On Thu, Apr 26, 2001 at 01:58:15PM -0700, Ian Murray wrote:
>
>
>
> > [Isn't this inspiring? First, they support intellectual property
> > restrictions, now this.]
>
> > FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
> >
> > Machinists Union Supports National Missile Defense
> ********************
>
> I just sent them [and Michael]:
>
> "But consider the
> definition of a racketeer as someone who creates a threat and then charges for
> its reduction. Governments provision of this protection, by this standard, often
> qualifies as racketeering. To the extent that the threats against which a
> government protects its citizens are imaginary or are consequences of its own
> activities, the government has organized a protection racket. Since governments
> themselves often constitute the largest current threats to the livelihoods of
> their own citizens, many governments operate in essentially the same ways as
> racketeers." [C. Tilly "War Making and State Making as Organized Crime"--from
> Bringing the State Back In edited by Peter Evans Dietrich Rueschemeyer and Theda
> Skocpol, Cambridge University Press]
>
> **************
>
> Jumping on the "corporate welfare" bandwagon are we? What ever happened to that good
> old union adage "workers of all countries unite!"
>
> You ought to be ashamed of yourselves, you've learned nothing since Viet Nam. And,
> obviously, your participation in Seattle was mere posing.
>
> Ian Murray
> Seattle, WA
>
>
>
>
-- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929
Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu