People Before Profit blog

Shades of Green: August 30

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 08:43:00 +0000

Shades of Green: August 23

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 07:49:00 +0000

NY students fight higher ed cuts

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 09:53:00 +0000

NEW YORK — On Aug. 19, Governor David Paterson called the legislature into special session to address the state’s growing fiscal crisis. One of the biggest targets is the higher education system. Students are not taking it lying down.

The New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG), Student Assembly of the State University of New York (SUNY), and University Student Senate of the City University of New York (CUNY) are jointly urging legislators to reject the cuts. NYPIRG program coordinator Fran Clark called them a “buffet of awful choices.” The student groups told legislative leaders in a letter, “We submit that the benefits of affordable, accessible, high-quality public higher education far outweigh the costs. Higher education’s power as an economic engine and its potential for workforce development and innovation … represent the state’s best chance to pull quickly out of this economic nosedive.” Students already took a big hit last April, along with seniors, people with AIDS and millions of others receiving human services. Then, SUNY suffered a whopping $150 million in cuts. Now the governor proposes further cuts of $100 million to SUNY, $50 million to TAP (the Tuition Assistance Program), $51 million to CUNY and 6 percent to all “opportunities programs.” The proposal would even cut funding for the new Veterans Tuition Awards in half.

“When you propose cuts to financial aid you take money out of the pockets of students and their families,” Clark told the World in a phone interview. Most programs to be slashed aim to provide low-income New Yorkers with college access.

Students aren't the only ones up in arms. “Slashing the CUNY budget is a terrible policy and absolutely the wrong way to address the budget shortfall,” said Barbara Bowen, president of CUNY’s Professional Staff Congress (PSC) representing 22,000 faculty and professional staff. The PSC and New York City Council Member Charles Barron held a press conference with students at City Hall Aug. 15. Barron was the lone city council member to vote against the recent city budget cutting many human services. The higher education cuts are among $1 billion in cuts the governor is asking lawmakers to pass this week to stave off the $6.4 billion deficit projected for 2009.

Unions, community groups and some legislators in Albany have proposed a different course: taxing the richest New Yorkers.

Assembly Leader Sheldon Silver’s bill for a new state tax on millionaires passed the Assembly but stalled in the Republican-controlled Senate. Now Paterson has even proposed to cap property taxes, which state teachers’ unions say would cripple K-12 public education.

A Paterson advisor, Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, also recommended taxes over cuts. Stiglitz wrote in a letter to the governor published by the New York Sun, “When faced with such an unpleasant choice, economic theory and evidence gives a clear and unambiguous answer: it is economically preferable to raise taxes on those with high incomes than to cut state expenditures.” ldellapiana @cpusa.org

The lefts lasting legacy

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 07:27:00 +0000

BOOKREVIEW

Against Capitalism:

the European Left on

the March

By William A. Pelz

Peter Lang Publishing, 2007, 159 pp.

Historian William Pelz, author of several previous books on the early German left, has written a stimulating short history of the European left that spans the period from the mid 19th century to just after World War I.

Pelz begins with the rise of the International Working Men’s Association (IWMA), formed in 1864. The IWMA was the left’s first attempt to form a worldwide workers movement to foster cooperation between workers in different countries, although the organization was not able to expand beyond western Europe. Karl Marx and Fredrick Engels were not initial organizers but became important leaders of the organization.

Despite its small size and barren treasury, the IWMA was able to collect money to support striking workers, stop strikebreakers from crossing national borders and encourage the formation of unions. According to Pelz, the “conservative press quickly came to see the hand of the International behind every display of public unrest and strike action.”

In the end, bitter divisions between anarchists and socialists tore the organization apart and the IWMA dissolved in 1876. The anarchists, who worked for the abolition of all governments, could not reconcile with the socialists, who wanted to use government to implement social and economic change.

The left continued to grow, reaching its greatest strength in Germany where the Social-Democratic Party reached one million members by 1914. However, rifts emerged within the left between those who advocated socialism through gradual reform and strong unions and those who argued for a revolutionary transformation of society. By the end of WWI, these differences led to an open rupture, with radical elements leaving social democratic parties to form communist parties.

