In a few days Israel’s Knesset will vote on a bill. That, in itself, is not news. The bill, however, is not standard, although I suppose it falls under the classic definition of the role of the state: health, welfare, morals. It “would establish two parliamentary commissions of inquiry to probe human rights groups and other non-governmental organizations perceived as leftist, anti-Israel, or pro-Palestinian.”
The vote has not yet happened; I cannot answer whether two Israeli-Arabic representatives in the Knesset will choose to go to the Arab League summit happening at the same time as this vote, nor can I describe whether six Jewish Israelis who were invited will choose to be at the J Street summit, a first-time event promoting Israeli-Palestinian peace, in Washington D.C. All eight of those representatives are opponents of the bill.
I can say with certainty, because they said so themselves, that several conservative members of the Knesset oppose the bill. Conservatives have a majority in the Knesset, 65 of 120 seats, but nine members of Netanyahu’s coalition (remember that there are several parties which form a coalition) have announced they will not vote for the bill.
More will be revealed.
I have been patient in reacting to the peaceful but serious battle over the future of unions, which began in Wisconsin. I have yet to write a detailed account of that conflict. (I notice I am using words like ‘conflict’ and ‘battle;’ even peaceful protests can become ‘contests’ and ‘battles’ and ‘conflicts.’ These words imply strong disagreement.) I will not spend time summarizing here what the governor has done except what I find necessary in this narrative.
The media, who did some work correctly, found quickly that the issue was larger than a deficit in the state budget. While there appears to be some doubt about whether Wisconsin began the year with a budget surplus, the issues at stake are the same:
Walker has introduced a bill that would strip public employees across the board — from teachers to snowplow drivers — of their right to collectively bargain for sick leave, vacation, even the hours they work. But absolutely nothing would change for local police, fire departments and the State Patrol.
Why try to destroy a union for public employees in this way? John Kenneth Galbraith did some classic work on the balance of power between economic entities: ‘countervailing power.’ Rather than lots of small corporations competing, the competition is between a few large companies and economic powers, including organized labor (unions), retailers and producers. For Galbraith, “the American economy was made up of large organizations, and to function properly, there had to be a system of checks and balances,” and unions are (yes, present tense) a central element, along with producers and retailers and distributors. The government’s role is not to represent workers, according to Galbraith, but to mediate the conflict between all sides. The voice for workers is, guess what, unions. The voice for public employees is, surprise, a union for public employees.
What should be the role of the government in resolving the competing interests in Wisconsin, and other states that have adopted the same pursuits? Let’s turn briefly to the Founding Fathers, and in particular Federalist 51 (Proper Checks and Balances Between Different Departments):
Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It ever has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit. In a society under the forms of which the stronger faction can readily unite and oppress the weaker, anarchy may as truly be said to reign as in a state of nature, where the weaker individual is not secured against the violence of the stronger.
I can infer from Galbraith’s work that checks and balances exist not only between the executive, legislature, and judiciary, but also between competing economic interests. We have seen what happens when there are no checks and balances on a federal government: the government doesn’t work. All sorts of laws get passed because there is no faction that can oppose the law with legislative force. So, what should the role of government be? Shouldn’t it be to preserve the economic checks and balances? Let me return to the question why try to destroy public unions. Forget that it’s being done this way, or that way, or any other way. The reason to destroy a public union is to minimize the power of the unions.
Workers rights has been a common theme in the past week. In fact, since January 25th, when Egyptians gathered for a planned march against their government, there has been a common theme. Workers rights. When I say workers, I refer to everyone: employed, unemployed, public sector, private sector. That’s what they wanted in Tunisia, weeks before January 25th. That’s what they wanted in Egypt. That’s what they want in Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Bahrain, and every other place that’s been in the news. And that’s what they want in Madison, Wisconsin. Workers rights.
There’s been a history of protests in the United States. If I were to start listing all of them, researching all of them, I would never – never – finish writing this. I don’t need to tell you about protests during of the founding of our country, or the ones in the first hundred years of our country. I’ll save that for a history lesson. But workers rights. Workers rights have been an issue for well over a century in our country.
For some cases involving workers rights, see Hammer v. Dagenhart (which ruled that the federal government could not regulate child labor), which was overruled by United States v. Darby Lumber (“the conclusion is inescapable that Hammer v. Dagenhart was a departure from the principles which have prevailed in the interpretation of the Commerce Clause”). Or, you may want to see Gibbons v. Ogden, a classic case, from which I derive the understanding that “commerce, undoubtedly, is traffic, but it is something more: it is intercourse.” Which means to me, that the commerce, the policies, the intercourse of Egypt, Iran, and Madison, Wisconsin, matter to me as if they were my own commerce.
