Neoliberalism, Democracy and the University as a Public Sphere (tags)
What can educators & others concerned about the future of higher education do to make sure it is not colonized by corporate & other antidemocratic interests? First, educators & others need to figure out how to defend more vigorously higher education as a public good & how central it is in producing the formative culture necessary to educate young people to be critical & engaged.
The Left is Not Obsolete (tags)
"Propaganda is always the other. We are the principled," said Norman Birnbaum. The left is rooted philosophically in the Enlightenment with its rejection of throne and alter. The left sought material redistribution for moral reasons-for the sake of transforming human nature.
"Trump does not read much" (tags)
A new supposed weakness of the populist is now discovered: he doesn't read...Trump is certainly a new phenomenon. He pretends to be an outsider of the political system and of knowledge.
fbi is public enemy # ONE (tags)
Never forget the evil that reigns in usa as fostered by fbi/cia .
TPP designed to make medicine more expensive (tags)
The TPP is the latest and most important new trade agreement that seeks to create new standards for intellectual property that are more friendly to pharmaceutical companies and publishers. The TPP chapter on intellectual property expands and extends drug monopolies.
NATO's propaganda outlet for progressives - The Guardian's board members (tags)
It is completely disingenuous for anyone to suggest that the Guardian reports on Edward Snowden's revelations are much more than a carefully managed propaganda exercise deployed in the internal power struggle of the US-Anglo elite about how best to manage their declining global power and influence. Likewise, it is absurd to suggest that the Guardian editors are implementing a "publish and be damned" policy, as Guardian writer Glenn Greenwald has suggested, when it is inconceivable that their editorial policy on publishing Edward Snowden's material will not have been closely coordinated on the basis of the Board's relations with colleagues in the British government, in British intelligence and in the US-Anglo corporate sector.
Does George F. Will Write Like a Weasel (tags)
Recently George Will wrote a column as to whom Mitt Romney might choose as his Vice President. Within the context of exaggerated hyperbole Will proposes Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan or Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. Thus this aging crank spent more time with blatant labeling of Obama (and the “entitlement state”) rather than making much of a case for either of his choices. If cartoonist and author Scott Adams wrote a book on politicians then George Will’s writing could easily inspire several chapters. What blowhard has written with more insinuation, illusion of logic, confusing sophistry, guilt by association, and whimsical vagary than this pretense of intellectual firepower? His political biases are almost always more prevalent than an ability to write clear and rational arguments.
ACTA
ACTA: Worse Than SOPA and PIPA (tags)
Internet freedom
Aaron Swartz and the Morality of Hoarding Knowledge (tags)
Activist-programmer Aaron Swartz was recently arrested for breaking into an MIT network closet to copy academic journals from the JSTOR system.
Under Threat: A Free and Open Internet (tags)
Internet threatened
Memories Of Madison - My Life In The New Left (tags)
"The Young Republicans were all dressed up—men in suits and ties, women in dresses—and looked like they were attending a business meeting at the country club. Even though the Young Republicans were all white and most of them came from Wisconsin, I can’t say that I related to them much. But I felt even more alien at the meeting of the antiwar committee. The attendees were dressed in a much more Bohemian style and there was a lot of intense talk about politics. And they were Jewish."
Open Letter to President of Depaul University (tags)
On the merit of Dershowitz vs. Finkelstein http://humanbeingsfirst.blogspot.com/2007/04/open-letter-to-president-of-depaul.html
Freed from International Law: Book Review (tags)
With deep conviction of self-righteousness, the United States demands observance of international law from other countries but dems it irrelevant for itself.. Being an intellectual is a calling for everyone. (Noam Chomsky)
The Failures of Faculty in Tough Times (tags)
t's possible that this watch-list strategy sprang fresh from the minds of the Young Conservatives of Texas, but it's more likely they were influenced by the national group Students for Academic Freedom and leftist-turned-right-wing-activist David Horowitz. The strategy is simple: Rather than attack specific professors for holding views critical of the dominant culture and its institutions, better to claim that the universities are dominated by these critical intellectuals who are crowding out other perspectives.
How Military Recruiters Pitch to Latinos: PowerPoint Racism (tags)
According to this racializing model, "right-brain" irrational Hispanics, unsuited for "America's system of education," will vote their way into Karl Rove's projected Republican majority, and for decades to come fill the ranks of the lowest echelons of the service sector, the prison system, and the combat units of America's imperial army. Were he alive today Che Guevara, whom a CIA operative once described as "fairly intellectual for a Latin," would undoubtedly be asking progressive Latinos what they plan to do about it.
Paul Wolfowitz’s Heart of Darkness (tags)
Now, War Hawks within the Bush-Cheney Gang are planning a First-Strike against Iran. It may come just before the Nov. midterm elections. The Neocon Paul Wolfowitz concocted the notion of a Pre-emptive War. His target, in 2003, was Iraq. Every time I hear Wolfowitz’s name mentioned, I curse him for all the deaths and suffering that his scheme has caused to the peoples of that unfortunate country, our brave troops and to our dwindling treasury.
Secondary Illiterates: The Crisis of Education in Western Industrial Countries (tags)
"Euroepan literacy and the schooling of society were not generous civilizing gifts to people but part of that process described as `inner colonialization'..Infrastructural institu-tions are not market enterprises but overall social conditions for the market economy.."
Globalization Study Group in LA (tags)
Is there any interest in forming a study group to discuss globalization, to seek some personal and community understanding of it, and to brainstorm plans of action to deal with it? Would you be interested?
Why the ''Free Market'' despises Open Source software (tags)
The Micorsoft's assualt on open source is like the WTO "free trade" conflict -- a massively subsidised, genetically modified, machinery and chemical-warfare wielding colossus at war with a tiny malnourished day labourer armed with a mattock.
RIAA sues 261 for sharing..... (tags)
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Wiesenthal Center: Germany Sold Poison Gas Iraq (tags)
The following report, commissioned by the Los Angeles, California based Simon Wiesenthal Center, was completed by Paris, France based Middle East Defense News. It clearly shows how Germany, particularly under Chancellor Helmut Kohl supplied Iraq with its poison gas, knowing full well that Iraq's aim was to use the gas on Israel.
The Twilight of Vanguardism (tags)
Revolutionary thinkers have been saying that the age of vanguardism is over for most of a century now. Outside of a handful of tiny sectarian groups, it's almost impossible to find a radical intellectuals seriously believe that their role should be to determine the correct historical analysis of the world situation, so as to lead the masses along in the one true revolutionary direction.
Illegal Art: Freedom of Expression in the Corporate Age (tags)
check out http://www.illegal-art.org/ and http://www.stayfreemagazine.org
come here talk about the problems with intellectual property and copyright! (tags)
Talk at UCLA about copyright and intellectual property