Pelz provides a gripping account of the revolutionary fervor that existed in Germany, Austria, France, Russia, Hungary and Italy after WWI. Fatigued by war and hunger, broad support emerged for socialism in these nations. However, socialist parties in these countries, with the exception of Russia, did little to harness popular discontent to come to power. In Germany, the social democratic government refused to build socialism and did everything possible to halt its spread. A communist government came to power in Hungary but only lasted one month after Romanian and Czech troops invaded the country.

Pelz concludes by trying to explain why the early European left , apart from Russia, was never able to realize its dream of governing. Among other things, he cites the left’s failure to win the support of farmers and to combat anti-Semitism.

However, the left was still able to shape society, forcing conservative governments to implement a raft of changes, including the abolition of child labor and the introduction of compulsory education and universal voting rights.

The lasting legacy of the left endures in western Europe, where workers from Sweden to Spain enjoy unheard of social benefits and long paid vacations. Pelz writes that these “nations where the left was strongest tend to have the highest standard and quality of life on the planet.”

Pelz has written an enjoyable and engaging history of the early European left that deserves to be broadly read.

World notes: August 16, 2008

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 03:38:00 +0000

UN: Asia tops child-death list

Having issued an overall report on the world’s children in June, UNICEF, the UN’s children’s organization, reported Aug. 5 in Dhaka, Bangladesh, that 40 percent of all deaths of children under age five occur in the Asia-Pacific region.

UNICEF’s web site notes disparities between rich and poor in the area, reduced public health expenditures, privatization of health services, lack of obstetrical services, especially in rural areas, and rampant discrimination against women and girls.

In South Asia, male life expectancy exceeds that of women. Improved child survival in China and India, where 2.5 million children died in 2006, is seen as crucial to global achievement of the UN’s Millennium Development Goals targeted for 2015.

Colombia: Uribe’s lie exposed

The Colombian government came under criticism for employing Red Cross insignia in the July 2 operation ending the captivity of 15 hostages held by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. Military appropriation of symbols of neutrality violates Geneva Conventions.

President Uribe begged off by suggesting that a frightened soldier had pulled them out at the last moment. However, a video shown on national television Aug. 5 revealed that Red Cross insignia had been used throughout the operation. Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos called the video release “treason against the homeland.”

Continuing to call the venture a military rescue, the BBC gave short shrift to reports that the army had hijacked a negotiated hostage release.

Japan: Corruption charges taint militarization plans

The dark side of dealings between U.S. and Japanese advocates of Japanese military buildup was on display July 24 with the arrest in Tokyo of Naoki Akiyama on charges of tax evasion.

Akiyama, head of the Japan-U.S. Center for Peace and Cultural Exchange, a bi-national organization of defense officials, weapons manufacturers and military procurement specialists, is accused of depositing consulting fees into U.S. bank accounts. One was set up by the Washington-based Council for National Security.

According to an internal memo cited by the Japan Press Service, Akiyama advised legislators and defense officials belonging to the Japanese Parliamentary Council for National Security, of which he was secretary-general, to ally themselves with the Washington-based organization.

Palestine-Israel: Labor federations to cooperate

The Israeli Histadrut trade union and the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions (PGFTU) agreed in July on measures to protect the rights of Palestinian workers working for Israeli employers.

The report on www.ituc-csi.org cites their joint resolve to rely upon negotiation, dialogue and joint initiatives. Arrangements were made for funds Palestinian workers pay employers to be applied to union representation and legal services.

A 1995 agreement between the two labor groups had never been implemented.

PGFTU General Secretary Shaher Sae’d said he looks forward to “future cooperation and the full respect of the rights of Palestinian workers,” and “attention to tackling the appalling state of the Palestinian economy.”

South Africa: General strike demands government action

The largest strike organized by the Confederation of South African Trade Union in years shut down banks, schools, mines, shops and auto plants in a one day nationwide general strike Aug. 6 aimed at the government.

“Johannesburg looks like a Sunday,” COSATU spokesperson Patrick Craven told the Mail and Guardian.

Over a million workers demonstrated against rising food, fuel and electricity prices as well as the government’s handling of the state-owned Eskom power corporation whose failure to add electrical generating capacity has led to power outages this year. The outages have led to factory slowdowns, and marchers demanded job protection.

Cuba: Puerto Ricans defy travel ban

In July, Puerto Rico’s Juan Rius Rivera Brigade visited Cuba for the 17th time, once more in defiance of U.S. travel rules.