That is a very incomplete sketch of labor history in the United States. The point is, workers have made some progress (from which comes the word ‘progressive‘). We – with lots of help from Madison, have developed collective bargaining, minimum wage, a five day work week, and helping out the person next to you (‘socialism’). These ideas aren’t perfect. They’re changeable. But they’re not things to get rid of, which is a lesson Scott Walker and his ilk have yet to learn. Workers rights.
I get the feeling that the old guard is a little bit slow catching on to the indescribable feeling of a people united, since in their hurry to create divisiveness they have forgotten that feeling.
As is my habit, I was reading through the news. I came upon an interesting article that explains a lot.
What will bring people here out into the streets? There has been a great deal of hand-wringing over failure to take to the streets, lamentations of our non-revolution….
Some say: Why should people here take to the streets? We have democracy, don’t we? Free press, free consumption, a flourishing free market. People aren’t going hungry, Facebook and Twitter are open to everyone.
Am I talking about America? Actually, this article is about Israel. And the article explains why people aren’t out in the streets:
But the truth is that it is difficult to expect the Israeli public to take to the streets, because in fact it has too many things to protest….continued occupation, the recurrent wars, depriving workers’ rights, diminishing health and welfare services, increasing and aggravating societal gaps of all kinds, and – in more recent years – eroding democratic rights and personal freedoms, and growing government corruption.
The difference I see between this critique of Israel, and any critique of America, is the word ‘occupation, and the difference between the word ‘Israeli’ or ‘American’.
Of course, there have been protests in America. There is a leaderless, invisible, and expanding revolution in America against banks and corporations by people (for people, as well). Why? Consider this story that headlined today: Foreclosed: but never missed a payment. Not an accident, and not as infrequent as we’d all like to hope. And there have been other protests in America. Once we were brave enough to protest a war we didn’t believe in, which began March 2003. Ten of hundreds of thousands of us, all across America and the world. What happened? From a plaintiff and legal worker in a case in Chicago,
A class action lawsuit, Vodak v. City of Chicago, was filed after the incident, which I have been involved in as both a plaintiff and a legal worker. The suit is on behalf of the approximately 550 people who were falsely arrested, some spending two days in jail, along with 300 others who were detained on the street for over an hour and a half and forced to discard their signs and anti-war materials. After years of litigation, on the eve of trial Virginia Kendall, the federal judge presiding over the case, ruled in favor of the City of Chicago and determined that the police had the right to arrest the protesters because we did not have a permit. That decision was appealed to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals where it was argued this past October, during which one of the judges stated, “It sounds like a police state, if a large crowd of peaceful people can all just be swept up and arrested by the police.” At the time of this writing, the class members and attorneys await the Appeals Court’s decision, which will determine whether the case can proceed.
Government discouraging rebellion. I think this says it best, about America, Israel, or any other place with or without protests and revolts at the moment (see, for a short list of current protests, South Africa, Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, Yemen, Libya, and Iran.
Israel’s politicians fail to recognize the public’s exhaustion and collective depression, its desire for peace, quiet and equality, and don’t understand that this is the real danger to our existence, security and character. That is because this exhaustion and desire for quiet have led to the yearning for a “strong leader.”
The truth is that we’re all yearning for a revolution. We watch with frustration all of those other people who have succeeded in making a change – not just tried, but succeeded – and we want the same. We, too, want to shape our lives, we also want something exciting and positive to happen to us, something awesome and inspiring – and most of all something that gives hope. Boy, do we need hope.
What are the essentials of democracy? Is it the right to bear arms? Some think so. Is it an implied division between church and state? Some think so. Is it the right of freedom of the press? Some think so… But what good does that do us with reports such as Joe Keohane’s in the Boston Globe that “research at the University of Michigan found that when misinformed people, particularly political partisans, were exposed to corrected facts in new stories, they rarely changed their minds. In fact, they often became even more strongly set in their beliefs.” The research found that actually “we often base our opinions on our beliefs … and rather than facts driving beliefs, our beliefs can dictate the facts we chose to accept”. Freedom of the press? What happens when the press is partisan?
