[PEN-L:6794] Re: una preguntita
Doug writes: Didn't Joan Robinson say that the only thing worse than being exploited under capitalism is not being exploited? Your mate Manuel Castells seems to say this, too. Without having much to say for or against the Marxian argument for the category of exploitation, he merely pronounces it a notion long past, and concludes the modern tragedy is that of exclusion. In other words, he's given up on that front (and the formal argument that supports it), and seeks to dig in along a front way behind where we could and should be. In a very 'third way' spirit, he seems to be arguing that its the progressive's task to help bring those currently not exploited by capital relations into the sphere of capital. Premise: those societies not organised by the exchange relation are currently the worst-off. Conclusion: the only thing worse than being exploited is not being exploited. Interpretation: we should all join hands to 'unite' the globe under the benificence of capital. Have I got him wrong? Cheers, Rob.
[PEN-L:6802] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: una preguntita
Tom, Don't you think most politicians need a lot of political correction ? Charles Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/13/99 04:04PM Well, Jim, if it's controls on capital flows. And you can combine that with an effort to educate and legislate controls right into the corporate charters of all corporations foreign, domestic and alien. Then you might have a chance of a "better" globalization. What we do here sets the standard for the rest of the world! On the subject of youth. It's sort of like the Canadian Steelworker told Doug Henwood's reporter, welcome to the wonderful world of minimum wage or something like that. Until people start demanding change and I mean demanding it from the politicians nothing is going to change. People are going to have to button-hole politicians of all parties from the local hack to as high as they can reach if they want real change---up close and very personal and not necessarily politically correct. Your email pal, Tom L. Jim Devine wrote: Tom Lehman wrote: For the big industrial unions like the Steelworkers, which is a pretty diverse if not the most diverse union, the losses in jobs resulting from downsizing, globalization etc. have been particularly cruel to our Black membership. Because they and their children will never see union protected jobs again in the so-called brownfields areas. Good jobs to which they have had easy access. right: downsizing (broadly defined) hits the "last hired" (those with the least seniority) hardest. One of the reasons for increased inequality among wage earners is that there is a shrinking of the sector of the working class that is able to benefit from "good jobs" (the primary labor market jobs) so that more and more workers, including younger white workers, are crowded in the secondary labor markets. The whole question is where do you draw the line on globalization, and how do you combat globalization? I think a better question is how can we create a _better_ globalization rather than trying strategies that dump the costs on other nations' working classes via protectionism and the like? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6804] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: una preguntita
Yes, they sure do---and I really don't care how it's phrased. Vernacular is vernacular. And I'm sure your an expert on Detroit vernacular. ;o) I read super market tabloids and enjoy urban legends, too. Your email pal, Tom L. Charles Brown wrote: Tom, Don't you think most politicians need a lot of political correction ? Charles Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/13/99 04:04PM Well, Jim, if it's controls on capital flows. And you can combine that with an effort to educate and legislate controls right into the corporate charters of all corporations foreign, domestic and alien. Then you might have a chance of a "better" globalization. What we do here sets the standard for the rest of the world! On the subject of youth. It's sort of like the Canadian Steelworker told Doug Henwood's reporter, welcome to the wonderful world of minimum wage or something like that. Until people start demanding change and I mean demanding it from the politicians nothing is going to change. People are going to have to button-hole politicians of all parties from the local hack to as high as they can reach if they want real change---up close and very personal and not necessarily politically correct. Your email pal, Tom L. Jim Devine wrote: Tom Lehman wrote: For the big industrial unions like the Steelworkers, which is a pretty diverse if not the most diverse union, the losses in jobs resulting from downsizing, globalization etc. have been particularly cruel to our Black membership. Because they and their children will never see union protected jobs again in the so-called brownfields areas. Good jobs to which they have had easy access. right: downsizing (broadly defined) hits the "last hired" (those with the least seniority) hardest. One of the reasons for increased inequality among wage earners is that there is a shrinking of the sector of the working class that is able to benefit from "good jobs" (the primary labor market jobs) so that more and more workers, including younger white workers, are crowded in the secondary labor markets. The whole question is where do you draw the line on globalization, and how do you combat globalization? I think a better question is how can we create a _better_ globalization rather than trying strategies that dump the costs on other nations' working classes via protectionism and the like? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6805] una preguntita
TL My idea is WE are correct, virtuous, highminded, cultured, beautiful, efficient, poets, practical, sporty, pals ,all that. Nothing's too good for the working class. It is THEY (the tophats) who are wrong, bad, lowdown, incorrect, grammatically off, trashy. As we say in the vernacular. I'm into fact over fiction. I never seem to be able to finish novels. CB Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/14/99 09:41AM Yes, they sure do---and I really don't care how it's phrased. Vernacular is vernacular. And I'm sure your an expert on Detroit vernacular. ;o) I read super market tabloids and enjoy urban legends, too. Your email pal, Tom L. Charles Brown wrote: Tom, Don't you think most politicians need a lot of political correction ? Charles Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/13/99 04:04PM Well, Jim, if it's controls on capital flows. And you can combine that with an effort to educate and legislate controls right into the corporate charters of all corporations foreign, domestic and alien. Then you might have a chance of a "better" globalization. What we do here sets the standard for the rest of the world! On the subject of youth. It's sort of like the Canadian Steelworker told Doug Henwood's reporter, welcome to the wonderful world of minimum wage or something like that. Until people start demanding change and I mean demanding it from the politicians nothing is going to change. People are going to have to button-hole politicians of all parties from the local hack to as high as they can reach if they want real change---up close and very personal and not necessarily politically correct. Your email pal, Tom L. Jim Devine wrote: Tom Lehman wrote: For the big industrial unions like the Steelworkers, which is a pretty diverse if not the most diverse union, the losses in jobs resulting from downsizing, globalization etc. have been particularly cruel to our Black membership. Because they and their children will never see union protected jobs again in the so-called brownfields areas. Good jobs to which they have had easy access. right: downsizing (broadly defined) hits the "last hired" (those with the least seniority) hardest. One of the reasons for increased inequality among wage earners is that there is a shrinking of the sector of the working class that is able to benefit from "good jobs" (the primary labor market jobs) so that more and more workers, including younger white workers, are crowded in the secondary labor markets. The whole question is where do you draw the line on globalization, and how do you combat globalization? I think a better question is how can we create a _better_ globalization rather than trying strategies that dump the costs on other nations' working classes via protectionism and the like? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6807] Bubble?
08:30 APRIL CPI NEARLY DOUBLE EXPECTATIONS. 08:30 APRIL CPI CORE UP 0.4%, MOST IN 4 YEARS. How now? regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6808] Bubble bursts finally with a vengence!
It looks like the real thing this time. All shares dropping rapidly, Europe lost an average of 2% overnight. Dow is dropping faster than I can type - 121 points in 8 minutes since opening and falling. 30 yr bond edges towar 6%. If it continues into next Monday, it will be all over. If it doesn't, the next correction will try again within days. Summers is facing a test of fire! Henry C.K. Liu
[PEN-L:6811] Re: Bubble bursts finally with a vengence!
