Wash Post on WB/IMF troublemaking

Roger Odisio rodisio at igc.org
Fri Jan 28 10:04:56 PST 2000


Max Sawicky wrote:


> "Even under Mayor Barry" !!?! Odd staement from a DC kind of guy like
> you, Max. Barry's dashiki fool you too?
>
> mbs: Thumping protesters was not his style, for all
> his other pecadilloes.

Yeah. He made his reputation as a protester. But, once in office, he soon became indifferent to his old allies, except the ones he took with him to share the graft. From there, I think, ultimately it was a short step to acquiescing to the cops' behavior.


> >>>Your reasoning--that we should strike where elites enjoy their wealth,
> rather than at the places where they exploit labor--is not very
> convincing, Max. Trash a posh eatery, the owner collects on insurance,
> nothing much changes. This is a difficult way to make the argument that
> these guys shouldn't *have* the fruits of labor in the first place.
> >>>>>
>
> That's not my argument. It's that these places are focuses
> of privilege and unrequited riches. Wage labor is by definition
> exploited, so it wouldn't matter on that account which
> window you broke. Symbolically, these expense-account
> places say a lot more, IMO. You forget I'm not a marxist
> and I'm not on a crusade to socialize capital.

I didn't forget, Max. I just wanted to try to bring you out of your self imposed analytical shell. Your advice is to harass capital. I was hoping you'd want to do something about capitalism.

So, does that mean you have no problem with the unequal labor market exchange?. You know, where labor gets its social subsistence, and whatever else it can wrench from capital, and capital gets to accumulate profits and decide how they will be used, what jobs exist and who gets them, and a whole host of other things.

If you did want to consider doing something about capitalism, you wouldn't pick a local restaurant as a focal point would you? You'd want to find some entity that was exploiting labor on a worldwide scale to match the transnational reach of capital. That was my point. It does matter which windows you choose or we wouldn't be having this conversation.

RO



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