jfv wrote: Thu Sep 01, 2022 10:40 am

kokorodoko wrote: Thu Sep 01, 2022 10:27 am Gorbachev??? wtf I thought he was already dead

I don't blame you. The dude was 91 and didn't exactly look like he was a health nut earlier in life.

What I meant is I was certain I had heard about the news of his passing like one or two years ago. Like "this was the last interview with Gorbachev before his death".

The great Barbara Ehrenreich. A national treasure. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/ ... -and-dimed


A nice, somewhat recent interview with her: https://www.vice.com/amp/en/article/k7e ... the-future

jfv wrote: Thu Sep 01, 2022 10:40 am But, yeah, RIP. His time as the leader of the USSR was certainly eventful... in many good ways.

Despised in Russia nowadays, as you might expect.

Putin did lay a wreath on his coffin, but only at the hospital. No state funeral for you!

And in a strange coincidence, at that same hospital, on the same day that Putin visited, yet another Russian energy CEO died by falling out of a window. Making him the eighth Russian energy executive to die suddenly this year. His former partner also fell out of a window. They just can't seem to make safe windows in Russia. In some unfortunate cases their wives and children also accidentally died.

I coulda swore I made a post back in mid July when Paul Ryder passed. But I don't see one.

The Happy Mondays were/ are a hot mess of a band. I quite like them. Paul was a very underrated bass player. RIP.

Re: Barbara Ehrenreich...

Did enjoy reading Nickel and Dimed a while back. Its general thesis, that in contemporary America it's hard to keep one's head above water on low wages/amid unprecedented economic uncertainty, has become a bit more widespread, maybe, since its publishing. At least it would seem that way. Or one would hope.

The main issue I have with such texts and other things along these lines is incidental, maybe, in that the people who probably need to reckon with them most . . . often won't read them. I can't help but feel that a lot of things having to do with socialism/"class warfare"/economic reform/improving the social safety net/reversing privatization and outsourcing/etc. don't really cut through to, I dunno, most captains of industry, CEOs and other higher-ups who run corporations, the 1%, special interest groups and the many politicians in their pocket, etc. In other words, the actual "slave masters."

That's not a knock on people like Ehrenreich, or Bernie Sanders (who I've voted for more than once), or whomever. It's just an observation.

Anyway, R.I.P.

The only relation I have to Barbara Ehrenreich is the utterly stupid "PMC" meme, which is probably unfair.

Not least because the originating essay is a lot more modest and pointed than recent proponents would make it seem.

DaveA wrote:most captains of industry, CEOs and other higher-ups who run corporations, the 1%, special interest groups and the many politicians in their pocket, etc. In other words, the actual "slave masters."

None of those are going to read a book or article, see the error of their ways and act against their interests, ever.

Her work served to promote or generate class consciousness, and, in the context of fairly mainstream US-American writing, that is a huge deal.

jimmy spako wrote: Tue Sep 06, 2022 6:21 amHer work served to promote or generate class consciousness, and, in the context of fairly mainstream US-American writing, that is a huge deal.

I agree, and wouldn't say that's up for debate.

Again, the preceding statements aren't a knock on Ehrenreich, her work, or that of people like her.


But there's always gonna be this lingering problem, that on an "industrial level" (if you will), the people who need to reckon with these things the most, largely won't. I see the same issue with climate change and the environment . . . an individual person can recycle, use less water and electricity and gas, have fewer children, buy less shit, fly less often, whatever. But will it move the needle in the right direction if "industry" is moving full speed ahead? . . . and if, in tandem with this, a large chunk of the citizenry is following suit, pretending like there isn't anything wrong either?

DaveA wrote: Tue Sep 06, 2022 1:31 pm But will it move the needle in the right direction if "industry" is moving full speed ahead? . . . and if, in tandem with this, a large chunk of the citizenry is following suit, pretending like there isn't anything wrong either?

No, it won't. The wealthy captains of finance and industry will just build themselves more bunkers.

RIP media in the UK:

Queen Elizabeth II has died, Buckingham Palace announces

She just met our brand new PM, who once gave a speech calling for the end of the monarchy. Coincidence?