APRIL CPI SOARS 0.7%, MOST SINCE GULF WAR. As Doug can remind us, though, Henry's exuberant expectation may be premature. But the question remains: how are the authorities going to squeek through this one? If the surge in the U.S. CPI can be explained as an anomaly that takes a lot of heat off. Otherwise, the expectation of higher interest rates looms. An interesting side note: APRIL CPI STILL SHOWS NO SIGNS OF WAGE-PUSH INFLATION. regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6812] Re: Old foggies/fogeys
To coin a term: is there a "heterodoxymoron"? At 07:25 AM 5/14/99 -0700, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Michael Perelman wrote: In my department, the average tenure must be about 20 years. We have no young people and we old foggies hang on. Michael Keaney wrote: One possible advantage accruing from present circumstances - more an unintended side effect - is that the so-called old fogeys preserve what remains of heterodox teaching and research. On the other hand: "As with other marginal groups, a certain handful of [heterodox old fogeys] are accorded higher status that they may perform a species of cultural policing over the rest. . . Such exceptions are generally obliged to make ritual, and often comic, statements of deference to justify their elevation." I've paraphrased from Kate Millett's Sexual Politics (1969), substituting "heterodox old fogeys" for "women". By definition, a "heterodoxy" offers a critique of the arbitrary selection and privileging of some discourses (orthodoxy) over others. But no critical discourse has the right to exempt itself from its own critique. So we may suppose that certain heterodox positions are "more orthodox" -- that is to say, more _deferential_ to the orthodoxy -- than others. And, we might suppose that it is those "less hetero" heterodoxies that are allowed by the orthodox to represent heterodoxy. Thus the "advantage" of preserving an old fogey heterodoxy must not be assumed to accrue to heteroxy per se. Quite the contrary. But I'm sure my incessant carping on this theme is boring to those who would distinguish between "the informed critique" and my inchoate rage at the deep structures of oppression. Long live econometrics! Long live NAIRU! Long live tenure for a handful of well-behaved radicals! regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6813] Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
I think that this is a very interesting letter. Unfortunately we all must face another hard fact. Part of the fact that Milosevic has won (nor more "petulance," Louis, now I'll just call him a schmuck and a mass murdererer (would the 200,000+ of the Croatian-Bosnian war be alive if he had died of a heart attack in 1986?)), is that the refugees will not be returning to Kosovo-Metohija, certainly not in significant numbers, except as armed UCK/KLA guerrillas. The experience of Israel and the Palestinians, and the Croatian-Bosnian war shows that, especially the latter. The Dayton Accords specified return of refugees, but it has not happened. It will not happen in Kosovo-Metohija. Ugly, but true. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Michael Eisenscher [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Recipient list suppressed Recipient list suppressed Date: Friday, May 14, 1999 1:20 AM Subject: [PEN-L:6800] Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic =- A Letter from Gregor Gysi* to Slobodan Milosevic Translation: Eric Canepa (Source: the PDS's weekly press report, Pressedienst, No. 18, 1999 (May 7), in internet at: www.pds- online.de/1/pressedienst/9918/) *Gregor Gysi is the chair of the delegation of the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) in the German Bundestag. Dear Mr. President, Mindful of our conversation of April 14, 1999 I am writing you this letter. Once again I stress my unequivocal rejection of NATO's illegal and completely unequal war against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and express my great dismay at the dead and wounded, especially within the civilian population, and at the ever more cynical destruction of what increasingly turn out to be civilian installations in Yugoslavia, as well as my condemnation of any kind of violation of human rights in Kosovo. I fear that the war will set back European integration and the relation of a number of European states to the Russian Federation for many years to come. This can only be in the interests of the U.S., as a way of hindering a political and economic competitor in Europe. Once again I ask you to give your consent to a UN peace force according to the UN charter--without participation of the aggressor NATO nations. If, in direct negotiations between the political leaderships of Yugoslavia and Kosovo, an accord should be reached with the participation of the United Nations, the return of hundreds of thousands of refugees must follow in a peaceful and secure manner. However, these refugees--and I will come back to this below-- understandably have no trust in the Yugoslav army and police. On the other hand, I understand that those who are now bombing Yugoslavia cannot secure peace. There are, however, other countries which would be more suited to securing that peace. The deployment of a UN peace force after the retreat of your troops from Kosovo would not mean occupation; it would have a time-limit set, and due to UN sovereignty would be a completely different approach to a solution than that of NATO. At the beginning of our conversation you rejected this suggestion; at the end, however, you assured me that you would think it over. I regard the results of your conversation with the Russian president's envoy, Victor Chernomyrdin, and the statements of your Vice-Prime Minister, Vuk Draskovic, as showing that this reconsideration is continuing. I appeal to you once again to open up this path. NATO would thus be forced to decide what is more important to it, the desire to be the sole factor in the Euro-Atlantic order, or the desire for peace. Such a peace would be difficult enough to put into practice, but it would have a real chance [of inhibiting] the current hegemonic strivings, especially those of the U.S. In our conversation, as in others I had in Belgrade, we went on to speak of the fate of Kosovo-Albanians. You claimed that before NATO's bombing of Kosovo there were--and this is incontrovertible--much fewer refugees from Kosovo. As causes for their flight in the period before the bombing, you pointed to KLA attacks and the civilian populations's fear of falling victim to the battles between your army and police and the KLA. The dramatic rise in the number of refugees since the end of March 1999 is, in your opinion, solely attributable to the NATO bombing. To my counter-arguments you replied that news reporting in Germany is one-sided, that the refugees are coached by clan chiefs, and moreover that the refugees only have a chance of being received in a Western country if they criticize the Yugoslav army and police. I told you that I wanted to travel to Albania and speak with refugees, and you thought that there I would see your account confirmed. But this in no way turned out to be the case. At first I followed the advice of a top official in your Foreign Ministry, and I looked at the Germany Foreign Ministry's status reports and the decisions of German high courts on deportation of Kosovo-Albanians during
[PEN-L:6814] Re: Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Barkley raises an important question. If we buy into the fact that all evil emanates from a single person, then the strategy of demonization works well. I suspect we should look at larger social forces. J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. wrote: would the 200,000+ of the Croatian-Bosnian war be alive if he had died of a heart attack in 1986?)-- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:6816] affirmative action
Michael Keaney writes: All of which is to say that my original point was that recruitment policies focusing primarily or significantly on the race, class or gender of applicants/candidates should also recognise the intellectual individuality of these individuals. Otherwise we can be as politically correct and as reflective of wider social composition as could be possible while the very ideology we would all indict as at least culpable in the legitimation and prolongation of our societal and international woes would be further propagated at the expense of any critical perspective. And then where would that leave us? when I was on an affirmative action committee, we treated issues like race gender as simply one extra factor along with issues of the quality of the job candidate's research, their individuality, etc. (Somehow class was forgotten, but then again, this is in the US, the classless society.) Race and gender were never the sole criteria. (Nor should they be.) BTW, I think that one of the problems of discussions of affirmative action is that people talk about the subject in very abstract terms, often referring to an individual case or two only to generalize them to apply to _all_ cases. I don't think my case represents the universal, but I'd bet that it was more common than the application of hard-core quotas. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6817] Re: Re: Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Michael, I do not think that "evil emanates from a single person," certainly not always. But when one person seems to be generating a lot of it, I do not see any reason not to point a finger and hold responsibility. In this case, let's think about it carefully. This is repetition of stuff I have said before, but, oh well. Why did the Croatian-Bosnian war happen (in which over 200,000 people died)? I can see three theories: 1) imperialist plotting (Gervasi-Proyect) 2) inevitable contradictions of misguided Yugoslav economic system 3) rampant and unavoidable nationalism 4) rampant nationalism exacerbated by power-hungry Milosevic. I take seriously the work of Sean Gervasi and I do think that German and to a lesser extent US plotting contributed to the breakup of Yugoslavia. But I also think that once democracy of some sort was allowed that probably Slovenia and Croatia at a minimum would have seceded. They had long resented having funds redistributed to Kosovo-Metohija and Macedonia. Maybe they could have been kept in a federation within a democratic structure, just as North Italy stays in Italy despite unhappiness over similar redistributions to the Mezzogiorno. But that would have required that there be no threat of a takeover and imposition of authority by one group led by a noisy leader, which was definitely going on after 1989. Much as I have been a fan of the old Yugoslav system and defended elements of it on this list, nevertheless, it did experience extreme difficulties in the 1980s. Growth stopped, unemployment soared, and inflation seriously took off. Some of this was exacerbated by IMF requirements (imperialist plotting!), but it must also be faced that the IMF was able to get its mitts in because of the high foreign indebtedness that Yugoslavia had acquired. That seems to be something that soft budget constraint market socialist countries as a group experienced. Thus, Hungary and Poland also had high foreign indebtedness in contrast with Czechoslovakia, a hardline command socialist economy. Furthermore, for whatever reason, we know that regional inequality had sharply increased. Paul Phillips has suggested that some of that may have been reversed or at least slowed during periods after workers' management became more influential. But we know that Slovenia in particular did quite well, with an unemployment rate averaging only 1.7% in the 1976-87 period while Kosovo-Metohija's averaged 29.6% during the same period, and with the ratio of their per capita incomes being about nine to one by the time of the breakup, this despite all the redistribution of revenues from Slovenia to Kosmet. Of course one can argue that the imperialism aspect showed up in the foreign indebtedness, that this was the inevitable outcome of market socialism and the integration of Yugoslavia into the world economy on a market basis. That may be, but then somehow Hungary has avoided getting into wars with Romania, Slovakia, or Serbia over the Hungarian populations located in those countries in territories that used to be part of Hungary. Why is that? Certainly there are deeply rooted ethnic and religious conflicts in the former Yugoslavia. But they were not always leading to wars, and in the nineteenth century there was a genuine "Yugoslav nationalist" movement based on the idea that the south Slav peoples had more in common than separated them. I would argue that the tragic economic differences that have emerged for whatever reasons have certainly exacerbated all of this. But they still do not explain war, slaughter, "cleansing." Well, we get down to the hard fact that 600 years after the Battle of Kosovo Polje, a power hungry League of Communist party leader for Serbia gave a firebreathing speech at Kosovo Polje (June 28, 1989) demanding an end to autonomy for Kosovo-Metohija and a reimposition of Serbian rule, despite the Serb population being a very small minority. There is no question that this speech was reported widely throughout the former Yugoslavia and that this actively stimulated the separatist movements in Slovenia and Croatia and also in other republics as well that had not had strong separatist movements before then (Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia). Ethnic Serbs did attack first in Vukovar, in Krajina, and in Bosnia-Herzegovina, all with the strong support of Milosevic, thus fully justifying the paranoia of those who wanted out. Of course the rampant nationalism argument would say that even if Milosevic had died in 1986, then some other chauvinist schmuck would have taken over, like Arkan or Vojislav Seselj. Maybe. But it may well also be that without Milosevic's 1989 speech and subsequent actions following up on it that such political figures would never had an opening, that Serbian politics would have resembled Hungarian and that there would 200,000+ people alive today who are not alive. Unfortunately, all though the other factors are
[PEN-L:6821] A thought on inflation
Now that inflation has returned to the financial pages, at least for a day, and papers are filled with glowing stories about corporate consolidations, I wonder if we're going to see a return to the idea that corporate power is a major factor in price increases? -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:6822] Re: Re: Re: Old foggies/fogeys
Seems to me that a lot of the heterodox old foggies have become converted to orthodox fogdom with their spectacles fogged by a slightly different coloured fog. Those who a few years ago may have asked interesting questions re Marxism have settled down in a sort Walrasian Analytical Marxism, that threatens nothing excpet Marxism as a revolutionary analysis of capitalism. Social Democrats have changed from savage critics of capitalism to responsible managers of global capitalism. From people such as Tommy Douglas who said he would not rest until the co-operative commonwealth was established in Canada and capitalism abolished, we have neo-liberal cheerleaders in New Zealand, and Tony Blair in the UK. Our own NDP federal leader expressed admiration for Tony Blair. Many of the old foggies along with some of the younger crowd in universities have followed these politicians along the same path. Cheers, Ken Hanly Michael Keaney wrote: On Fri, May 14, 1999, 2:42 pm, Tom Walker wrote: Michael Keaney wrote: One possible advantage accruing from present circumstances - more an unintended side effect - is that the so-called old fogeys preserve what remains of heterodox teaching and research. On the other hand: "As with other marginal groups, a certain handful of [heterodox old fogeys] are accorded higher status that they may perform a species of cultural policing over the rest. . . Such exceptions are generally obliged to make ritual, and often comic, statements of deference to justify their elevation." I've paraphrased from Kate Millett's Sexual Politics (1969), substituting "heterodox old fogeys" for "women". By definition, a "heterodoxy" offers a critique of the arbitrary selection and privileging of some discourses (orthodoxy) over others. But no critical discourse has the right to exempt itself from its own critique. So we may suppose that certain heterodox positions are "more orthodox" -- that is to say, more _deferential_ to the orthodoxy -- than others. And, we might suppose that it is those "less hetero" heterodoxies that are allowed by the orthodox to represent heterodoxy. Thus the "advantage" of preserving an old fogey heterodoxy must not be assumed to accrue to heteroxy per se. Quite the contrary. I am not exempting critical discourse from its own critique. Far from it - assuming the existence of a significant number of heterodox old fogeys in positions of relative power and influence, especially with regard to course development and delivery, doctoral supervision and faculty appointment, then these would have a lot of answering to do as regards the shrinking opportunities for heterodox study in American and British universities. Similarly, what about the recruitment opportunities for heterodox youngsters? Those who espouse greater disciplinary or intellectual pluralism do not seem to have had much impact regarding the nurturance of the provision of alternative perspectives. This observation becomes a criticism when it refers to those who could have made a difference. All of which is to say that my original point was that recruitment policies focusing primarily or significantly on the race, class or gender of applicants/candidates should also recognise the intellectual individuality of these individuals. Otherwise we can be as politically correct and as reflective of wider social composition as could be possible while the very ideology we would all indict as at least culpable in the legitimation and prolongation of our societal and international woes would be further propagated at the expense of any critical perspective. And then where would that leave us? Michael Michael Keaney Department of Economics Glasgow Caledonian University 70 Cowcaddens Road Glasgow G4 0BA Scotland, U.K.
Re: [PEN-L:6794] Re: una preguntita
I think so (refers to your question at the end). Manuel Castells' take on the global-informational economy is that it incorporates and it excludes. His effort in showing how it excludes (Africa, inner cities, child labor) should not be interpreted as calling for inclusion under exploitative relations. That could very well be but systemic exclusion also offers little hope (a consequence of also several local/institutional factors). While I did not see Castells' with a Robinsonian lens until now, I do think there is merit in Robinson's position. Economic malaise is far too strong in developing countries, the least we can do is include people but preferably on national/regional lines (even if that means deepening capitalist relations). Anthony P. D'Costa Associate Professor Comparative International Development University of Washington 1900 Commerce Street Tacoma, WA 98402, USA Phone: (253) 692-4462 Fax : (253) 692-5612 On Fri, 14 May 1999, Rob Schaap wrote: Doug writes: Didn't Joan Robinson say that the only thing worse than being exploited under capitalism is not being exploited? Your mate Manuel Castells seems to say this, too. Without having much to say for or against the Marxian argument for the category of exploitation, he merely pronounces it a notion long past, and concludes the modern tragedy is that of exclusion. In other words, he's given up on that front (and the formal argument that supports it), and seeks to dig in along a front way behind where we could and should be. In a very 'third way' spirit, he seems to be arguing that its the progressive's task to help bring those currently not exploited by capital relations into the sphere of capital. Premise: those societies not organised by the exchange relation are currently the worst-off. Conclusion: the only thing worse than being exploited is not being exploited. Interpretation: we should all join hands to 'unite' the globe under the benificence of capital. Have I got him wrong? Cheers, Rob.
