Guide to World Holidays

A number of people have responded to some of my posts, notably my essay on "Choosing to Have a Happy Holiday," by saying they had not heard of some of the holidays I mentioned! Certainly people can get by in the modern world without knowing too much about Saturnalia, but it probably behooves most educated people to know about the holidays being observed by their neighbors, and so I have decided to start this guide to world holidays. I also hope to reveal some interesting things people might not have known about more familiar holidays.

Saint Patrick’s Day (March 17): This religious holiday devoted to the patron saint of Ireland is observed by the Catholic Church, the Anglican Communion, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the Lutheran Church. It has been an official church feast day for about 400 years but, in more recent times, has also evolved into a more secular celebration of Irish culture in general that is observed with parades, wearing green clothing, eating, and, naturally, drinking. And, for those who care about such things, participation in it does grant a one-day dispensation on the strictures of Lent for those observing it! Saint Patrick, a 5th century Romano-British Christian missionary and bishop, has a number of claims to fame that warrant such revelry in his memory, the main one being the prominent role he played in spreading Christianity throughout the Emerald Isles. He is also credited with banishing all serpents from Ireland, driving them into the sea and to their deaths after they had the impertinence to attack him during his own Lenten rigors. The fact that there are no snakes in Ireland today suggests that he did, in fact, do a pretty good job in this regard.

Songkran (April 13-15): This holiday coincides with the New Year of many calendars of South and Southeast Asia and is celebrated as the traditional start of the New Year in Thailand. This was originally a moveable feast with a date set by astrological calculation but is now fixed; if its days fall on a weekend, the missed days off are taken on the weekdays immediately following. Songkran falls in the hottest time of the year in Thailand, at the end of the dry season. Songkran has traditionally been celebrated as the New Year for many centuries, is believed to have been adapted from an Indian festival, and is observed nationwide. The most famous Songkran celebrations, however, are still in the northern city of Chiang Mai, where it continues for at least six days. It has also become a party for foreigners and an additional reason for many to visit Thailand.

New Year's Day (January 1). Celebrated on the first day of January throughought much of the world, this day marks the beginnning of the new calendar year. Strange as it may be to conceive of, however, this was not always the case, and only started to be observed on January 1 in the English-speaking world between the years A.D. 1600 and 1761! Up until that point, the start of the New Year was generally observed on March 25, and going back into the Middle Ages a number of other dates were used, including March 1, September 1, Christmas Day, and Easter. Many Catholics may also recognize January 1 as the day Jesus was circumcised.

Epiphany (Mostly January 6 in 2013). This Christian feast day celebrates the revelation of God the Son as a human being in Jesus Christ. In the Western Christian tradition, Ephiphany mainly commemorates the visitation the baby Jesus by the Magi, symbolizing Jesus' physical manifestation to the Gentiles, and is generally celebrated either on January 6 as a Holy Day of Obligation or on the first Sunday after January 1. In the Eastern Christians tradition, the holiday celebrates the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River, recognized as his revelation to the world as the Son of God, and is generally celebrated on January 19. In certain countries, however, Epiphany is celebrated on different days (e.g., January 9 in Columbia).

Seijin no Hi/Coming of Age Day (Japan; January 14 in 2013): Events of this sort date to at least A.D. 714 in Japan and were officially established as an annual holiday in 1948; since 2000, Coming of Age Day has been observed on the second Monday in January. Its purpose is to congratulate and encourage all those who have reached the age of majority which, in Japan, is 20 years old, and when new adults are legally allowed to vote, drive, and smoke. Festivities include ceremonies at local government offices and after-parties among family and friends.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day (January 21 in 2013). This U.S. federal holiday marks the birthday of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., chief spokesman for nonviolent activism in the U.S. civil rights movement during the 1960s. It is observed on the third Monday of January each year, around the time of King's Jan. 15 birthday. President Ronald Reagan signed the holiday into law in 1983 and it was first observed on January 20, 1986. Some states initially resisted observing the holiday as such, combining it with other holidays or giving it alternative names, and it was officially observed in all 50 states for the first time in 2000.

Republic Day (India; January 26): Republic Day is a national holiday that marks the adoption of the Constitution of India and the transition of the nation from a British Dominion to a republic on January 26, 1950. It is one of the three national holidays celebrated in India. On this day, the country finally realized the dream of Mahatma Gandhi and the numerous freedom fighters who, fought for and sacrificed their lives for the Independence of their country. It is marked by speeches, parades, and ceremonies, especially in the national capital of New Delhi. It is worth noting, for those who might not have been aware of this, that India -- and not the United States -- is today the largest republic in the world!

Chinese New Year (February 10 in 2013): Also called the Lunar New Year and the Spring Festival, Chinese New Year is the most important of the traditional Chinese holidays. While it is particularly celebrated in mainland China and Taiwan, it is also observed by expatriate communities worldwide in countries that include the United States, Malaysia, and Indonesia. The festival traditionally begins on the first day of the first month, Pinyin, in the Chinese calendar and ends on the 15th, a day known as Lantern Festival. Because its observance is based on a lunar calendar, it falls each year on a different day of the Western calendar. Vietnamese New Year, or Tết, is based on the same calendar and falls on the same day as Chinese New Year. Each year of the Chinese calendar is said to be influenced by a particular sign of the zodiac, and 2013 is the Year of the Snake. People born under the sign of the Snake are said to be especially acute, attractive, aware, contemplative, cunning, graceful, introspective, intuitive, private, proud, refined, unflappable, vain, simultaneously dark and exciting, but not particularly good at communication, somewhat scheming, and often vicious.