Bill Moyers, commenting on this study to History Makers, a journalistic organization dedicated to factual broadcasting, said,
‘”No wonder many people still believe Obama was born in Kenya, not Hawaii, as his birth certificate shows; or that he is a Muslim, when in fact he is a Christian; or that he is a socialist when day by day he shows an eager solicitude for corporate capitalism. In a Harris survey last spring, 67 percent of Republicans said Obama is a socialist; 57 percent believed him to be a Muslim; 45 percent refused to believe he was born in America; and 24 percent said he ‘may be the antichrist.'”
Ah well, we believe what we want to believe. As Dumbledore said so well, “we see what we want to see.” However, if the ‘right’ sees only what it wants to see, so does the ‘left’; and so do I.
From Moyers again:
Disinformation is not unique to the right, of course….[What about the] airtight case proving that the Bush administration conspired to bring about the attacks on the World Trade Center? …’the [9/11] truthers’ threw out all the evidence of al-Qaeda’s involvement, from contemporaneous calls from hijack victims on the planes to confessions from al-Qaeda leaders both in and out of captivity that they had indeed done it.
Much as I would like to believe these 9/11 ‘truthers,’ at the same time I discredit the ‘birthers’ and ‘truthers’ claiming all sorts of obviously false things about Obama. I, of course, like others, see the partisan world I want to see, while disregarding views that do not help me, and also approach political means with my own biases. What’s my point? Moyers continues not with further rumors and might-or-might-not-be’s, but with reminding his colleagues of Orwell’s 1984. “Control of the present rests on obliteration of the past,” is the inference Moyers makes.
The bureaucrats in the Ministry of Truth destroy the records of the past and publish new versions. These in turn are superseded by yet more revisions. Why? Because people without memory are at the mercy of the powers that be; there is nothing against which to measure what they are told today. History is obliterated.
First of all, that sounds oddly like an authoritarian (perhaps fascist or Communist – Communist as the USSR was, and not was Communism was meant to be) state. Second of all, that sounds oddly like America, especially some news organizations. There are not three, as Cleanth Brooks argued, but four enemies of democracy (says Moyers):
The poet Czeslaw Milosz identified another enemy of democracy when, upon accepting the Noble Prize for Literature, he said ‘Our planet that gets smaller every year, with its fantastic proliferation of mass media, is witnessing a process that escapes definition, characterized by a refusal to remember.’ Memory is crucial to democracy; historical amnesia, its nemesis.
As a brief aside, I have a degree in political science. I have no trouble memorizing facts and figures, no trouble developing hypotheses and seeing the world as it is (or, rather, of course, as I wish to see it). However, I devour an immense amount of information every day, and I too frequently forget somewhat important events, and do not see others coming (for example, the revolutions and lengths of revolutions currently hitting the Middle East). It is too easy to forget.
Here’s an example of what we forget, of what history hides from us. Bill Moyers
spent more than a year working on another PBS documentary called “Trade Secrets,” a two-hour investigative special based on revelations – found in the industry’s own archives – that big chemical companies had deliberately withheld from workers and consumers damaging information about toxic chemicals in their products. These internal industry documents are a fact. They exist. They are not a matter of opinion or point of view. They state what the companies knew, when they knew it and what they did with what they knew (namely to deep-six it) at peril to those who worked with and consumed the potentially lethal products.
The revelations portrayed deep and pervasive corruption in a major American industry and raised critical policy implications about the safety of living under a regulatory system manipulated by the industry itself. If the public and government regulators had known what the industry knew about the health risks of its products when the industry knew it, America’s laws and regulations governing chemical manufacturing would have been far more protective of human health. But the industry didn’t want us to know. That’s what the documents revealed and that was the story the industry fought to keep us from telling.
But the task that Moyers pursues, that one that in his words, have “never required him to grow up and get a day job,” is an essential task. He is preventing collective memory loss. After all,
that’s what keeps us going, isn’t it? The knowledge that all the bias and ignorance notwithstanding, facts still matter to critical thinking, that if we respect and honor, even revere them, they just might help us right the ship of state before it rams the iceberg.”
When I was last employed, I worked as a campaign staffer for Kevin Van De Wege. Those of us employed and dedicated to his cause met frequently in Clallam County’s Democratic Club office, which was convenient for me in a race that took up two and a half counties, since the office was the closest thing to my home and field work. An interesting county, split Republican, Democrat, and other, Clallam County is full of retirees from California and Democrats who long for the good old days of FDR and Kennedy (and, although I’ve never asked, I would guess that the Republicans dwell on the good old days of Nixon and Reagan). The Old Boys Club, I call these Democrats, who reminisce on fond memories of politics in the old days.