[PEN-L:6825] una preguntita
At 04:04 PM 13/05/99 -0400, Tom L. wrote: What we do here sets the standard for the rest of the world! This is partly true, but when linked to various protectionist-like schemes it really means "we" come first, which is not a sound basis for international solidarity. Bill Burgess
[PEN-L:6828] Re: una preguntita
Ok. Bill what's your plan? Your email pal, Tom Bill Burgess wrote: At 04:04 PM 13/05/99 -0400, Tom L. wrote: What we do here sets the standard for the rest of the world! This is partly true, but when linked to various protectionist-like schemes it really means "we" come first, which is not a sound basis for international solidarity. Bill Burgess
[PEN-L:6830] Re: Re: Re: Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Now that's just like Barkley to obtain vicarious pleasure in imagining His Excellency dead and then imagining as well that the present Kosovo mess might not have followed. But why not pick on some of the pro-NATO heroes? Imagine that Clinton's inordinate sexual desires got the better of him last fall and he had a passionate affair with Madeline Albright and she had a fatal heart attack during sex. Imagine also that at the same time Tony Blair dies in a fatal accident on his way to a dinner engagement with Margaret Thatcher. Now a diplomatic solution allowing UN rather than NATO occupation forces to keep the peace in Kosovo would be possible with the blessing of Milosevic and the FRY parliament. Isn't that just as plausible a possible world? Cheers, Ken Hanly J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. wrote: Michael, I do not think that "evil emanates from a single person," certainly not always. But when one person seems to be generating a lot of it, I do not see any reason not to point a finger and hold responsibility. In this case, let's think about it carefully. This is repetition of stuff I have said before, but, oh well. Why did the Croatian-Bosnian war happen (in which over 200,000 people died)? I can see three theories: 1) imperialist plotting (Gervasi-Proyect) 2) inevitable contradictions of misguided Yugoslav economic system 3) rampant and unavoidable nationalism 4) rampant nationalism exacerbated by power-hungry Milosevic. I take seriously the work of Sean Gervasi and I do think that German and to a lesser extent US plotting contributed to the breakup of Yugoslavia. But I also think that once democracy of some sort was allowed that probably Slovenia and Croatia at a minimum would have seceded. They had long resented having funds redistributed to Kosovo-Metohija and Macedonia. Maybe they could have been kept in a federation within a democratic structure, just as North Italy stays in Italy despite unhappiness over similar redistributions to the Mezzogiorno. But that would have required that there be no threat of a takeover and imposition of authority by one group led by a noisy leader, which was definitely going on after 1989. Much as I have been a fan of the old Yugoslav system and defended elements of it on this list, nevertheless, it did experience extreme difficulties in the 1980s. Growth stopped, unemployment soared, and inflation seriously took off. Some of this was exacerbated by IMF requirements (imperialist plotting!), but it must also be faced that the IMF was able to get its mitts in because of the high foreign indebtedness that Yugoslavia had acquired. That seems to be something that soft budget constraint market socialist countries as a group experienced. Thus, Hungary and Poland also had high foreign indebtedness in contrast with Czechoslovakia, a hardline command socialist economy. Furthermore, for whatever reason, we know that regional inequality had sharply increased. Paul Phillips has suggested that some of that may have been reversed or at least slowed during periods after workers' management became more influential. But we know that Slovenia in particular did quite well, with an unemployment rate averaging only 1.7% in the 1976-87 period while Kosovo-Metohija's averaged 29.6% during the same period, and with the ratio of their per capita incomes being about nine to one by the time of the breakup, this despite all the redistribution of revenues from Slovenia to Kosmet. Of course one can argue that the imperialism aspect showed up in the foreign indebtedness, that this was the inevitable outcome of market socialism and the integration of Yugoslavia into the world economy on a market basis. That may be, but then somehow Hungary has avoided getting into wars with Romania, Slovakia, or Serbia over the Hungarian populations located in those countries in territories that used to be part of Hungary. Why is that? Certainly there are deeply rooted ethnic and religious conflicts in the former Yugoslavia. But they were not always leading to wars, and in the nineteenth century there was a genuine "Yugoslav nationalist" movement based on the idea that the south Slav peoples had more in common than separated them. I would argue that the tragic economic differences that have emerged for whatever reasons have certainly exacerbated all of this. But they still do not explain war, slaughter, "cleansing." Well, we get down to the hard fact that 600 years after the Battle of Kosovo Polje, a power hungry League of Communist party leader for Serbia gave a firebreathing speech at Kosovo Polje (June 28, 1989) demanding an end to autonomy for Kosovo-Metohija and a reimposition of Serbian rule, despite the Serb population being a very small minority. There is no question that this speech was reported widely throughout the former Yugoslavia and that this actively stimulated the
[PEN-L:6829] Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
to what extent are the current troubles in Serbia due to Enver Hoxha's efforts to attack Tito (or due to antagonisms between the old Yugoslavia and the old Albania)? Jim Devine From an article by David Binder, NY Times, Apr. 19, 1981: Outsiders sometimes forget that socialist Yugoslavia was born not only of the war against Hitler, but also of a raging civil war that pitted nationality against nationality and church against church, at a cost of 1.7 million lives. The nationality problems of the Kosovo region, desperately poor despite considerable mineral wealth, are centuries old and were exacerbated in both world wars. Originally the home of Serbia's founding dynasty in the 12th century, Kosovo lost most of its remaining Serbian population in the 17th century when the Serbs, Orthodox Christians, fled northward to distance themselves from the Ottoman Turks. Albanian tribesmen filled the vacuum; they now constitute more than four-fifths of the province's population. When the great powers agreed in 1913 to make Albania independent more or less within its present borders, they ceded Kosovo to the Serbian monarchy. It was a blow the Albanians have never forgotten, the more so because their own independence movement had begun in the Kosovo town of Prizren in 1878. World War II brought more upheavals when Kosovo was handed to Mussolini's Italy by Germany and some Albanians enlisted out of gratitude on the Italian side. Retribution came when Tito's partisans entered the area, massacring suspected collaborators before the horrified eyes of their own Albanian Communist comrades in arms. Tito Partisans Once Ruled Albania For a time, Tito's dominant forces ruled Albania and a permanent Yugoslav-Albanian federation was even contemplated. One holdout was Enver Hoxha, who had earlier called for a plebiscite in Kosovo. In 1948, the reversals caused by Tito's ouster from the Cominform lofted Mr. Hoxha into the Albanian leadership he still holds today. For two succeeding decades, Tito's Yugoslavia held down the Albanians of Kosovo, denying them proper schooling and arresting or killing outspoken Albanian teachers. The repression ended in 1966 with the fall of the Serb leader who was Tito's number two, Aleksandr Rankovic. Since then, federal money has poured into Kosovo at a higher rate than into any other part of the country. Pristina University has grown to become one of the country's largest with 48,000 students. Most of the region's administrators, and its police, are ethnic Albanians. The Kosovars are even allowed to fly the Albanian flag, a black eagle on a red field. Yet this ''tremendous dynamic of development,'' as Mr. Dolanc described it, ironically has fed unrest. There were riots in 1968 and again in 1975. This time the youths of Kosovo shouted ''We want a republic'' (their semi-autonomous province has almost all rights of a Yugoslav republic except the right to secede) and some even demanded annexation by Mr. Hoxha's Albanian fatherland. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6831] Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
From an article by David Binder, NY Times, Apr. 19, 1981: Louis, that's an interesting article, but is there any evidence that Hoxha actively sought to subvert Yugoslavia by arming ethnic Albanian Kosovars, propagandizing them, etc.? And did Tito and his successors respond in any way? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6833] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Gregor Gysi letter toSlobodan Milosevic
