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The Last Of The Occupy Movement?

Posted on September 15, 2012 in Articles

The Article: Oakland, the Last Refuge of Radical America by Jonathan Mahler in The New York Times.

The Text: The Anti-Capitalist Brigade started gathering early on May Day at Oakland’s Snow Park. There was free coffee, oatmeal, doughnuts, fliers with the day’s agenda and plenty of pot. A “street medic” — “I just finished a wilderness first-aid course,” he told me when I asked about his training — tended to his first case of the day, a man in his 20s whose leg had been beaten to a purple hue with a metal rod in an overnight fight in the park. Nearby, an organizer reminded protesters to take down the toll-free number for the National Lawyers Guild: “This is important. Do not put it in your cellphones, because if you get arrested, the cops will take those away. Write it on your bodies. In indelible ink. There are Sharpies on the table.”

Mayor Jean Quan has feuded with her own police department, complicating the response to Occupy Oakland.

No central action was planned. A coalition of labor unions had asked Occupy Oakland, with its proven ability to turn out large numbers of militant activists, to blockade the Golden Gate Bridge, but then withdrew the request at the last minute. Instead, thousands of Occupy protesters met at various “strike stations” and fanned out into the streets with shields and gas masks (or the homemade alternative: bandannas soaked in vinegar), transforming downtown Oakland into a roving carnival of keyed-up militants of every shape and size: graduate students, tenured professors, professional revolutionaries, members of the Black Bloc, dressed like ninjas, their faces obscured.

No Luck In Love? Blame The Economy

Posted on September 14, 2012 in Articles

The Article: How Job Insecurity Is Messing Up Your Love Life by Lynn Paramore in AlterNet.

The Text: What does love feel like when you don’t know what tomorrow will bring? When life as you imagined it seems further and further out of reach? How do you know when it’s time to hold on to what you’ve got, or let go in the face of mounting anxiety? What if you’re so stressed out you can’t even think?

Trends like restructuring, privatization, mergers, downsizing, and relentlessly high unemployment are transforming intimate relationships. Chronic job insecurity is shifting the way we approach the idea of hooking up, having sex, staying together, and starting families. And it might just be changing the very nature of romance.

One minute you’re happily planning a life together and talking about having kids. Then, suddenly, everything changes.

Israel’s Fading Democracy

Posted on September 13, 2012 in Articles

The Article: Israel’s Fading Democracy by Avraham Burg in The New York Times.

The Text: WHEN an American presidential candidate visits Israel and his key message is to encourage us to pursue a misguided war with Iran, declaring it “a solemn duty and a moral imperative” for America to stand with our warmongering prime minister, we know that something profound and basic has changed in the relationship between Israel and the United States.

My generation, born in the ’50s, grew up with the deep, almost religious belief that the two countries shared basic values and principles. Back then, Americans and Israelis talked about democracy, human rights, respect for other nations and human solidarity. It was an age of dreamers and builders who sought to create a new world, one without prejudice, racism or discrimination.

Listening to today’s political discourse, one can’t help but notice the radical change in tone. My children have watched their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, kowtow to a fundamentalist coalition in Israel. They are convinced that what ties Israel and America today is not a covenant of humanistic values but rather a new set of mutual interests: war, bombs, threats, fear and trauma. How did this happen? Where is that righteous America? Whatever happened to the good old Israel?

Can Schools Fix The Economy?

Posted on September 12, 2012 in Articles

The Article: Can schools fix our economy? by Richard Kirsch in Salon.

The Text: We all know that the key to our economic future is a more educated workforce, right? Here, for example, are the “Guiding Principles” of President Obama’s education policies: “Providing a high-quality education for all children is critical to America’s economic future. Our nation’s economic competitiveness and the path to the American Dream depend on providing every child with an education that will enable them to succeed in a global economy that is predicated on knowledge and innovation.”

Now it’s certainly true that a good education is still the best ticket – other than inheriting wealth – to entering the middle class. In the simplest terms, Americans with a Bachelor’s degree or more earn more than the average wage and those with an Associate’s degree earn less. So it makes sense for us to encourage our children to get a good education. But is the president’s assertion that the path to the American Dream in the new global economy depends on providing every child with a good education true?

As an important new report underscores, if that is the only path we rely on, our economy will come up way short and so will the great majority of Americans who are striving to live the American Dream – with and without a good education.

Gore Vidal’s Suggested Reading For Americans

Posted on September 11, 2012 in Articles

The Article: Gore Vidal and His Reading List for America by Michael Winship in TruthOut.

The Text: I briefly interviewed Gore Vidal once. It was a little more than thirty years ago, at the end of a long day of filming in Los Angeles. I was working as writer and segment producer on an arts magazine pilot for public television.

Vidal was staying at a friend’s house near the Hollywood Bowl. At 5 pm, the prearranged time, I knocked on the door and after a minute or so heard footsteps coming down stairs. The door opened and there he was, swathed in a long, elegant, silk paisley robe (of course!) and still half-asleep.

I told him who I was and reminded him why I was there. Ronald Reagan had been in the White House for less than a year and already was threatening major cuts to funding for the arts, so as part of the pilot, I was interviewing authors about books they thought might help the rest of us through his presidency. The answers would be spotted throughout the show, like currants in a bun. Vidal nodded and returned upstairs to change while the crew set up in the living room.