Seattle General Strike Feb 6 1919

Seattle General Strike: "On the morning of February 6, 1919, Seattle, a city of 315,000 people, stopped working. 25,000 union members had joined the 35,000 already on strike. Much of the remaining work force was idled as stores closed and streetcars stopped running. The General Strike Committee, composed of delegates from the key striking unions, tried to coordinate vital services and negotiate with city officials, but events moved quickly beyond their control."

"Wall Street Uses the “S” Word to Denounce Criticizing its Bonuses - Socialism!"

“I think President Obama painted everyone with a broad stroke,” said Brian McCaffrey, 55, a Wall Street lawyer who was on his way to see a client. “The way we pay our taxes is bonuses. The only way that we’ll get any of our bailout money back is from taxes on bonuses. I think bonuses should be looked at on a case by case basis, or you turn into a socialist.”

That, indeed, was a recurring equation: Broad strokes + bonuses = socialist.

“It’s a very slippery slope to go down,” said another insurance broker as he waited to be seated for lunch at Cipriani Downtown. “A blanket statement like that borders on” — you guessed it — “socialism.”
The Washington Independent

Santa's helpers disable naughty cameras in Tempe

Creative protest against the surveillance state.

Clap On, Clap Off --Mark Fiore

Best Comic of the Year. Clap Capitalism On and Off

The Indypendent � Change from Below: Dutch Socialists Build a Grassroots Movement

The Indypendent � Change from Below: Dutch Socialists Build a Grassroots Movement

Brenda Stokely

I just met Brenda Stokely in this online video. I'm guessing she
comes from the Maoist tradition. Nevertheless, I enjoyed
watching this video from 2005. It's apparently a speech given at
a conference organized by Worker's World.
She seems to have a realistic assessment of the revolutionary left,
and she has some good ideas on organizing. I'm not sure of her
perspective on how to overcome our divisions but it's interesting.

Brenda Stokely: "Dailymotion - Brenda Stokely

I found a link to other videos from the same conference
for those interested.

How to Run a Con (or become a powerful politician, among other things)

"My laboratory studies of college students have shown that two percent of them are "unconditional nonreciprocators." That's a mouthful! This means that when they are trusted they don't return money to person who trusted them (these experiments are described in my post on neuroeconomics). What do we really call these people in my lab? Bastards. Yup, not folks that you would want to have a cup of coffee with. These people are deceptive, don't stay in relationships long, and enjoy taking advantage of others. Psychologically, they resemble sociopaths. Bastards are dangerous because they have learned how to simulate trustworthiness. My research has demonstrated that they have highly dysregulated THOMASes."

How to Run a Con