached the U.S. Supreme Court where it
Re: Economics and law
At 9:32 PM -0700 8/10/04, David B. Shemano wrote: Even taking your example into consideration, let's imagine a lack of economic coercion. Actually, I can't imagine it. In any event, let's assume that the law requires every car have the safety of a Lexus and everybody can afford a Lexus. Fine. But then a new car comes on the market that is safer than a Lexus, but costs a lot more. Conceptually, you are right back where you are today, where the poor can buy a used Pinto. Right back where you are today, in terms of relative deprivation due to the existence of classes (as more safety regulations do not abolish classes as you note correctly), but in the hypothetical scenario that you mention, at least the minimum standard of safety for all have gone up, including for the rich who can now have products of even higher safety standards than products of already high standards that they had at their disposal before the advent of stricter safety regulations. That sounds like a virtuous spiral of progress of technology for all, whether you take a capitalist or socialist point of view. -- Yoshie * Critical Montages: http://montages.blogspot.com/ * Greens for Nader: http://greensfornader.net/ * Bring Them Home Now! http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/ * Calendars of Events in Columbus: http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html, http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php, http://www.cpanews.org/ * Student International Forum: http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/ * Committee for Justice in Palestine: http://www.osudivest.org/ * Al-Awda-Ohio: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio * Solidarity: http://www.solidarity-us.org/
Let the Empire vote, eh?
An apparently only half tongue-in-cheek argument in yesterday's Globe and Mail for why Canadians and others should be allowed to vote for the US President. The Kerry Democrats, you would think, would have a real interest in taking the issue a step further. Rather than lamely trailing after Bush in Iraq, they could dispel any lingering swing voter doubts about their own imperialist bona fides by agitating for a quick and easy US invasion and annexation of Canada, which would also, incidentally, give them effective control of both the White House and Congress in perpetuity -- a real Democratic Dictatorship beyond anything imagined by Lenin. The political culture of Canada strongly resembles that of the US Northeast and Northwest. Polls taken in Canada during the 2000 election showed very strong support for Al Gore over George Bush. Even members of the former right-wing Reform party, based in Alberta, Canadas Texas, surprisingly favoured Gore by a slim margin. Bushs Canadian support in 2004 is probably less than Ralph Naders in the US. On second thought, faced with the loss of medicare and hockey's Team Canada, its not out to be ruled out that Canadians could mount a stiff resistance to an invasion. A more peaceable solution would simply be for the Northern states to secede from the Union and form a more perfect one with the Canadian provinces. MG --- My Canada includes the White House By Larry Krotz Globe and Mail August 10, 2004 On Nov. 2, in the election to decide the world's most important office, I won't get to vote. Nor, you might say, should I be able to cast a ballot in the American presidential election, since I'm a Canadian. Not so fast: Opening the White House ballot to anybody who lives in the spreading shadow of U.S. empire (which would be at least half the world) ought to become the political-reform cause of the 21st century. This isn't just a matter of how I might feel about another four years of George W. Bush; the idea first came when Bill Clinton occupied the White House. Even though I was not an American, I could no more avoid the Clintons than fly to the moon. The multiplying powers of the media made sure we who dwelt outside U.S. borders were as intimate with Hillary, Bill, Chelsea and, yes, Monica, as anybody residing in the 50 states. The White House was the lightning rod, not just of politics -- the global economy, diplomacy, war and peace -- but of popular culture. In comparison to the attention we directed toward Washington, our own Prime Minister enjoyed about as much status as the governor of Ohio. Which raises the point: The appeal of democracy is the power to accept or reject, on every level. You must be able to influence whatever it is you're going to have to put up with. Wasn't my time and attention (though admittedly not my dollars) being taxed without proper representation? With the presidency of George W. Bush, everything has become more urgent. In November of 2000, when the strange election that brought the current administration to power took place, I was in Russia. Night after night, on the television in my St. Petersburg hotel room, the drama of the hanging chads played itself out. Not one person I encountered, Russian or foreign, lacked an opinion about who should win; little did we realize how, just 10 months later, it would be critical to all of us. As this administration has polarized not only America but the world, the decision about who occupies the White House has become one of life and death. The Oval Office is a Global Office. No president since Herbert Hoover has been able to function on a predominantly domestic agenda. Things, like the rest of the world, get in the way. So what about that rest of the world? The Bush presidency has driven home the ease with which the superpower can make its own rules. The exceptionalism under which it has approached not only military actions but such matters as the Kyoto Protocol, International Criminal Court and various arms-control conventions, has disabused us of illusions the world was naturally multilateral. Even that much-used term coalition is really just a piece of the rhetoric. Terminology aside, what can't be denied is the huge investment we all have in how America is run and, in particular, how it operates in the world. As a citizen of that world, I want some right (and rite) of participation. In vassal states of empires past, certain rights always accrued. The biblical Saint Paul got great mileage out of being a Roman citizen, even though he lived in Greece and Asia Minor. Voting, of course, was not one of those rights, but then most people inside the empires didn't vote either. That had to wait until the 18th century, with the French and American revolutions, to gain place as a cherished measure of citizenship. The ideas of representative government followed quickly, pushing relentlessly forward until women, as well as men, held the right to vote. Now it is the universal
Re: Greens For Nader Update: Rigged Convention Divides Green Party (Sign and Forward This)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 08/11/04 3:03 AM At 1:03 AM -0400 8/11/04, Michael Hoover wrote: of course, my point was that nader people have not - and will not - raise equal protection matter (although they'll - no doubt, and rightly so - complain about being exluded from prez debates)... Have you actually looked into all the lawsuits that the Nader campaigns have filed? Here are a couple of lawsuits (probably among many more) that the Nader campaigns this year and in the part have filed, singly or jointly with other parties: the 2004 Texas General Election and all subsequent General Elections in Texas, and the facts and circumstances relating thereto, are illegal and unconstitutional, in that they are violative of the rights of the Plaintiffs under the First and Fourteenth Amendments to blockquote1. This is a civil action for declaratory and injunctive relief arising under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Plaintiffs challenge the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's requirement blockquoteOhio had authority to list the name of presidential candidate Ralph Nader on the November 2000 ballot without his Green Party affiliation, a federal appeals court ruled yesterday. Ohio officials said the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling upholds the state's position that it has authority to impose reasonable requirements for ballot listings to ensure orderly, fair elections. The Green Party and Nader had argued that keeping the party's designation off the ballot violated their constitutional rights of free speech, free association and equal protection of law. As a matter of fact, in his writing, Nader indicted violations of the equal protection clause as early as in 1958 in the context of noting the court's turning a blind eye to them: The Illinois law was challenged by the Progressive Party just before the 1948 elections. The case reached the U.S. Supreme Court where it was argued that the statute's disproportionate favoring of rural counties violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. In a 6-3 decision, the court disagreed and upheld the law. Writing the dissent, Justice Douglas stated: The notion that one group can be granted greater voting strength than another is hostile to our standards for popular representative government. He was referring to the fact that 25,000 signatures from 50 of the least populous counties could form a new party while the same number from 49 counties with 87 percent of the registered voters could not. . . . stand corrected re. reference to 14th amendment, although none of above addresses point i was making, they're all *within* states, not *among* them.. texas example is about differential filing deadlines between parties and independent candidates in texas, not differential deadlines throughout states... penn example is about absence of waiver for filing fee in penn (other states make allowance for such, thus, to not do so could be determined 'unreasonable' under 83 supreme court decision btw: 83 supreme court decision allows for differential definition of 'reasonableness'... ohio example is about differential number of petition signatures needed in ohio, party vs independent candidate... re. illinois example in 58 nader co-authored article, douglas dissent refers to differential number of signatures among state's counties, interestingly, this does begin to get at my point if douglass critique is applied *among* the states, similar to warren's 64 majority opinion in _reynolds v sims_ (case from alabama, if memory serves correctly) holding that one-person one-vote apportionment principle applied to state senates as well as to state lower-houses, if so, similar *principle* could also apply to u.s. senate irrespective of 1787 constitutional arrangement, same for douglass dissent if one considers differential numbers in various states (which could be addressed with use of percentage since states do have different size populations)... many technical/procedural/justice problems arise from 1787 constitutional language assigning each state authority to determine times, places, manner of holding elections... Sorry, I meant to write the Liberty Party. Although its vote never exceeded 3% of the votes cast in a presidential election, the party did further political abolitionism. In closely contested state and local elections, the Liberty party often held the balance of power, sometimes causing major party candidates to take advanced antislavery positions in a bid for its support (Kinley J. Brauer, Liberty Party, Encyclopedia Americana). More importantly, many Libertymen eventually joined with anti-slavery factions of Whigs and Democrats to form the Free Soil Party, many of whose former members would later form the core of the Republican Party. Only out of many seeming failures can a movement grow -- in fact, there is no way people can gain political experience except by trying, failing,