Prensa Latina said the 40-person group attended the July 26 celebrations in Santiago de Cuba and conferred with government officials, artists, historians and community representatives in Trinidad and Sancti Spiritus.

Exiled from Puerto Rico in 1868 after failure of the “Grito de Lares” revolt against Spain, Juan Rius Rivera fought in both Cuban wars for independence, in 1897 assuming leadership of rebel forces in western Cuba on the death of Antonio Maceo.

The U.S. Venceremos Brigade and Pastors for Peace group also challenged the U.S.’ Cuba blockade by traveling to the island in July.

World Notes are compiled by W.T. Whitney (atwhit@roadrunner.com).

Beating the oil barons

Fri, 08 Aug 2008 06:40:00 +0000

Special to PAI WASHINGTON (PAI)--Over the past eighteen months, oil prices have more than doubled, inflicting huge costs on the global economy. Strong global demand, owing to emerging economies like China, has undoubtedly fueled some of the price increase. But the scale of the price spike exceeds normal demand and supply factors, pointing to the role of speculation, and underscoring the need for policy action to clean up the oil market.

Reflecting their faith in markets, most economists dismiss the idea speculation is responsible for the price rise. If speculation were really the cause, they argue, there should be an increase in oil inventories, because higher prices would reduce consumption, forcing speculators to accumulate oil. The fact that inventories have not risen supposedly exonerates oil speculators.

But the picture is far more complicated: Oil demand is not very sensitive to price. In the short run, it is technically difficult to adjust oil consumption. For instance, the fuel efficiency of every automobile and truck is fixed, and most vehicle travel is absolutely needed, such as say, to, from or on the job. And though higher airline ticket prices may reduce purchases, airlines cut oil consumption only by canceling flights.

This illustrates a fundamental point: In the short run, reduced economic activity is the principal way of lowering oil demand. Thus, absent a recession, demand has remained largely unchanged over the past year. Moreover, it is relatively easy to postpone lowering oil consumption. Consumers can reduce spending on other discretionary items and use the savings to pay higher gasoline prices. Credit can also temporarily fill consumer budget gaps.

Although the housing boom in the United States, which helped in this regard, ended in 2006, consumer debt continues to grow, and the Federal Reserve has been doing everything it can to encourage this debt growth. Consequently, for the time being the U.S. economy has been able to pay the oil tax imposed by oil speculators. Unfortunately, proving that speculation is responsible for rising prices--as some congressional Democrats contend--is difficult, because speculation tends to occur in booms, so price rises easily masquerade as a reflection of economic fundamentals. But, contrary to economists’ claims, oil inventories reveal a footprint of speculation.

Inventories are actually at historically normal levels and 10% higher than five years ago. Furthermore, with oil prices up so much, inventories should have fallen, owing to strong incentives to reduce holdings. Meanwhile, The Wall Street Journal has reported financial firms are increasingly involved in leasing oil storage capacity.

The root problem is that financial markets can now mobilize tens of billions of dollars for speculative purposes. This enabled traders collectively to hit upon a strategy of buying oil and quickly re-selling it when end users accommodate higher prices.

The situation is aggravated by the GOP Bush government, which has persistently added oil supplies to the U.S. strategic reserve, driving up demand--and crude oil prices--and providing additional storage capacity.

Absent a change in trader beliefs, the current oil price spike will be broken only by a recession that exhausts consumers’ capacity to buffer higher prices, or when the slow process of substitution of other energy sources for oil kicks in. Thus, economic fundamentals will eventually trump speculation, but in the meantime society will pay a high price.

Whereas oil speculators gained, both the U.S. and global economies suffered and been pushed closer to recession. In the U.S., heavy dependence on imported oil worsened the trade deficit and further weakened the dollar.

This sobering picture calls for new licensing regulations limiting oil-market participation, limits on permissible trading positions, and high margin requirements where feasible. Sadly, given the conventional economic wisdom, implementing such measures will be an uphill struggle.

But some unilateral populist action is possible. A major form of gasoline storage is the tanks in cars. If people would stop filling up and instead make do with half a tank, they would immediately lower gasoline demand. Given lack of storage capacity, this could quickly lower prices and burn speculators

A symbol of change

Thu, 07 Aug 2008 00:53:00 +0000

News Analysis

Those who say there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the Republicans and the Democrats should take a look at a piece of legislation that passed the House, but fell victim to another GOP filibuster. It involves a little-known federal agency, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC).

