[Marxism-Thaxis] Trumka: Democrats Are Inviting A Repeat Of 1994
Trumka: Democrats Are Inviting A Repeat Of 1994 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/11/trumka-democrats-are-invi_n_418694.html One of the top union leaders in the country warned on Monday that the Democratic Party risked suffering electoral losses of historic proportions if they pass watered-down health care legislation and refuse to seriously tackle financial regulatory reform. In a speech before the National Press Club (and comments beforehand), AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka insisted that Democrats are "inviting a repeat" of the 1994 midterm elections by instituting a tax on high-end insurance plans as part of their final health care compromise, among other things. "It could well be" a recipe for disaster in 2010, Trumka told a group of reporters. "I just came back from southern California. I was in five or six places out there... it is amazing the number of people that come up to you unsolicited and say, 'I'm really worried about this health care bill.'" Asked if he thought union and non-union workers will stay at home if health care reform (as outlined by the Senate) is passed into law, Trumka replied: "That could very well happen. A bad bill could have that effect... an [election] where people sit home. It could suppress votes... Look at what happened in '94." In his speech before a packed crowd, the AFL-CIO president was blunt with his electoral prognosis, branching out his criticism of Democratic-authored reform beyond the realm of health care. "In 1992, workers voted for Democrats who promised action on jobs, who talked about reining in corporate greed and who promised health care reform," Trumka said, according to a version of his prepared remarks. "Instead, we got NAFTA, an emboldened Wall Street -- and not much more. We swallowed our disappointment and worked to preserve a Democratic majority in 1994 because we knew what the alternative was. But there was no way to persuade enough working Americans to go to the polls when they couldn't tell the difference between the two parties. Politicians who think that working people have it too good -- too much health care, too much Social Security and Medicare, too much power on the job -- are inviting a repeat of 1994." The specter of massive congressional losses is certainly a topic of deep concern within Democratic circles. And it should be noted that Trumka's sentiments are shared by several Democratic lawmakers in the House of Representatives -- many of whom campaigned in 2008 on a pledge not to tax high-end insurance plans (which often cover workers who have negotiated away wages in exchange for the coverage). Likewise, President Obama ran for office on a platform that vilified a tax on so-called Cadillac plans before reversing course once health care negotiations hit a critical stage between the House and Senate. Asked to explain Obama's reversal, Trumka directed questions to the White House. He and more than half a dozen other labor leaders are slated to meet with the president this afternoon to go over such policy disagreements. "It is a meeting among friends," Trumka described it. _ Trumka warns Dems not to take workers for granted http://www.politico.com/livepulse/0110/Trumka_warns_Dems_not_to_take_workers_for_granted.html AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka spoke at the National Press Club a few minutes ago and slammed the Senate bill and its tax on high-end insurance plans and predicted an electoral catastrophe for Democrats, circa 1994, should the party take working people for granted. Remarks by Richard L. Trumka President, AFL-CIO National Press Club Washington, DC January 11, 2010 Good morning and thank you, Donna (Lienwand). I am delighted to be here at the National Press Club. I want to thank the officers of the Press Club for the invitation to be with you today, especially President Lienwand and speakers' committee member Bob Carden. Ten days into the new decade, and one year into the Obama Administration, our nation remains poised between the failed policies of the past and our hopes for a better future. This is a moment that cries out for political courage - but it is not much in evidence. I spent the first week of this year traveling on the west coast. In San Francisco, I was arrested with low- wage hotel workers fighting to protect their health care and pensions from leveraged buyouts gone bad. In Los Angeles and San Diego, I talked with working Americans moved to tears by foreclosure and unemployment, outsourcing and benefit cuts. Everywhere I went, people asked me, why do so many of the people we elect seem to care only about Wall Street? Why is helping banks a matter of urgency, but unemployment is something we just have to live with? Why don't we make anything in America anymore? And why is it so hard to pass a health care bill that guarantees Americans healthy lives instead of guaranteeing insurance companies healthy profits? As I travelled from city to c
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Race Riots Grip Italian Town, and Mafia Is Suspected
Carrol Cox wrote: > One of the few TV programs I watched regularly before my eyes gave out > was Real Sports on HBO. The best sociological program that ever appeared > on TV. Some years ago they had a wonderful report on racism in European > footbll (soccer to Americans). I can't remember any of the details, but > it showed racism obviousl running pretty deep in Europe. > > Carrol CB: The famed French left is in shambles. The working class is divided on -what else - nationality. Marx and Engels emphasized that workers of all countries, nations, must unite for the victory of the proletariat. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Popularity of Atlas Shrugged: r ( theory, practice)
On 1/11/10, CeJ wrote: > >>CB: Isn't that redundant ? Leftwing anti-statists are anarchists<< > > But in the American political lexicon, socialist, communist, even > democratic socialist are banned. Social democrat is not much used, > while liberal has fallen out of use as well. > > The most one can hope for on the left is to be called a 'left-wing > libertarian'. Since most don't know what that means, at least it makes > them notice it. > > CJ CB: You are correct. One of the propaganda and mass ideological accomplishments of Reaganism has been to make "liberal" an insult, and liberals in the US after the New Deal were American social democrats, such as they were. "Progressive" is still used. Libertarians are fairly fringe, so no advantage to leftists aggravating their sectarianism/smallness by using that term. May Day will come again ! ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Could God die again ?