At 01:54 PM 5/14/99 -0500, Ken wrote: But why not pick on some of the pro-NATO heroes? Imagine that Clinton's inordinate sexual desires got the better of him last fall and he had a passionate affair with Madeline Albright and she had a fatal heart attack during sex. Imagine also that at the same time Tony Blair dies in a fatal accident on his way to a dinner engagement with Margaret Thatcher. what if Clinton had a passionate affair with Margaret Thatcher or with Tony Blair? why not a menage a trois? (My new strategy for losing weight: nauseate myself right before lunch.) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6834] Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Louis, that's an interesting article, but is there any evidence that Hoxha actively sought to subvert Yugoslavia by arming ethnic Albanian Kosovars, propagandizing them, etc.? And did Tito and his successors respond in any way? I'll tell you the truth. I've been digging through the history of this Kosovo question through the 1980s pretty thoroughly and I have found no reference to this whatsoever. The only accusation that's been made is that Berisha, Hoxha's successor, armed the KLA. There is strong circumstantial evidence for this, but no smoking gun. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6838] Re: Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Jim, Well, as a further addendum to my earlier response to Louis, another hard fact is that there has been tension and at times violent conflict, between the Serbian and Albanian ethnic populations in Kosovo- Metohija for a long time and certainly off and on all of this century. Furthermore the population balance in the area has gone back and forth over time as one group or the other has had the upper hand locally. This begins to sound like the rampant nationalism explanation. But somehow it must be faced in this case, whatever is done. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Friday, May 14, 1999 2:29 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6827] Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic At 01:31 PM 5/14/99 -0400, Louis wrote: Barkley, you leave out enormous gaps in your account of the Balkan problems. Milosevic's attack on Kosovan autonomy did not come out of the blue. It was preceded by at least 7 years of mounting tensions in which Kosovars had made life miserable for the average Serb, to the point of driving many from the province. I think this is important, too. he quotes: At a soccer match in Belgrade this October, fans of the Pristina team from Kosovo started chanting ''E- Ho! E-Ho!,'' for Enver Hoxha. About the same time, a post office was bombed and an electric power plant, sabotaged. ''Kosovo is finished as Serb territory, that's for certain,'' said Milutin Garasanin, a distinguished archeologist at Belgrade University. to what extent are the current troubles in Serbia due to Enver Hoxha's efforts to attack Tito (or due to antagonisms between the old Yugoslavia and the old Albania)? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6839] Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Louis, "Originally the home of Serbia's founding dynasty..." Uh, Louis, did history begin in the 12th century? I think that we have been through these deep historical exercises already. You want to start waxing eloquent about Kosmet as the "spiritual home" of the Serbs? Give us a break. Just for the deep historical record, the ancestors of the Albanians, the Illyrians (and the Dardanians to be specific to Kosmet) were there long before the Serbs or any other Slavs got anywhere near the neighborhood. But I don't think this "deep historical" stuff should count for too much, in spite of Milosevic's self-identification with the long-dead Prince Lazar, the "martyr" of Kosovo Polje in 1389. Yuck! Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Friday, May 14, 1999 2:44 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6829] Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic to what extent are the current troubles in Serbia due to Enver Hoxha's efforts to attack Tito (or due to antagonisms between the old Yugoslavia and the old Albania)? Jim Devine From an article by David Binder, NY Times, Apr. 19, 1981: Outsiders sometimes forget that socialist Yugoslavia was born not only of the war against Hitler, but also of a raging civil war that pitted nationality against nationality and church against church, at a cost of 1.7 million lives. The nationality problems of the Kosovo region, desperately poor despite considerable mineral wealth, are centuries old and were exacerbated in both world wars. Originally the home of Serbia's founding dynasty in the 12th century, Kosovo lost most of its remaining Serbian population in the 17th century when the Serbs, Orthodox Christians, fled northward to distance themselves from the Ottoman Turks. Albanian tribesmen filled the vacuum; they now constitute more than four-fifths of the province's population. When the great powers agreed in 1913 to make Albania independent more or less within its present borders, they ceded Kosovo to the Serbian monarchy. It was a blow the Albanians have never forgotten, the more so because their own independence movement had begun in the Kosovo town of Prizren in 1878. World War II brought more upheavals when Kosovo was handed to Mussolini's Italy by Germany and some Albanians enlisted out of gratitude on the Italian side. Retribution came when Tito's partisans entered the area, massacring suspected collaborators before the horrified eyes of their own Albanian Communist comrades in arms. Tito Partisans Once Ruled Albania For a time, Tito's dominant forces ruled Albania and a permanent Yugoslav-Albanian federation was even contemplated. One holdout was Enver Hoxha, who had earlier called for a plebiscite in Kosovo. In 1948, the reversals caused by Tito's ouster from the Cominform lofted Mr. Hoxha into the Albanian leadership he still holds today. For two succeeding decades, Tito's Yugoslavia held down the Albanians of Kosovo, denying them proper schooling and arresting or killing outspoken Albanian teachers. The repression ended in 1966 with the fall of the Serb leader who was Tito's number two, Aleksandr Rankovic. Since then, federal money has poured into Kosovo at a higher rate than into any other part of the country. Pristina University has grown to become one of the country's largest with 48,000 students. Most of the region's administrators, and its police, are ethnic Albanians. The Kosovars are even allowed to fly the Albanian flag, a black eagle on a red field. Yet this ''tremendous dynamic of development,'' as Mr. Dolanc described it, ironically has fed unrest. There were riots in 1968 and again in 1975. This time the youths of Kosovo shouted ''We want a republic'' (their semi-autonomous province has almost all rights of a Yugoslav republic except the right to secede) and some even demanded annexation by Mr. Hoxha's Albanian fatherland. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6842] Re: Re: Re: Bubble bursts finally with a vengence!
howdee, although wall street prices aren't indexed in the cpi, i'm wondering if there is some relationship between the stock market boom and inflation. perhaps what the notion of a "bubble" is supposed to imply--but given that securities are relatively liquid, wouldn't there be something to the idea that the boom increases money supply (broadly construed) and hence might have something to do with inflation? how much of this would depend on international markets? that is, does this come down, internationally and nationally, to a problem of liquidity preference? christian
[PEN-L:6843] People's Daily Commentary and Mark Twain
Charles: Barkley: I get my versions from the Washington Post which reports stuff that is not just from "official spokespersons." Charles: This is not very critical thinking. To buy the idea that the monopoly media is independent from the U.S. power structure is to be under U.S. Big Brother mind control. In other words, your response to the People's Daily Commentary is in a sarcastic tone, smacking of the old capitalist propaganda that communism has Big Brother and the U.S. doesn't, that the U.S. has freedom of the press, and communist countries don't. This in itself is to be a sucker for U.S. mindcontrol. The U.S. has freedom of the press, for them that owns the presses. *It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either.* Mark Twain, Following the Equator, Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar Yoshie
[PEN-L:6847] Nonsense on Stilts
THE FINANCIAL TIMES May 13 1999 NONSENSE ON STILTS Most of the rationalisations for the Wall Street boom were foreshadowed in the run-up to the 1929 crash Samuel Brittan Whatever Wall Street's immediate reaction to the long-awaited departure of Robert Rubin as Treasury secretary, it will not stop talk about the so-called "new paradigm". This is supposed to allow a combination of economic events previously regarded as impossible, but which only fuddy-duddies now deny. The new paradigm used to be known - with justifiable cynicism - as the Goldilocks scenario. It has three elements. First, it is said, the US economy can now be run with a much lower level of unemployment than before without generating rising inflation. Second, it is suggested that there has been a pronounced upward shift in the underlying growth rate. And third, Wall Street is supposed to soar to ever greater heights. The first assertion - that the US can now be run with a tighter labour market than previously supposed without inflation taking off - is probably justified. The second - about a higher underlying growth rate - is more dubious. The third - about Wall Street's ability to reach the stratosphere - is nonsense on stilts. Alan Greenspan, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, has reminded us how Fed forecasts have chronically overestimated inflation and underestimated real growth. Unemployment has fallen to lows normally associated with rising wage costs and accelerating inflation, according to nearly all models. Yet wage inflation has never seemed more subdued. Even this most plausible part of the paradigm can be exaggerated. For there have been some favourable once-for-all influences on the inflation rate, arising from falling commodity and oil prices and a rising dollar. These may give a misleading idea about quite how far the sustainable rate of unemployment has fallen. According to Goldman Sachs, the recent rise in energy prices will be sufficient to bring about a blip in the US inflation rate from 1½ per cent to over 3 per cent this quarter, and a more lasting rise to 2½ per cent or more. Another abnormality is the strength of the investment boom, which has produced the rare coincidence of a tight labour market and a large margin of excess capacity. It is, in any case, nonsense to conclude that fundamental economic rules need rewriting. Those