I was stalking around on Facebook yesterday afternoon when I came across a post from a guy I know who is in Paris on business. According to him, a union protest attended by thousands had snarled traffic and disrupted his dinner plans. As an executive for one of the world’s most known retail companies, this guy’s sphere of influence is horrific, so lots of people are in line waiting for their chance to kiss his ass in the most public way possible. And yesterday they did just that. The comments attached to his status update were great examples of how people want to side with those who have power and money, even if they’re fortunes are far more aligned with those who do not. What could French workers possibly have to complain about? What do they want? More vacation time? Here’s how I see it: People who depend on earning an hourly wage are willing to throw grenades at people in another country because they’re in a union, because they get more vacation days and because they have the nerve to cause a traffic jam in Paris and delay their main man’s dinner engagement. This is done in order to suck up to someone who would, I’m quite certain, vote on the side of management and shareholders rather than on their behalf were he forced to make a choice. Pardon my language, but what a mind fuck.
Personally, I wish the Paris protesters had been in Washington, D.C. yesterday to clog traffic in our highest court’s neighborhood. I think it would have benefited all of us in ways we can barely imagine had some folks who think about more than their next promotion been available to distract the justices as they paved what I think is a major on-ramp to the road that will lead to the demise of our election system, or what's left of it. In their wisdom, they ruled that corporations can spend as much as they’d like on campaigns. In their benevolence, they tossed us a bone, I suppose, by granting unions and nonprofits the same green light. That assumes, of course, that unions and nonprofits will be able to sustain themselves through what I anticipate will be an onslaught the likes of which we’ve never seen, so forceful and relentless they may even interrupt dinner plans.
Personally, I wish the Paris protesters had been in Washington, D.C. yesterday to clog traffic in our highest court’s neighborhood. I think it would have benefited all of us in ways we can barely imagine had some folks who think about more than their next promotion been available to distract the justices as they paved what I think is a major on-ramp to the road that will lead to the demise of our election system, or what's left of it. In their wisdom, they ruled that corporations can spend as much as they’d like on campaigns. In their benevolence, they tossed us a bone, I suppose, by granting unions and nonprofits the same green light. That assumes, of course, that unions and nonprofits will be able to sustain themselves through what I anticipate will be an onslaught the likes of which we’ve never seen, so forceful and relentless they may even interrupt dinner plans.