Since that campaign, and job, ended in November, I’ve been back to the Democratic Club office only a few times, and only at hours I guessed no one would be there. I’d slip in with the combination, drop off some stray yard signs I’d found, and leave an office looking very much as I’d seen it in November.
Now, why would I, a Democrat with enough pride to volunteer, and then be employed by, a Democratic state legislator, not return to that office to spend time with other Democrats? First, you’ll notice that I didn’t refer to the other Democrats – with the exception of the campaign manager for Kevin, who was from a different county – as dedicated to the work it takes to win an election; I saw little of such dedication from the Old Boys Club. Second, I saw that the Old Boys Club spent a lot of time sitting around discussing how things were in past elections (and, although I would like to say that they didn’t spend time contributing to the current election, they did; they contributed money and office space and letters; what they did not do, and I should not fault them for it, is canvass or make phone calls). I fear that if I return to that group of men whose median age is about forty-five years my senior, that I will spend my time thinking of days gone by.
Indeed, since I am, through no fault of my own, of this generation without opportunity of employment or social mobility, I already find myself wondering if the best days of my life have not already gone by (do not answer that please, but consider its applicability to your own life). The best days of life would be college, everyone says. Except, of course, unless you went to Webb; at Webb they tell you – and it is true – that Webb would be better than college. So, I am finished with college, which was to be that best time of my life but-not-for-those-of-us-who-went-to-Webb.
Already, I reminisce about college, which was to be that best time of life. I have rarely kept in touch, for the same reason as my discontinued affiliation with the Old Boys Club. I am afraid, perhaps wrongly so, of dwelling on the past. If I am always looking backward, as the Boys Club does, I will always be thinking the best time I had happened long ago. I would rather hope for the future than the past.
Once again I wade into the deepest and most complicated of political topics; the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is all-consuming. Often I criticize Israel, but I do not feel that is undeserved; Israel has made countless mistakes (which, in and of itself, is somewhat understandable and acceptable, but I feel that rarely does Israel own up to – that is, admit to – the mistakes, and that is the source of the criticism). Perhaps, then, I should not criticize [yet] for the news is recent. And it is Palestine of which I am critical.
Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s Foreign Minister, announced plans for a provisional Palestine. Other than the fact that this sounds a little bit too similar to the Palestinian Authority, and that the announcement was made by Lieberman (who has acted as a catalyst for Israel’s international decline), this is not bad in itself. Then why am I disapproving of this plan? “The Palestinians rejected the notion of a provisional state as a ‘publicity stunt’ and urged Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman to work instead to achieve a final peace deal.”
A Palestinian official, Saeb Erekat, said “the option of provisional borders or an, interim agreement is no longer on the table. I urge Lieberman not to fight the emergence of a Palestinian state, because it’s coming.” The proposal is “a publication relations stunt, to throw the ball in our court,” Erekat added.
Palestine (all factions of it), Israel just “threw the ball in your court.” Take the ball and run with it, as the saying goes, because then Israel will be forced to make a choice. It will either grant you the state you have been asking for, or it will cause more death and destruction of your people – which is nothing new, and is happening – or none of the above. Don’t tell Israel that a partial deal in which you get 50% of the land you desire and claim isn’t good enough for you.
As I sat waiting for the ferry to Seattle I observed the car next to me. A youngish middle aged woman in an SUV sat drinking out of a pink coffee mug. Was there a kid in the back seat?
It doesn’t matter where you are. You will see a woman much like this.
Or you will see what I saw when cars began to load. A prius with a personalized licence plate and an obama/biden sticker. Either you will see this or a person equally as proud of a pickup and a (pick your conservative) bumper sticker.
This is the American life.
I write here and bombard you, my reader with news and thoughts. I don’t imagine that’s a bad thing, but I write from my point of view, which is different than, and influences, your view. I do not think that these news and thoughts are a bad thing, and I attempt to recognize my own biases and approach my writings in a universal sense – that is, that they apply to more than just me.
Clearly, I want to write here about something that applies to you as well as to me. However, I frequently write of politics, and politics is naturally divisive, because we do not get what we want. I make an effort not to be impulsive, or to write of news without studying some history, and hopefully the ramifications as well; writing of events and viewpoints increases awareness of interconnectedness and collective consciousness, which makes it clear that it is important to understand and appreciate multiple views.
The Dole Blog 