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12826 [lbo-talk] Finkelstein tenure brouhaha -- rank: 1000

<http://insidehighered.com/news/2007/04/03/finkelstein> Furor Over Norm Finkelstein Norman G. Finkelstein has been more controversial off his campus than on it. On his frequent speaking tours to colleges, where he typically discusses Israel in highly critical ways, Finkelstein draws protests and debates. When the University of California Press published Finkelstein's critique of Alan Dershowitz and other defenders of Israel in 2005, a huge uproar ensued with charges and counterchar ...

Document Size:	14616
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Apr 3 08:54:53 PDT 2007

12827 [lbo-talk] Stratfor on Iraq: spoiling attacks -- rank: 1000

Geopolitics and the U.S. Spoiling Attack By George Friedman [Stratfor] The United States has now spent four years fighting in Iraq. Those who planned the conflict never expected this outcome. Indeed, it could be argued that this outcome represents not only miscalculation but also a strategic defeat for the United States. The best that can be said about the war at the moment is that it is a strategic stalemate, which is an undesired outcome for the Americans. The worst that can be said is t ...

Document Size:	20677
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Apr 3 08:51:34 PDT 2007

12828 [lbo-talk] WMT: the Dems new friend -- rank: 1000

[the handprints of Leslie Dach are all over this...] Washington Post - April 3, 2007 Wal-Mart, the Democrats' New Friend By Jeffrey H. Birnbaum Last Tuesday evening, the world's largest retailer sponsored a fancy reception in the Capitol's LBJ Room off the Senate floor to celebrate a yet-to-be-completed documentary about female members of the chamber called "14 Women." The film's three producers include Mary Lambert, the older sister of Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), and Nicole Box ...

Document Size:	6524
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Apr 3 08:40:44 PDT 2007

12829 [lbo-talk] The Death of Classical Music (da capo, con brio) -- rank: 1000

On Apr 3, 2007, at 5:52 AM, Colin Brace quoted: > http://music.guardian.co.uk/classical/story/0,,2048916,00.html > > Vanishing acts > Martin Kettle > > What went wrong was partly the glut: with 435 versions available, who > needs number 436? More than partly. By the mid-1960s, recording technology had gotten very good, and things from the 1950s weren't so bad either. So we've got 40 or 50 years of very high quality performances of what is a large but nonetheless limited c ...

Document Size:	6224
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Apr 3 05:51:30 PDT 2007

12830 [lbo-talk] Land use in the US -- rank: 1000

On Apr 3, 2007, at 8:17 AM, James Heartfield wrote: > swamps I thought those had been rebranded as "wetlands." Doug

Document Size:	4658
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Apr 3 05:39:31 PDT 2007

12831 [lbo-talk] Reid backs war funds cutoff -- rank: 1000

Washington Post - April 3, 2007 Reid Backs Iraq War-Funds Cutoff Senate Leader Makes It Clear a Bush Veto Wouldn't End Debate on Withdrawal By Shailagh Murray Washington Post Staff Writer Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid yesterday endorsed the Senate's toughest antiwar bill yet, a bid to cut off funding within a year, sending a clear signal to President Bush that the Iraq debate will continue in Congress regardless of whether he carries through on his veto threats. Reid (Nev.) announced ...

Document Size:	9012
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Apr 3 05:03:22 PDT 2007

12832 [lbo-talk] SEIU membership -- rank: 1000

On Apr 2, 2007, at 6:24 PM, Mark Rickling wrote: > Affiliations of already existing public sector units accounts for some > of this growth, but not most of it. Any idea how much? > That would be homecare and > childcare -- approx. 142,000 newly organized workers in the time span > below. That's almost 3/4 of the 201,185 gain from 2000 to 2006. That was done mainly with political contributions and connections and not traditional organizing, right? Doug

Document Size:	4957
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 16:26:41 PDT 2007

12833 [lbo-talk] merely cultural -- rank: 1000

Ok, here's how Butler used "recognition" in "Merely Cultural," as pub'd in Social Text, 1997: Positing a spectrum that spans political economy and culture, she situates lesbian and gay struggles at the cultural end of this political spectrum. Homophobia, she argues, has no roots in political economy, because homosexuals occupy no distinctive position in the division of labor, are distributed throughout the class structure, and do not constitute an exploited class. " ...

