Million-Dollar Golden Handshake

Peter Gowan

2009-09-22T17:45:00.002-05:00

I had never really heard of Peter Gowan before this year.

He wrote an amazing piece for the New Left Review about the financial crisis, and sometime after we had him as a guest on This is Hell (he's on at the very end of the show if you are interested).

Before he died this summer, he sat down with a couple colleagues to discuss his life and career. Read it here.

“Capitalism involves an endless struggle for value streams, and the social preconditions for the right kinds of value streams to come out of different areas—and capitalist states get very agitated if other states create spheres of influence which cut them out of the value stream. So there are tremendous efforts to restructure the internal regimes of states, along with, of course, efforts to restructure the external regimes.”

Lazy Links

2009-09-19T11:11:00.001-05:00

Bicycle Commuter Tax Credit

Too Bad

Megrahi Dossier

Yep

Good Day.

Today Show : Wallerstein

2009-09-18T11:18:00.002-05:00

I complained quite a bit to pretty much anyone who would listen about the switch to digital television that occurred this past summer. I hate to go all cranky old man on the switch, but I just couldn't understand why anyone would want to take the crappy system of free television and replace it with an even crappier one. In Chicago I couldn't get CBS. I fired off a cranky old man email to them and received this response about a month later:

Hi Drew,

Thank you for your recent inquiry. On June 12th we will begin
transmitting on VHF channel 12 from Sears Tower, and doubling the output
power, after that date if you are still experiencing problems please get
back to me for additional assistance.

We currently transmit on VHF channel 3. You require a Roof Mounted
UHF/VHF antenna with 8-10' long elements, in good working order. Small
plastic antennas or rabbit ears will not work.

Sincerely,

Paul S. Rodriguez
WBBM-TV Chicago

I never got CBS in Chicago after the switch. Oh well, I have it in Philadelphia now. Suck it Rodriguez!

Plus, the green light on my government subsidized digital converter box turns on and off periodically leading me to believe that I'm being monitored in some way.

Anyway, I get some additional channels with the converter box. I've been watching the Vuelta on NBC's Universal Sports station. Sometimes I get Aussie Rules Football, which as far as I can tell has no rules at all. On weekday mornings from 8 to 9 the Universal Sports channel airs RT, some sort of Russian news agency that broadcasts in English. Immanuel Wallerstein was on this morning. Here's the video.

I'm a big fan of Wallerstein. I like the idea that the crisis that transforms the world system is always only a couple years away. I feel like he's been saying this since the 1970's, but it's fun to imagine.

prison like whoa

2009-09-08T19:40:00.003-05:00

Stumbled upon this nice Philly progressive politics site. Good chart...

Jersey Shore/Atlantic City

2009-09-08T19:13:00.002-05:00

Took the train to Atlantic City this past weekend for some relaxing.

I sailed on a catamaran.

This kinda sums it up

It was awesome.

Unfinished Ideas...

2009-09-03T14:00:00.007-05:00

These are the sorts of things I would write about if I wasn't lazy...

1. Oral History of Abandoned Lots (yes, I know that story is soooo 2002). There's a lot of empty acreage right across the street from my new apartment. What's up with that?

2. I just killed a mosquito.

3. Write about Brazil's impending pharmaceutical patent infringement and what I recently read in Ha Joon Chang's Bad Samaritans about intellectual property rights and development.

4. Complain about beer and liquor sales laws in Philadelphia. Seriously, I thought this city was supposed be all about freedom?

5. I went to Italian Market yesterday and bought a 10 pound pork shoulder. 12 hours later I had a BBQ pulled pork sandwich.

6. Why do I like Cat Stevens? "Sitting" on the 1972 album Catch Bull at Four is the jam.

7. Does the bar across the street know that they are selling Dogfish Head's Raison D'Etre an 8% ABV beer for $2.50?

8. I listen to the Adam Carolla podcast every morning. It's kinda like Stern, but free. I have to ignore his politics.

9. Subway tokens? Seriously? What the fuck?

10. Mexico

Left Business Observer

2009-08-29T11:22:00.002-05:00

My friend Kevan forwarded me the latest Left Business Observer newsletter a few days ago. Every issue pretty much blows my mind. Doug Henwood the editor of the publication has been on This Is Hell in the past. This month there is a great article with wonderful stats and graphs which debunks in a small way the myth of the American consumption binge.

LBO states:

"...at the end of 1978, consumption was 61.5% of GDP; in the second quarter of 2008, it had risen to 70.3%, or 8.8 points. Well over half that increase, 5.0 points, came from spending on medical care. The share of GDP devoted to spending on goods actually fell by 4.7 points over that 30-year period."

Americans have not been spending their shrinking paychecks on installing televisions and x-boxes into their Lincoln Navigators. We have been paying to go the emergency room.

New Post....What?

2009-08-27T18:13:00.003-05:00

Baby Mangino

2008-11-19T15:45:00.002-06:00

Hi

2008-10-29T16:19:00.000-05:00

Joke

2008-09-19T15:05:00.001-05:00

Feliz Navidad

2008-07-29T09:26:00.000-05:00

"Maps of Time"

2008-07-27T17:52:00.002-05:00

Favre

2008-07-21T11:24:00.001-05:00

Where I Stay

2008-07-18T10:09:00.002-05:00

This was posted on the Beachwood Reporter sometime this week. Check out their website. It's quite excellent.

Journalism

2008-07-13T22:24:00.001-05:00

Click To Play

The recording above is a segment that I delivered live on This is Hell last Saturday (5-Jul-08). I was Indiana visiting family and helping with my brother's campaign for state senate. I admit that the piece is a bit cynical and somewhat negative. I left off the hopeful conclusion so that people may get an idea of just how bad things are in many parts of Indiana, but you should know that I do believe things can change in the deindustrialized rural areas of this country.