John Forbes Kerry and the war on Iraq
(This is such a great column that I am posting it unclipped.) NY Observer, August 11, 2004|9:42 AM On Trumans Train, Kerry Comes Down On WarHes For It by Robert Sam Anson Its the war, stupid. Pretty much everybody seems to get that. Delegates to the Democratic National Convention sure did: They thought Iraq was the issue. Not the economy. Not health care. Not the environment, civil rights, freedom of choice, separation of church and state, or anything else the Bush administration has turned into pretzelsIraq. Out there in the great red state/blue state beyond, its basically the same story. When pollsters call, Iraqs the word they hear more than any otherthe first time a war has dominated a Presidential election since 1972. Hard to blame folks, really. Something that kills nearly a thousand Americans; wounds, maims and cripples more than five times that many; costs $127 billion, to date; and has no end in sightit does get your attention. Most peoples, anyway. But if some didnt have a different opinion, then this great, big, wonderful country of ours wouldnt be a democracy, would it? And if we werent a democracy, then not only would there be no need for elections, there wouldnt be any terrorists, either, because our being a democracy is why they hate us (at least, thats what George Bush says). And that goes for Saddam Hussein, too. So if youve been wondering why we really and truly had to go to war with Iraq, now you know: Were a democracy. Which brings us, at long last, to John Forbes Kerry, one of those people with a differing opinion on the importance of Iraq. He puts it at No. 7 on the list of reasons why hed be a better President than Dubya. Truth is, Mr. Kerry doesnt like to talk about it much, particularly whether he thought it was such a hot idea in the first place, now that it turns out that Saddam didnt have the W.M.D.s Mr. Kerry thought he did, when he was handing Mr. Bush a blank check to wage war whenever and however he wanted. That, Mr. Kerry wouldnt talk about at all. Until this week. Inspired perhaps by the scenic wonders glimpsed from his campaign train as it chugged its way through the Southwest (or maybe fed up with the nagging of The New York Times editorial board), Mr. Kerry finally fessed up on Monday that he would, indeed, have supported Mr. Bushs war, even if hed known that W.M.D.s were a George Tenet air-ball. Yes, he said, I would have voted for the authority. I believe it was the right authority for a President to have. In coming to his position, Mr. Kerry is following the lead of Hillary Clinton, who two weeks ago told Nightline she was all for the war (a continuation of her husbands policies, shes called it), W.M.D.s or no W.M.Ds. So did 29 other Democratic Senators, including Chuck Schumer, who demanded that Vice President Cheney apologize for continuing to insist that Saddam was the glove to Osamas hand, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Fabled for his love of TV cameras, Mr. Schumer would have gotten more face time had he lumped Hillary with Dick. But apparently Mr. Schumer was tied up with Gabe Pressman on that October day in 2002 when his junior colleague took to the Senate floor to denounce Saddam for providing aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members. In any event, now that Mr. Kerry has gotten the would-he-or-wouldnt-he-have question behind him, he can go back to speechifying about topics he does like. Such as how it would be nice for everyone to have a job, affordable health care, a good education, and kids who dont mainline or stick up bodegas. Sentiments, in short, even Dick Cheney could share. This week in New Mexico, for instance, Mr. Kerry was saying we ought to treat Indians better. Who but descendants of George Armstrong Custer can quarrel with that? Our forefathers and -mothers did, after all, steal the country from them (a fact not mentioned by Mr. Kerry, concerned perhaps that Custer kin might be in the audience), and in the swing-state Land of Enchantment, Native Americans account for 10 percent of the vote. Which is not to say Mr. Kerry never declaims about Iraq. He does frequentlythough only about the mess Dubyas made of it. Evidence was piling up yet again this week: bloody, bitter, hand-to-hand fighting in supposedly secure Najaf; the shooting down of another U.S. helicopter (over Baghdad, yet); more kidnappings and bombings; the announcement of 27 criminal investigations into where the reconstruction money went (since it wasnt to reconstructing); and the issuing of a warrant on charges of counterfeiting for Ahmad Chalabi, the convicted bank-looter and accused Iranian spy Wolfowitz Co. thought would make a swell replacement for Saddam. But that things are untidy in Iraq, as Don Rumsfeld likes to put it, aint a news flash. Nor is Mr. Kerrys oft-recommended fix: having the U.N., NATO, defanged Muslim nations and presumably whoever else wishes to
Economics and law
by David B. Shemano Why is your personal opinion relevant? I mean, I am sure I can find somebody (Melvin P.?) who apparently highly values going 100. Therefore, your opinion is cancelled out. Now what do we do? ^ CB: Well, it's like why vote ? Your vote is only one in millions. How can it be relevant ? David Shemano's vote is going to cancel yours , so why vote ? In general, all we have here on email is opinions ,no ? For example, you recognized that opinions are readily expressed in this mediuam when you said to Michael Perelman: I don't have a strong opinion on whether regulation should be done by legislation or litigation -- it seems like a peripheral issue. Would your opinion have been relevant if you had one ? ^ Why do you assume such facts for a socialist society? We have 75 years of experience with socialist inspired economies. Did they place a higher value on safety compared to comparable capitalist societies? ^ CB: Well, yea for automobile safety. The Soviet cars were like tanks, which , Justin mentioned, would be the direction that you would go to have safer cars. They had more mass transportation in the form of omnibuses, trains, trolleys than individualized units, as Melvin alluded to as a safer form, generally. Obviously, there can be train accidents too. We have too much capitalism in the world to get a full socialist test of more safety in general. Lets get rid of capitalism and find out what we can really do as humans. ^^^ Were they able to implement safety concerns more economically than comparable capitalist societies? ^ CB: Good question. I'm not sure how you would get a comparable capitalist society , but if you think my opinion on it is relevant, I'd say a comparable capitalist economy for the SU would be someplace like Brazil in some senses at some periods. It's hard because the Soviet Union (and all socialist inspired economies) had to put so much economic emphasis on military defense because capitalism was constantly invading them or threatening to nuke 'em. This throws off all ability to measure from Soviet and socialist inspired history what might be the benefits of a peaceful socialist development of a regime of safety from our own machines. ^^^ It seems to me that safety increases in value as a society becomes wealthier, and the value is not correlated to the economic system itself. ^ CB What do you mean by safety increases in value ? I'm not sure human life is valued more highly as society gets wealthier. Death and injury by automobile accidents is the main cause of premature death in the U.S., isn't it ?
Fox to Be Tested for Rabies
Headline from the Wash. Post online. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Kerry would have gone to war
(A frequent argument on behalf of Kerry is that he would have not invaded Iraq after 9/11. He might be an imperialist but is not a rash, adventuristic unilateralist. Guess what, folks. He is a rash, adventuristic unilateralist. He might not be a born-again Christian and might favor stem-cell research, but on the burning question of the day, he and Bush are agreed.) Kerry Defends Position on Iraq Democrat Says He Would Reduce U.S. Troops Within 6 Months By Jim VandeHei and Mary Fitzgerald Washington Post Staff Writers Sunday, August 8, 2004; Page A04 LA JUNTA, Colo., Aug. 7 -- On his whistle-stop swing through the West, Sen. John F. Kerry has been pulled into two issues he rarely touches on in his campaign speeches to the party faithful: his support of the Iraq war and his opposition to same-sex marriage. Kerry, who is trying to focus on less divisive issues, such as health care, during his train trip through battleground states, was pushed into the spotlight on Iraq and same-sex marriage by President Bush, local reporters -- and a fellow Democratic senator from the swing state of Wisconsin. Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) told the Capital Times in Madison on Thursday that Kerry and his running mate Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) were wrong to vote for the congressional resolution authorizing the war and later against the $87 billion to fund it. His comments mark one of the few times a Democratic senator has spoken critically of the party's ticket in the general-election campaign. They should have voted no against an unwise war and yes to support the troops, as he did, Feingold told the newspaper. Stephanie Cutter, Kerry's communications director, said Kerry voted to hold [former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein] accountable and continues to believe that it was the right thing to do. After witnessing the way in which the president went to war, Senator Kerry voted against the $87 billion because it was wrong to give a blank check to the president for a failed policy. Bush is stepping up pressure on Kerry to declare whether it was right to oust Hussein, despite the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Steve Schmidt, a Bush campaign spokesman, said the president would not only have still ousted Hussein, but not adjusted the strategy or timing of the military strike. Unequivocal answer: [Bush] would have removed Saddam when we did, Schmidt wrote via e-mail. Knowing then what he knows today about the lack of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Kerry still would have voted to authorize the war and IN ALL PROBABILITY would have launched a military attack to oust Hussein by now if he were president, Kerry national security adviser Jamie Rubin said in an interview Saturday. As recently as Friday, the Massachusetts senator had said he only might have still gone to war. full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48708-2004Aug7.html -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
A nickel's worth of difference?