Shrove Tuesday (February 12 in 2013): Better known to many in the United States as Mardi Gras (French for "Fat Tuesday"), this is the tradition in Roman Catholic and Anglican societies of celebrating the day before the start of the austere season of Lent with eating, drinking, and costumed revelry. It is celebrated througout the Western world and also known variously as Carnival in many places (e.g., Italy, Brazil) and Fasching in Germany. The period of celebration leading up to this day, which ends abruptly at midnight, varies from place to place and can be a day, a week, or even a few months. As a point of commentary, it bears mentioning that holidays like this are at least implicitly intended to let normal people periodically blow off steam. So, while Mardis Gras is often presented as an event created for party animals this is not really the case, as the most hedonistic can carouse whenever they want and it is the people who do not do so regularly who need observances like this one. Holidays like this have, in any case, been observed since time immemorial in most societies and subcultures that eschew such celebrations simply contribute to the misery of their members and drive them to partake of their pleasures more covertly.

Saint Valentine's Day (February 14): Generally known simply as Valentine's Day, this secular holiday is observed in more than 100 countries worldwide and is named in honor of two or three early Christian saints. This holiday was established by Pope Gelasius I in A.D. 496 and acquired its romantic connotations during the Middle Ages and, by the 1400s, was observed by the exchange of flowers, candy, and cards between lovers. Its name and history notwithstanding, however, Valentine's Day is no longer observed as a religious holiday, and the Catholic Church removed it from its list of official holidays in 1969. It also bears mentioning that the figure of Cupid, the winged child associated with Valentine's Day, is in fact the ancient Roman god of desire, pointing once again to the pagan roots of a seemingly modern holiday.

A Union by Any Other Name, Part 4

The Moneyball Method

Regardless of the goals of any group, political or otherwise, one common thread repeats: garner the highest yield for any effort applied. The political struggles between unions and corporations are no different. Both are trying to capitalize on any gains they make and pick the battles they are most likely to win. Minimizing expenses and maximizing results is a tactic used by both sides and for the very same reasons. It is a strategy employed in nature and relies on the conservation of energy. After all, nobody, regardless of the situation, wants to get the least possible returns for their efforts. It is the surest way to drive oneself into extinction. For this reason, humans are no different. While we might enjoy the fruits of our labors as a species, we prefer to engage in leisure activities as much as possible as it means we have reached a point where our work nets us more than the minimum needed for a sustained existence.

In addition to the analogy to the natural world, corporations and unions act in a way that is analogous to the sports world. As the title of this section alludes to, the reference is to what the Oakland Athletics used in 2002 to tie the record for the longest winning streak. Though that was not the goal of the club, it is was the result of a strategy designed to get the most out of a budget that had little leeway and was seen as a course destined to failure. The analogy however works to lay out some of the basic issues between the unions and corporations as well as how they work. The Oakland Athletics are known as a “small market” team despite being based in the 47th largest city in the nation. Granted, it is nowhere near the size of San Francisco or Los Angeles, but its proximity to San Francisco and the surrounding communities of the San Francisco Bay Area, a Bay Area Rapid Transit station named after the stadium with an elevated walkway connecting to said stadium, and portions of the San Joaquin Valley being within driving distance gives the team a large enough fan base that one would think it is anything but a small market. The San Francisco Bay Area alone has 7.46 million residents.

An examination of the city might shed some light on why it stands out and the importants it plays in the shape of the club’s market status. Oakland is an industrial city with a port. These two industries have been the base of the local economy and have led to its recent troubles. Thus, it has been hit hard by the recession and the technological changes over the last twenty years. Though nowhere near Detroit’s unemployment levels, the city is not known for its residents’ buying power. Some jokes refer to Oakland as an inordinately large crack house and sections of downtown are known as “Oaksterdam” for its medical marijuana shops. It should come as no surprise then that attendance for home games is abysmal when compared to other teams in Major League Baseball.

Yet despite these drawbacks, Oakland has been able to challenge so-called “large market” teams like the New York Yankees and their massive payroll. The Yankees are known for their big name players and consistency in winning division championships if not the World Series. As New York plays host to one of the largest financial sectors around, there is another allusion to the corporation/union divide. This is because the city itself is as identified with Wall Street and finance in the way that Oakland is for its blue collar roots. Add to this information the population in the whole metropolitan area spans four states and encompasses 22.23 million people. That makes it roughly three times the size of the SF Bay Area and it too has two baseball teams. The Yankees, though, are the 800-pound gorilla of baseball. Burning through so much money to attract talent is how they have won so many championships. And with so many residents close enough to go to a game or buy team merchandise, it is easy to see how the team is able to garner so many division and league titles.

Baseball is no longer the national pastime with all the nostalgia of regionalism that it once was where players often played with the same team for their entire careers. For the fans this may still be the case, but not for the corporations that are the managing staffs for each team as well as the commission that oversees Major League Baseball. The game is largely built around money, hence the references to small- and large-market teams. Players now go where the money is, just like many clubs have, including the Athletics. They once played in Philadelphia before moving to Kansas City and then to their present location. Each of their previous locations now house teams of their own, showing just how large of a market they were for professional baseball. The trend is something that has also applied for workers. People once stayed with a company for their entire careers before retirement. Not anymore. The average person will have seven different careers over the course of his working life.

Free agency in sports is something we have come to expect as sports fans. Why would a player who is that talented want to stay with a club that has no discernible chance of winning a championship stay with a losing team if offered a larger salary with one that does have a shot at a title? Corporations play the same game with their employees and as a result, unions are cut out of the picture. No need for a fussy mess of a contractual system that hamstrings wages for other employees, incentives to stay on the floor and avoid a strike, or even long-term baselines for minimum compensation packages. Free agency for people in the corporate world comes down to who can offer the most attractive incentives in exchange for a person’s skills. Unions obviously lose out because of this as their goal is collective in nature, which does not favor varying salaries for employees who may have better negotiating skills than others in the worker pool. White collar workers are more likely to play the job market game as free agents than blue collar workers for many reasons; the most common reason is the nature of corporate jobs compared to manufacturing. Interpersonal skills go a long way in making connections within the company and the businesses that partner with it. Manufacturing does not offer frequent interactions as the focus is on making a physical product that can absorb the worker’s time.