Floating Woman

2008-07-11T10:43:00.003-05:00

I will never again forget how much I love No Doctors.

Farce

2008-07-11T10:09:00.002-05:00

Annie are you OK?

2008-06-26T15:43:00.000-05:00

Reading Marx's Capital with David Harvey

2008-06-19T13:53:00.003-05:00

David Harvey has been teaching this course for almost 40 years and now all 13 lectures will be available online.

Please check this out.

Here is the first class with an introductory interview

Time to get smart y'all!!!

This Is Hell

2008-06-02T12:36:00.002-05:00

Next Saturday is the 10th anniversary show for This Is Hell a public affairs radio show on WNUR that I work on. Please listen in if you have never heard Chuck before. After the show we will be heading over to the official listening center of This Is Hell, Cary's Lounge in the West Ridge area of Rogers Park. Please stop on by for the celebration.

Beisbol

2008-05-30T16:05:00.002-05:00

This is from a baseball game in Caracas last year.

Totally awesome!

Fulbright Proposal

2008-05-28T15:02:00.008-05:00

This summer I will be applying for a Fulbright fellowship so that I may travel and study in Venezuela next year.

This is me there last year

The basic idea is to develop a greater understanding of labor rights for professional Venezuelan baseball players within the context of the Bolvarian Revolution and "21st Century Socialism."

Venezuela exports the 2nd most number of players to Major League Baseball after the Dominican Republic. Several MLB teams have training academies and franchise teams that play in the Venezuelan summer leagues. The highest paid pitcher in MLB, Johan Santana is from Tovar in the Merida state. Venezuela's contribution to American baseball is immense, but what happens to the thousands of players who do not sign multi-million dollar contracts supported by a relatively strong labor union in the US? Many players destroy their bodies making about $800 per month in Venezuela and most will never play baseball for a MLB team. One of the goals of this project is to understand these players' stories.

Understanding the political and economic climate in which these athletes compete is also of great importance. President Hugo Chavez (pictured above) proposed a 10% tax on MLB contracts signed by future Venezuelan big leagers. This obviously angered team owners and league officials in the US. Many teams have withdrawn their development teams which play in the Venezuelan summer league. As one of my favorite sports columnists Dave Zirin often points out, sports and politics are deeply intertwined yet we continually choose to ignore the linkages. With the Venezuelan government moving forward on a number of social, economic and political reforms, I feel it will be interesting to understand how Venezuelan baseball players are affected by those reforms with the hope that the broader implications for 'labor' can be revealed.

Scream Bloody Murder, The Mountains Are Listening

2008-05-21T11:22:00.002-05:00

Yanqui Go Home

2008-05-15T20:39:00.005-05:00

Simon Romero of the New York Times reported a couple of days ago that the president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, will not renew an agreement made in 1999 to keep a United States military base in Manta (the original agreement expires next year). The city on the coast is apparently crucial in the US led "war on drugs" for spotting cocaine traffickers moving product from Colombia up the coast and up your nose.

The classic leftist critique of US military bases abroad is of course based on the belief that the global capitalist leader, in order to maintain control of economic resources, must expand the empire as part of its endless accumulation of capital. This critique manifests itself in popular anti-imperialist slogans encouraging Yanquis to go home. Let me say, first off, I find these critiques useful, in the sense that they mobilize popular support, and also generally accurate.

I recently revisited a framework first argued by Charles Tilly and reworked by Giovanni Arrighi in Adam Smith in Beijing which brings a broader perspective to this relatively minor international incident. Tilly argues that the state often acts as a racketeer which "produces both the danger and, at a price, the shield against it." The US has acted in this way in Latin America and around the world for years with impunity. Arrighi shows that with the decline of US power and legitimacy, the artificial danger and the protection provided no longer seem relevant. Correa's refusal of the US base should be examined in this light. Although this incident may seem like another leftist Latin American president rejecting Yanqui imperialism, it is in fact a reasoned dismissal of a very hollow empire that can neither produce real danger nor force tribute for protection.

Much has been made in recent years of Latin America's turn toward the left. Immanuel Wallerstein's Commentary 233, released this morning, attempts to explain this political phenomenon. Professor Wallerstein cites four examples as evidence of this leftward swing. The rejection of the United States' political and economic project for the hemisphere and the world is one. The neoliberalism 1980's and 90's failed and is now dead. There is no sane government in the world that would ever consider the economic shock therapies offered just a decade or so ago. The changes seen in Latin America are not particularly radical. Most of the so-called leftist governments that have taken power in the region are relatively moderate. A new set of world historical conditions has presented itself to the states. Some governments, like Ecuador's, are responding appropriately.

Charles Tilly

2008-05-12T15:24:00.004-05:00

I've been meaning to write something about Charles Tilly since his death a couple weeks ago but have not been able to find the time. It would not be an exaggeration to call him one of the greatest social scientists of the last 50 years or so. Please enjoy this interview forwarded to me from some of his colleagues in the field. More information and comments on the life and work of Professor Tilly is forthcoming.

Winner By A Mile!

2008-05-12T15:19:00.003-05:00

Matt won the primary election against Tony "Big Dog" Van Pelt by an extremely large margin. He will be running against Republican incumbent Brent Steele in the general election this November. Keep yourself posted at his own website.

Get 'er done!

2008-05-05T15:12:00.001-05:00

My brother Matt is running for Indiana State Senate. If you live in Indiana go vote sometime before tomorrow afternoon.

l'internationale

2008-05-01T09:24:00.000-05:00

Movie

2008-04-30T12:07:00.000-05:00

Map

2008-04-28T10:10:00.000-05:00

Welcome

2008-04-27T17:44:00.000-05:00

I will see you soon.