who say this do not know what these rules are. The estimates made of - forgive the jargon - the Non Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment or Nairu, are simply rough guesses. Even if valid, they apply only to limited periods. There is no reason in basic theory to expect the Nairu to be unchanging. Milton Friedman, one of its inventors, has always refused to guess its level. As Mr Greenspan said: "Neither the fundamental laws of economics, nor of human nature on which they are based, have changed or are likely to change." The validity of the new optimism about underlying growth depends somewhat on what you mean by "underlying". Mr Greenspan sang the praises of the information technology and related revolutions. But he then pointed out that they are less important than technological revolutions around the turn of the last century, leading to the introduction of the automobile, the aircraft, the telephone and the beginnings of radio. Charles Jonscher, who is an acknowledged IT expert, remarks on the lack of evidence that IT has increased US productivity growth (Who Are We in the Digital Age?, Bantam Press). Indeed, the average annual growth of business output per hour in the post-1992 business cycle has been less than in the years between 1954 and 1975. Mr Greenspan believes that the new technologies have indeed brought an unexpected increase in output over the last few years. But he considers it invalid to project this increase into the future. For we do not have the knowledge to distinguish between a once-for-all jump, and a change in trend. Now I come to Wall Street itself. Even if equity prices do not crash, the US boom is highly vulnerable. For American consumers - the much vaunted saviours of the world economy - have stopped saving, and have been running down their financial balances. This cannot go on for ever. It only appears sustainable on the basis of a continuing rise in equity and other asset prices, which is creating the illusion of wealth. Surveys of equity analysts show expectations of 13 to 14 per cent annual rises in corporate earnings continuing. But if these represent real profits, and not just a resumption of inflation, they are absurd. For the average annual growth of nominal gross domestic product is barely 5 per cent. If any component of GDP continues to grow faster than the total, compound interest alone suggests that it would eventually account for almost the whole of GDP. The return of near double-digit growth of broad measures of money over the past year also needs attention. It could be passed off as an aberration if it were
[PEN-L:6846] The limits of Chinese anti-imperialism (fwd)
Recall what I said last week about the often confused discourse of anti-imperialism and neo-liberal ideology taking plaace in China at the moment... Steve HK Standard May 15, 1999 Backlash against US goods could boomerang STORY: SHANGHAI: Chinese citizens would damage their country's interests if they heed calls by student protesters to boycott US goods, the official Youth Daily quoted commentators as saying. Scholars, analysts and students alike criticised the boycott proposals in a ``forum'' article, saying they would rob people of jobs and slow the country's efforts to develop into an economic power. Students protesting on Shanghai's streets and on the Internet against Saturday's deadly Nato bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade have urged people not to wear Nike shoes, ride in Cadillacs or eat at McDonald's or Kentucky Fried Chicken. At one university a large crowd even criticised two female students after they were seen drinking Coca-Cola, it said. ``I can feel (the student protesters) have patriotic feelings but in other ways their thinking is not well-developed,'' said Ni Jiatai, chairman of the Shanghai economic committee under the US-Europe Overseas Students' Association. The economic world was increasingly interconnected so if relations were cut with a major foreign country ``it will affect China's economic development'', he said. ``For example, if now we don't buy General Motors (GM) Buicks or stop co-operation with GM, an economic pillar of Shanghai will feel the effects,'' he said. Shanghai GM's newly built plant, the biggest US investment in the mainland at US$1.5 billion (HK$11.7 billion), is expected to employ 3,000 local workers. Lu Deming, the director of the Chinese Economic Research Centre at Fudan University, said: ``When foreign investment enters China, the foreign side profits but the Chinese side also profits.'' ``It expands our employment capability and adds to local tax revenues,'' he said. - AFP
[PEN-L:6851] Re: Nonsense on Stilts
Consider the recent story about a truck driver who gave a lift to a man in a dark suit. The man in the suit asked the driver if he ever invested in stocks. He replied that not only did he do so, but that he had been able to buy a tropical island with the proceeds. This is the modern equivalent of the cab drivers making fortunes in the 1920s, and driving only as a hobby. of course, we should remember that the above story is an advertisement for some on-line brokerage rather than being genuine folklore. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/JDevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia now!
[PEN-L:6845] Re: RE: Old foggies/fogeys
Peter is correct that radical economics is not reproducing itself. The space for new left economists is limited to a few liberal arts colleges, Catholic institutions, and less prestigious state colleges. For the most part, these do not have graduate programs. During the '60s, students demanded something other than standard neoclassical fare. In order to maintain majors, departments had to hire a few lefties to make their programs more interesting. I was hired for this purpose. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:6844] Re: Re: Re: Re: Old foggies/fogeys
Let's be blunt. Nonneoclassical economics is not reproducing itself. It needs a fresh supply of PhD's who can be hired to teach new ones *in graduate programs*. With a few exceptions the radical/alternative programs (UMass, New School, AU, Notre Dame, etc.) hire people from mainstream programs. They used to find the odd radical (when there were enclaves within Berkeley, Harvard, Michigan, etc.), but that supply is drying up. This is a serious problem. Peter "J. Barkley Rosser, Jr." wrote: Michael, The problem is that the heterodox old fogeys are not in positions of power in the main Ph.D. granting institutions. There are a few such institutions that have heterodox economics programs. But they are few in number and their graduates have a great deal of trouble getting placed out of their circle in such institutions. Barkley Rosser
[PEN-L:6841] Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Barkley wrote: Louis, OK, so what's your solution? Partition? Domination and discrimination by minority Serbs of majority Albanians? Removal of majority Albanians by minority Serbs by force? I come at this from a somewhat different angle than most people. I don't think there can be peace, justice or social equality as long as the criminals in Washington, London and Bonn are in power. I believe that we are entering a period of profound social and economic crisis that will lead to wars, civil war and revolutions. Russia is entering a dangerous new period as Yeltsin and his imperialist backers will use violence to remain in power. A restoration of socialism in the East would be impermissible. A day does not go by when the rift between China and the west does not deepen. The root cause of all these conflicts is the failure of the capitalist system worldwide. Indeed, the "success" of the American stock market is inversely proportional to the failure of the rest of the world. Indonesia, Colombia, Venezuela and a host of other countries are already in the center of massive class struggles. The problems of the Balkans are intractable so long as the fundamental structural problems in the world economy persist. What I have been urging for the past year or so is a reorientation in our way of thinking. Although I realize it is difficult for many of us to make such a shift, I reserve for myself the right to be an irksome reminder of the imperative to reorient our thinking. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6836] Re: An important Sean Gervasi article
There's been some confusion about where exactly this article is on the Covert Action webpage. Here is the exact URL which will point you to it: http://www.covertaction.org/lead_frameset_5.htm Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6835] Re: Compensation for Mistakes?
Ken Hanly wrote: Does NATO intend to pay any compensation to the Chinese for the mistaken attack on its embassy? The unexploded cruises are a gift to Chinese reverse engineers. Doug
[PEN-L:6832] DC Heath?
Does D.C Heath publishing still exist? If not, who bought them? Thanks, Doug Orr PS if they exist, does anyone know their URL?
[PEN-L:6827] Re: Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
At 01:31 PM 5/14/99 -0400, Louis wrote: Barkley, you leave out enormous gaps in your account of the Balkan problems. Milosevic's attack on Kosovan autonomy did not come out of the blue. It was preceded by at least 7 years of mounting tensions in which Kosovars had made life miserable for the average Serb, to the point of driving many from the province. I think this is important, too. he quotes: At a soccer match in Belgrade this October, fans of the Pristina team from Kosovo started chanting ''E- Ho! E-Ho!,'' for Enver Hoxha. About the same time, a post office was bombed and an electric power plant, sabotaged. ''Kosovo is finished as Serb territory, that's for certain,'' said Milutin Garasanin, a distinguished archeologist at Belgrade University. to what extent are the current troubles in Serbia due to Enver Hoxha's efforts to attack Tito (or due to antagonisms between the old Yugoslavia and the old Albania)? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6826] Re: Re: Bubble bursts finally with a vengence!