OPIC does not actually dole out money, except in extreme circumstances — a foreign nation’s takeover of U.S. corporate interests, known as “nationalization.”

OPIC provides federal loans to such U.S. firms to set up shop abroad and provides loan guarantees so the firms can get repaid by the U.S. Treasury — a.k.a. taxpayer dollars — for their investments if a nationalization occurs.

Those loans and loan guarantees have come with no strings attached. And OPIC has been criticized as a great federal subsidy for corporations which want to engage in the “race to the bottom” by investing in developing nations with no workers’ rights, low or no pay and lots of workplace hazards.

Last July, the Democratic-run House passed HR 2798, renewing OPIC for three more years, until Sept. 30, 2011. The Democratic-run Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved it in March. It had strings, lots of strings. We’re quoting from a fact sheet from the Senate GOP Policy Committee, not exactly a pro-worker group:

“The bill provides OPIC may insure, reinsure, guarantee or finance a project only

in a country eligible (under worldwide trade rules) for developing countries or where the Washington government has taken or is taking steps to afford workers internationally recognized workers’ rights.”

The House-passed OPIC bill “gives preference to projects in countries where laws protect workers’ rights, where governments are receptive to private enterprise and where governments agreed to implement extractive industries transparency initiative principles” i.e. to tell their own citizens who’s exploiting their raw materials and why.

That’s quite a change from the untrammeled right OPIC had to make loan guarantees to firms to build plants in countries where a nationalization could occur — and then the U.S. taxpayer would pick up the company’s tab.

The OPIC bill was all set to go. But then the Senate’s “Dr. No,” Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), held it up. He said the OPIC bill might cause new spending. His hold delayed it for months..

The Democrats tried to get around Coburn by packaging the OPIC bill with many others Coburn “held” and bringing them all up for a vote, in one massive bill, on July 28. Guess what happened. Right, a GOP filibuster. The OPIC bill, and all the rest, died.

That’s a common story in this Congress. But what we mean to illustrate here is the “dime’s worth of difference” between the two sides. The Democrats’ OPIC bill attached workers’ rights to the agency’s loan guarantees. The existing Republican-written OPIC law does not. And the Republicans blocked an attempt to change it.

So if anyone tells you there’s no difference in who’s in the White House or who runs Congress, just show them the OPIC bill.

Mark Gruenberg, PAI

House oks Paycheck Fairness Act for female workers

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 23:33:00 +0000

WASHINGTON --Turning back objections from big business and yet another veto threat from the anti-worker GOP Bush regime, the House July 31 passed the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill designed to put some teeth into federal equal employment laws. The 247-178 vote saw 14 Republicans join all 233 Democrats in voting yes. All the no votes came from the GOP.

The measure (HR 1338), pushed for 11 years by Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) and with the strong support of the AFL-CIO and women's rights groups. It drew a blast from the National Association of Manufacturers. NAM said the 1962 law on the issue - which DeLauro's bill updates, is good enough.

NAM said it opposes pay discrimination abased on sex, but warned lawmakers who voted for equal pay that it would use the vote to determine campaign contributions.

Bush's Office of Management and Budget said his senior advisors would strongly recommend he veto HR 1338. They charge it would open the way to unlimited lawsuits over unequal pay. Senate Labor Committee Chairman Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) praised its passage, but did not say when his panel would try to move it.

The threats did not stop DeLauro or her allies from pushing paycheck fairness. “The bill is about ensuring that women who work hard and productively and carry a full range of family responsibilities are paid at a rate they are entitled,” DeLauro said.

Rebutting the White House and big business, DeLauro added “It is time to stand up for working women and their families. We can do that by,,, re-asserting the principle that women and men should be paid the same when doing the same work, and making it real by allowing female employees to sue for compensatory and punitive damages.”

DeLauro said her bill does not impose â€œthe arbitrary caps women face under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. As amended by prior GOP-run Congresses, those caps often put a $300,000 limit on discrimination damages - small change for companies that give woman workers unequal pay.

And DeLauro said her bill “protects employees from retaliation for sharing salary information with their co-workers, with some exemptions.” Lack of data often hampers victims of pay discrimination from finding out, until years later, how much they lost to it.