SM: >> And crucial is that in the Scrolls the foremost grievance against the priests is that they have distorted the calendar and are holding their festivals at the wrong time. Clearly, the "Essenes" (if that is what they were) of the Scrolls were essentially *dissident Sadducees*. Calendrical questions in early religion cannot be underemphasized. For a thousand years Christians fought fiercely over the proper date on which to celebrate Easter. For more than three hundred years after the Canopus decree of Ptolemy III Euergetes (and, the Egyptians being expert astronomers who knows for how many years before that?) the Egyptians refused to accept leap years until the Julian calendar was imposed upon them by Augustus.<< Well a solar calendar makes very good sense for farmers. A lunar calendar makes me think of monotheism coming from belief in a moon god and temple cult (I'm just imposing my modernist mind on all this, this is not scholarship). Pharisees and Sadducees are identified with 'lunisolar' calendars. Christian Easter if fixed using lunisolar means. I think one reason why the hypothetical sectarian settlement of Qumran has been pinned to the 'Essenes' is because of the solar calendar argument. However, evidence for other calendars have also been found in the texts. Some now doubt the 'sectarian settlement hypothesis', saying Qumran was a military site and that in times of trouble the texts were stored near there. Others question the existence of 'Essenes'--for example, they cite instead some sort of reformed Zealot movement, with John the Baptist as its shining example. Others say that Qumran was probably a military site only later claimed by Jewish sectarians of some sort. We clearly are not dealing with history in any modern sense here. We have loads of speculation, most likely corrupted/variant religious texts, pre-modern histories and literature, and archaelogical evidence though. http://www.essene.com/Church/ShawuiCalendar.htm Dead Sea Scroll Calendars Several calendar systems have been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, including solar and lunar methods of reckoning. Before very many of the Scrolls were translated, there was much talk of a solar calendar used by Essenes at Qumran. Once more scrolls became available, with their many references to lunar and other methods of reckoning, scholars have corrected the earlier misinformation about a sole use of a solar 364 day calendar among Essenes. All serious scholars now concede that a lunar calendar system is also documented by the scrolls. It is likely that the many types of calendar systems represented at Qumran are indicative of the general transition, from lunar phase to fixed week calendars, which became popular among some sects and in the dominant Roman church. Although some Dead Sea Scrolls do have a relationship to Yeshua's Nasarene Essenes, the 364 day solar calendars of Qumran do not seem to among them. (Qumran was probably an Osseaen Camp, rather than a Nasarene community. According to Epiphanius, these two sects were related, but not identical. They probably represent the two Essene sects spoken of by Josephus. They differed in such basic areas as marriage, and perhaps Calendar observance. They both shared a vegetarian diet and a disdain for Pharisee sacrifices and scriptures.) I'm not vouching for the veracity or profundity of anything I'm citing here. I'll just say it was interesting to try and take in. http://www.jewishmag.com/14mag/essenes/essenes.htm One of the differences between the Essenes and the Pharisees was in the calendar. The Jewish people today follow the calendar of the Pharisees. This calendar is based on the moon. The month will have either 29 or 30 days depending on the sighting of the moon. Since a lunar year is 29.5 days times 12 months equaling 354 days. A solar year is 364.25 days, therefore the lunar year is short by 10.25 days from the solar year. The rabbis therefore had to add extra month every three years to make up this difference, otherwise the holidays, (such as Pesach would not be celebrated in the beginning of the summer) would rotate around the year. To the Essenes, this calendar was an abomination. Their calendar was a solar calendar. Each month had 30 days. One month in three had 31 days, hence each season (three months ) had 91 days. Each year had 364 days. The holidays began on the same day of the week each year (as opposed to our calendar where the New Year varies from year to year on which day of the week it falls). Practically speaking this caused a big rift in relations between the Essenes and the other two groups. When the Pharisees and Sadduccees celebrated the holidays, the Essenes worked. Conversely, when the Essenes celebrated the holidays, the other two groups worked. Although no known record of conflict is recorded, we can deduce that due to the reclusive nature of the Essenes, conflict was minimized. Historians have long pointed to the Essenes as the forerunner to the Chri
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Could God die again ?