The shift from a manufacturing base to one that is more services-based, which includes programming, has also had an impact on the unions. The shift favors the free agency strategy of employees as they do not have to worry about whether they will be subject to rules that may or may not favor them. Programmers might work as part of a team assembling new products, but they are hired for their talents, not their ability to ply a trade with precision and accuracy on what amounts to similar situations day-in and day-out. Unions also have a tendency to be overly protective of their current members, which discourages people from trying to get their foot in the door at the beginning of a career, not to mention union dues which can hamper a person’s living arrangements if the costs of living are not as equitable to the net pay before dues are assessed. Free agency is a much more promising method of making a living under such conditions and the new manufacturing base of electronics is peopled by workers who often go to college, which has been the traditional path of the white collar world. Free agency also favors and empowers corporations since they can negotiate compensation packages with an individual without worrying about a loss of power on their part.

The inflexibility of unions and that of corporations come down to the same thing: greed. This might sound shocking, but neither side is altruistic in their goals. As mentioned earlier, everyone wants to maximize what they get for the least amount of effort as possible. Unions try to leverage as much for their members as possible and do their best to lock out non-union employees so as to not have any competition for their power. This is an artificial system that, while it helps workers have agency when dealing with those who own the means of production, does not do labor any favors if it remains entrenched and opposed to a mixed workforce. Without competition, there is no innovation or even a way to maintain the flexibility critical to a sustained panel that can negotiate with the companies. Additionally, the inflexibility has often come at the expense of innovations which increase productivity because it can lead to the loss of union members. The automotive industry is a great example of how this has happened. The assembly lines have been automated, meaning fewer workers are needed to build cars, but those who are employed need more education that before in order to run the complex machinery that does the work more efficiently and safely than any human could. Allowing rapid change does not benefit the union, help it retain its power, or protect workers from losing their jobs.

Corporations do not want to give away anything more than they have to. It is probably an obvious statement, but nonetheless true. How else can the organization stay in business if it cannot make a sufficiently sized profit that allows it to expand or absorb unexpected expenses? The amount that is left over sometimes goes into someone’s pockets in the form of bonuses and salaries for those who manage to make the company so profitable that it has such financial stability, but a lot of it goes into expanding the organization or being socked away for the unexpected. The workers might keep the machinery running, but because they do not manage the human capital to such a degree as to expand the company’s reach they do not receive nearly as much in compensation. Whether this is fair or not is not the subject of this piece, however. The difference is mentioned inasmuch as it applies to the way both sides try to earn the greatest profits at the least cost.

Going back to the baseball analogy, the unions employ something akin to Sabermetrics. Unions do not buy the best team they can assemble; rather, they pay for the most consistent one through the compensation packages they can get for their employees and the dues they can charge. By maintaining that sustained output, the union is able to keep in the running with the corporations that employ union members since they have much larger resource caches. This is one of the ways collective bargaining helps unions secure guarantees for employees. However, unions have to pick their battles well. They cannot merely choose to go on strike to get attention; they need to ensure that there will not be a public – or political – backlash for employing the tactic. This is where consistency comes in handy since it is not a sprint, but a marathon that unions must run against corporations. They have to work through their special interest and lobbyist channels just like the corporations do. But, the unions offset the greater amount of lobbying corporations can engage in with some strategic areas of labor that they dominate, like government and various trades. Unsurprisingly, athletes have unions as well as referees who officiate the games so that the corporate offices do not determine wholly the value of the talent on the field. When untalented individuals are brought in to do the work of these seasoned professionals, it becomes clear just how skilled union members are at their jobs and how much of a value they provide. The replacement referees used by the National Football League at the beginning of the 2012 season made this painfully clear.

There are times when the tactics use by both sides show how manifestly greedy they truly are. A lot of what is done comes down to instilling fear with a healthy dose of intimidation thrown in for good measure. They are the same tactics used in political elections; just sometimes they go a little to the extreme as the tactics do not necessarily happen in public view the way political campaigns do. Take a look at the Teamsters in the 50s through the 70s. The influence of organized crime over that union shows how shady and corrupt the unions can become. Jimmy Hoffa is essentially synonymous with the problems that can surround unions. What better icon of fear and intimidation than the mafia?

Corporations are no saints either. There are the historical instances such as the Pinkertons at the Homestead Strike in 1892. Today, there are the influences of the Koch brothers and the US Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling. The net result is not unlike the Yankees trying to buy up all the talent their money can attract, a tactic that financial companies have used in the guise of bonuses and the like to attract employees. In regard to the Supreme Court ruling, the point is to ensure corporate power is unchallenged as much as possible by letting companies flood the media channels with more advertising than their opposition can muster. Yes, unions can benefit from the ruling as much as the corporations, but do they have the deep pockets of their competitors? Neither side wants to lose, but as they need each others to remain as honest as possible, they are stuck with one another. The two provide a checks-and-balances system necessary to drive competition between diverse industries as well as the future of the capitalist system just like the political parties are supposed to do with each other.

