Workers of the World, Harmonize!

I'm not much for musicals. I can enjoy a decent musical experience such as 'West Side Story' or 'Fiddler on the Roof', but the snob in me (and on the surface) rebels against the routine 'showstopper' solos and endless ensmeble scenes. And Andrew lloyd Webber? Forget about it.

Recently, however, an old friend of my grandfather's stopped by for a visit. Despite being 86 years old and a having suffered a recent collision with a motorcycle, Jim was still raring to go, having dropped by DC for the September 24th anti-war march. His love of political leftism, however, was only outweighed by his love to express it in song and verse, as evidenced by his voluminous collection of Gilbert & Sullivan tapes as well as volumes and volumes of song parodies; two of which he had written himself. Disappointed to find me still at school, he left me a tape with a semi-random collection of Tom Lehrer, old comedy routines, bits and pieces from socially-conscious singing grous, and significant excerpts from a show called 'Pins & Needles'.

Premiering in 1937 with music and lyrics by Louis Schaffer and Harold Rome, 'Pins & Needles' was less a straight musical than a series of sketches satirizing the politcal climate of the day, with the main focus being on the state of the labor movement, problems of class and capitalism, and the rise of fascism.

The show was cast with all union performers from the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union and rehearsed for a full year (they had, after all, full-time jobs) before it opened at the Labor Stage (formally the famed Princess Theater). The show played only on weekends, its cast and crew keeping their full-time employment as pressers, dressmakers and cutters. It ran for 1,108 performances.

The show opens with an always-topical ditty (sweetly sung by a young Barbara Streisand):

Sing me a song with social significance
or you can sing til you're blue.
Let meaning shine
from every line
or I won't love you.

Other numbers include Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, and Chamberlain singing 'Four Little Angels of Peace' and a Park Avenue matron crooning 'It's not Cricket to Picket', in which she scolds the striking workers for their lack of manners and vulgar preoccupation with being able to feed and clothe themselves. Probably my favorite, though, is 'Bertha, the Class-Conscious Sewing Machine Girl; or, It's Better With a Union Man'. In which the aforementioned Bertha falls in with a leering non-union cad (who was thoroughly bad) only to discover that, as one can only expect from a non-union man, he's a polygamist. The theatergoers are thus reminded:

It's better with a union man
It's better with a union man
You'll live to regret
if you ever forget
This motto pro-let-ar-i-an!
So always be upon your guard
Demand to see a union card.
You'll never go wrong if you follow this plan
It's better with a union man!

Now, if I actually belonged to some kind of union this might work.

Vaclav & Me

Last Friday I had the opportunity to attend a lecture (and then briefly interview) czech president Vaclav Klaus. Here's the article that will appear in the school newspaper:

On Friday the 23rd at the Shapiro Center theater Vaclav Klaus, current president and former prime minister of the Czech Republic, addressed a packed gathering of press, faculty, and students from colleges from around the Boston area.

In a brief biographical sketch delivered before the president himself spoke, International Business School dean Peter Petri described how Klaus was born and educated in Prague, where he graduated from the University of Economics. Klaus then rose to prominence after the 1989 Velvet Revolution which toppled the Communist regime in a bloodless coup. He served as chairman of the democracy-promoting Civic Forum after Vaclav Havel resigned the chairmanship to become the Czech Republic’s first president in 1990. Klaus later broke with the Civic Forum and founded the right-of-center Civic-Democratic Party (ODS). In 2003 he was elected president, where he remains to this day.

In his talk, “Why Europe Must Reject Centralization” Klaus spoke proudly of the Czech Republic’s advances in integrating itself into Europe after the fall of the Soviet Union but stressed the danger he felt was represented by the expanding power and influence of the European Union. The EU came to dominate the lecture, as he explained how the advance of that organization has created what he called a ‘democratic deficit’ in which the Brussels-based European Parliament destroyed national sovereignty by submitting directive after directive to national parliaments (including that of the Czech Republic) which they than had to implement. This he viewed as an effort to make all European countries the same, characterizing his struggle against such efforts as “the battle between liberalism (in the European sense) and homogenization.” Klaus stressed that there was no such thing as a culturally or socially coherent ‘Europe’ which could be formed into a single standard entity; at most, he would prefer an ‘Organization of European States’ on the model of the OAS.