Tom Walker wrote: APRIL CPI STILL SHOWS NO SIGNS OF WAGE-PUSH INFLATION. Quite true. The real wage growth of the last few years seems to have peaked. Real wages are still positive, year-to-year, but ebbing. Doug
[PEN-L:6823] Re: Military (was EPR, prison, interest rates)
Robert Naiman wrote: So how does the U.S. look compared to other OECD countries if you count institutionalized adults as part of the population? Can one also account for the role of the military? Doug gave us the figures on incarceration, but what about the military? I remember reading somewhere that about 1 million people are employed by the US armed forces. Is that correct? Yoshie 1 million figure has been pretty consistent since onset of Cold War... number has declined a bit in recent years and is the lowest it has been since 1950..there are currently about 830,000 (almost 30% of present total) civilian employees of the federal gov't working for Defense Dept (called War Dept. until 1944)...in addition, some 260,000 work for Veterans Affairs Dept, a number comparable to all federal agencies associated with social and welfare activities combined... current number of uniformed military personnel is about 1.5 million, also the lowest figure since 1950... Michael Hoover
[PEN-L:6819] Gregor Gysi letter to Slobodan Milosevic
Barkley wrote: I think that this is a very interesting letter. Unfortunately we all must face another hard fact. Part of the fact that Milosevic has won (nor more "petulance," Louis, now I'll just call him a schmuck and a mass murdererer (would the 200,000+ of the Croatian-Bosnian war be alive if he had died of a heart attack in 1986?) Barkley, you leave out enormous gaps in your account of the Balkan problems. Milosevic's attack on Kosovan autonomy did not come out of the blue. It was preceded by at least 7 years of mounting tensions in which Kosovars had made life miserable for the average Serb, to the point of driving many from the province. This is from a December 25, 1983 NY Times article by David Binder: During 1982, the Serbian parliament, party councils and press were bursting with expressions of concern over the steady migration of Serbs out of the autonomous province of Kosovo, the southern plateau region abutting Albania. The pain was almost palpable as report followed report of the flight of thousands of families of Serbs and their mountain cousins, the Montenegrins, leaving more and more of the land in the hands of the burgeoning Albanian minority. The Serbs were keening, not only because Kosovo was the birthplace of the Serbian nation a thousand years earlier, but also because, across the Sava River, the rich Vojvodina flatlands appeared to be drifting away from the control of Belgrade as the large Hungarian minority and a disaffected population of Serbs asserted themselves politically. In the Belgrade cafes, Serbs began to speak sardonically of ''Narrow Serbia,'' - that is, Serbia without Kosovo and without the Vojvodina. At a soccer match in Belgrade this October, fans of the Pristina team from Kosovo started chanting ''E- Ho! E-Ho!,'' for Enver Hoxha. About the same time, a post office was bombed and an electric power plant, sabotaged. ''Kosovo is finished as Serb territory, that's for certain,'' said Milutin Garasanin, a distinguished archeologist at Belgrade University. Such, it appears, is the outcome of the 1981 Pristina University riots in support of political independence that sparked an uprising by the Albanians all across Kosovo and in ethnic Albanian communities dotted around Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia. Kosovo Serbs were warned by their ethnic Albanian neighbors to get out, and some were physically harmed. What had begun centuries ago as a gradual drift of Serbs northward out of Kosovo ended in a frightened exodus - authorities put the total at some 13,000 people in three years, although off the record, officials suggest the number is more like 70,000. Token efforts were made by Belgrade authorities to escort the fearful back to their homes, but few wanted to live in armed settlements in a hostile land. As far as Croatia and Slovenia are concerned, they had opted for capitalism. In reality, Serbia was stuck in the middle. The prosperous republics were prepared to split, while the least prosperous province was to become even more aggressively anticommunist as the national treasury was diminished by the secession of Croatia and Slovenia. The Kosovars, who are largely peasant in social composition, adopted a form of nationalism that was in keeping with most of the anti-Soviet secessionist movements in the 1940s and 50s. Like the Ukraine, the Albanian nationalists were militantly anticommunist. Although the KLA has a reputation for some kind of Maoism, I would suspect that the Khmer Rouge is closer to Maoism than these bandits. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:6818] Re: Re: Re: Old foggies/fogeys
Michael, The problem is that the heterodox old fogeys are not in positions of power in the main Ph.D. granting institutions. There are a few such institutions that have heterodox economics programs. But they are few in number and their graduates have a great deal of trouble getting placed out of their circle in such institutions. Barkley Rosser -Original Message- From: Michael Keaney [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Friday, May 14, 1999 12:46 PM Subject: [PEN-L:6815] Re: Re: Old "foggies"/"fogeys" On Fri, May 14, 1999, 2:42 pm, Tom Walker wrote: Michael Keaney wrote: One possible advantage accruing from present circumstances - more an unintended side effect - is that the so-called old fogeys preserve what remains of heterodox teaching and research. On the other hand: "As with other marginal groups, a certain handful of [heterodox old fogeys] are accorded higher status that they may perform a species of cultural policing over the rest. . . Such exceptions are generally obliged to make ritual, and often comic, statements of deference to justify their elevation." I've paraphrased from Kate Millett's Sexual Politics (1969), substituting "heterodox old fogeys" for "women". By definition, a "heterodoxy" offers a critique of the arbitrary selection and privileging of some discourses (orthodoxy) over others. But no critical discourse has the right to exempt itself from its own critique. So we may suppose that certain heterodox positions are "more orthodox" -- that is to say, more _deferential_ to the orthodoxy -- than others. And, we might suppose that it is those "less hetero" heterodoxies that are allowed by the orthodox to represent heterodoxy. Thus the "advantage" of preserving an old fogey heterodoxy must not be assumed to accrue to heteroxy per se. Quite the contrary. I am not exempting critical discourse from its own critique. Far from it - assuming the existence of a significant number of heterodox old fogeys in positions of relative power and influence, especially with regard to course development and delivery, doctoral supervision and faculty appointment, then these would have a lot of answering to do as regards the shrinking opportunities for heterodox study in American and British universities. Similarly, what about the recruitment opportunities for heterodox youngsters? Those who espouse greater disciplinary or intellectual pluralism do not seem to have had much impact regarding the nurturance of the provision of alternative perspectives. This observation becomes a criticism when it refers to those who could have made a difference. All of which is to say that my original point was that recruitment policies focusing primarily or significantly on the race, class or gender of applicants/candidates should also recognise the intellectual individuality of these individuals. Otherwise we can be as politically correct and as reflective of wider social composition as could be possible while the very ideology we would all indict as at least culpable in the legitimation and prolongation of our societal and international woes would be further propagated at the expense of any critical perspective. And then where would that leave us? Michael Michael Keaney Department of Economics Glasgow Caledonian University 70 Cowcaddens Road Glasgow G4 0BA Scotland, U.K.
[PEN-L:6815] Re: Re: Old foggies/fogeys
On Fri, May 14, 1999, 2:42 pm, Tom Walker wrote: Michael Keaney wrote: One possible advantage accruing from present circumstances - more an unintended side effect - is that the so-called old fogeys preserve what remains of heterodox teaching and research. On the other hand: "As with other marginal groups, a certain handful of [heterodox old fogeys] are accorded higher status that they may perform a species of cultural policing over the rest. . . Such exceptions are generally obliged to make ritual, and often comic, statements of deference to justify their elevation." I've paraphrased from Kate Millett's Sexual Politics (1969), substituting "heterodox old fogeys" for "women". By definition, a "heterodoxy" offers a critique of the arbitrary selection and privileging of some discourses (orthodoxy) over others. But no critical discourse has the right to exempt itself from its own critique. So we may suppose that certain heterodox positions are "more orthodox" -- that is to say, more _deferential_ to the orthodoxy -- than others. And, we might suppose that it is those "less hetero" heterodoxies that are allowed by the orthodox to represent heterodoxy. Thus the "advantage" of preserving an old fogey heterodoxy must not be assumed to accrue to heteroxy per se. Quite the contrary. I am not exempting critical discourse from its own critique. Far from it - assuming the existence of a significant number of heterodox old fogeys in positions of relative power and influence, especially with regard to course development and delivery, doctoral supervision and faculty appointment, then these would have a lot of answering to do as regards the shrinking opportunities for heterodox study in American and British universities. Similarly, what about the recruitment opportunities for heterodox youngsters? Those who espouse greater disciplinary or intellectual pluralism do not seem to have had much impact regarding the nurturance of the provision of alternative perspectives. This observation becomes a criticism when it refers to those who could have made a difference. All of which is to say that my original point was that recruitment policies focusing primarily or significantly on the race, class or gender of applicants/candidates should also recognise the intellectual individuality of these individuals. Otherwise we can be as politically correct and as reflective of wider social composition as could be possible while the very ideology we would all indict as at least culpable in the legitimation and prolongation of our societal and international woes would be further propagated at the expense of any critical perspective. And then where would that leave us? Michael Michael Keaney Department of Economics Glasgow Caledonian University 70 Cowcaddens Road Glasgow G4 0BA Scotland, U.K.