Counterpunch, August 11, 2004 Bush v. Kerry? Not Even a Dime's Worth of Difference By ALEXANDER COCKBURN Kerry goes from bad to worse. Last week he dropped Saddam's non-existent WMDs as a campaign issue. He did this huge favor to Bush via his (Kerry's) foreign affairs spokesman, the insufferable Jamie Rubin, formerly the top State Department flack in the Clinton years. Rubin told the Washington Post last weekend that knowing then what he knows today about the lack of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Kerry still would have voted to authorize the war and in all probability would have launched a military attack to oust Hussein by now if he were president. Up until the previous day Mr flip-flop O'Kerry had said he only might have still gone to war. Then on Monday Kerry did some further clarifying in Arizona where he told the press he would not have changed his vote to authorize the war against Iraq, although he would have handled things very differently from President Bush. Kerry said the congressional resolution gave Bush the right authority for the president to have. (Since Kerry voted for that resolution, what else could he say?) But, Kerry went on, (as reported by CNN) I would have done this very differently from the way President Bush has. After this blather, Kerry proclaimed that There are four real questions that matter to Americans, and I hope you'll get the answers to those questions because the American people deserve them. My question to President Bush is why did he rush to war without a plan to win the peace? Why did he rush to war on faulty intelligence and not do the hard work [what hard work?] necessary to give America the truth? Why did he mislead America about how he would go to war? [What does this mean?] Why has he not brought other countries to the table in order to support American troops in the way that we deserve it and relieve a pressure from the American people? In other words, absolutely nothing separates Kerry from Bush's positions on Iraq except he claims he would have lied more efficiently and somehow wheedled the UN and NATO into giving support. This business about getting the Allies on board, you may recall, was Howard Dean's posture back in the spring. So Bush, a lousy president but ludicrously over-demonized, is bracketed by a Democratic candidate, Al Gore, who was calling for immediate war on Saddam back in 1999, flanked by all the neo-Cons who subsequently flocked to Bush, and by Kerry who now says he holds exactly the same position, rationalized by the same neo-Cons. If the war on Iraq bothers you, a vote for Kerry is a vote thrown away. full: http://www.counterpunch.org/ -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Nader press release on Kerry's Me-Too-ism
Nader For President 2004 P.O. Box 18002 - Washington, DC 20036 - www.VoteNader.org FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE For Further Information: August 10, 2004 Kevin Zeese 202-265-4000 Nader: Is there no end to Kerry's Me-Too-ism with Bush on Iraq? Washington, D.C.: Independent Candidate Ralph Nader today criticized John Kerry for responding to Bush bait and saying he would still vote for the Iraq war knowing what he knows today. Nader asked: Is there no end to John Kerrys me-too-ism on the Iraq War? John Kerry and all Americans know today that we were misled by President Bush in order to justify the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq. We now know: 1. There Were No Weapons of Mass Destruction. It is no longer in dispute: there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. According to David Kay, President Bushs former chief weapons inspector, any weapons of mass destruction were destroyed after the Gulf War. After returning from Iraq, having led a large team of inspectors and spent nearly half a billion dollars, David Kay told the president: We were wrong. (See: David Kay testimony before Senate Armed Services Committee, January 28, 2004.) 2. There Were No Ties Between Iraq and Al Qaeda. The 9/11 Commission review now indicates there were no ties between Iraq and Al Quaeda. Indeed, Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden were mortal enemiesone secular, the other fundamentalist. 3. Saddam Hussein Was Not a Threat to the United States. In fact, Hussein was a tottering dictator, with an antiquated command over an uncontrolled army, Kurdish enemies to the north, and Shiite adversaries to the South. Hussein could not even control the air space over most of Iraq. 4. Saddam Hussein Was Not a Threat to his Neighbors: In fact, Iraq was surrounded by countries with far superior military forces. Turkey, Iran, and Israel were all capable of obliterating any aggressive move by the weakened Iraqi dictator. 5. We Have Not Liberated the Iraqi People. The United States has merely installed a puppet government. We continue to have an occupying force of over 130,000 troops in Iraq and plann on building 14 military bases there. Our corporations are putting down roots in Iraq to ensure control of its natural resources, especially oil. In response to President Bushs demand for clarification of Senator Kerrys position, Kerry said: Yes, I would have voted for the authority. The authority to declare war is exclusively in the hands of Congress (Article I, Section 8) and cannot be delegated as the Congress did in October 2002. It becomes more difficult every day to know what John Kerry stands for. At the Democratic Convention he said he would not send troops to war unless absolutely necessary; now he says he would have authorized troops for Iraq, despite what we now know. Prior to the Convention, Kerry said he would keep troops in Iraq throughout his first term in the presidency; last week he said he would reduce them in the first six monthsthen his aides clarified his statement and said reduction was a best case target, said Nader. Why is Kerry letting George W. Bush off the hook and letting down the widening anti-war movement and like-minded citizens in the U.S.A.? -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: back to PPP comparisons
[Sometimes my response has to be much delayed, sorry. I will also try to reply to others.] Michael Lebowitz writes: I have just received some comments from a former colleague on the questions posed about the use of PPP. They include his comments in a letter plus an attachment which I have copied into the text below. Please thank your colleague for his comments which show a generous effort; please also thank your other friend for pointing us to the Robert Wade article. For me, your colleague's comments illustrate the dilemma - even very well informed people assume PPP is just a statistical tool and not a economic model that is produced only through assuming the most severe and improbable free market models of price formation. I can't tell how much of my postings he got to read, but I'll bet that he would have some doubts if he knew what was under the hood of the PPP. Without repeating my earlier comments, I will make a few below. - He writes: I beg to disagree with the idea that the PPP method is imaginary and the Atlas method is actual. Agreed - at least the part about the Atlas method not being actual. One is trying to compare apples and oranges (Manhattan with African villages) so there can not be a magic actual conversion number. However, and as you point out, at least exchange rates (used in the Atlas method) are actual for the international part of the economy and so inherently partly relevant and real. I (like authors on this subject) used the comparison with the Atlas method to show just how large a difference an (arbitrary) method can make. As I explain in the attachment, the PPP exchange rate takes into account the price difference of goods and services between countries,or the purchasing power of a country's currency vis-a-vis the currencies of other countries (or the US dollar), whereas the market exchange rate does not take into account the price difference. They say PPP does that (the Belassa-Samuelson argument). But it is not that simple (nor could it be, IMO). The actual PPP method does something very different than just adjust for price differences and one can only believe the PPP model is accurate if one also deeply believes in neo-classical General Equilibrium theory - and one of the most die-hard versions of it. Anything less and the numbers become weaker. I will illustrate this further down. Take a simple example of Japan and the US. Say the market exchange rate is 110 Yens = One US$. Now take an equivalent basket--in quantity and quality--that contains a burger with fries and a drink. It costs 450 Yens in Tokyo and US$ 2.50 in New York. The PPP exchange rate is then 180 Yens = One US$ (450/2.50). There is nothing imaginary about the PPP exchange rate since it gives you the purchasing power of a country's currency vis-a-vis the US dollar. Start with a smaller problem in this analogy: burgers, fries and a drink carry different connotations in different cultures that distort a purely physical comparison. When I was last in Japan (a while back) McDonalds had a cachet in certain young circles (hard to believe no?) so the burgers cost more than just a physical comparison would justify. Neo-classics wave off these price distortions as imperfections but... The larger problem with the burger analogy is that it leaves out the next 2 steps in forming a PPP. First: which items do we put in the basket (or price vector)? A hamburger in the Kenyan basket or the Kenyan staple ugali in the Manhattan basket? Use the hamburger and Kenya is made to look more expensive; use ugali and New York looks more pricey (using both doesn't solve the problem since the difference isn't likely to be symmetrical and in any case this is impractical for 200 countries). One universally accepted criticism of the in PPP/basket issue is the substitution problem (aka the Gershenkron effect) - poor people substitute poorer items in their basket but out of need not preference. The PPP uses an price index method (called the Geary-Khamis method) that takes no account of this. Even the OECD (who had often been hardline over negotiations on this issue) ultimately refused to use it and turned to Then comes a breathtaking leap. Manhattan and the Kenya have a small number of items in common. But the ratio between these items then gets applied to ALL the rest of the items in their respective economies that have never been traded (and some, like some labor services, that could never be tradable). The Gen. Eq. model that is produced assumes that this doesn't matter. So it treats the haircut sold in the village in Kenya AS IF it could be sold in Manhattan. Obviously this is a biased and unreal model that erases some important facts of life. How much do these differences matter? Relax just one extreme assumption in the PPP model: include substitution effect which many (most?) neoclassics would since this is more of a statistical issue than an ideological one. The authors of the PPP acknowledge
Re: back to PPP comparisons
As a general question, do these income comparisons somehow factor in nonmonetary income, state-supplied benefits or similar perks? E.g., in the country in which my butt is parked, monetary incomes are generally relatively low, but most families own their own apartments and grow their own food in part, plus electricity and utilities are dirt cheap, even giving the recent price increase. Thanks. --- Paul [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: [Sometimes my response has to be much delayed, sorry. I will also try to reply to others.] __ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - 50x more storage than other providers! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Re: JEP Schleiffer
1) I, for one, deeply regret the loss of JEP. I don't think anyone can really maintain that the new version is more socially useful, especially compared to the way JEP was before the 'great turnover', when the AEA itself was less monolithic. It seems that within the AEA, there is now a ruling dynamic that is far more concerned with promoting their ideology than with serving the public. 2) Latest AEA/AER publication (San Diego Proceedings) has a choice article: Does Competition Destroy Ethical Behavior? by Andrei Shleiffer. Opening sentence: This paper shows that conduct described as unethical and blamed on 'greed' is sometimes a consequence of market competition. This builds on the author's article entitled Corruption in last year's QJE. I am sorry to kick someone when they are down, and also to criticize someone not on the list but... 3) The two issues are part of a larger problem - AEA's role (or lack of role) in promoting ethics and a sense of public responsibility in the profession. I was struck by this at the San Diego ASSA and commented on it to the list at the time. AEA, and the economics profession in general, lags considerably behind other fields on this point. Paul At 08:55 AM 7/31/2004 -0700, you wrote: Shleifer is the editor; DeLong is gone. So the journal has become more technical, less topical. Its beauty, especially under Stiglitz, was that it could keep non-specialists informed about different fields and truly offer different, even dissident, perspectives. On Sat, Jul 31, 2004 at 08:47:51AM -0700, Devine, James wrote: [was RE: [PEN-L] Deeper Problems for Shleifer] Michael writes: Does anybody niotice the rapid decline in the Journal of Economic Perspectives? A right winger will take over the Journal of Economc Literature. I haven't been paying attention. Why do you think that the JEP is in decline? why do you think it went into that tailspin? who is the editor? is it still Brad deLong? who's taking over the JEL? replacing whom? jim d -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Fidel Castro horrified by China
From my standpoint the conversation concerning China gets loud because of the lack of concrete economic and political data. Then ideology parades as insight. Quite. If China's non agricultural workforce is between 350 and 400 million . . . with roughly 100 million in the NON STATE SECTOR . . . then the question becomes what is the economic meaning of state sector and non state sector in China? The self-described meaning of the state sector is here: http://www.sasac.gov.cn/eng/eng_qygg/eng_qygg_0001.htm This is its number 1 responsibility: 1) ... to guide and push the reform and restructuring of the state-owned enterprises. Supervise the maintenance and appreciation of state assets value for those state-invested enterprises, reinforce the management of the state-owned assets, promote the establishment of modern enterprise system of the SOEs and improve enterprises Corporate governance, drive the strategic adjustment of the state-owned economic structure and layout. Also, your employment numbers are fantastically off. Here's a report (2002) from China's State Council: The employees of state and collective enterprises and institutions accounted for 37.3 percent of the total urban employees in 2001, down from 99.8 percent in 1978. Meanwhile, the number of employees of private, individually owned and foreign-invested enterprises has increased drastically. In the countryside, the household is still the dominant unit of agricultural employment. However, with the implementation of the urbanization strategy and the development of non-agricultural industries, non-agricultural employment and the transfer of rural labor have increased rapidly. By the end of 2000, the number of employees of township enterprises had reached 128.195 million, of which 38.328 million were employed by township collective enterprises, 32.525 million by township private enterprises and 57.342 million by individually owned township enterprises. Since the 1990s, the labor force transferred from rural to urban areas has topped the 80-million mark. from: http://www.china.org.cn/e-white/20020429/1.I.htm Furthermore, since 2000, nearly *all* of the township and village enterprises have been formally privatized (usually sold to the managers), so the 38+ million listed above in the 'collective' economy can now be moved to the 'private' column. Add it all up: 65 million employed in the state sector, 800+ million outside of it. Also, the ratio of employees working in the state sector continues to decline, as does its share of GDP/assets, etc. And furthermore, many of the SOEs are now no longer fully 'owned' by the State. The state merely has a controlling stake of the enterprises' shares, while management has been contracted out to From the perspective of living labor, what is the difference between state and non-state management if their common goal is the ruthless expansion of value? Let's forget about the 800 million in agriculture . . . who under the best conditions of industrial socialism ... can only alienate their products on the basis of exchange . . . no matter what the form of property in land. There aren't 800 million in agriculture. There are somewhere around 800 million people registered in rural areas, but a little less than half of China's working age population is engaged in agriculture, around 450 million. Jonathan
Re: ABK Comrades!
