The Infamous Ink

I read the New Yorker less frequently than I used to. I had to admit at a certain point that I didn’t understand half of what they write about, and their fiction section is as thrilling as moon pie on a paper plate. Occasionally they still write something that grabs my attention and today yielded this article on the so-called paradox of free trade:

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2008/05/26/080526ta_talk_surowiecki

The author plays into an age old fallacy of believing that political candidates (in this case, Clinton and Obama,) actually plan to follow through on the promises they make during the campaign. They compare the primary contest to a “who hates free trade more” competition and then chastise the Democratic candidates for not understanding the “paradox” that free trade represents.

That paradox: raising tarriffs on China to help middle Americans will eventually hurt middle and lower class Americans because it will effect their buying power. Buying power that is used to by cheap clothes and shoes made by Chinese children who earn less than a dollar an hour in a sweatshop.

The logic is the same that has brought us the (Still waiting for my) economic stimulus package. Ordinary Americans will quickly spend the money that is being sent to them, and thus will help the economy. If you read between the lines, the administration is saying that poor people are stupid and will give the money right back to us by purchasing useless shit.

I may benefit from cheap goods made in China. In fact, I’m wearing a pretty cheap button-up shirt right now that was made there. But you know what I would benefit from EVEN MORE? A real job that pays well, is protected from outsourcing, and has the backing of a union. Then maybe, just maybe, I could afford to stop buying cheap goods that don’t last very long, and enjoy the luxuries of travel and education like the wealthy.

The anusless masses who subscribe to the New Yorker and the National Review should be smart enough (because of all that expensive education) to understand that lower and middle class Americans wouldn’t make such supposedly stupid buying decisions if they could actually afford to make good ones.

Obama has played the populist card as well as anyone, while nobody (except the middle class people who refuse to vote for him) seems to notice that he thinks free trade is the greatest thing since the wheel. It says so on his website.

Meanwhile, nobody was more responsible for the unleashing of free trade than Bill Clinton. Is it not painfully obvious to anyone that the Democratic party doesn’t give a fourth of a flying fig about average Americans’ interests? (Which is still twice as much as Republicans)

Don’t buy the hype. The benefits of free trade for average Americans (and Chinese) are far outweighed by the costs.

Do you want to fight for immigrants’ rights and economic justice?

MOBILIZEORGANIZE

Make a difference … become a member of the UNITE HERE Organizing Team working to organize hundreds of thousands of low-wage workers in hotel, casino, retail and laundry work throughout North America. Help workers stand together and fight for their rights and economic security. We are interviewing applicants for a two day intensive organizing skills workshop.

Recommended participants will have the opportunity to lead organizing campaigns in the Midwest.

UNITE HERE Local 1

2 Day Organizing Training & Evaluation

May 30^th and 31^st 2008

Requirements:

• Desire to fight for justice and organize the unorganized.

• Valid driver’s license.

• Excellent communication skills.

How to Apply:

Illinois applicants send resume to Lou Weeks at weeksunitehere@yahoo.com

Indiana applicants send resume to Marc Carbonneau at mr_carbonneau@yahoo.com

Minnesota applicants send resume to Martin Goff at mgoff@here17.org

For more information on UNITE HERE and its campaigns visit our website: www.unitehere.org

Greetings Fellow Students, Members of the Community and Infamous Ink Readers:
This Thursday, May 1^st, people will turn out across the country to demonstrate and march in celebration of International Workers’ Day, to march for immigrant and labor rights, continuing the struggle of progressive movements through out the history of liberal-capitalism to effect economic and social change. Thursday’s marches are the occasion to recognize and enumerate the intolerable social and political situations enabled by that system today and to demand:

universal amnesty, equal rights in the workplace, the right to unionize, the Employee Free Choice Act, fair wages and full employment, the end of the occupation in Iraq, equal access to education, universal healthcare

CALLING ALL STUDENTS:

Leave campus to join fellow progressive labor and community organizations to

WITHHOLD LABOR and MARCH AND RALLY DOWNTOWN

Take part in a movement to change our society!

Join major events in Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, San Antonio, Dallas Texas, Atlanta Ga, Phoenix, other cities in the United States and Latin America.

Meet at 11:00 am at Ashland and Ogden, and march together to Union Park for a public rally!

Here are five reasons why students of conscience should take part in Thursday’s mobilizations:

1. Student movements have played a major role in social struggles for democracy and civil rights. Students have a unique place in public discourse, as the young people in national institutions of learning, we have the task and privilege to envision and shape the future of our society.

2. Students come from communities that are effected by today’s political problems; we have friends and family who are serving in Iraq, who are threatened by deportation because they do not have legal documentation to work in this country, who do not have access to healthcare, and who labor without just compensation.

3. Students have a unique role in international political discourse. We inhabit the international institutions of higher education, and we benefit from access to funds to study and travel abroad. We study with fellow students and professors from around the world, and are thus empowered to develop a critical international perspective on political issues in this country.

