“Occupy”, big labor’s spin machine, has accomplished the not very difficult task of duping us into believing that without that pesky 1%, we’d all go back to pre-recession prosperity. Using people already used to camping in city parks is genius.

A recent article by a former Labor Secretary claims a long held ‘covenant’ between corporations and labor has been broken; that workers could afford to buy the products they made. Back in the day maybe, but HELLO…not in our global economy. How do companies compete paying $100/hr (in salary + benies)  to bolt on fenders when you can get it done in Whereveria for $10 and still be raising Whereverians standard of living 100%. Since when did the Left get so protectionist? Shouldn’t we export democracy and the good life to Whereverias everywhere?

We’ve eaten the world’s lunch for a century because we could take them one at a time. Now they’re organized (euros anyone?), losing ugly fat (austerity programs in Greece, Spain and Italy) AND they’ve been woodshedding (Singapore’s math score’s, Korea’s too. etc.) and many, many are jamming for degrees right now in our top university’s engineering depts.

Bacon said “Knowledge is power”. If national education test scores are any indication, we’re in trouble. That our cherished Entitlements are a ponzi scheme is surprise only to us. Occupy rhetoric sounds like the ‘last in’ investors outside Madhoff’s trial. Ever hear a congressperson apologize for passing legislation that bankrupts us?

Job creation begins at home. The home of the applicant. If you’re happy to have your kids bolt on fenders be prepared to visit them in Whereveria. Otherwise, get a them a math tutor, preferably a visiting scholar from Singapore.

Libraterian (lemme guess: a libertarian with an MLS?):

You’re riffing on Bernstein’s blog post, I think.  He talks about visiting Berkeley and finding unions and Occupy — “all the stuff we need in place if working families are to get a fair slice of the action”.

I agree that the glib comment from Bernstein is bogus but I disagree with your reasoning as to how it is bogus:

A society can compete globally by becoming locally resilient.

A locally resilient community is one capable of producing (locally) most of what it needs:  energy, food, tools, clothes, shelter, and so forth.    A locally resilient community would look in some ways very different from what we have currently in Berkeley (and the region).   As one example, there would be a much greater emphasis on urban farming and consequently a reduced emphasis on ornamental gardens.

Under the current system of global capital — the context in which you compare the US to Europe and Asia — local resilience is actively prevented by capitalists.   Global capitalism thrives by skimming flows of money and goods over long distances.   Therefore it engineers social “solutions” that emphasize global inter-dependence.   For  example, our ability to eat affordably in Berkeley is dependent on systems of industrial farming and its inputs (like massive water diversions, massive amounts of fuel, and so forth).   Because of that centralization of production and long-haul trade, capital is afforded its opportunities to extract profits from both the producers and consumers.   (It’s an essentially religious article of faith with capitalists that so-called economies of scale must inevitably play out in such forms.)

The opposite of local resilience is a condition of global inter-dependence — a bad way to live. Global inter-dependence is inherently unstable because it sets up inevitable “cascade failures”.   In a global trade network, a “cascade failure” is a situation in which one or a small number of remote, isolated components of the trade network fail — but this triggers the failure of adjacent nodes in the trade network, which in turn trigger failures in the next adjacent nodes and so on.     Such cascade failures are a certainty, although their precise timing is not.

A system of global capitalism like we’ve got can not harden itself against such cascade failures because to do so would (a) destroy the margins on trade which capitalists skim;  (b) reduce demand for global trade.   Additionally, some dissenters adopt a strategy — call it terrorism, if you like — that mainly involves attempting to cause cascade failures of global trade by inexpensively attacking and disrupting key nodes.   A simple example is the rise in attacks on oil and gas pipelines.   See the wikipedia article on systempunkt.

While the precise timing of major collapses is hard to predict, there is compelling reason to expect one and even to suspect that one is underway now.    We are running full speed into a large number of walls: peak oil, peak food, peak water, climate catastrophe, financial system chaos, global pandemics, and so forth.

It’s important or at least desirable that many kids learn some math, as you say.  Don’t make the mistake of thinking, though, that they are likely to spend their lives competing for white collar jobs in a global economy: that global network of trade is subject to probable cascade failures.   It’s good that kids learn math as part of becoming generalists who can help to design and maintain locally resilient economies.  If your kid can help design the circuit for a radio in the morning and estimate the ideal size of a cistern in the afternoon then, among other things, that’s some good math teaching at work.

Given those conditions you are surely right that the “restore the bargain” rhetoric of Reich and similar sounding rhetoric of Bernstein misses the point a bit — but then so does your fretting about the number of Asians in higher ed. or the details of nationalism and banking failures in Europe.

On unions, Occupy, and things like them:

The need to transition away from global capitalism to local resiliency is imposed on us essentially by the laws of nature.   This isn’t a question of “lifestyle choice” any longer.