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 08/10/04 11:44 PM At 9:20 PM -0400 8/10/04, Michael Hoover wrote: maybe post header should have read: anybody but kerry and cobb, in any event, no need to limit oneself to left petit-bourgeois deviationism of nader, choose between several real-live socialists (commies even) Only Nader/Camejo represented a potential to threaten the Democratic Party's hegemony over the left side of the political spectrum by taking 2-7% of the votes, according to the polls http://montages.blogspot.com/2004/08/nader-2004-nader-2000.html -- hence the Democrats' well-organized attacks on Nader/Camejo. Among the parties that you listed, only the Libertarian Party, whose core supporters are well-to-do, will have its candidate on the ballots in all 50 states: blockquoteDemocratic strategists have long fretted that Ralph Nader could draw votes from their presidential candidate. But a new survey suggests that President Bush faces a potential threat of his own from a more obscure spoiler: Michael Badnarik. In the survey, conducted in three Midwest battleground states, some voters who said they would choose Bush over Sen. John F. Kerry in a two-candidate race also said they would pick Badnarik, the Libertarian Party nominee for president, if he were added to the ballot. The numbers for Badnarik were small: He drew 1% to 1.5% of the vote in a four-way race with Bush, Democratic candidate Kerry and Nader, an independent. But analysts said the results suggested that the small-government Libertarians could attract enough conservatives disaffected with Bush's leadership to swing a tight race, just as Nader attracted discontented liberals in 2000. you're not suggesting that one should only make vote choice among candidates/parties on ballot in all 50 states.. re. libertarian 'spoiler' for bush, i posted figures in aftermath of 2000 election indicating that this happened in several states where buchanan 'took votes' from bush 'allowing' gore to win those states, buchanan did this with national aggregate of 1%... michael hoover -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Re: Greens For Nader Update: Rigged Convention Divides Green Party (Sign and Forward This)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 08/11/04 8:32 AM many technical/procedural/justice problems arise from 1787 constitutional language assigning each state authority to determine times, places, manner of holding elections... meant to note in above portion of earlier point that congress may at any time by law make or alter state regulations... query 1: what became of nader's announcement a few months ago that he was going to establish a 'populist' party... query 2: reform party 'endorsement' of nader preceded his selection of camejo as running mate, any listers know whether reform endorsement is for nader only or does it include candidate at bottom of ticket as well... can imagine some (many?) 'reformers' being less than pleased if party endorsed socialist, 2000 reform party squabbles that gave impression of turnips falling off vegetable cart still exist to some degree, evidenced by dual/duel parties in michigan, moreover, nader endorsement has apparently not gone over well with some (majority?) in whatever remains of whatever reform party endorsed him, sounds familiar... mh -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Re: PPP comparisons
On 8/5/2004 Sam Pawlett wrote: One thing I've never understood about PPP, is it an attempt to measure -what it is like living in a poor country- or is the idea more modest as the above paragraph suggests trying to demonstrate what the market equivalent amount of currency buys in a given country? For example the PPP GDP or GNP per capita of a country is $US 500. Does this mean that living in that country on that given amount of money is like living in the USA on the same amount of money? It is more muddled than that. PPP creates its own international currency: the international dollar which makes things not very comparable (but you only see that if you look hard for the footnotes and sometimes it is left out). PPP does use the US as the normalizer - i.e. the U.S. PPP basket = 100 so, if one believed in the U.S. basket as a true reflection of U.S. life (not an accurate assumption) then $500 in PPP would be like living on that in the U.S. Paul Paul
Re: re PPP comparisons
On 8/7/2004 Mike Lebowitz wrote: I don't know anything myself about the way the PPP is constructed or the neoclassical assumptions that Paul proposed were used. Intuitively, though, it makes real sense to select the PPP measure (ie., something that takes into account prices) over one using market exchange rates. Eg., according to the dollar/cuban peso market exchange rate, we might conclude that Cubans live on the equivalent of $20 USD per month. Anyone think that tells us very much about the Cuban standard of living? michael Yes this is where most people get drawn into the PPP : the per capita GNI (or GDP) numbers look so low. And they are low, if we think of measuring living standards which GNI or any of the national accounts do NOT, they only are a ticker to the market economy without double accounting. Comparing national accounts is only a 'market economy to market economy' basis. So the developing country's GNI per capita feels low for various reasons. For example conventional National Accounts would normally leave out all the non-market income of the traditional economy in a developing country. Likewise, the whole pattern of life changes to facilitate the lower standard of living. I recall when it was not rare in Europe not have a refrigerator (or only a small one). People ate perfectly well because things were organized around this: small portions at regular prices, distribution channels were structured so people could shop for food every day, etc. Today, if you can't afford a refrigerator it becomes hard to imagine how most West European families would cope. People think of the low per capita income in developing countries and say it makes no sense in terms of comparing lives. It doesn't, but that is because national accounts compare market economies not living standards. Along comes PPP which recalculates the numbers and since it moves developing countries closer to the developed countries, people think it makes more sense. But the more realistic numbers are entirely coincidental - they still are not measuring living standards because national accounts measure something else. But, on its own terms PPP probably overshoots the developed\developing country relationship for narrow statistical reasons (the PPP authors admit this) and distort rankings within developing countries (for example the PPP conversion factor for Venezuela is relatively small because it is already much integrated in the tradable economy). Above all the PPP becomes treacherous when one starts to then use them outside of per capita comparisons - e.g. growth rates over time, response to neoliberal measures, etc. [BTW: I don't know how Cuba's national accounts are calculated. The World Bank does not publish any figures at all. I imagine it is largely guesswork by whomever you are citing (UN?); as you know most planned economies used Net Material Product as their equivalent. There can't be a logical conversion factor for the same reasons PPP doesn't work (apples and oranges). In fact, that is how this international comparison business got started (for example Gerschenkron, Alexander A dollar index of Soviet machinery output, 1951). It was quickly grasped (a bit like PPP) as an ideological tool, ultimately with people like Wolfowitz and Pipes jumping in.] Paul
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
Louis Proyect wrote: (A frequent argument on behalf of Kerry is that he would have not invaded Iraq after 9/11. He might be an imperialist but is not a rash, adventuristic unilateralist. Guess what, folks. He is a rash, adventuristic unilateralist. He might not be a born-again Christian and might favor stem-cell research, but on the burning question of the day, he and Bush are agreed.) Kerry Defends Position on Iraq Democrat Says He Would Reduce U.S. Troops Within 6 Months (snip) -- I don't attach much credibility to what opportunistic politicians say in election campaigns -- particularly in Kerry's case, where he perceives his electoral fortunes, rightly or wrongly, to be dependent on adaptation to a segment of the voting population infected with a high degree of chauvinism. But there's no evidence whatever that the Democratic leadership saw an invasion of Iraq as a pressing necessity, much less that they were prepared to break with their closest allies and the UN to initiate one. Either you're much too taken by what politicians running for office (or their aides) say, which I doubt, or you're grasping at straws in your effort to persuade us that there aren't any distinctions, tactical or otherwise, we need to draw between the economic and foreign policies of the two parties. MG
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
Marvin Gandall wrote: I don't attach much credibility to what opportunistic politicians say in election campaigns -- particularly in Kerry's case, where he perceives his electoral fortunes, rightly or wrongly, to be dependent on adaptation to a segment of the voting population infected with a high degree of chauvinism. Huh??? A clear majority of Americans now thinks the war was a mistake. Beyond that, 90 percent of the delegates at the DP convention thought the same thing. I wouldn't call Kerry an adaptationist at all. I would say that he is swimming against the stream. That is, if you exclude the sections of the United States that are outside the Washington, DC beltway and who don't have a signed autograph of Tim Russert. But there's no evidence whatever that the Democratic leadership saw an invasion of Iraq as a pressing necessity, much less that they were prepared to break with their closest allies and the UN to initiate one. I don't engage in alternative historical scenarios. I leave that to writers who think up plots like Germany defeating Great Britain in WWII, or Elvis alive and well in Albuquerque. -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: back to PPP comparisons\Chris' question
Chris wrote As a general question, do these income comparisons somehow factor in nonmonetary income, state-supplied benefits or similar perks? E.g., in the country in which my butt is parked, monetary incomes are generally relatively low, but most families own their own apartments and grow their own food in part, plus electricity and utilities are dirt cheap, even giving the recent price increase. Thanks. I hope I am not presenting myself as expert on this (anyone out there who is?) but here is my understanding. State supplied utility benefits such as electricity are in Russia's national accounts in Ruble terms, so yes they are included in these comparisons. BUT there is no objective way to compare electricity in Russia vs. the U.S. (i.e. how do you convert the Rubles to dollars). Straight exchange rates are flawed (prices may be lower in Russia); so they have tried to create a different PPP conversion BUT, as I have tried to point out, inevitably this has new flaws and biases that are as serious. Self-grown food is normally not in *conventional* national accounts - one example of why people get perplexed when they see very low GNP p/c figures that don't match up to their intuitive feel for living standards. As the obsession with GNP has grown, analysts have tried to extend it to measure life as a whole by imputing their own estimates of all sorts of things, including such non-market production, along with household production (esp. women's work and child labour), depreciation of the environment, etc. Some of this may have bled into including a bit of self-grown food in some countries' national accounts. ((And of course in Russia all bets are off when it comes to the official accounts which periodically include estimates of unrecorded income in ways that are negotiated within the govt and with foreign authorities.)) Existing apartments are assets so they are not, per se, in Russia's Ruble national accounts. But the depreciation (or creation of new assets) would be - in theory - put in the Ruble national accounts (no doubt big errors and guesses here). But depreciation would appear only under the heading of a Net National Product not the Gross National Product (aka Gross National Income). I don't even want to think about how they would include depreciation of an asset in a PPP version of a Net National Account (I haven't checked but I bet they don't bother to try to produce this). Of course Russia is maintaining much of its living standard by living off its assets (and human skills) and this is another way that Gross National Accounts don't capture living standards. Paul