Given that much of the fight between the two groups happens in the political arena, unions and corporations have turned to the use of Political Action Committees. Yet, the traditional PACs are constrained by the rules that govern elections and the limits placed on contributions. The new free agents in the political arena where both groups can duel without restraint are the super PACs and other organizations that are not affiliated with any particular candidate. The amount of money they can spend is astounding, but again, where the corporation backed groups can blast the airwaves with their messages, the union groups have to target their messages and be more strategic about their placement, which usually follows a grassroots approach in communities. After all, the services most people rely upon to keep an orderly society in place all have unions: teachers, police, and firefighters, to name a few. If they went on strike or had a mass flu “epidemic,” it would adversely affect the community and shows how the steady consistency keeps the community on a sustainability winning streak. This is the same method that Oakland used to push itself to one game shy of making it to the 2002 postseason. The players Billy Beane selected were based on statistical analysis. One of the reasons why this approach was necessary is rooted in the slashing of the team’s operating budget. It went from one of the highest paid rosters in baseball in 1991 after it went to three consecutive World Series to one of the lowest.

Why the change? This is speculative, but the economics and population numbers for the city of Oakland most likely have something to do with it. According to the 2010 Census, Oakland has a population of 390,724 people. The current owners want to move the team to San Jose, the third largest city in California boasting a population of 945,942 people. It has twice the population of Oakland and sits in the heart of the Silicon Valley, a decidedly white collar region of the SF Bay Area and thus a significantly higher likely discretionary budget amongst its residents. The shift moves the team from a union heavy town to a free agency dominated city, which mimics the shift the country has experienced as a whole from one form of industry to another.

Much like the resistance unions have towards technological innovations that threaten their size and power, the city of Oakland, along with many fans, does not want the team to move. After all, it brings in revenue for the city and there is easy access to it by several public transportation lines. But, the stadium itself is not in the most ideal location for the team, not to mention the cash-strapped status of Oakland itself. The team owners are trying to follow the money like previous owners have done before. The San Francisco Giants also oppose the move because they have a minor league team, the San Jose Giants, in the area. There is a bit of protectionism going on from the corporate end in what is a form of NIMBYism. San Jose is seen as the corporate backyard of the Giants. Ironically, the tactic is out of the union playbook. The move to a new stadium would be innovative for the Athletics as they currently play in the only remaining dual use football/baseball stadium in the nation. Oakland is trying to build a new park for the team, but finding a place to put it and ensuring people would go there is not clear. However, the lure of San Jose’s higher salaries and population seems to be more important than where a new stadium is and if it is as innovative as needed for the franchise. Blocking any form of change towards the future is not characteristic of the corporate strategy, yet this shows a clear example that they as well do use the same tactics as their chief rival.

The move to greener pastures is essentially what a corporation tries to do when it outsources jobs to locations where unions have no say. If the case cannot be won to move towards free agency and empower the companies where they are, then it stands to reason that the capital can be spent to go somewhere else, preferably a location where right-to-work laws are strong or unions are nonexistent, thus lowering the threshold for wages, which is not unlike the proposed move of the Athletics to San Jose. The unions do everything to oppose such moves because it threatens their power base and their employees’ standards of living, all of which come down to the amount of currency and the leverage that that comes with and is what both sides work to accrue. The tactics are similar, but the methods are often not seen as the same even though they are. The underlying problem is greed at all levels of the game. Winning when the game is rigged against you is hard, but it can be done. Unions have shown that time and again, so have corporations. In baseball, Oakland almost did it this year with nineteen rookies, which keeps their payroll so low. Ironically, the corporate brand of the team is “green collar baseball,” echoing the city’s roots they are trying to escape. This is telling and shows that corporations and unions are not as different as they would like people to believe. They have similar beginnings, they have similar interests, and they use the same methods to get what they want.

A Union by Any Other Name, Part 3

By Richard T. Balsley

See Part 1 and Part 2 if you have not already!

The Use and Application of Labor
Offices and factories allow people to pool their efforts. This has the added bonus of multiplying the output of each individual as they specialize to handle key areas of the process to produce the product or service offered by the company. Having such proximity to one’s fellow workers makes it easier to cope not only with the stresses of the job, but it also helps to alleviate any sense of isolation between members of the same profession. Some of these concerns may have led to the guild halls for the same reason that people gather in offices or hold trade conventions today. As everything has a trade-off, there is a downside to the ability to congregate and perfect one’s skills on a daily basis.

The individual worker has no say in where he can perform his job nor does he have any input into the conditions of the facility. Government ordinances do, certainly, but they are outside the power of a specific person. These conditions are under the control of the person who owns the worksite. Additionally, most workers do not own the equipment necessary to do their jobs regardless of their level of skill. Herein lays the problem for the worker: having a desire to perform meaningful work for meaningful pay without losing access to the means of production where such criteria can be met. If the chief aim of the company is to provide a product for profit, then it behooves the board members to maximize earnings, but where to take the money is another question.

For good or for ill, all workplaces that employ groups of people are sites of labor extraction. There is nothing inherently wrong in this idea. Not only is it convenient and require less logistics, a centralized work location, and also a place where quality and safety controls can be instituted, but it is also a place where efforts can be coordinated. It is this last point where one can see the need for a supervisor. No longer burdened with teaching a new apprentice how to create the entire product, a supervisor or foreman can train a worker to perform a specific series of tasks along the assembly line style of industrialized production. The foreman likewise only needs to know how to do the jobs under his purview. Some of these changes between one job and the other are often minimal so that workers may graduate from one position to another in some industries. The purpose of this is nominally for standardization of quality.

Owning the sites of labor extraction and the means by which to do it is a central point of contention. In a truly communistic culture, the people who do the labor would own the site, giving them complete control over how, when, and the value of their efforts for whatever capital or other assets are exchanged to obtain what the workers produced. Whether it is a cultural or biological imperative for people to stratify themselves, the most likely result is the concentration of power in the hands of fewer people, not more. This is what capitalism does efficiently and effectively and why it is mentioned near the end of the last installment as a natural extension of feudalism. In a democratic republic, the people are legally equal in all respects. Within the site of labor extraction and the laws that govern how such labor may be extracted, this is not the case.

