If you’ve been following my conversation with Corey W. deVos (or, even if not) you might find this one interesting, I sure did.
In a somewhat surprising, but welcome development, the American Medical Association has officially adopted a policy which calls for a review of marijuana’s status as a Schedule 1 drug (along with LSC, PCP, and heroin), aka a drug with no known medicinal purpose.
“This shift, coming from what has historically been America’s most cautious and conservative major medical organization, is historic,” said Aaron Houston, director of government relations for the Marijuana Policy Project, who attended the AMA meeting. “Marijuana’s Schedule I status is not just scientifically untenable, given the wealth of recent data showing it to be both safe and effective for chronic pain and other conditions, but it’s been a major obstacle to needed research.”
The health care bill passed by the House is complete bull shit. For exactly not the reason my grandpa insists.
Only a brief list of why:
I know, it’s been less than a week of my (thus far) quasi-triumphant return to blogging. But I’m leaving you. Well, sorta. The fact is that tomorrow I head down to Connecticut (as we used to say in a play on CT’s lame motto “the constitution state”: “the institution state”) to see old friends, go to a wedding, and give my mom some much deserved ‘grandma time’ with Mira; and between now and next Monday, you should expect about zero from me by way of posts. Sorry. I do feel great about finally getting back to writing, and getting back to thinking about more than pregnancy, babies, and work, which is quite literally 9798% of my life over these past 11 months.
In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a few things to chew on:
- A really cool new site, found via commondreams.org, tracking the financial backing behind the new conservative “grassroots” (i.e., “tea party” protests, etc) movement. I read recently that Noam Chomsky had warned a gathering at an Amnesty International event of the dangers that a right-wing populist movement could pose- which I think is a fair point, despite how tempted we may be to simply laugh them off. The truth of the matter, of course, is that much of what such protesters are instinctually reacting against is, well, worth being against or at least questioning. The problem, most of the time, is the angle from which the right arrives at their points. ”Government run” health care? no, of course, shitty. But they take a “populist” stand for private health care, rather than for real, populist, socialized medicine. Etc. My new favorite saying- from the French- that the American right people really needs to meditate on (and move towards): in the United States the people are afraid of the government, in France, the government is afraid of the people. Think about that one.
- Well, before I’ve gotten a chance to go there, seems we’ve fucked up the beautiful Mount Kilimanjaro. The UK Times points out that it’s a dramatic show of global climate change’s effects, which it is, but all I keep thinking is “fuck, what wondrous beauty will be left for my kids? really? only historical footage of Kilimanjaro?
- My partner’s best friend, an old political comrade of mine, and my daughter’s godfather gave me this bottle of Glenmorandie Scotch which I’ve managed to keep on hand for a year, and let me tell you, sipping it right now at 11 pm is grand.
- I don’t know what happened in the past few weeks, but the tone over at my friend Mioke’s blog is noticeably different. Not all the time. But in general, I’ve found his latest posts to be reflective to a degree that is markedly different from his usual iconoclastism, as well as patient and, good lord what word am I gonna use here- digestive of the small town Vermont (American? I don’t know) experience. There’s something very zen going on over there, worth keeping an eye on.
- The big national-hype of NY’s 23rd Congressional District (“the fighting 23rd”) is worth a mention. If you don’t know, there was a Dem, a Republican, and an independent (a “Conservative Party” candidate, right of the GOP candidate). This particular district has been represented by a Republican for longer than anyone is able to remember. The GOP candidate in this case also happens to be a moderate by American political terms (she’s relatively pro-union, her husband being a local AFL-CIO president, as well as being pro-choice). The Conservative Party candidate hit the ground attacking her as “not a true conservative” and, well, did pretty good damage to her. Recently she dropped out of the race (polls were showing here a distant third, as well as she had a hard time raising money). Upon dropping out, she endorsed the Dem, as did a number of national Republicans. All of which has been a rallying-cry for the Conservative Party candidate who’s claiming to be fighting for the soul of the conservative movement. Some national Republicans, however, can see the strategic writings on the wall and are calling for “conservatives” to open up their Party to a wider ‘tent’, lest they be left in the political dust. Well, it just may be too late for that. This race is a great example of the huge schism in the American Right- between moderates and hard rightists- which is going to be a huge problem for the GOP in elections over the near future. Not to worry for them, because the Dems have the same problem on their hands, as progressives continue to wake-up to the B.S. that is president Obama and moderates in that party continue to champion him (or, somehow, despise him for being a “socialist” when in fact he’s as socialist as, I dunno, Regean). Should be interesting, to say the least.
- Interesting note on the state of political protests. Don’t know entirely what I think, but worth a read.
OK, I’ll be back next week. Thanks for being here. Cheers.
Ah yes, now I remember writing, and thinking, and pondering (and throwing my various opinions out at the world)… sorry ’bout that 8-month or so interruption. Life tends to get in the way of one’s best laid plans, I guess.
And when I left off, I was thinking a lot about- in fact, even working in my spare time on a book- the importance of integral theory to the political providence. Conversely, I was also thinking a lot about the many ways in which integral thinkers get politics all wrong. For instance, I just came across a new (to me) site by integral heavy-weight Corey W. deVos, a guy who I generally like (OK, I’ve never met him). This despite the fact that I have some serious disagreements with his take on “integral politics”. But it’s nothing personal against him, since the mistakes he makes are rampant throughout the integral community.