On economic matters, he denounced social-democratic welfare states as rigid “even though many people like them” and expressed his total opposition to all government subsidies and control over the economy, while also advocating a flat tax. he also expressed disbelief at the idea that countries compete with each other; only corporations do that.

In the question-and-answer session followed, Klaus denied that the rise of the EU was due to a desire to oppose the US, but was simply born out of the ideology of regulation and ‘Europeanism’. In an entity as large as Europe, he said, public participation in the governmental process was simply not possible; the nation-state was just the right size for the right amount of democracy. As for Turkey’s desire to join the EU, he admitted that Turkey may enter into the European Union, but it could never be part of Europe. He denounced multiculturalism as “a terrible mistake” and said that the immigrants to Europe shouldn’t be accommodated in any way. “After all,” he said “When you join a golf club, you can’t change the club charter the next day.”

In a brief interview granted to members of the press (including The Hoot) after his lecture, Klaus reiterated his opposition to a unified Europe and centralization of all types, but stressed that for a country to transition smoothly out of the Communist era they required a leader with three things: vision, a coherent plan to implement that vision, and the trust of the people. “But;” he added, “that really needs a two-hour lecture to answer, and I really must be going.”

The event was hosted by the Brandeis International Business School as part of their Rosenberg Institute Distinguished Lecture series.

Frankly, I'm disappointed it wasn't Vaclav Havel, but you can't have everything.

German Elections: It Could be Worse

So, the German elections are over but nobody has won. The three parties that were in power or striving for power - The Social Democrats, Greens, and Christian Democrats - all lost seats, while the liberal FDP and socialist Left Party or Linkspartei (formerly the Party of Democratic Socialism) gained significantly, achieving roughly 10% and 9% of the vote, respectively. This makes the old Red-Green alliance between the SPD and Greens unworkable, but leaves the presumed government of a CDU-FDP coalition in basically the same situation.

Most people put the blame (or the credit) for Schroeder's decline in popularity on Germany's 11% unemployment rate, while the CDU's Angela Merkel lost much of an early lead by batting around a wildly unpopular flat-tax scheme and saying that one of her as main actions as Chancellor would be to "make it easier for people to be fired."

Interestingly, while the SPD is the traditional 'left' party and the CDU is the respectable 'right' party, this elections seems to represent a shift away from both of them, with the left moving left and the right moving center.

Anyway, the governments that are possible:

Great Coalition - CDU and SPD

If CDU can maintain their seat plurality Merkel will be chancelor, despite what Schroeder is saying. However this coalition seems like a recipe for paralysis, as the joining of both major parties to achieve super-majorities usually only happens during periods of great national crisis.

Traffic light coalition - SPD, FDP and Greens

Called traffic light because the colors are red, yellow and green. FDP already said that is out of the question and even the Greens would be against it, I think, because Joschka Fischer would rather go into oposition than be anything less than foreign minister and vice-chancellor (traditional trappings of the coalition partner's top candidate).

While FDP and Greens are almost diametrically oposite on economy and environment they share some values on social issues. For example they are in agreement on abolishing the conscription.

Jamaican Coalition - CDU, FDP and Greens

Similar to above, just with CDU at the helm. The CSU (a Bavaria-only party closely allied with the CDU) leader already showed interest in talking to the Greens.

Red-Red-Green coalition - SPD, Left Party and Greens

SPD and the Left party do not like each other. One part of the party is formed by breakaways from SPD - such as former finance minister Oskar Lafontaine. The other is the remnant of the former East German ruling party, one with which SPD refused to coalesce on the federal level already (but with which it formed coalitions in some eastern states).