Act now to end this war occupation: Voices in the Wilderness
Act Now to End This War Occupation Hands Off Najaf By VOICES IN THE WILDERNESS Our country's military now declares preparations to attack the Shrine of Ali in the city of Najaf in Iraq. Our country stands on the precipice of declaring war on Islam. An attack on the Shrine of Ali is an attack on the heart of Islam and must be nonviolently resisted in our country. The U.S. military is urging civilians to leave Najaf. We take this as a signal that our country is preparing to turn Najaf into a free-fire zone, in which all who move, civilian or not, are targeted for attack. A free fire zone and an attack on the Shrine would significantly escalate the violence throughout Iraq, increasing the danger for all Iraqis. Voices in the Wilderness calls upon all U.S. government officials--elected or appointed--to publicly declare their opposition to any attack by U.S. military forces against the Shrine of Ali. We further call upon U.S. military forces to withdraw from the holy city of Najaf and to cease all military operations against the city, its citizens and at the Imam Ali Mosque. Voices calls for citizens of the U.S. to demand that their congressional representative, U.S. senator and presidential candidate John Kerry publicly call for an end to U.S. military actions in Najaf, against its citizens and against the Imam Ali Mosque. If there is no response or a negative response, Voices calls for nonviolent actions at their offices, such as: an office occupation; a vigil outside their office; a fax campaign to their office; or a phone call campaign to their office. Voices further calls for the establishment of vigils in public spaces throughout the country. The Shrine of Ali is the holiest of shrines in Shia Islam. It is the burial place for Imam Ali, cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Mohammed. The shrine is sacred to both Shia and Sunni Muslims. Attacking the Imam Ali Mosque is akin to bombing the burial site of Jesus for people of the Christian faith or the Western Wall for people of the Jewish faith. An attack on the mosque would also replicate the history of oppression of Shia under Saddam Hussein. In 1991, Shia rose up against Saddam Hussein, at the urging of the first President Bush. As U.S. warplanes flew overhead, not intervening, Saddam's helicopters massacred Shia on the ground below. Saddam attacked the Imam Ali Mosque during this time, killing those inside. As U.S. citizens we must say no to this threatened attack on the heart of Islam. We will use all nonviolent means available to us to resist it. The violent overthrow of the Iraqi government and the subsequent military occupation of Iraq have not lead to freedom, security, and prosperity for the Iraqi people. Neither have they created the conditions in which freedom, security, and prosperity can be sown and nurtured. Quite the opposite: the threat and reality of violence is commonplace. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed or injured. To this threat of violence, add the increased threat of water-borne disease and the weight of a collapsed electrical grid. The Iraqi people are our sisters and brothers. Our humanity demands that we begin to act as if the lives of Iraqisand their faith truly matterto us.As U.S. citizens we must respond without equivocation and act to end this war and occupation. Contact: Jeff Leys or Safaa Abdel-Magid at 773-784-8065; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Voices in the Wilderness was formed in 1996 in response to the U.S. economic sanctions against Iraq. Voices has sponsored over 70 delegations to bring humanitarian supplies to Iraqi citizens despite U.S. law. Voices currently faces a $20,000 fine for delivering medicine and other humanitarian supplies to Iraq.
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 08/11/04 2:27 PM Marvin Gandall wrote: I don't attach much credibility to what opportunistic politicians say in election campaigns -- particularly in Kerry's case, where he perceives his electoral fortunes, rightly or wrongly, to be dependent on adaptation to a segment of the voting population infected with a high degree of chauvinism. Huh??? A clear majority of Americans now thinks the war was a mistake. Beyond that, 90 percent of the delegates at the DP convention thought the same thing. I wouldn't call Kerry an adaptationist at all. I would say that he is swimming against the stream. kerry, of course, did go to war... guy i work with taught at school overseas with jfk's sister years ago and he says that she talked about how her brother wanted to be prez as teen (reminds of what used to be reported about clinton), he joined military because he thought that would be useful in later career, noticed wind was blowing in different direction after coming back from vietnam and jumped on anti-war bandwagon (some may recall flap a few months back over whether or not jfk was at v v a w meeting in which presidential assassination was raised, 'suggestion' was attributed to gainesville 8 defendant scott camil who feds would later try to kill), surely no one (even his loudest/strongest 'left' supporters) ever thought kerry was gonna rock the boat... michael hoover -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Economics and law
Coincidently, here a news story today. Charles ^ Road deaths fall to new low Wednesday, August 11, 2004 Image http://www.detnews.com/pix/2004/08/11/0asec/081104-p1-nhtsa-fatality-ch.jpg http://www.detnews.com/pix/folios/dot.gif Road deaths fall to new low Seat-belt use, fewer drunk drivers cited, but SUV fatalities up By Lisa Zagaroli / Detroit News Washington Bureau See the reports http://www.detnews.com/pix/folios/general/redarrow.gif NHTSA announcement, state-by-state fatality statistics for two years http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/nhtsa/announce/press/pressdisplay.cfm?year=2004fi lename=pr35-04.html http://www.detnews.com/pix/folios/general/redarrow.gif NHTSA summary, analysis and full report http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30/NCSA/PPT/2003AARelease.pdf http://www.detnews.com/pix/folios/dot.gif WASHINGTON - Fewer people died on U.S. highways during 2003 in every type of passenger vehicle except sport utility vehicles, according to new data showing the lowest fatality rate since the government began tracking it. Safety officials said the decline - which ended a troubling rise in highway deaths in recent years - was owed largely to better seat-belt use and fewer drunken-driving accidents. Last year, 42,643 people died and 2.89 million were injured in crashes, compared to 43,005 deaths and 2.93 million injuries in 2002. We're encouraging safer cars, safer roads and aggressively discouraging impaired driving, said Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta. The report noted several positive trends: * While Americans drove more miles last year, the death rate - highway fatalities per 100 million miles traveled - fell to a record low of 1.48 from 1.51 in 2002. * Only 56 percent of occupants who died in crashes weren't buckled up, compared to about 60 percent in 2002, said Dr. Jeffrey Runge, head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. * Drunken-driving deaths dropped 3 percent, the first decline since 1999. Runge said it helped that 14 states adopted the tougher blood-alcohol standard of 0.08 last year to avoid losing federal funds. Local safe driving advocates cheered the news. That's very encouraging, said Lee Landes of Farmington Hills, who teamed up with his wife to found Wayne County Mothers Against Drunk Drivers in 1982 after their son, George, was killed by a drunken driver. I'm encouraged by the statistics, but it's also an incentive to keep up the work we've been doing. Jim Kress of Northville agrees that using seat belts saves lives and said he used them long before the Michigan law requiring it took effect in 1999. I've used seat belts ... because I personally think they're safer. But I still don't think the government should be making people use them, even if it does mean more safety. NHTSA's report differs notably from a preliminary report issued in April that suggested 2003 data would show another increase in highway fatalities. Runge said the projections issued in April didn't take into account the success of the agency's $25 million seat belt awareness campaign and tougher enforcement efforts. Fatalities in passenger cars dropped the most, by 5.4 percent to 19,460 deaths; followed by pickup trucks, by 3.2 percent to 2,066 deaths; and vans, by 2 percent to 2,066 deaths. SUV deaths increased 10 percent to 4,446, with rollovers linked to 59 percent of all SUV fatalities. Even so, Joan Williams-Cash of Southfield said she feels safe in my SUV. I feel better being a little more off the ground. When I'm driving anything else any more, I feel like I'm dragging the ground, she said. Rollover deaths in passenger cars fell 7.5 percent and in pickup trucks 6.8 percent, but they rose 3.6 percent in vans and 6.8 percent in SUVs. There were actually fewer rollover deaths than would have been predicted in SUVs by the (11 percent) increase in registrations, Runge said. What we don't have are data to say whether that was due to more people buckling up or whether there were fewer rollover crashes. Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook said the death rate has gone down steadily for 60 years, but the raw number of deaths has remained about the same since 1995. The reason they haven't gone down - even with the advent of air bags - is an increase in SUVs and increase in rollovers, she said. Runge said the number of serious crashes was down as well, reflecting improvements in crash avoidance as well as crashworthiness. Death rates among child occupants were slightly up through age 15, although the number of children killed as pedestrians, for example, fell, the report shows. Other problem areas include motorcycle rider fatalities, which have grown 73 percent to 3,661 deaths in six
Re: Fidel Castro horrified by China
In a message dated 8/11/2004 12:06:10 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Also, your employment numbers are fantastically off. Here's a report (2002) from China's State Council: Reply Thanks for the data. Actually . . . they are not my figures . . . and perhaps should not have been used. Here is the data and source of "my" figures from an article dated Nov. 1, 2003: Current Condition of China's Working Class by Liu Shi is a former vice-chairman of the Chairman of the ACFTU (All-China Federation of Trade Unions) "Workers now are responsible for the creation of 72.1% of China's GDP. In 1978, there were 120 million workers in China. By 2000, there were 270 million. Adding the 70 million peasants that have moved to the cities and found long-term wage work, China's working class now numbers approximately 350 million, accounting for half of China's working population. There are currently more than 100 million workers now employed in the non-state sectors. The 13th Party Congress established that workers laboring in private enterprises are wage laborers. What about the SOEs? SOEs have undergone two types of reforms: the small have been sold-off and the large have been transformed into joint-stock corporations. A portion of small and medium-sized SOEs have been sold to private owners, and transformed into private enterprises, while another portion have transferred ownership of a significant portion of enterprise shares to the management. http://www.chinastudygroup.org/index.php?type=articleid=62 Melvin P.