Aiming at Bush, DeLauro also said her bill “does not eliminate key employer defenses against claims of discrimination. It simply makes clear that when an employer states that its pay scale is informed by a 'factor other than sex' that must actually be true, and not just an excuse to continue discriminatory practices. Kennedy and other lawmakers have introduced a companion Senate bill.

Chicago students take a lesson from civil rights era

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 00:12:00 +0000

CHICAGO – “We’re here today to voice our message for safe passage to and from school and to say we are tired of students being killed,” said 15-year-old Armando Mancilla who attends the Little Village Lawndale High School on the city’s southwest side.

Mancilla spoke passionately during a July 31 press conference at his school, organized by him and his peers. Together they were joined by dozens of their classmates, teachers and staff, youth instructors and community activists to address the on-going violence taking place in the predominantly Latino Little Village neighborhood and the African American North Lawndale community. As many as 31 Chicago Public School students have died due to gun related violence since the end of last July.

“We’re here to demand, to inform and to take charge of this situation,” said Mancilla. “Children are getting shot on their way to school. We should be able to walk down the streets and feel safe,” added Mancilla.

Mancilla said the press conference was organized as a call to action in order to increase neighborhood safety and to reverse negative stereotypes about youth caught in community violence. In addition its purpose was to build broad multi-racial unity through collective power for more jobs, recreational opportunities and programs for youth including voter education and registration drives.

Mancilla participated in a group of students from the Little Village Lawndale High School who took part in a four-week leadership development program that focused on learning about the civil rights movement and connecting that history to the current struggles for undocumented workers today.

The program was a project of the Little Village Community Development Corporation (LVCDC) to address social justice issues and to encourage multi-racial unity, especially between the Latino and African American neighborhoods where the majority of students who attend the high school reside.

Denise Olivares, 17, said the press conference was not only to highlight safe passage for all Chicago students who walk to and from school but also to promote the importance of working together in a very segregated city. “It’s hard enough as minorities to surpass our limitations but it’s even harder for us as minorities to be constantly separated from each other,” added Olivares.

The leadership program gave the students the unique opportunity to visit historical sites and monumental landmarks of the civil rights movement as part of their learning experience. The students visited the 16th Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, and went on a tour at the Lorraine Hotel where Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. They also visited the home where King lived as well as the King Center in Atlanta, Georgia.

Tattiera Green, 17, said the trip was very moving. “The museums were so realistic and you couldn’t help but feel inspired to learn about the movement,” she said. “We were able to experience what people went through during the civil rights era,” added Green. “I learned that it doesn’t matter how old you are but it’s about the actions we take together and when that happens we could really make a difference,” she said.

Devontae Davenport summed up the trip, “I learned about how African Americans were killed so I could have a great education today.”

Mr. Rito Martinez, principal of the Social Justice School, one of the four at the Little Village Lawndale High School, said a guiding theme taught in the classroom is unity. Martinez said the idea is taken from a Martin Luther King Jr. quote, “We must fight together as sisters and brothers in struggle or parish together as fools.” Martinez added, “Everything that we do revolves around this guiding principle and through leadership programs students can become inspired to replicate the historic struggles of the past.”

Jesus Garcia, President of LVCDC, said the largest stakeholders in the Little Village and North Lawndale communities are young people and their presence shows the great promise of our future. “Partnerships and building unity allow us to improve the quality of life in our neighborhoods,” he said. Young people are the largest population in both communities added Garcia. “We need to listen better to young people,” he said. “We have the power to learn and make history. We have heard you and now we will seek to move and confront the challenges ahead.”

Cristina Pacione-Zayas, Director of the Community Schools with LVCDC, said the press conference was the culminating event for the students. “It’s important to instill a sense of history and inspire a drive for activism in order to build bridges between the Black and Brown communities in common struggle,” she said. “This project is one of those that passes the torch, and now these youth need to be prepared to take the lead,” said Pacione-Zayas.

Abdul-Aziz Hassan, instructor of the program, said, “We wanted the students to talk about the civil rights era and immigrant rights today as the same movement.” Hassan said youth today have to grow up too fast compared to past generations. “Young people today are not protected by their youth and are losing that privilege,” he added. “They are born and hit the ground running with no space to second guess or make mistakes.”

Hassan made the closing remarks at the press conference. “Your future is in your hands,” he told the attentive students. “It’s up to you to claim it and protect it.”

Shades of Green: August 2

Sat, 02 Aug 2008 05:08:00 +0000