|
well, one big difference is taft-hartley. it's true. that's a bit of labor law the democrats, those champions of the working feller, gave to us. the idea was to prevent railroad strikes or other such actions that would "endanger national security"...what it did was circumscribe the right to strike in an unacceptable way. in an industrial context (remember those?) holders of capital and their management proxies had almost all the power---the ability of workers to shut the place down was a counterweight. in political life, the state and the oligarchy for which it stands has power---a main counterweight is the collective withdrawal of consent. the mechanism that enables withdrawal of consent is a strike---not organizing a militias and playing paintball in the woods while fantasizing about returning to the 18th century--but organized actions that are aimed at shutting down the existing system **legitimately**
i don't think folk understand what was taken in the 40s by stuff like the taft-hartley act and it's expansion of the notion of "national security" to preclude political strikes.
demonstrations aren't strikes, btw.
what's happening in france right now is a general strike. from a political viewpoint, the challenge to sarkosy's government represented by a general strike is about a serious as it gets.
in the united states, there's no meaningful way for people to register a withdrawal of consent. their "freedom" is restricted to the charade of faction rotation within the oligarchy one day every 4 years.
i say this because i don't think the common good is served by the american system.
how exactly **would** you withdraw consent?
and without such a mechanism, those in power can do anything. witness the war in iraq.
__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
|