[PEN-L:6810] Re: Old foggies/fogeys
Michael Perelman wrote: In my department, the average tenure must be about 20 years. We have no young people and we old foggies hang on. Michael Keaney wrote: One possible advantage accruing from present circumstances - more an unintended side effect - is that the so-called old fogeys preserve what remains of heterodox teaching and research. On the other hand: "As with other marginal groups, a certain handful of [heterodox old fogeys] are accorded higher status that they may perform a species of cultural policing over the rest. . . Such exceptions are generally obliged to make ritual, and often comic, statements of deference to justify their elevation." I've paraphrased from Kate Millett's Sexual Politics (1969), substituting "heterodox old fogeys" for "women". By definition, a "heterodoxy" offers a critique of the arbitrary selection and privileging of some discourses (orthodoxy) over others. But no critical discourse has the right to exempt itself from its own critique. So we may suppose that certain heterodox positions are "more orthodox" -- that is to say, more _deferential_ to the orthodoxy -- than others. And, we might suppose that it is those "less hetero" heterodoxies that are allowed by the orthodox to represent heterodoxy. Thus the "advantage" of preserving an old fogey heterodoxy must not be assumed to accrue to heteroxy per se. Quite the contrary. But I'm sure my incessant carping on this theme is boring to those who would distinguish between "the informed critique" and my inchoate rage at the deep structures of oppression. Long live econometrics! Long live NAIRU! Long live tenure for a handful of well-behaved radicals! regards, Tom Walker http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
[PEN-L:6809] Re: una preguntita
Tom L, So true, so true, my friend, And then I look at the O.J. case, Littleton, Bill "all is fair in love and war" Clinton, the fall of the Soviet Union , DNA results of all kinds, etc. and I think: Truth is stranger than fiction; life imitates art. I'll do a web search on Ewen. I heard a guy speak who used to work for tv advertising who is now anti-tv. He was spilling some of the PR secrets too. Television tries to turn fiction into fact in another way. CB Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/14/99 10:23AM I too like facts, and when they resonate as urban legend or rumor, I like them even better! Speaking of fiction becoming fact, rather than fact becoming popular---take a look at Stuart Ewen's book PR! A Social History of Spin. The novel thing about rumors and legends, is they often turn out to be true! Your email pal, Tom L. Charles Brown wrote: TL My idea is WE are correct, virtuous, highminded, cultured, beautiful, efficient, poets, practical, sporty, pals ,all that. Nothing's too good for the working class. It is THEY (the tophats) who are wrong, bad, lowdown, incorrect, grammatically off, trashy. As we say in the vernacular. I'm into fact over fiction. I never seem to be able to finish novels. CB Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/14/99 09:41AM Yes, they sure do---and I really don't care how it's phrased. Vernacular is vernacular. And I'm sure your an expert on Detroit vernacular. ;o) I read super market tabloids and enjoy urban legends, too. Your email pal, Tom L. Charles Brown wrote: Tom, Don't you think most politicians need a lot of political correction ? Charles Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/13/99 04:04PM Well, Jim, if it's controls on capital flows. And you can combine that with an effort to educate and legislate controls right into the corporate charters of all corporations foreign, domestic and alien. Then you might have a chance of a "better" globalization. What we do here sets the standard for the rest of the world! On the subject of youth. It's sort of like the Canadian Steelworker told Doug Henwood's reporter, welcome to the wonderful world of minimum wage or something like that. Until people start demanding change and I mean demanding it from the politicians nothing is going to change. People are going to have to button-hole politicians of all parties from the local hack to as high as they can reach if they want real change---up close and very personal and not necessarily politically correct. Your email pal, Tom L. Jim Devine wrote: Tom Lehman wrote: For the big industrial unions like the Steelworkers, which is a pretty diverse if not the most diverse union, the losses in jobs resulting from downsizing, globalization etc. have been particularly cruel to our Black membership. Because they and their children will never see union protected jobs again in the so-called brownfields areas. Good jobs to which they have had easy access. right: downsizing (broadly defined) hits the "last hired" (those with the least seniority) hardest. One of the reasons for increased inequality among wage earners is that there is a shrinking of the sector of the working class that is able to benefit from "good jobs" (the primary labor market jobs) so that more and more workers, including younger white workers, are crowded in the secondary labor markets. The whole question is where do you draw the line on globalization, and how do you combat globalization? I think a better question is how can we create a _better_ globalization rather than trying strategies that dump the costs on other nations' working classes via protectionism and the like? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6806] Re: una preguntita
I too like facts, and when they resonate as urban legend or rumor, I like them even better! Speaking of fiction becoming fact, rather than fact becoming popular---take a look at Stuart Ewen's book PR! A Social History of Spin. The novel thing about rumors and legends, is they often turn out to be true! Your email pal, Tom L. Charles Brown wrote: TL My idea is WE are correct, virtuous, highminded, cultured, beautiful, efficient, poets, practical, sporty, pals ,all that. Nothing's too good for the working class. It is THEY (the tophats) who are wrong, bad, lowdown, incorrect, grammatically off, trashy. As we say in the vernacular. I'm into fact over fiction. I never seem to be able to finish novels. CB Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/14/99 09:41AM Yes, they sure do---and I really don't care how it's phrased. Vernacular is vernacular. And I'm sure your an expert on Detroit vernacular. ;o) I read super market tabloids and enjoy urban legends, too. Your email pal, Tom L. Charles Brown wrote: Tom, Don't you think most politicians need a lot of political correction ? Charles Tom Lehman [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/13/99 04:04PM Well, Jim, if it's controls on capital flows. And you can combine that with an effort to educate and legislate controls right into the corporate charters of all corporations foreign, domestic and alien. Then you might have a chance of a "better" globalization. What we do here sets the standard for the rest of the world! On the subject of youth. It's sort of like the Canadian Steelworker told Doug Henwood's reporter, welcome to the wonderful world of minimum wage or something like that. Until people start demanding change and I mean demanding it from the politicians nothing is going to change. People are going to have to button-hole politicians of all parties from the local hack to as high as they can reach if they want real change---up close and very personal and not necessarily politically correct. Your email pal, Tom L. Jim Devine wrote: Tom Lehman wrote: For the big industrial unions like the Steelworkers, which is a pretty diverse if not the most diverse union, the losses in jobs resulting from downsizing, globalization etc. have been particularly cruel to our Black membership. Because they and their children will never see union protected jobs again in the so-called brownfields areas. Good jobs to which they have had easy access. right: downsizing (broadly defined) hits the "last hired" (those with the least seniority) hardest. One of the reasons for increased inequality among wage earners is that there is a shrinking of the sector of the working class that is able to benefit from "good jobs" (the primary labor market jobs) so that more and more workers, including younger white workers, are crowded in the secondary labor markets. The whole question is where do you draw the line on globalization, and how do you combat globalization? I think a better question is how can we create a _better_ globalization rather than trying strategies that dump the costs on other nations' working classes via protectionism and the like? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Bombing DESTROYS human rights. US/NATO out of Serbia!
[PEN-L:6801] Old foggies/fogeys
On Thu, May 13, 1999, 7:30 pm, Michael Perelman wrote: Jim Devine made a point that I raised some time ago. In my department, the average tenure must be about 20 years. We have no young people and we old foggies hang on. Previously, when we had more openings, some young people did not get permanent jobs. Job tenure is now much higher here, but that represents a step back from the 70s. One possible advantage accruing from present circumstances - more an unintended side effect - is that the so-called old fogeys preserve what remains of heterodox teaching and research. The vast majority of new PhDs and other potential applicants are most likely to be versed only in the conventional wisdom, given the paucity of heterodox provision, a situation likely only to get worse in the foreseeable future. Thus, paradoxically, our ability to identify, investigate and remedy problems of tenure and recruitment may diminish as these are identified, investigated and remedied. Michael ps As a "lurker" of some weeks' standing, may I say a big thankyou to all who have provided an invaluable information service concerning the travesty of a moral crusade grinding incessantly onward in Yugoslavia. Michael Keaney Department of Economics Glasgow Caledonian University 70 Cowcaddens Road Glasgow G4 0BA Scotland, U.K.
