Grocery Auctions

This article was actually posted a pretty long time ago (nearly 3 years), but I think as the economy has continued on its course of stagnation (soon to be contraction), it is still somewhat timely.  I had never heard of such a thing, but apparently, auctions aren't just for selling art and antiques anymore.  To fulfill the demand of the downwardly mobile, auctions have expanded to include the everyday necessities of life, including groceries.  The savings at these auctions seem to be pretty substantial, and the profit is split between the grocer and the auctioneer.  The grocer even sells "scratch 'n dent" items for auction, which is a lot preferable than just throwing away a perfectly good can or box of food that happens to have a small dent in the box. 

Being a fan of Jim Kunstler, this picture amused me.

"Most Extreme Configuration of the Jet Stream Ever Recorded"

This winter has been pretty funky thus far; I'm in New York, and there's nary a snowflake in sight, and most days have been in the 50s.  It isn't the first mild winter I've had, and it's been happening more often than not.  A possible culprit is a major shift in the jet stream.  The Icelandic Low blows a strong flow of air over the eastern U.S., preventing arctic air from hitting the U.S. and Europe.  Records are kept of this, of course, and this is said to be the 2nd most extreme December in terms of this, other than 2006.  It's too soon to tell whether this is man-made or natural, although I'd guess it was the former.  Like Bill Maher, I prefer to think of it as "climate change" rather than "global warming", as every time we do get a snowstorm or unusually cold weather, the idiots come out of the woodwork and say "so much for that darned global warming." 

Media Marginalizes Another Candidate

I usually pay at least some attention to the election season, but as I'm not voting this year (and am not planning to as long as the electoral system is in place), my attention on the primaries has been minimal at best.  But there is always one candidate who has a tendency to say what he believes, polls be damned, and would seem to have a capacity to actually shake things up if he were to become president.  And then the media ensures that he won't get anywhere near the White House by ignoring or downplaying his chances as much as possible.  In this particular election cycle, I am speaking of the Republican candidate, Ron Paul.  I know that he also ran in the '08 primaries as well, but his stature and campaign have grown by leaps and bounds since then.  In 2008, he was a marginal candidate who was given no coverage by the mainstream media.  Now, he regularly polls right up there with the frontrunners, like the billionaire Mitt Romney.

I am not necessarily a Ron Paul supporter, although he does give me the impression that he is an honest man who usually stands behind what he says.  His ideas for improving the country are certainly needed.  In the end, his campaign platform is essentially getting the federal government out of the way, and letting the states govern themselves.  And he is a real conservative in that sense, the other candidates will say similar things, but their actions would show that they love a bigger federal government.  And now, even with his popularity growing, the corporate media still continue to marginalize and ignore him.  Just look at this video.  It flashes back to 2008 news coverage, and the reporters and pundits explaining how important Iowa was in choosing the next president.  Then it shows this year's news coverage, and the reporters suddenly deem Iowa irrelevant and not an important state.  The difference?  In 2008, Paul was polling at the margins; this year, he came close to winning (he finished 3rd in a tight race behind Romney and religious extremist Rick Santorum).



In 2004, I volunteered and ran as a regional delegate for the campaign of Dennis Kucinich, a Democratic congressman who ran for President in that year.  Like Paul in 2008, he was a marginal candidate who never made headway in the minds of the media.  But the low expectations and high passion of his supporters made his campaign more efficient, so rather than go all-out in one state (like Iowa or New Hampshire), finish 4th or 5th and drop out, he was able to mount a vigorous campaign in all 50 states.  My hope is that Dr. Paul will be able to do the same.

An Interview With Another Great Author

Yesterday, I posted a link to an illustrious panel talking about the issues of the day, and today, I found a recently uploaded Youtube video of another of my favorite authors, Chris Hedges.  Hedges had been a war reporter for around 20 years, and is now writing editorials for the website Truthout.  He wrote a great book, "War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning" and the last book of his that I read, "Empire of Illusion", is pretty incredible as well.  While he does not write about peak oil extensively like Kunstler or Orlov, a key theme of his has become the decline of the American empire.  In his words, "the descent is going to be horrifying."

This interview was originally broadcast on C-SPAN's BookTV, and the interview is 3 hours long.  I think it'll totally be worth it.

