By Joseph Orosco (March 31, 2020) Some thirty years ago, Cesar Chavez staged his last major hunger fast. This fast went on for thirty-six days. In his statement issued at the end, Chavez said he had begun the fast because he had to do penance; he was ashamed of himself. For all his years as an organizer, he said…
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By Tom Motko (March 30, 2020) (For National Viet Nam Veterans’ Day 3/29) Please do not thank me for Viet Nam. Just welcome me home and let me finally rest. Gratitude misplaced grants you no absolution. Congratulate my survival and my brothers’ but atone for your country and its sins. Do penance for the whores and the half bloods, put…
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By Zakk Flash (March 25, 2020) We’re going to see some serious supply chain problems as my fellow “essential workers” and I fall sick. Workplace protections have never been good in most industries; I’m grateful for the Teamsters collective bargaining agreement that I work under that gives me a bit more security. Unions are going to be a big part of what…
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By Joseph Orosco (March 24, 2020) Looking around for articles that highlighted speculative fiction responses to pandemics, I ran across this piece from Alan Yuhas from a few years ago. Yuhas mentions some obvious things such as Camus’s The Plague and The Walking Dead, etc, but what I found most interesting was a mention of Italian Renaissance writer Boccaccio and…
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By Natan Rebelde (March 24, 2020) Many people are currently becoming more accepting of the reality that there’s something very, very wrong with our way of life. Declarations such as “humans are the virus!” are indeed misguided, but I would caution against knee-jerk accusations of eco-fascism. Of course, fascists utilizing ecological realities to forward their agendas will likely make use…
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By Arun Gupta (March 23, 2020) I wrote this days ago saying an economic contraction of 10% or more and an unemployment rate of 20%. Only now are investment banks worth hundreds of billions of dollars considering we are in a depression. I haven’t seen anyone acknowledge what is obvious: The same economic denialism is going on now as in…
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By Louis Colombo (March 22, 2020) Lots of doom and posts prophesying the end of the world. No doubt, these are some unsettling times and it’s hard to know where the bottom is. No doubt too that there’s lots of reasons to be concerned for yourself, your loved ones, and even folks you’ve never met. But here’s the thing. From…
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By Joe Lowndes (March 21, 2020) Tucker Carlson is being cheered by some liberals for calling out NC Sen. Richard Burr for insider trading. Burr should be investigated for this, to be sure. But this is consistent with Carlson’s right-wing nationalism more generally – just as it was Pat Buchanan’s before him. However, it will matter in a new way…
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By Astra Taylor (March 20, 2020) If you know me, you know I love etymologically. I love the buried meanings of the word we use, their hidden resonance. The word “crisis” comes from the ancient Greek. It means the turning point in an illness—death or recovery, two stark alternatives. Someone just told me the root of “apocalypse is “to reveal”…
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By Natan Rebelde (March 19, 2020) Y’all scared? Good. You should be. I am too. But I have been, for a very long time. I hate that I feel vindicated to some degree. And the reality is, this is just the tip of the iceberg. The disruptions and collapse to come will dwarf this by comparison. But they are part…
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By Teka Lark (March 19, 2020) The central banking system of the United States is the Federal Reserve System aka the Fed. According to Investopedia a central bank acts as the regulatory authority of a country’s monetary policy and is the sole provider and printer of notes and coins in circulation. The Fed is run by the board of governors….
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