SM:
>>What is not being said is that "Zadokite" is the same word as
"Sadducee," the Greekish NT term for the established priesthood (the
successors of Zadok).<<
Most of the sources I went through just assume you know they are
synonyms, just as they assume
you know they are often associated with Samaritans (because any
priestly class with a temple-based form of Judaism might invoke
legends of Zadok and lines of descent to legimate their status,
including).
The problem with what we know fo the Sadducees is that the sources are
hostile and, of course, not historic in any modern sense. So how do we
figure out in a modern historic sense who they were and what they
believed? Note well, though, the treatment the term gets in the JE's
section on 'In Literature'.
CJ
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=40&letter=S
Name from High Priest Zadok.
Name given to the party representing views and practises of the Law
and interests of Temple and priesthood directly opposite to those of
the Pharisees. The singular form, "Ẓadduḳi" (Greek, Σαδδουκαῖος), is
an adjective denoting "an adherent of the Bene Ẓadoḳ," the descendants
of Zadok, the high priests who, tracing their pedigree back to Zadok,
the chief of the priesthood in the days of David and Solomon (I Kings
i. 34, ii. 35; I Chron. xxix. 22), formed the Temple hierarchy all
through the time of the First and Second Temples down to the days of
Ben Sira (II Chron. xxxi. 10; Ezek. xl. 46, xliv. 15, xlviii. 11;
Ecclus. [Sirach] li. 12 [9], Hebr.), but who degenerated under the
influence of Hellenism, especially during the rule of the Seleucidæ,
when to be a follower of the priestly aristocracy was tantamount to
being a worldly-minded Epicurean. The name, probably coined by the
Ḥasidim as opponents of the Hellenists, became in the course of time a
party name applied to all the aristocratic circles connected with the
high priests by marriage and other social relations, as only the
highest patrician families intermarried with the priests officiating
at the Temple in Jerusalem (Ḳid. iv. 5; Sanh. iv. 2; comp. Josephus,
"B. J." ii. 8, § 14). "Haughty men these priests are, saying which
woman is fit to be married by us, since our father is high priest, our
uncles princes and rulers, and we presiding officers at the
Temple"—these words, put into the mouth of Nadab and Abihu (Tan.,
Aḥare Mot, ed. Buber, 7; Pesiḳ. 172b; Midr. Teh. to Ps. lxxviii. 18),
reflect exactly the opinion prevailing among the Pharisees concerning
the Sadducean priesthood (comp. a similar remark about the "haughty"
aristocracy of Jerusalem in Shab. 62b). The Sadducees, says Josephus,
have none but the rich on their side ("Ant." xiii. 10, § 6). The party
name was retained long after the Zadokite high priests had made way
for the Hasmonean house and the very origin of the name had been
forgotten. Nor is anything definite known about the political and
religious views of the Sadducees except what is recorded by their
opponents in the works of Josephus, in the Talmudic literature, and in
the New Testament writings.
Read more:
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=40&letter=S&search=sadducee#ixzz0cNlVFfME
Legendary Origin.
Josephus relates nothing concerning the origin of what he chooses to
call the sect or philosophical school of the Sadducees; he knows only
that the three "sects"—the Pharisees, Essenes, and Sadducees—dated
back to "very ancient times" (ib. xviii. 1, § 2), which words, written
from the point of view of King Herod's days, necessarily point to a
time prior to John Hyrcanus (ib. xiii. 8, § 6) orthe Maccabean war
(ib. xiii. 5, § 9). Among the Rabbis the following legend circulated:
Antigonus of Soko, successor of Simon the Just, the last of the "Men
of the Great Synagogue," and consequently living at the time of the
influx of Hellenistic ideas, taught the maxim, "Be not like servants
who serve their master for the sake of wages [lit. "a morsel"], but be
rather like those who serve without thought of receiving wages" (Ab.
i. 3); whereupon two of his disciples, Zadok and Boethus, mistaking
the high ethical purport of the maxim, arrived at the conclusion that
there was no future retribution, saying, "What servant would work all
day without obtaining his due reward in the evening?" Instantly they
broke away from the Law and lived in great luxury, using many silver
and gold vessels at their banquets; and they established schools which
declared the enjoyment of this life to be the goal of man, at the same
time pitying the Pharisees for their bitter privation in this world
with no hope of another world to compensate them. These two schools
were called, after their founders, Sadducees and Boethusians (Ab. R.
N. v.).
The unhistorical character of this legend is shown by the simple fact,
learned from Josephus, that the Boethusians represent the family of
high priests created by King Herod after his marriage to the daughter
of Simon, the son of Boethus ("Ant." xv. 9, § 3; xix. 6,