Re: Fidel Castro horrified by China
In a message dated 8/11/2004 12:06:10 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: From the perspective of living labor, what is the difference betweenstate and non-state management if their common goal is the ruthlessexpansion of value? Comment The property relations that determines the circuit of reproduction and give it a distinct shape. Under the best socialism . . . or rather under the socialism that has and exist . . . one sells their labor power . . . even if it is to a system that is the dictatorship of the proletariat. At best socialism is a transition in the form of property and does not equal the abolition of property. Socialism has never meant freedom to me. You are correct concerning my use of 800 million. They arerural as opposed to agricultural sector. Nevertheless my base question was what did Fidel say that qualified as being horrified by China. Melvin P.
Iraq Veterans Against the War
(A new group of veterans just got organized: Iraq Veterans Against the War. Great! On the other hand, Marine Lance Cpl. Abdul Henderson is in trouble because of his appearance in his service dress Alpha uniform in Fahrenheit 9/11. Let's support him.): http://montages.blogspot.com/2004/08/iraq-veterans-against-war.html Yoshie Furuhashi
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
The foreign policy difference between Bush Kerry would probably be that Kerry would be less likely to instigate crises, such as Haiti -- maybe Venezuela, but faced would public pressure might react like Bush, or even worse in order to prove that he is STRONG. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
Michael Perelman wrote: The foreign policy difference between Bush Kerry would probably be that Kerry would be less likely to instigate crises, such as Haiti Clinton co-opted Aristide; Bush overthrew him. The first sucks but the second is worse. Doug
Re: Greens For Nader Update: Rigged Convention Divides Green Party (Sign and Forward This)
KPFA had a debate between Cobb Camejo regarding the charge of the rigged convention. It did not sound nearly as clear cut as it was presented here. I was once on a jury panel for Camejo, but was kicked off left with a clenched fist salute. I liked what he did when I was at Berkeley, but in his run for Gov., much of his attack on Davis what almost identical to what the Republicans said. He would mention some progressive positions, but he devoted most of his time to fiscal responsibility. In the debate Cobb came off as a well-intentioned Green. Not strong, but nice sincere, but he gave a reasonable explanation. Camejo had answers, but nobody seemed to have a clear cut case. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
Exactly. On Wed, Aug 11, 2004 at 04:10:37PM -0400, Doug Henwood wrote: Michael Perelman wrote: The foreign policy difference between Bush Kerry would probably be that Kerry would be less likely to instigate crises, such as Haiti Clinton co-opted Aristide; Bush overthrew him. The first sucks but the second is worse. Doug -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
Michael Perelman writes: The foreign policy difference between Bush Kerry would probably be that Kerry would be less likely to instigate crises, such as Haiti -- maybe Venezuela, but faced with public pressure might react like Bush, or even worse in order to prove that he is STRONG. public pressure--this should be translated an orchestrated media campaign, n'est-ce-pas? Shane Mage Thunderbolt steers all things...It consents and does not consent to be called Zeus. Herakleitos of Ephesos
Re: Fidel Castro horrified by China
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Nevertheless my base question was what did Fidel say that qualified as being horrified by China. He probably has never criticized China's capitalist transformation publicly since China has been fairly generous with Cuba economically. The article I forwarded quotes diplomats who were in contact with Castro supposedly, but I doubt you'll find anything specific in print. The last time Castro visited China, he made a rather tactful observation about how much had changed. To really get a handle on how he might see developments in China, you have to look at what he has said about Cuba and extrapolate from that. Castro has been resistant to market reforms all along the line. If you want more information, check the Castro speech database at: http://lanic.utexas.edu/la/cb/cuba/castro.html It is a very useful resource. -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: Kerry would have gone to war
Shane is also correct in interpreting my meaning. On Wed, Aug 11, 2004 at 04:18:25PM -0400, Shane Mage wrote: Michael Perelman writes: The foreign policy difference between Bush Kerry would probably be that Kerry would be less likely to instigate crises, such as Haiti -- maybe Venezuela, but faced with public pressure might react like Bush, or even worse in order to prove that he is STRONG. public pressure--this should be translated an orchestrated media campaign, n'est-ce-pas? Shane Mage Thunderbolt steers all things...It consents and does not consent to be called Zeus. Herakleitos of Ephesos -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Over 6, 000 US wounded
Note that the post talks of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan both as the war on terror!! At least Iraq is an occupation after an illegal invasion and Afghanistan also involved the overthrow of a government and consequent occupation but with more international junior imperialists than in Iraq at most in the Afghan case the Taliban gave aid and comfort to terrorists. Cheers, Ken Hanly U.S. Military Wounded Numbers More Than 6,000, Wash. Post Says Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. war on terrorism has wounded about 6,120 soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Washington Post said. Many soldiers are treated at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., where doctors have seen 3,358 soldiers from Operation Iraqi Freedom, including 741 battle casualties. The rest have suffered from non-combat conditions ranging from heat exhaustion to road accidents, the Post said. A spokesman for Walter Reed said the hospital spent $42.3 million in fiscal 2003 treating wounded soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan. In fiscal 2004, the cost has been $37.1 million, and that is expected to rise, the Post said. (Washington Post 8-11 A1)
Re: ABK Comrades!