4. Our ‘workplace,’ the university, is an ideal place of political discourse, we have logistical and practical tools to share information and organize ourselves that people working in other parts of society do not have access to.

5. We need to create an international community of citizens of conscience, willing to stand up and send a message to our political leaders, and the rest of society. We need to show that the American public is demanding comprehensive immigration policy reform that protects the civil and human rights of all workers, both native and foreign, who work in this country and contribute to this nation’s wealth.

The Chicago Students for a Democratic Society stand with other progressive community and labor organizations to march on May 1^st.

Take a stand! Join more than 100 students across Chicago that are already planning to come out.

Please look at the following links for more information:

• [RIGHT HERE] Visit the site of one of the major coalition groups planning the May 1^st march.
• [RIGHT HERE] - Read an article on the state of progressive politics of immigration and labor rights.
• [RIGHT HERE] -Listen to an audio file of a panel discussion with organizers of the May 1^st marches for student organizers.

In solidarity,

Ben Blumburg, Ashleigh Campi, Ian Morrison

Chicago Students for a Democratic Society

The Platypus Affiliated Society

A new development has come out in the struggle over tomato pickers’ wages in Florida. If you haven’t heard, Burger King is the only major chain that is still resisting the change. Now comes a story that shows the true colors of the fast food chain: the vice president of the company has been caught posting derogatory messages about the workers’ group.

http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080428/BUSINESS/804280351/1075

He signed on using his not-even-teenage daughter’s screen name to spread false information about the coalition and the propose raise in wages.

How LOW can you go?

I for one, will resist the lure of the flame-broiled behemoth until BK agrees to pay the Florida workers more. How bout you?

For too long I have wondered why those that rock the boat of the status quo are alienated. Most people, I believe, live lives of comfortable displeasure but are too afraid of the consequences any action against that comfortable displeasure may bring. Nothing good comes from just sitting on one’s hands and saying “eh, good enough!” Hope and change, though mocked in recent media and by bitter cynics as loaded campaign words, are very real, tangible things for which to be fought. Nothing, not a single thing, can convince me that private interests are more important than those things that liberated, thinking people demand and, when those private interests are defended by real people because they collect a paycheck from said private interests it makes me question their moral integrity. What is more important, a paycheck or liberty? What is important, a pat on the back or knowing you’ve contributed to the further liberation of people?
No one that writes, contributes or edits this news/cultural criticism blog is diluted enough to call themselves “perfect” or “righteous” but they can say they do not sell out their causes or ideas for any sort of pay. So, more to the point, this entry is an attempt to answer the question of what is more important: the private interests that string people along for pay or real tangible liberty?

No private interest should have the right to discriminate or choose not to grant any sort of due process to those individuals or movements that they deem contrary to their WASP obligations and motives. People should not be held under the thumb of or live in fear of retaliation by any private interests, especially an institution of higher education that is supposedly dedicated to the advancement of new ideas and free speech.
Readers, there is supposed to be justice for all under the law not just interpreted justice for private interests.

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE COLUMBIA COLLEGE COMMUNITY

Dear Students, Faculty, Staff and Administrators of Columbia College Chicago:

It has been brought to my attention, via the awful rumor mill that persists in the basement of the 1104 building, that a student has been banned from participating in Student Government or SOC activities for the remainder of this year and all of next.  I assure you (if this is true) I have my own opinions on this issue but, for fear of retaliation by Columbia College I will refrain from sharing them in detail and simply say this: The fact that a paying student with a sterling academic record is being prevented from being the author of this generation’s culture, based on what amounts to hearsay, is a travesty.   Columbia, to my knowledge and according to the rumors, never conducted a proper investigation into those incidents that led to this student being banned nor was any sort of due process granted; private “business” or not, a human being in the United States is entitled to due process, representation in any meetings or interrogations and an opportunity to appeal.

In addition to the violation of those traditions that make America a place of free people, Columbia has also ignored its own recent statements that it is to be the most student centered media arts college in the world.  Being the most student centered anything means that, ideally, a strong emphasis is placed on hearing, working with, and supporting student endeavors to advance their own cause and interests.  That said, the “code of conduct” is not what the students want.  Students are asking for a comprehensive document that has been written by students for students, not by administrators for their lawyers and insurance companies.  What the college has been doing concerning the Student Bill of Rights amounts to censorship and a clear disregard for grass-roots democratic process.  If the Bill of Rights can no longer be a Student Government issue the only clear assumption I am able to make is that it now becomes a college wide issue.

I am tired of Columbia College and its blatant disregard for Constitutional Rights, American traditions and its own students’ efforts to make Columbia a shining beacon of freedom, political discourse, and art.  Allow students to hear to Student Bill or Rights, if not for anything else but because it is the right thing to do.

Wondering why Columbia Hates Freedom,

Infamous Ink

www.theinfamousink.com