On “Great interest in lecture by Professor Rabinowitch in Berlin”
This article on Professor Rabinowitch’s lecture in Berlin was, I found, very exciting. But, the photograph of the filled hall, well, that just warmed my soul!
Heinz S
16 October 2010
On “The New York Times’ Roger Cohen attacks French workers”
Congratulations on a pointed and well-written condemnation of this Cohen person from the New York Times! I particularly enjoyed the part about Cohen’s pensive mood at the grave of the royal dog! Apparently he has more bathos to offer a long-deceased French canine than he has sympathy for the long-suffering French working class (or the American working class, for that matter)!
I also particularly liked your questions following assorted dimwitted statements made by Cohen [“But reform will involve tough choices made in the knowledge that the alternative is collapse.”], such as:
“Why is the reader supposed to believe that there are absolutely no alternatives to complete surrender to the demands of the banks? Cohen does not say.”
Thanks for the poinards you have stuck into Cohen’s canards.
Carolyn
18 October 2010
California, USA
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Mr. Cohen can shine his own f***ing shoes or perhaps he can get the Ghost of Coco the favorite dog to lick them into a nice dog spit shine.
Billy W
18 October 2010
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I made $8.10/hr in high school sacking groceries at a union store. Nobody starved then. Food was not more expensive back then. This was 1978. Then, one day, someone broke the union, promised lower prices, sacrificed amazing profits for a year or two and when all the union grocery stores had been exterminated, jacked the prices up even higher than they were before.
This is what is going to happen in France. They’ll promise all these “savings” and once the people have been driven to their knees and all union leaders run out of town, they’ll slash wages, raise prices and call anyone working for the people a “socialist”. I’ve seen it a million times.
PK
18 October 2010
On the social crisis and media sensationalism in Italy
The murder of a 15-year-old teenager in a small village near Taranto Puglia has captured and distracted the masses of Italians. While day-to-day existence is being shredded by worsening economic conditions, the press has bombarded the headlines with this macabre incident.
Missing for 40 days without a clue, the cell phone of the girl turned up in the hands of the uncle. Few days passed before it became clear that the uncle murdered the girl after the girl refused his sexual advances. Not only that, but after weeks of a television blitz and full-court press circus, the girl’s cousin and daughter of the uncle has also been arrested and indicted for being an accomplice to the murder. Italians have become possessed and obsessed by such gladiatorial fanfare. However, this tragedy takes the cake because every night several Berlusconi-owned TV stations have filled the airwaves with live reports from this small town.
The sensationalism reached such a high pitch that people from all around were coming to see the hidden well where the naked body of this poor girl was dumped. When sensation eclipses reality, when the “15 minutes of fame” becomes the first priority, then there is a blurry line in what psychologically motivates individuals caught up in truly sad, often disgusting events, while the whole social structure implodes.
Martin F
Romazzano, Italy
17 October 2010