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 08/10/04 11:44 PM Only Nader/Camejo represented a potential to threaten the Democratic Party's hegemony over the left side of the political spectrum by taking 2-7% of the votes, according to the polls http://montages.blogspot.com/2004/08/nader-2004-nader-2000.html -- hence the Democrats' well-organized attacks on Nader/Camejo. Yoshie dems were going after nader irrespective of his standing polls, this was gonna be payback, baby, for what lots of dems (however misguided and cry-baby like) think happened in 2000... and hey, it's their party, they can be scummy, although i'd suggest that criticizing nade for considering another prez bid, trashing him when he decides to run, and then attempting to keep him off ballots and destroy his candidacy (at relatively little financial cost to dems and economic burden to nader) are quite different approaches, some 'lefties' (most, if not all, of whom should be able to offer persuaive account that nader did not cost gore 2000 election) might genuinely/sincerely consider first approach to be legitimate or at least something to debate, such folks should have nothing to do with nor be associated with people engaged in third approach... on other hand, nader's folks are pretty disingenuous re. reps who were apparently working to help him get on ballot, this is same ole' cynical establishment-like politics that ought to be shunned... allow me to play mainstram poli sci guy for a moment, potential electorate has been told countless times grave importance of 2004 election (for sake of discussion at least, assume this is true), historical data indicates that so-called 'important' elections are often close contests, role of minor parties tends to be reduced in such instances as competition tends toward 'big tents' of two major parties, tends to be spike in turnout in these types of elections as well, very largest percentage of which goes to one or other of two large party camps... above may help explain why nader fared less well than some had hoped in 2000, might also offer some predictive (so says mainstream poli sci guy) expectation of nader - and other minor candidates - doing rather poorly in 2004... michael hoover -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
CIA Venezuela
This UPI/El Mundo story looked a little wild to me at first, but when I saw that Chilean officials denied that Spencer was in Chile, I thought there might be something to it. 15) UPI Hears ... United Press International August 10, 2004 Charges of CIA meddling into other country's affairs has always been a sensitive issue, especially when it comes to Latin America where the agency has a history -- and not always a good one at that. Madrid's El Mundo is reporting that the CIA has developed contingency plans to counteract Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez winning the Aug. 15 recall referendum. The newspaper reports that the CIA is resigned to a Chavez victory and subsequently is working on a strategy to neutralize Chavez. The CIA's undersecretary for southern hemispherical affairs, William Spencer, is in Santiago, Chile, to brainstorm the Venezuelan situation with CIA country directors from Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil and Peru. Spencer is reportedly convinced that following his victory Chavez, intends to overthrow Colombian President Alvaro Uribe Velez and Bolivian President Carlos Mesa. According to Spencer's domino theory, Chavez will then use corruption scandals to force Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo from office. The CIA is developing a strategy using financial and possibly military pressure to thwart Chavez's overwhelming ambition to transform Latin America into an impregnable replica of Fidel Castro's Cuba. Under the newspaper's scenario, the Venezuelan Movimiento Quinta Republica will suspend the referendum, arguing that serious irregularities have occurred. The CIA's fear is that Chavez will claim to have uncovered an assassination conspiracy and use it as a pretext to declare a state of emergency and suspend the constitution. The Langley spooks are pursing a high-risk strategy for the U.S. economy -- far from being a powerless banana republic, Venezuela currently supplies 1.4 million barrels per day of oil to the United States, 17 percent of U.S. oil imports. 22) Desmienten presencia en Chile de subdirector de CIA Associated Press (Carried by El Nuevo Herald) August 10, 2004 http://www.miami.com/mld/elnuevo/news/breaking_news/9364218.htm SANTIAGO DE CHILE - El director de la policía de Investigaciones, Arturo Herrera, negó la presencia en el país del subdirector de la Agencia de Inteligencia de Estados Unidos, CIA, para monitorear el referéndum del domingo en Venezuela. Se supone que cuando llega un personaje de esa alcurnia aquí al país debíamos conocer nosotros y al respecto no tenemos antecedentes que esté presente ni el director de la CIA ni su subdirector, dijo a la prensa el director de Investigaciones. Agregó que tampoco tienen antecedentes que se encuentre aquí otro funcionario de la CIA para coordinar alguna posible acción contra el gobernante venezolano en caso de triunfar el domingo en el referéndum revocatorio. La versión sobre la acción de la CIA contra Chávez desde este país la dio un periódico español. El diario El Mundo señaló que el encargado de coordinar a la CIA sería el subdirector, William Spencer, quien habría convocado a Santiago a funcionarios de la agencia en otros países sudamericanos. El embajador de Venezuela, Víctor Delgado, dijo La Tercera el martes que le están haciendo un seguimiento a la información. Desearíamos que fuera una gran mentira, pero en el supuesto de que fuera verdad sería una agresión más por parte del gobierno norteamericano a través de su agencia contra el gobierno democrático de Hugo Chávez, dijo el diplomático. -- Robert Naiman Senior Policy Analyst Venezuela Information Office 733 15th Street, NW Suite 932 Washington, DC 20005 t. 202-347-8081 x. 605 f. 202-347-8091 www.veninfo.org ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: The Venezuela Information Office is dedicated to informing the American public about contemporary Venezuela. More information is available from the FARA office of the Department of Justice in Washington, DC.
Re: Fidel Castro horrified by China
In a message dated 8/11/2004 3:20:06 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Nevertheless my base question was what did Fidel say that qualified as being horrified by China. He probably has never criticized China's capitalist transformation publicly since China has been fairly generous with Cuba economically. The article I forwarded quotes diplomats who were in contact with Castro supposedly, but I doubt you'll find anything specific in print. The last time Castro visited China, he made a rather tactful observation about how much had changed. Reply Agreed . . . and I will most certainly examine the sources indicated. I of course do not deny the existence of the bourgeois property relations in China. Nor do I beleive that one can advance to communism on the basis of the industrial system. My resistance is to an ideological curve in our history that bounces from crying crocodile tears over the alleged famine killing perhaps as many as 40 million people and all kinds of vilification of the revolution in China and the on going revolutionary process. China . . . or rather the character and substance of her economy . . . is most certainly being more and more integrated into the world economy on the basis of bourgeois reproduction or a set of needs that generates profits and the reproduction of the bourgeois property relations. What some call expanded value without qualification. Value is more than one thing . . . and embraces a social relationship. To be frank . . . telling me about the law of value or expanded value in CHina means next to nothing . . . it don't mean shit to me. You did not state this . . . but is there a possibility of us reaching communism without an expanded value that is transformed on the basis of the form of property and the technological regime? We read and can read the same material more than less. I cannot predict the path of the people of China for the next 100 years. Fuck dumb shit. What has been our path for the past 100 years . . . in terms of the liberation of an oppressed class? The class that was liberated was the sharecropper . . . he was fucking abolished or his energy as a class was no longer need as productive activity. All of us speak of value as this mystical thing. My communism is common sense. Yea . . . common sense and not theoretical excursion about alienation. Fuck that abstract shit about expanded value . . . I did that for twenty years. What did Fidel say about China is a valid question and you answered in an honorable way. I know a little bit about Cuba and its curve of history and why Fidel is out of time. Hey . . . I love Fidel . . . but there are some outstanding demographics that cannot be ignored forever. There is some real history involved. Thanks . . . Lou. Melvin P. China . . . or rather her economy . . .
libertarian journal watch project
http://www.econjournalwatch.org/main/index.php This would be an excellent project to replicate from the left. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Fidel Castro horrified by China
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: My resistance is to an ideological curve in our history that bounces from crying crocodile tears over the alleged famine killing perhaps as many as 40 million people and all kinds of vilification of the revolution in China and the on going revolutionary process. Which I haven't heard anyone do here, please correct me if I'm wrong. But speaking of revolution, here's the (very) rough draft of a piece by Li Changping, former county head in China, who came to fame in China by writing a letter to then Premier Zhu Rongji about corruption and the desperate conditions in Hubei Province. Prevent Rural Problems From Becoming Revolutionary The main manifestation of rural problems 1. In central and western China, most rural households find it difficult to even maintain simple reproduction after paying taxes and fees on their agricultural income. Furthermore, the majority of migrant workers find it difficult to reproduce their labor power on their wages. In 70% of the villages in central and western China, each family has about 8 mu of land. In average years, each mu of land produces about 1,500 jin of grain, and at .5 yuan/jin, this is about 750 yuan in gross revenue per mu. After subtracting about 200 yuan per mu in production and transaction costs, and 100 yuan in all sorts of visible and invisible taxes and fees, this leaves 450 yuan/mu in income, or about 3,600 yuan in income per family, and usually not more than 5,000 if you include income from sidelines. This figure is an approximation of farm income in currency, while only about 3,000 yuan of a family's income comes in the form of cash. Because education, medical, and the production costs of farmers are all high, it is thus difficult for farming households to break even. According to a survey undertaken by students from Nanjin University in their hometowns, 66% of central-western rural households find it difficult to maintain simple reproduction, and 64% of households are operating in debt. Migrant workers in cities currently earn about 6,000 yuan a year, but they have on average 900 yuan in medical expenses, 1,500 yuan in rent, 2,000 in food and incidental expenses, 200 yuan in clothing expenses, etc. This leaves them with about 600 yuan/year to take home. It is not possible for a young man to accumulate enough money to build a house, get married, and prepare for children and old age on 600 yuan a year. 2. Central-western China's infrastructure has been crumbling. Health, education and other public goods exist only in name. Rural markets are depressed, and financial resources have dried up. Production and life in general are difficult in rural areas, and the romantic image of farming in China is now nothing more than a historical memory. In recent years, the state has spent a great deal on managing large river systems, with impressive results. However, because the level of organization and mobilization in villages has fallen from the past, many of the infrastructure projects built under the communes are not being maintained, lowering villages' abilities to fight natural disasters. The number of school buildings has increased in the last few years, but the public education system that existed before the 80s no longer exists. Schooling is now farming households' biggest expense (36% of their income). A survey by the Ministry of Health revealed that rural households pay on average 500 yuan/year in medical expenses. Falling ill and going to the hospital have become a luxuries for farmers, and also one of their greatest fears. In the 80s, middle schools, roads, electricity, communication, pumps, etc., were all part of the state's responsibility, but now they are all the people's responsibility. How will farmers, who have a difficult time with simple reproduction, be able to shoulder what should be the state's burden to provide public goods? Farmers' disposable cash income is falling, as is their purchasing power. Rural markets are shrinking, and TVEs (town and village enterprises) are having a rough time as rural markets shrink. The four major state banks have retreated from rural areas, and the inability of farmers to secure loans has become one of the bottlenecks for rural development. The new generation of farmers no longer feel a connection with the land, signaling that the age of chaotic urban growth is set to begin. 3. Agricultural investment continues to drop, the natural environment in rural areas is getting worse, farmers produce more and earn less, and many villages are being pressured to return to self-sufficiency. The central government increased its agricultural investment, but provincial, city, county and township governments, heavily in debt (rural townships alone owe 230 billion yuan in debt) and under pressure to issue wages to their millions of bloated staff, prevented this money from reaching the countryside. Since the 1990s, hundreds of millions of hours of labor were mobilized each year to undertake infrastructure
lesser evil question
If Kerry keeps shifting right, maybe we will have to vote for Bush as the lesser evil? -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: lesser evil question
Michael Perelman wrote: If Kerry keeps shifting right, maybe we will have to vote for Bush as the lesser evil? Michael, I realize you are being witty but the differences between Bush and Kerry are substantial. They range over taxation, stem cell research, AIDS funding, etc. They also agree substantially on Iraq, trade agreements like NAFTA, etc. However, from a Gramscian standpoint it is essential to preserve the appearance of democracy. That is why elections are so important. They give the impression that history is being made, even when the major decisions that are made after the election do not involve the people who pulled the levers. For the Democratic Party to retain credibility with Columbia professors, trade union functionaries, journalists at places like the NY Times and Mother Jones, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs who marched against the Vietnam war, NPR listeners, etc., it must take correct positions on at least a number of issues. If tomorrow John Kerry announced that he favored teaching creationist science in the high schools, opposed affirmative action on principle (even though he opposed it tactically during an election campaign some years back), school vouchers and started making regular appearances on Rush Limbaugh, the whole game would be up. To run a proper shell game, you have to give the mark the impression that he can win sometimes. That is why the con man allows some bets to go against him occasionally. That is bourgeois democracy in essence. -- Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: ABK Comrades!
