Archive for October, 2006
A Thomas Friedman quiz
Thomas Friedman: The Lexus and the Olive Tree. The World is Flat. A column in the New York Times. “Arguably the world’s most influential and popular foreign-policy thinker,” according to The Washingtonian. Quick dear readers—which quote is parody and which is the real Thomas Friedman? A. We got this free market, and I admit, I ...Read more.
Dollars & Sense becomes the Book Liberation Front
Dollars & Sense has temporarily transformed itself into the Book Liberation Front. The warehouse where we have stored our book inventory for several years is doubling its minimum monthly storage fee on November 1. Soon after we got the news, we found a new home for the books at Encuentro 5—the fifth floor of the ...Read more.
Background on the crisis in Oaxaca.
Violence has escalated in the Mexican state of Oaxaca. Several protesters were killed last Friday, including Brad Will, an independent journalist affiliated with New York Indymedia. Mexican president Vincente Fox has sent federal police forces into Oaxaca. The following report is from the Inter Press Service News Agency: The Popular Assembly of the People of ...Read more.
The Economist: Weapon of Mass Deduction?
The Economist’s latest ad campaign has become ubiquitous in Boston over the past few weeks. Similar to the recent Snickers campaign that co-opts the adbusting technique of subverting a brand’s logo, The Economist’s ads feature the magazine’s red-box logo with various slogans replacing the words “The Economist.” And, as much as D&S laments the reverse ...Read more.
Solving the wrong problem in Michigan
Dollars & Sense blogs, and some of our readers blog, too. Today, subscriber Richard Murphy justifies his lack of support for Michigan ballot proposal 5, which allocates half a billion additional funding for K-university education. There is no problem that the schools face that is isolated to the schools – all of these are symptomatic ...Read more.
Econamici: The End of Iraq, by Peter Galbraith
The End of Iraq: How American Incompetence Created a War without End, by Peter Galbraith From the day the war in Iraq became imaginable, my husband and I have not missed a peace march. Nonetheless, as the slaughter continues, I have worried about how the US can extricate itself. Ambassador Peter Galbraith’s book is reassuring, ...Read more.
Webwashing 2.0
Say you’re the manager of a company that does nasty things, like killing union workers in Colombia. Before you know it, people are writing about it on the web. What should you do to help your company’s reputation? a) Resign in disgust b) Get your company to change its behavior c) Post bogus comments and ...Read more.
2nd US Federation of Worker Cooperatives Conference
D&S co-editor Chris Sturr and business manager Esther Cervantes spent the weekend in New York at the 2nd US Federation of Worker Cooperatives conference. Panel topics ranged from nuts-and-bolts—How to Make Your Co-op Loan-Ready—to big-picture—Unions and Worker Cooperatives: Is There Room for Collaboration?. And we got to meet tons of people who work in co-ops, ...Read more.
New Nobel Prize Economist – Wrong on Unemployment?
This year’s Nobel Prize winner in economics has just been announced: Edmund Phelps, a Columbia University economist, for his work on unemployment and inflation. Phelps is one of the economists of the “natural rate of unemployment” theory — the theory that has provided the intellectual foundation for employing fear-mongering about inflation to fight job-creation policies. ...Read more.
Photos from D&S event available
Dollars & Sense’s September 15 event on Economic Justice and African American Communities was a big success. A large and lively crowd gathered at the Community Church of Boston for a participatory forum with anti-poverty organizer Diane Dujon, labor activist Bill Fletcher, and Boston city councillor Chuck Turner, in honor of D&S’s own Chris Tilly. ...Read more.