This is unlikely to happen because of animosity between SPD and Left Party and because Greens are unlikely to play third fiddle, even though they came in fifth and may be lucky to end up playing second viola.


Since we live in a majoritarian system that has two parties and not five, this might all seem terribly confusing. It is, and will probably be resolved by some shady backdoor dealings between party leaders. Even so, don't count on the new German government lasting too long.

The Next Internationale

Several weeks ago Smiling Neocon and I were having one of our customary arguments, which usually center on socialism, U.S. foreign policy, or depressing Israeli movies. In the course of the conversation we got to the issue of how in internationale disputes each 'democratic' nation must always giver other democratic governments preference over their more autocratic counterparts, so as to encourage democracy. I contended that no democratic government every actually did this, and that most democratic countries (including the U.S.) had no interest in whether their allies allowed basic freedoms or not. To cap it off, I somewhat sarcastically remarked that "It's not like we're part of some Democratic Internationale which tries to encourage personal freedom and government accountability around the world."

Thinking about it now, though, why aren't we?

It might seem like this idea has been done to death. We've already had at least three Communist internationales, and we've still got a Socialist Internationale (actually for social democrats), a Liberal International, a Green Internationale, and even a right-wing conservative Internationale, which started calling itself the 'Freedom International' after 9/11.

Still, why is this a useless idea? In the world today there is no government or major party that has dedicated its resources to helping other countries achieve popular self-rule. Instead, we have ideologically bound organizations which focus almost exclusively on economic issues. So, private-property rights or collective ownership rights are stressed to the neglect of freedoms of speech, conscience, religion, and equality under the law.

As the symbol of this new Democratic Internationale, there are many options, though I suppose an Athenian laurel crown would do perfectly well.

The Mummy's Election

Yesterday saw the first multi-party election Egypt has ever had. Nine candidates ran against 4-term incumbent Hosni Mubarak, including Numan Gumaa from the New Wafd Party and 40-year Ayman Nour of the Tomorrow Party, though not the banned Muslim Brotherhood. Mubarak represented his own ironically-named National Democratic Party.

Last Tuesday the ever-wry BBC, reporting on this event, told listeners that "Egyptians elections are being held tomorrow. We should know Mubarak's margin of victory by Saturday."

Allegations of abuse are already flying, including charges of voter intimidation, votes being taken away before people could mark them, and intenrational obsevrers being blocked from polling stations. A consortium of Egyptian artists gathered to protest

But, if you had any doubts about where illiterate laundrymen-turned nationalistic singers stand on whether Mubarak deserves a fifth term, look no further than jewel of the Nile Shaaban Abdel Rahim. In his latest song 'The Word of Truth', Rahim lavishes praise on the 76-year-old premier. "Oh president, you do not need any words," he sings, "The people are happy because they feel secure." Rahim goes on to list Mr Mubarak's many feats, ranging from the construction of 'new cities' to the advent of the 'incredible metro' in Cairo. Mr Mubarak is also credited with bringing satellites to Egypt and making running water and mobile phones readily available to the general population. Rahim is generally regarded as something between kitsch and camp by Egypt's 'cultured' society, who derisively refer to him as 'Ludwig Shaaban'.

All joking aside, this little charade in honor of democracy is nothing new; autocratic regimes have been calling themselves 'republics' or 'democratic republics' or even 'Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriyas' since 'democracy' became the accepted ideal after World War Two. While some might see this as a sign of progress in that formerly regimes must at least go through the motions of allowing public participation in government, my fear is that it's much easier to stifle dissent and calls for democracy if at least some people are fooled into thinking they've already got it.

UPDATE: Mubarak has been declared the winner with 88.6% of the vote - 4 point higher than he got six years ago in what he admitted was a rigged election. So, you see, dictators can embrace democracy too.