People are paid based not on the work they actually do in a factory or an office, but rather for what the company thinks the position each person occupies is worth. The individual is replaceable. As a result, the wages are deflated just enough to make the job enticing without making it too repellant and costing the company more money than what they would earn by paying the higher wage. Unions have helped keep the pressure on companies to provide benefits while keeping wages stable. Given the cut in profits that such wages and other forms of compensation unions work to secure in exchange for their members’ labor to be extracted, it is easy to see why both have an antagonistic relationship.

The disintegration of union power through right-to-work laws is not a bad thing in light of some of the problems that union control has had over the job market. Anyone attempting to enter a trade had to be a member of a union or be barred from work in a facility where the union oversaw employee relations with the company owners. Unfortunately, those very laws have given corporations more leverage in dictating what workers will receive in compensation for their labor. The rise and prominence of unions has been at times a barrier to the growth of any single business, but when strikes spread across several companies in support of work stoppages in other locales, it becomes harmful to the economy overall. Hence, there exists the need for balance in the legal system to prevent abuse by either organization.

The data for the past forty years or so shows a correlation between the decline of the middle class wage and the decline of the unions. Whether this is because corporations have worked so diligently to break the corporations or is in part a result of the changes in technology and the outsourcing of so many manufacturing jobs is not necessarily so clear. The increasing disparity between wages of blue collar and white collar workers, however, is. Unpacking the reasoning for this is beyond my purview, but what I can comment on is the mentality that defines the two sides of the argument and how that has helped lead to the entrenchment.

Essentially, the divide between unions and corporations comes down to a quasi-ritualistic structure that imposes a moral order on the thinking of the members of each group. The effect is a cultural indoctrination which Joseph Campbell described in The Masks of God, Volume 4: Creative Mythology as part of the ritual which serves “as the enforcement of a moral order: the shaping of the individual to the requirements of his geographically and historically conditioned social group” (p. 5). The result is the belief that the opposed group is the Other bent on eradicating the culture’s existence, and to some extent this may be true with all the legal wrangling that have informed both union and corporate culture. The strategies and tactics used by both groups are not so different, however; how they manifest is.

A (Belated) Response to a (Strange) Hoax

Almost two weeks ago, I received a many-times-forwarded message with the subject “Congressional Reform Act of 2011” (see Debunking 'Congressional Reform Act of 2011' on this site). On the surface, it appeared to be a typical piece of Tea Party/neocon invective that was unexceptional in any way; it started off with the obvious lie that it had originated with Warren Buffet, and then went on to call for a number of “common sense” responses to problems that don’t really exist, etc., and looked like something that had been making the rounds on Facebook a few days earlier. When I looked to see if I could tell where this message had originated, however, I was struck by a genuine surprise: It had, by all accounts, been sent out by the Chair of the Democratic Party of Comal County, Texas!

“While I personally do not fully agree with all of these suggestions, they are a good place to start,” this good lady writes at the beginning of her message. In that the contents of the message were ultimately written by the kind of people who make Democrats feel nervous about living in Texas, I would imagine that she would not agree with them. Why things she does not agree with would be “a good place to start,” however, I have no idea.

The idea that the leader of an organization representing besieged Democrats in a frighteningly Red state would be sending out rightwing literature was too much for me to accept and so I immediately sent her an email message to let her know I had received it. I expected she would probably let me know that she had been a victim of identity theft, but figured there was also a slight chance she would embarrassedly admit to accidentally disseminating something she had not bothered to verify (or even read very carefully to ensure it was in keeping with her party’s ethos).

When I had not received a reply after three days, I followed up with her again, once again emphasizing my affiliation with this site and my intention to publish an article about the hoax to which she had, one way or another, been party. That was a week ago and, as of this writing, she has still not had either the sense or the courtesy to reply to me or the readers of this site.

Seemingly coincidentally, right after I sent my first message to the Chair of my local Democratic organization I received a friendly and somewhat solicitous message from a gentleman who shared her last name. A little investigation revealed that this individual is currently running for a U.S. Senate seat, that he is also a member of the Democratic Party of Comal County, and that he is, in fact, the husband of the woman who had sent out the message being discussed here. We traded a few messages but, when I asked him about the email message that had originated with his wife, it went quiet at his end and our correspondence ceased.

And so, in the absence of any kind of a response, I am left to conclude that the most recent rightwing hoax to cross my desk originated with … a local office of the Democratic Party. This is certainly not an auspicious way for an organization of this sort to start off any year -- all the less so one in which we are about to experience what might be one of the most crucial national election cycles of our lifetimes and in which the Democrats will need to be on their game.

Endorsing a Republican Candidate

In November, millions of Americans will cast their votes for the person they most want to see become the next president of the United States. It is already shaping up to be a heated campaign and will pit one of the most controversial administrations of modern times against whoever ends up being the Republican nominee and any number of third-party candidates.

The rump hopefuls don’t have any hope to speak of, of course, and the contest is ultimately going to come to a toe-to-toe slugfest between incumbent Barrack Obama and the as-yet-unknown Republican candidate. Who that should be — perhaps more so even that who it ultimately will be — is thus a matter of great interest for Americans in general and the editors of this site in particular.

A good first step in getting to who should be the Republican nominee is to figure out who it should not be and to many of us there are some easy answers to that.