Title: Re: ABK Comrades! on other hand, nader's folks are pretty disingenuous re. reps who were apparently working to help him get on ballot, You might want to verify your source. Here's what Nader has to say about it... Ralph Nader Responds to Terry McAuliffe False Statements on Republican Support Tells Him to Stop Democratic Dirty Tricks Challenges Kerry-Edwards to Debate August 6, 2004 Terry McAuliffe, Chairman Democratic National Committee 430 S. Capitol St. SE Washington DC 20003 Dear Mr. McAuliffe: I am writing in response to your letter of August 6, 2004 which contains numerous falsehoods. If you had not approved the actions of these Democratic officials I would assume that your dirty tricksters are misleading you. But since you have approved of this tasteless adventure, it is more likely that you are intentionally spreading false information and need to be saved from further recklessness by veracity. The falsehoods include: - You asserted that: Signatures for the most part are being gathered by Republicans. This is absolute fiction. We have many volunteers and signature gatherers working across the country gathering signatures on behalf of Nader-Camejo. Republican support, as I am sure you are aware is greatly exaggerated (as in Nevada where claims of Republican support are laughably false) and, in any event, contrary to our approach (as in Michigan where we do not need any signatures thanks to the Reform Party endorsement). - State parties are merely checking to make sure we play by the rules. You are able to invoke opposition using the rigged statutes that your Party and the Republicans enacted together in many states, but the actions of your underlings have gone further than that, e.g. spoiling ballot access conventions in Oregon, using taxpayer funded employees in Illinois to check signatures and more. - Waiting for me to disavow any financial or organizational help from Republicans or Republican groups. I have always said we reject organizational help from any major Party. As for individual contributions, I'll bet our major donations from individual Democrats far exceed major donations from individual Republicans in part because they want your Party to be pulled toward more progressive programs and away from its corporate grip and its corporate and corporate executive contributors. Look at your recent Convention's corporate hospitality suites and the at least $40 million in corporate contributions to your Party's coronation, for example. Besides, don't you want us to garner Republican votes? - Aligning with the kind of right-wing, Pat Buchanan conservatives such as the Reform Party. Sadly, today's Reform Party is more progressive than the Democratic Party on many issues. They want an immediate withdrawal from Iraq not a continued quagmire occupation; they sincerely want statehood for Washington, DC; they want to withdraw from trade agreements that undermine our sovereignty and weaken environmental, labor and consumer protections; they want to truly protect the environment and support organic farming; they oppose the constitutionally abusive Patriot Act; they want election reforms that will create a more robust democracy including open debates and voting on weekends so America's workforce can vote more easily; they want a crackdown on corporate crime and an end to corporate welfare, and they demand reduction of the huge deficit that is a tax on our children. However, your false claims about inappropriate Republican support should not cloud the actions of your Party, its lobbyists, law firms and underlings. As you can see from the enclosed article in The Los Angeles Times, we are very concerned about this nationwide effort to prevent voters from having a real choice. When I announced my candidacy, John Kerry said he would take my voters by taking my issues. Do you lack confidence in Senator Kerry? If you were confident in him, you would not be harassing, litigating and dirty tricking us from being on the ballot. You would not be trying to deny voters from making their own choices. Your letter fails to disavow these actions. Do you support these dirty tricks? Your Party has received millions of dollars from known wealthy Republicans hedging their bets - a tradition that wealthy Democrats also follow for Republican Presidential candidates. Please send me the names of those Republicans and the amount of their contributions. Moreover, kindly admit as soon as possible that your letter contained false statements and do not repeat them. I expect that you will have enough confidence in the debating capabilities of Senator John Kerry and Senator John Edwards to have the two party created and controlled Commission on Presidential Debates* open its doors to me and my vice presidential nominee, Peter Miguel Camejo. Polls indicated Californians believed Camejo did the best during the California gubernatorial recall debate last year. Sincerely, Ralph Nader cc: Senator John Kerry Senator
on country comparisons
Paul, I've forwarded your earlier note commenting on my former colleague's reply to him; I'll post his answer if/when I get it. Paul wrote: 11 August 2004 17:56 UTC On 8/7/2004 Mike Lebowitz wrote: I don't know anything myself about the way the PPP is constructed or the neoclassical assumptions that Paul proposed were used. Intuitively, though, it makes real sense to select the PPP measure (ie., something that takes into account prices) over one using market exchange rates. Eg., according to the dollar/cuban peso market exchange rate, we might conclude that Cubans live on the equivalent of $20 USD per month. Anyone think that tells us very much about the Cuban standard of living? michael [Yes this is where most people get drawn into the PPP : the per capita GNI (or GDP) numbers look so low. And they are low, if we think of measuring living standards which GNI or any of the national accounts do NOT, they only are a ticker to the market economy without double accounting. Comparing national accounts is only a 'market economy to market economy' basis.] Maybe I've introduced a new question--- I was taking a Cuban monthly wage (let's say 300 pesos) and the dollar/peso street exchange rate (say $25), which would lead one to conclude that Cubans live on $12USD per month. Ie., I wasn't raising national accounting questions as such. Now, a little casual empiricism tells me that living standard for Cubans is nothing like what $12 USD would be in the US. So, I ask, what would be a better measure of the Cuban standard? Intuitively, I am inclined to say--- we need to take into account the things that have zero or nominal prices in Cuba. Are you saying that doing that leads in the wrong direction because to price things completely we end up making neoclassical assumptions? (How sensitive are the conclusions to particular NC assumptions?) I.e., I'm prepared to accept your criticisms of the PPP measure but I'm not certain what exactly you are proposing as an alternative. Paul: [BTW: I don't know how Cuba's national accounts are calculated. The World Bank does not publish any figures at all. I imagine it is largely guesswork by whomever you are citing (UN?); as you know most planned economies used Net Material Product as their equivalent. There can't be a logical conversion factor for the same reasons PPP doesn't work (apples and oranges). In fact, that is how this international comparison business got started (for example Gerschenkron, Alexander A dollar index of Soviet machinery output, 1951). It was quickly grasped (a bit like PPP) as an ideological tool, ultimately with people like Wolfowitz and Pipes jumping in.] You raise here an interesting parallel. If I recall the Soviet growth question, it revolved around the fact that implicitly two different questions were being asked; (a) what is the growth rate using 1927/8 prices and weights (ie., before a significant transformation) and (b) what is the growth rate using later (eg., 1954) weighting and prices. Insofar as sectors with high initial prices grew quite rapidly (and their prices fell relatively), those choosing (b) could scoff at the Soviets who used (a). A first issue, then, is what question do we want to ask? A second consideration is whether we learn anything by asking both questions and establishing a range? In the matter on hand, what is the question we are asking? Taking the Kenya/ Manhattan comparison you raised before, do we ask what it would cost a Kenyan to consume the Kenyan basket in NYC and how that changes over time? Or do we ask what it would cost to consume a NYC basket in Kenya? Or do we say, all of this is going to be artificial--- let's just take the real wage in Kenya and the verifiable currency exchange rate? Is this basically the same question that you were exploring or have I gone off in a completely different direction? in solidarity, michael Michael A. Lebowitz Professor Emeritus Economics Department Simon Fraser University Burnaby, B.C., Canada V5A 1S6 Currently based in Venezuela. Can be reached at Residencias Anauco Suites Departamento 601 Parque Central, Zona Postal 1010, Oficina 1 Caracas, Venezuela (58-212) 573-4111 fax: (58-212) 573-7724
Re: ABK Comrades!
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 08/11/04 9:58 PM on other hand, nader's folks are pretty disingenuous re. reps who were apparently working to help him get on ballot, You might want to verify your source. (as in Michigan where we do not need any signatures thanks to the Reform Party endorsement). above was news story for some days during time i was in michigan this summer, re. reform party endorsement, apparent problem with ballot line exists because there are apparently 2 reform parties in state, nader campaign was said to be filing suit about time i was leaving at end of july, has there been court ruling in matter, if so, was it decided in nader's favor, thereby, securing his place on reform line, if not, above statement by nader is not accurate... michigan reform party flap led nader campaign in michigan to go from saying that it wouldn't accept petition signatures generated by reps to saying that it was no longer sure that it would refuse to accept such signatures to eventually accepting said signatures (which were in excess of number needed)... my source is recollection of news coverage in michigan... michael hoover -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Re: JEP Schleiffer
Paul deserves criticism for his summary of Shleifer -- he is far too gentle. Shliefer insists that market-induced competition does not create undesirable consequences. It is non-market corruption that is bad. And he is considered one of the bright lights of economics. Paul wrote: 2) Latest AEA/AER publication (San Diego Proceedings) has a choice article: Does Competition Destroy Ethical Behavior? by Andrei Shleiffer. Opening sentence: This paper shows that conduct described as unethical and blamed on 'greed' is sometimes a consequence of market competition. This builds on the author's article entitled Corruption in last year's QJE. I am sorry to kick someone when they are down, and also to criticize someone not on the list but... -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University michael at ecst.csuchico.edu Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
