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As always, very insightful comments.
I would add something to your remarks about labor, I think.
In addition to the ways you suggest, I would raise a critical institutional change that is needed. Labor movements only work well when they are activist and have grassroots democracy over this activism. Almost every union in the USA has a long history of restricting this in practice--and much of labor law was enacted in part as a way to force them to do this. Nonetheless, one thing that some labor officials might do is to be verbally supportive of rank and file democracy and to be less repressive when workers start to enact it.
-----Original Message-----
From: Hunter Gray <[email protected]>
To: Redbadbear <[email protected]>
Cc: Bear Without Borders <[email protected]>; SycamoreCanyon <[email protected]>; marxist <[email protected]>; newgreencanada <[email protected]>
Sent: Fri, Sep 13, 2013 6:10 am
Subject: [BearwWthoutBorders] Just a few personal comments
From an RBB discussion:
Night before last, I went through several news channels. On one, Obama was being criticized from several perspectives for his wishy-washy handling of the Syrian crisis. (I, too, am wary of a strong presidency -- but Obama's vacillations on Syria, undergirded by his consistent display of verbal militancy and military strength, took this country into a very dangerous -- for everyone -- box canyon.) On another, Putin, whose piece in the NYT had already hit the streets, was being damned as a "dictator" and such. I went to Rachel Maddow who was off on an anti-gun thing.
I hit the sack.
I think Putin's piece called it pretty accurately. When he criticizes the self-propounded perception that the U.S. is "exceptional" in a "beneficent" fashion, he's basically challenging the arrogant ethnocentrism that's been carefully constructed for decades as a cover for many self-serving adventures abroad. The DC chickenhawks et al. can't stand thoughtful criticism -- although I suspect most are now privately relieved by the Russian initiative. Good to see the anti-war reaction by most of the American people.
And I think Putin's right on when he points out that the rebel forces in Syria are increasing infiltrated by Al Qaeda and comparable elements.
On the American labor movement, I have little faith in the often verbose but frequently action-less Trumka et al. The basic answer to Labor's malaise is to cut 'way back on useless political contributions and to put the money into effective field organizing -- and effective service generally, especially in the processing of grievances. I add, too, that there's importance in actually organizing the unemployed wherever possible.
From my observation, the industrial unions get along pretty well these days with the crafts. There can be little fights over jurisdiction. Sometimes, the industrials encompass craft classifications but, more often cover production and maintenance -- with the various crafts actively on the scene. When it comes down to the local level, industrial and craft workers are frequently friends and neighbors and, in strike actions, stand together, and certainly do so where the same bargaining units are involved.
Hunter Bear
HUNTER GRAY [HUNTER BEAR/JOHN R SALTER JR] Mi'kmaq /
St. Francis Abenaki / St. Regis Mohawk
Member, National Writers Union AFL-CIO
Check out our massive social justice website
www.hunterbear.org The site is dedicated to our
one-half Bobcat, Cloudy Gray, and to Sky Gray:
http://hunterbear.org/cloudy_gray.htm
.
See my new expanded/updated "Organizer's Book,"
JACKSON MISSISSIPPI -- with a new substantial
introduction by me. And this book is also an activist's
how-to manual: http://hunterbear.org/jackson.htm
And see the related http://crmvet.org/comm/hunter1.htm
and also "Fifty Years: Remembering Medgar Evers" :
http://www.solidarity-us.org/site/node/3876
See the Stormy Adoption of an Indian Child [My Father]:
http://hunterbear.org/James%20and%20Salter%20and%20Dad.htm
(Many photos.)
Our very substantial page on effective community organizing
techniques: http://hunterbear.org/my_combined_community_organizing.htm
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