It seems obvious that the next chief executive of our country should not be someone who is stupid. Right there that rules out Rick Perry for anyone who values intelligence, and his weird antics, rambling monologues, funny faces and gestures, and memory lapses clearly mark him as someone who is mentally defective. Unfortunately, ever since that most brilliant of Democrat presidents, Jimmy Carter, was unable to resolve the Iran Hostage Crisis in the late 1970s, Republicans have responded by trying to place simpletons in the White House (just try to follow the painful thought process behind that … ). Sarah Palin has confined her involvement in this election to inane commentary and Michelle Bachmann has dropped out, and Perry is tanking in the state caucuses, so we may actually be clearing out the lower end of the intellect pool fairly early on.

To me, it seems like a foregone conclusion that the next president of the United States should not be verifiably corrupt. That pretty much rules out Washington insider Newt Gingrich, who has by all accounts been too cagey about his personal finances and accepted an awful lot of money from Freddie Mac and Fannie May — by his own admission for doing nothing! A willingness to take taxpayer money in exchange for doing admittedly nothing — and in actuality for influence peddling — should make Gingrich completely unacceptable. (Recently, there was a message making its rounds on Facebook in which the author suggested that because Gingrich was more articulate and better able to give a good speech that we should set aside his faults and elect him on that basis alone. Have we really slipped that far? That is reminiscent to me of the students who campaigned for Bill Clinton back in the ‘90s with the line “Character is not an issue!”).

In that most Americans are not wealthy and have felt the impact of the recent recession, the next leader of the American people should definitely not be party to making them the vassals of one-percenter business interests. That, by all accounts, rules out Mitt Romney, who would have business interests directly peddle their goods and services to children via commercial advertising on Sesame Street and would prevent workers from forming labor unions. It never ceases to amaze me that people of relatively modest means would get behind people without their economic interests at heart, and yet it seems to happen increasingly.

Finally, our next president should not be a bigot. Whether anyone likes it or not, America is a nation of many peoples, and intolerance for the ones that are not like oneself divides and weakens us as a country. So, even though the “young people” are rallying behind unapologetic demonstrated racist Ron Paul, that pretty much rules him out (and most of those young people are those smug little creeps who have not yet had the chance to experience much adversity in their lives and their numbers will wane as they come to the grim realization that most of us do).

Those exclusions don’t leave too many candidates on the Republican slate! There is one that remains, however, someone who cannot just be excluded by the above criteria and who beyond that is in palatable in his own right, and that is John Huntsman. He is educated and articulate. As the former U.S. ambassador to China he is experienced in foreign affairs — something that xenophobic amongst us, as well as those that think wars are a substitute for diplomacy, don’t get at all, but which is absolutely critical in the globalized real world. And, as a Republican who has served in a Democrat administration, he has demonstrated that he can work with leaders on both sides of the aisle and is not inclined to be a polarizing influence.

In light of the above, the editors of Religion, Politics, and Sex, have decided to endorse Huntsman as the Republican candidate for president. His attitudes, frankly, are so undeniably more progressive and intelligent than those of any of his other GOP colleagues — and his portfolio and experience so clearly superior — that it is somewhat inexplicable and dispiriting that, far from being a frontrunner, he is trailing behind all of the other surviving candidates mentioned above. If there is one characteristic many of this election’s extreme and weird slate of Republican candidates have shown, however, it is a tendency to self-destruct. As there is nothing to suggest that Huntsman has this particular trait, we can hope that he might be the last man standing while his opponents implode and drop out amidst shame and scandal. And, if that happens, Americans who feel the need to vote a GOP party line or want an alternative to the current administration may actually be able to make a viable choice.

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A Union by Any Other Name, Part 2

Picking up from where I left off, this installment looks at the development of what became the modern organizations we recognize as unions and corporations. The most recent political struggles of the past thirty years are not covered here because of the length of this entry and the complexity of the issues that have been conflated with the debate of the role each plays in the economic structure of modern society.


Trade Unions

While there is no direct links to guilds due to laws that banned labor organizations for upwards of 500 years in some places, as in England. That said, enough similarities exist to suggest that the modern unions are rooted in the guilds of old. How so, you may ask? Like trade unions, guilds served to protect their members and the knowledge of their craft. In part, this last point was in lieu of legal protections that find modern analogues in various laws for patents, trade secrets, product identity, and so forth.

By controlling what amounts to instructional capital (now mainly held in the hands of private schools and their public institute counterparts), the guilds not only held job security, but also the insurance manifest in the power bound in their protected crafts and the need of access by those not privy to such services offered by their respective guilds. Guilds were as much a vocational school as they were organizations designed to protect their members’ interests. Maintaining secrecy meant that guilds could limit or prevent a client’s exploitation of its members. In effect, it let the guild shield its members from the aristocracy’s power.

So, what happened to them? In part, technology helped in their undoing. Mostly, they were legislated out of existence for being too much of an obstacle either to someone else’s power, or their own bureaucratic system that made them financial burdens, depending on who you ask. They didn’t completely disappear, however. The word “guild” comes from the German “Guilde,” which applied only to merchant organizations. “Gilden,” the plural form of the word, dealt in money. “Gilden” was the Saxon word “to pay” and helps explain phrases like “the gilded hand.”

Despite laws which eventually broke the guilds, not all of them disappeared outright. Some of them changed forms. Merchants had their own guilds, after all. The breaking of the guilds decoupled labor from its performers. It not only sent the knowledge to the universities (predominantly in the hands of the church at the time), but also the means of production into the hands of those who owned the devices and commodities of production. Thus the standardization of production meant the technology and location fell to those with the capacity to acquire the resources necessary to control and supply goods.