Political and economic organizing can help in several ways.    It creates discursive spaces in which local resiliency can be discussed, analyzed, and envisioned.   It creates  modes of political organization which can begin to work on implementing local resiliency.  It creates a capacity for resistance to the whims of global capatalism — some bargaining leverage to implement the kind of society we need but which global capitalism otherwise works against.   This should help to answer question “since when did the left become so protectionist”.   Protectionism vs. free trade of the sort you are talking about is an analytic framework of global capitalism.   It’s purely about impedance or the lack of it to global capital flows.  Progressives don’t need to take anything other than purely tactical positions on that question — the real fight lies elsewhere.   Protectionism is perhaps, in some cases, a useful tactic for the overall project of taming global capitalism.

Would that Occupy was passing around petitions and starting letter drives and voter drives to change issues like that instead of engaging in futile port closures and other highly visible but ultimately futile protests and trashing public parks.

You seriously think that Occupy Cal could have drawn as much attention to the issue of tuition increases if it had circulated a petition and started a voter drive? 

Maybe Gandhi could have won freedom for India more quickly if he had spent his time on petition drives rather than on civil disobedience. 

The Occupy movement has not been futile.  It has changed the conversation nationwide. 

As a result of the Occupy movement, you and I are talking about the issue of inequality right now.

It was Reich’s article.

You don’t indent?

Does Occupy have any ideas for realizing that goal?  Keeping tuition affordable is an outcome, not an action plan.  No one in public office is thinking “hmm, how can I squeeze those students some more?”  But they are having to deal with less revenue and higher expenses.  As our legislators are mostly reactive, the best approach would seem to be to create a proposal that they can get behind.  Raise taxes?  OK, which taxes and with which other consequences?  Cut other spending and redirect it to the schools?  OK, which spending? 

What’s with the creepy stalkish behavior, libratarian?

Stop personalizing everything and come up with some original ideas of your own. Make a case in the active, not reactive mode.

I see that at least one of those five comments has been removed – a nasty personal insult directed at Bruce Lord.  Berkeleyside comment policy says:

We will delete or censor any comment that:
is abusive….contains ad-hominem attackspromotes hate of any kind

…
Repeat offenders will be banned from commenting on the site.
 
Libraterian has been a repeat offender.  He has repeatedly posted personally abusive comments, comments that promote hate, and comments that contain ad hominem attacks.

In the ideal — but only imperfectly in practice — Occupy is a process not a platform.   It’s  a rallying point and a loose collection of rallying methods for a lot of us looking at the same problems but coming from different angles.   In my view:  Occupy stands for Organize.

http://occupyberkeley.org/occupy-berkeley-beer-committees/

We’re putting the slideshow up again tonight! On Channing, between Telegraph and Bowditch. <3, the UCB Labor Center

See what you just did there?   Do you remember the topic here before you started attacking people? 

I will quote the Berkeleyside policy again:

We will delete or censor any comment that: is abusive …contains ad-hominem attacks
Repeat offenders will be banned from commenting on the site.

There is not a day that goes by without an abusive, ad hominem attack from libraterian.  He is clearly a repeat offender.   This latest comment is nothing but a long string of ad hominem attacks.

Posting personal information about Bruce Love is much worse than most of his comments, and I am glad that it was removed.  He dismisses it by calling it “a vague piece of much more detailed personal information made publicly available whenever one posts using their legal name.”  That sounds very odd coming from someone who does not use his real name.  Presumably, he doesn’t give his name because he doesn’t want anyone stalking him in the way he has stalked Bruce Love. 

There are lots of interesting articles posted on Berkeleyside.  I would like to be able to discuss those articles without having the discussion interrupted by repeated personal insults. 

Also, did you notice this detail?

Libratarian wrote:

“…I see that at least one of those five comments has been removed – a
nasty personal insult directed at Bruce Lord.  Berkeleyside comment
policy …”

Just as I had hoped.

I am having difficulty finding any way to parse that other than as a direct statement that  Libratarian intends to cause problems here.

I must have missed the post we’re all talking about, but I think Libratarian has a good point here.
You have to admit that the obsession with “real names” from a poster who refuses to ever publicly acknowledge his real name here is kind of weird. He doesn’t use his, and won’t ever actually say it here, so why the persistent demands that B.Side require everyone to post under their given names? And do what end? If not because he plans to research the background of everyone who uses their given name here, what does he hope to gain out of it? There’s a weird disconnect there that I don’t like.

I agree that posting personal information here is inappropriate, but I also think that people should be allowed to post using whatever name they wish and be as public or private with their personal information as they want to be.

Someone referring to older folks as “old farts” is “ageist hate speech?”
Ageist? Sure.
Hate speech? No.