A Panel With Some of my Favorite Writers/Thinkers in One Place

I just found out about this panel and can't wait to listen to them.  It consists of James Howard Kunstler (the man who introduced me to peak oil and economic collapse, via his book "The Long Emergency"), Dimitri Orlov ("Reinventing Collapse", in which he compares and contrasts the collapse of his home country, the Soviet Union, with the pending collapse of that other superpower in which I happen to inhabit, the U.S.A., is one of my favorites), Richard Heinberg (who's written many books on energy issues and economics, including "The Party's Over"), Nicole Foss (who has a very popular blog, The Automatic Earth) and the elder statesman/rock star of the group, Noam Chomsky (I read many of his books when I was in college, and they were a revelation to me). 

Orlov wasn't happy with the discussion of the panel (he titled his blog posting in which he discusses it as "A Dismal Public Affair"; ouch!) and blames Chomsky's tendency to "ramble".  I'm still looking forward to listening to it, though.  

The End of Unions to Come by January 1?

This is a very striking piece about how corporations and the GOP are fighting the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), over requiring businesses to put up a poster informing workers on what their rights are (to collectively bargain, join a union, etc.) and what actions employers are prohibited from taking against their employees.  In this economy, I believe that most employees are scared shitless and wouldn't dare to do many of these things, poster or no poster.  But for the top 1% to not even want their employees to know what their rights are...  As a coworker of mine would say, "tragic". 

Anyway, a potentially larger story is nearly hidden in the closing paragraphs.  Several articles linked to in the story report on the fact that the NLRB has been under assault for decades by mainly Republicans, in an attempt to undermine their abilities to enforce labor law and to protect unionization.  In the latest development, the Supreme Court ruled last year that the NLRB needed at least 3 members on its board in order to be operational.  Due to Republican filibusters in the Senate to prevent voting on new members to the board, Obama has had to make emergency appointments in order to keep the board active.  After one member's term is up on December 31, there will not be enough members on the board for its rulings to be valid.  The potential of this is huge.  As the New York Times points out in an op-ed,

Workers illegally fired for union organizing won’t be reinstated with back pay. Employers will be able to get away with interfering with union elections. Perhaps most important, employers won’t have to recognize unions despite a majority vote by workers. Without the board to enforce labor law, most companies will not voluntarily deal with unions. 

Do not take this to mean that I am strictly pro-union.  I have my own issues with them, probably the biggest being that their missions to raise wages and benefits for its members, noble as they undoubtedly are, are going to be unrealistic in the new world that we are slowly waking up to.  Peak Everything will affect everyone, and a rising standard of living for union members will no longer be possible, like it was in the mid to late 20th century.  But they are a bulwark for workers, sometimes a shitty bulwark, but a bulwark nonetheless.  I have read and seen countless corporate propaganda over the years, stating that employees don't need unions, that the businesses have an "open-door" policy, that they look out for their workers.  And I can tell you that it's bullshit.  The only goal for business is to make money.  They couldn't give two shits about their employees.  Okay, I'm getting off my soapbox now.  Anyway, I think the best objective for unions, rather than aiming for a higher standard of living for its members, is to protect them from arbitrary actions by their employers, and to ensure that the upper echelons of management aren't being rewarded with wheelbarrows of cash and company cars while the rank-and-file get nothing.

RIP Christopher Hitchens

I came home yesterday morning to the news that the brilliant essayist Christopher Hitchens had passed from complications from throat cancer, at 62.  I have spent the entire morning reading tributes and obits to him; there's a helpful Yahoo! article here that contains links to these, as well as a fine tribute all in itself. 

I have not really read a lot of Hitch in recent years, but at the dawn of my political awakening (I have long since fallen back into a proud slumber, hopefully never to re-awaken), I was pretty blown away by a couple of books he had written in the late 90's--early 2000s, dealing with the ethical and moral failings of (then) President Bill Clinton and Henry Kissinger.  He had an explosive way with words and was never afraid to offend either right or left.  That is what I'll take away from him, rather than his proud atheism, which is heavily emphasized in the obits.  It's a true gift to possess, when you can write something that polarizes everybody, and can alienate a lot of people, while those same people are still nonetheless impressed by what you are writing and find it worthwhile to read.  I felt that way when he presented himself as an ardent supporter of the invasion of Iraq.  While I did not agree with his position, I still looked forward to reading his views on the matter; I now remember even reading a very small book that was published, that consisted of his essays on the Iraq invasion (entitled A Long Short War: The Postponed Liberation of Iraq).  That would usually be unthinkable, like a staunch leftist reading a tome by Sean Hannity or Ann Coulter, or a dyed-in-the-wool rightwinger reading something by Michael Moore, but again, Hitchens had that gift.  He was such a gifted, informed writer that you needed to hear his thoughts on a particular topic, even if you came away red in the face and mumbling curses after reading it.  

I'm hoping to eventually read more of his works, especially God is Not Great and Hitch-22, his autobiography.