Modern unions arose with the Industrial Revolution. By this time, laborers had no claim to their work. The work done was paid with wages, but the value of the service performed was greater than the compensation. In part this was due to the fact that, despite schooling, laborers were unskilled. The improve work conditions, wages, and job security (including protection from an employer’s whims), workers began to unionize in the nineteenth century. No longer the one-stop shop of the guild system, a modern union works to control the conditions of labor and access to it to prevent exploitation. Unions work to protect jobs, but this can also result in negative views of the unions.

The early strikes of modern unions resulted in a great deal of violence that has colored the perception of these groups. The tactic was, and still is, used to prevent exploitation via unfair labor extraction of union members. Beyond ensuring a workers is considered skilled enough to be a journeyman (meaning such individuals can move from one work site to another and is treated as a skilled practitioner), the ability to strike or call for one as a bargaining chip to force factory owners to the negotiation table. As such, the modern union has some of the tools of the guilds, but not their clout. One doesn’t need to look at the recent developments in Wisconsin with Scott Walker’s union stripping bill. The clashes with the Pinkertons and factory workers marked the struggle to unionize and set the tone for American unions.

The “us vs. them” mentality has been a part of the American psyche since the nation’s inception. Americans have always been xenophobic because of the invasive policies of the British Crown. While some will gladly point out that the Revolution was over a 3% tax, this is a red herring. It’s what that fee (and other taxes) represented; or rather, what they didn’t grant in terms of representation. Like modern unions, the colonists were looking for a place at the table to prevent any exploitation via the Crown’s wealth extraction of the colonies. Being denied that, both sides ramped up the pressure and antagonism until only violence would lead to any changes. As a result, a system of antagonistic forces was inculcated in the fabric of American culture along with a deep-seated xenophobia. It carried over to the struggles between factory owners and laborers, which led to the violence during the factory strikes of early unionization.

Corporations

The earliest recorded company charter in Europe dates back to the fourteenth century, not coincidentally around the same time that guilds were being outlawed; discounting those of the Roman Empire that is. The purpose of a company is to minimize the risk to any one person. Perhaps not so curious is the fact that merchants did this in their own line of work. Look at the array of goods available to a consumer in any one given store. That example of so many different products in one location serves to show how companies work. If one product fails, the store doesn’t suffer. The varied inventory makes up for the loss of any one line.

As corporations are all about providing services at a cost, the image of the merchant serves well here; so further examination is warranted. As merchants operate stores, a bit needs to be done to understand what that means. Depending on how far back one goes, say mid-thirteenth century, the word refers to goods kept on a premises, such as food, fuel, clothing and so forth. It is in this context Americans use the word for a merchant’s place of business. The building and the goods/services offered are the merchant’s stores. What a merchant does, then, is provide the service of compiling goods in one location. This has fundamentally remained unchanged for the profession throughout its many iterations.

When a company is formed, the partners have to invest it with capital from their personal reserves, or stores, if one wants to extend the metaphor. The more partners, the less risk (and reward) to those involved in the venture. But companies cannot merely spring up out of nowhere. So the corporate charter from the 1300s is pretty important. Not only does it establish the legal precedent that marks business formation, but it also recognizes and regulates the proposed corporation. Short of a monarchy owning stock in the company’s business, the charter is designed to preserve the power of the crown while allowing those forming the company to have an exclusive grant to use the company to their mutual advantage. The question is where the funds come from to start the enterprise.

Now, any student of history can confirm that money in the fourteenth century was predominantly concentrated in the hands of the aristocracy and/or nobility of any given country. Laborers and the like from the lowest social strata surely couldn’t afford to establish a business. When the guilds were dissolved, this left the merchant class and nobles with the means to form a company that extended beyond selling their labor as services. Corporations are understandably modeled on merchants as the purpose of a corporation is to provide a service to their clients and shareholders. The people who provide the labor make it possible for corporations to do this at a profit, which will be discussed later.

What one should take away from the above point is that the merchants didn’t just disappear when their guild did. It is a good bet they didn’t lose their accumulated wealth, either. Some began to channel it into newer ventures. With their acumen in diversification, merchants knew how to minimize risk. Anyone who doubts as much should read the works of Adam Smith and Daniel Defoe. While not the oldest treatises for the transition and development of what would become the corporate model, these writers show the mentality that informs capitalist and corporate theory. Granted, some of this has fallen out of favor, but that does not negate the importance such work has in how corporations have developed and continue to affect modern economic theories and practices. Comparisons to the South Sea Bubble and the recent economic crises are a good indicator to the accuracy for this argument.

Where do factories fit into this system? For one, all those unskilled laborers had to go somewhere. With the collapse of cottage industry with its piecemeal work in favor of standardization and automation that improved output at the cost of skilled labor. As the primary site of production, the factory owners were applying technology to an old economic model: feudalism. Replacing farming and other duties of the serfs tied to the land system that was the site of labor extraction with the factory changed the relationship to finished goods the peasants formerly enjoyed. Like corporations, the factories lacked the means to provide the services they promised without employing others to perform the services on the company’s behalf.

Merchants had the money and knowledge to set up new ways to give clients services previously more cost intensive than what clients wanted to spend time doing themselves. This extended to activities people were unaware of that they needed someone else to help them accomplish. Advertising helps get the word out in regards to this last point. By having groups of people who not only can do the work needed to provide the service, the corporation divides the labor any one person performs. Like any other merchant, the corporation doesn’t make the good or service, it provides the conduit for customers to purchase a physical object or access to the commodity. Readers are free to speculate where this places venture capitalists and investment firms, but it should suggest itself.

In the next installment, how these seemingly divergent paths aren’t so different after all.

A Union by Any Other Name, Part 1

Up until a short time ago, I thought I was late to the party on the ongoing debate concerning unions and that it had fallen to the wayside in the news cycle. That was until I watched the commentary on Wisconsin’s recall election, the debt ceiling fiasco, and the 8/11/11 Republican presidential debate. So, I figured I should weigh in with my views on the subject.