In particular, my attention was drawn to a post up on Mr. deVos’ site which is more or less a mini-manifesto on the wonders- the integral nature even- of green capitalism. As I’ve said before, I’ve found that in general the integral community is liberal (in the American popular sense, liberal to social democratic in the European political sense) and very, very defensive of capitalism. They like it. A lot. At the very best they’d like to see it look more like the capitalist-socialist hybrid that is popular through much of Europe. But the integral community is, from what I’ve seen, more or less 98% upper-middle class or better. Even those “without money” come from privilaged backgrounds (not surprisingly, there’s a high concentration of ‘whiteness’ too, since economic standing and racial make-up are so often related, though, again just from what I’ve seen, the racial mix of the integral community is a bit more diverse than the socio-economic mix).
And while I’m on this tangent (I will get to Mr DeVos’ post and my opinions of what’s wrong with it), a word about the integral community’s general economic background (and connected political leanings): it’s no coincidence at all that the integral community is by-and-large made up of individuals whose economic lot have enabled them to have a higher degree of education, and have afforded them the leisure time to ponder the sorts of bigger picture questions that might lead one to come to an integral vantage point of the world (Kosmos, whatever you’d like to call it). There are, in fact, little if any people (let alone currents) involved with integral theory (or practice or interests) from Harlem, East St Louis, or South Central LA. There are, however, hotbeds of integral activity in Boulder, Ashville, Burlington. Speaking in strictly political terms, people who benefit from a political (economic) system are going to be loath to embrace the destruction of that system, even if the destruction of that system were to bring about a net gain for the majority, or even the planet. Instinctually, we want security and safety, and if we have it, well, it becomes quite a thing to root for something else to take its place, no matter the pros or cons.
… is, surprisingly, every once in a while, a great day to be a Miami Dolphins fan. Especially if some of your regular blog readers are Jets fans. Ha.
Dolphins should end the year no worse than 10-6; Jets should be close to that mark- the season sweep may be useful come tie-breaker time. My biggest (and, in fact, only) concern now is the Patriots. In fact, welcome to the cross-over between this sports post and political life, because there, too, my only concern are the patriots as well.
Every once in a while I find some bit of news that’s not only good, but genuinely exciting; that’s really positive and makes me, well, hopeful. Today I stumbled on just such news. It came to me in the form of Tuesday’s announced partnership between the United Steelworkers (USW) and Mondragon Internacional. USW, of course, is the largest industrial union in the United States, representing over 1.2 million current and retired workers from a variety of sectors. But you might not have heard of Mondragon: they’re a behemoth corporation with over 260 separate entities under their purview- and every single aspect of Mondragon, from top to bottom, is collectively owned and run by their over 100,000 members. Mondragon originated in 1956 in the rural Basque region of Spain, and is actually Spain’s 7th largest corporation. Those 260 separate entities I mentioned operate in over 40 different countries around the world in an almost bizzarly diverse array of sectors, from industrial manufacturing to retail to financial services to construction and, seemingly, almost everything in between. And, yes, all of it collectively owned and managed by the workers themselves.
The partnership between USW and Mandragon is not only promising, but has the potential to completely re-shape economic recovery in the U.S.. From their joint statement about the collaboration:
“We see today’s agreement as a historic first step towards making union co-ops a viable business model that can create good jobs, empower workers, and support communities in the United States and Canada,” said USW International President Leo W. Gerard. “Too often we have seen Wall Street hollow out companies by draining their cash and assets and hollowing out communities by shedding jobs and shuttering plants. We need a new business model that invests in workers and invests in communities.”
Josu Ugarte, President of MONDGRAGON Internacional added: “What we are announcing today represents a historic first—combining the world’s largest industrial worker cooperative with one of the world’s most progressive and forward-thinking manufacturing unions to work together so that our combined know-how and complimentary visions can transform manufacturing practices in North America.”
Highlighting the differences between Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) and union co-ops, Gerard said, “We have lots of experience with ESOPs, but have found that it doesn’t take long for the Wall Street types to push workers aside and take back control. We see Mondragon’s cooperative model with ‘one worker, one vote’ ownership as a means to re-empower workers and make business accountable to Main Street instead of Wall Street.”
And in there is exactly the point: when businesses (be they manufacturing plants, construction companies, retail operations, financial services, whatever) are firmly rooted and invested in the people and places where they exist- not out of some abstract idea or feel-good community relations ploy, but because the “business” itself is the very people who are the community- then there is no question of moving jobs oversees, of outsourcing, of benefit cuts for the bottom and pay increases for the top. Businesses which are in fact the community, and not a bottom-line promoter for Wall Street, or a handful of profit-driven CEO’s are good employers, good neighbors, and good stewards of of the environment; because it’s themselves and their friends and family that they’re employing, it’s their actual neighbors, and their own environment which is all to be not only protected, but even enhanced by their actions. Win, win, win (for everyone except, well, Wall Street).
So cheers to this welcome development. I’ll be keeping a close eye on how they progress.
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