Document Size:	7383
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 14:34:48 PDT 2007

12834 [lbo-talk] SEIU membership -- rank: 1000

So could all you SEIU hands explain the course of union membership to me? Here's what the DOL data says: 2000 1,374,300 2001 1,376,292 0.14% 2002 1,464,077 6.38% 2003 1,602,882 9.48% 2004 1,702,639 6.22% 2005 1,505,100 -11.60% 2006 1,575,485 4.68% CAGR 2.30% (CAGR = compound annual growth rate) The series is, as economists say, lumpy. A 9.5% gain one year, an 11.6% decline two years later. The average over these six volatile years is 2.3%, a little over twice the ...

Document Size:	5173
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 13:09:43 PDT 2007

12835 [lbo-talk] Henry the K: Iraq war can't be won -- rank: 1000

[from Cato's daily email] "Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who helped engineer the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam, said Sunday the problems in Iraq are more complex than that conflict, and military victory is no longer possible," reports the Associated Press. "The faceless, ubiquitous nature of Iraq's insurgency, as well as the religious divide between Shiite and Sunni rivals, makes negotiating peace more complex, he said. 'It is a more complicated problem,' Ki ...

Document Size:	5562
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 12:00:08 PDT 2007

12836 [lbo-talk] Salon death watch (cont.) -- rank: 1000

[The Salon death watch commenced about time the dot.com's went bust. Still, it survives...] <http://gawker.com/news/salon/why-nobody-wants-to-work-at- salon-248850.php> Why Nobody Wants To Work At 'Salon' The recent staff changes at Salon, not to mention their bonkers-crazy political correspondents, made us wonder how things are holding up at the famously bi-coastal public company. So we took a little gander at some of its recent filings with the SEC. Yikes! "Salon has been relyin ...

Document Size:	7718
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 11:24:07 PDT 2007

12837 [lbo-talk] merely cultural -- rank: 1000

On Apr 2, 2007, at 12:47 PM, Dwayne Monroe wrote: > Finally, the additional vote of Conservative > Protestants for Republican candidates, over and above > that of Mainline American Protestants, is meager about > seven percentage points. Hmm, a lot depends on definitions, I guess. According to the 2004 exit poll, 53% of the electorate was Protestant, and went 56/43 for Bush. Among Evangelicals, 22% of the electorate, Bush took 76%, vs. 23% for Kerry. They provided about a third of ...

Document Size:	5026
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 11:01:23 PDT 2007

12838 [lbo-talk] more art talk -- rank: 1000

On Apr 3, 2007, at 12:29 AM, Chuck Grimes wrote: > (Thank you Dawyne and Joyce. Testing list patience for art talk...) Chuck, for you, I've got lots of patience! Doug

Document Size:	4644
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 09:37:04 PDT 2007

12839 [lbo-talk] merely cultural -- rank: 1000

On Apr 2, 2007, at 1:14 PM, Rakesh Bhandari wrote: > supposedly surprising findings in a new book by Michael Hout You tease! What are they? Doug

Document Size:	4622
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 09:30:57 PDT 2007

12840 [lbo-talk] Merely cultural and post-Situ: Soft Focus w/ Ian Svenonius -- rank: 1000

On Apr 2, 2007, at 9:56 AM, Ted Winslow wrote: > Doesn't Butler share with Sokal et al an understanding of "class" and > "culture" that logically excludes any space for the conception of > either as the locus for the the development and expression of > "subjects" able to actualize "freedom" as relations of "mutual > recognition"? As I recell "Merely Cultural" - I don't have a copy at hand - Butler uses a lot from Nancy F ...

Document Size:	5442
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Apr 2 07:23:56 PDT 2007