Here’s my disclaimer: I’m not affiliated with any party. In fact, when I take political tests, I come out as a Libertarian. Mainly this is due to my views that anything safe, sane, and conducted by consensual adults in the privacy of their homes has no place in public debate or legislation; and, government should do the maximum good at minimal costs. The first because it’s none of my business what people do, as long as I don’t have to see it or join in if I do not want to. The latter: the less money used the less corruption possible. My lack of political affiliation stems from lies and half-truths oozing out of the rhetoric of everyone in office. The power grabs are appalling and irritating.

The Art of Communication

You don’t have to have a language degree to know there are multiple ways to say the same thing. Take the words used to describe dogs. The common reference is “dog,” the scientific is “canine;” one can address them by breed (Cocker Spaniel, Chihuahua), breeding terms for gender, and so on. Either way, it is the same thing being described. What differs is how much detail is being provided along with the emotional response imbued in each word available to denote what one wishes to discuss. In “The Language Instinct,” Steven Pinker makes the claim that language is the desire to acquire a form of art. If one considers the range of sounds people can use to convey emotional states without a linguistic (language) connection, there is no need to convey thoughts about one’s own state of being. Add to this the vast array of nonverbal cues we use to get a point across and there is no need for words outside the transfer of concepts from one individual to another.

Words, then, are a means by which people transfer intangible, sometimes esoteric, ideas from their conscious mind to someone else’s. Because ideas are fluid, people need ways to indicate subtle changes with something more adaptable to the mercurial world of ideas. Hence, a vocabulary with shadings of meaning for similar or related objects. Word slippage may lead to misinterpretation, but it is this very nuance that gives the art of language its versatility and power. Word slippage is one of the ways in which we form new meanings and words to cover gaps in our concepts we were previously unaware of. The obsoletion of words is essentially the failure of a definition to remain viable for a society’s needs. Language as a technology remains useful so long as it serves the needs of its users.

Language is a technology? Yes, in the sense of the meaning of the Greek root “techné,” the “art or technique of revealing.” Language is a tool for transmitting thoughts and an art for revealing new facets of humanity’s relation within its place amongst the natural world. So, people communicate in order to further this process. This leads to another word that requires a bit of explanation: “communicate.” The root of this word means “to share.” Whenever we gesture, speak, write, or simply are present, we are sharing something with others. What then are people sharing in regards to the divide between unions and corporations? For that, an examination of the roots of those words is required.

Etymology of Two Groups

Despite the rhetoric and slippage in meaning, there is very little difference between unions and corporations. Both groups are formed out of a common interest. In this case, it is the desire to make money. To some, this may sound strange. Let’s begin with corporations.

“Incorporation” means “the act of forming a body.” It is literally in the Latin from which the word descends: in + corpus, which becomes incorporaer. The meaning is the same. Corporations then are organizations that are composed in order to form a whole from discrete parts. In the US, cities as well as businesses incorporate to create an entity designed for legal recognition as such. These organizations work towards a common purpose via a group effort it can leverage in its favor. For the city, that is securing its citizens’ safety and ability to eke out a living. Corporations exist to benefit its members financially using similar analogous functions to a town. The most notable is the council elected by members of the body to lead the organization. This group then oversees the organs that sustain the incorporated entity are supplied with whatever they need to carry out their function. This could be equipment, labor (fire, police, education, payroll, personnel, etc.), or procedural codes (laws, safety guidelines, etc.).

To “unionize” means “to become one.” Unions, then, are organizations which come together to become a single entity. Like an incorporated group, unions are formed out of a common goal. The root of “union” and “unionize” is “unum,” The Latin word for “one.” With a single front, the unionized collective can pursue its members’ interests with minimal risk to any one entity. I used “entity” here because not all unions are collectives of people. The United States is such a union of entities, along with the Chamber of Commerce. Keep in mind the language used in the Constitution reflects this: “in order to form a more perfect union.” Unions organize to protect its members from the leverage of other groups that employ such pressure on individuals to accept a contract that does not necessarily benefit the person. In order to do this, the union elects a panel to represent it and to organize the group’s resources and people to ensure the functioning of the union and produce its leverage. So, as one can see, the corollaries between unions and incorporated entities in what they are and how they function are virtually synonymous.

Finally, let’s take a look at the words “organize” and “organs” as they have some bearing on this subject. Like the previous pairs, these two words share a common root. Both enter English from Greek (organon) via Latin (organum). The original meaning is “implement, tool.” The organs of a body are, in a technical sense, tools. They have very specialized functions that keep the body working: fuel intake, fuel processing, pump, filter, communications and distribution system. Companies do this as well. Each department is an organ; an implement that serves a specific need to allow a corporation to function, such as payroll and human resources. Trade unions originally were designed to nurture and protect the interests of people best suited to make requisite corporate organs function.

To “organize” is to implement or create the tool. Organization leads to efficiency. Ask any writer how beneficial it is to have a system in place to write with clarity and economy. They have a system; we all do if we want to be seen as professionals. If that is a single-person operation, imagine organizations with twenty or more people. Organizing, then, is to structure things for a specific purpose, just like hand tools are designed to perform a single functions. Following this line of thought, every component/division/etc. in an organization is a tool. Trade unions are tools that facilitate the hiring of specialized talent whereas corporations are tools for creating the need for such people to work amongst the corporate ranks.

Suffice it to say, both unions and corporations need each other the way all bodies need organs. The closeness of this relationship, along with similarities in their structures is why so much effort has gone into distinguishing the two. This, however, is the focus of the next installment.