Like a good citizen, I voted today. “Yes” on 1 and 2, “No” on 3 and 4, against Whitey for Mayor, Socialist Workers where I could, Working Families where I could not and write-in votes for “Socialism” for the judges and Public Advocate.
One question: why the Hell are we voting on a Tuesday?
It’s funny how quitting a job can sometimes feel like breaking up with a girlfriend. Even if the break-up occurred for good reasons, it tears you up to hear what she’s been up to, and makes you wish, if only for a moment, that you were still there.
Sunday’s New York Times profiles the upcoming contract fight for the city’s hotel employees union, where I worked for three years before resigning last November 3rd. That fight was brewing for at least as long as I worked for the union, so I’ve had a front row seat to this drama.
The term “Me Too” still makes my heart sing. More than just a promise to keep the employees working, as the Times frames it, a “Me Too” is actually where the company signs the contract before it is even written. Whatever the other companies agree to, we do too. Please don’t strike us. It’s key. A general hotel strike does no real damage if it hurts all the industry’s competitors equally. But if the hold-outs are shuttered while their competitors who made peace with the union do boffo business, that’ll nudge the bosses to settle a lot sooner. Besides, no matter how impressive a $30 million war chest may be (and the membership referendum that voted by a nine to one margin to tax themselves ten dollars a week for two years is one of the most impressive, and unsung, victories for working people last year), it won’t last long with all 27,000 members out on picket lines.
Next year’s nine city hotel strike will likely be a historically epic battle between trade unions and the multinational corporations. My guess is that it will be the first real test of the Change to Win federation. This will be where talk is translated into action. It’s going to be a tough fight. I’m sorry that I won’t be a more active participant. But you can’t go home again. But I will be there on picket lines, if and when they materialize, and I will be exhorting you, dear readers, to do the same.
This seems as good a time as any to announce that I have finally accepted a permanent position with a union (well, as permanent as any job in the labor movement can be). I started this blarg when I was unemployed. I’m still figuring out how much I should talk about work. So, all I’ll say now is that I’m organizing, somewhere in the teacher’s union. Fight the good fight, comrades.
For the benefit of readers who lack a Masters degree education in Labor Law, or a brain in their skulls, when workers return to their job site with no conditions or stipulations after a walk-out, and their boss responds, “No, I will not allow you to return to work,” that is not a strike. That’s called a lock-out, and it’s what management has done to the union musicians at the Radio City “Christmas Spectacular.”
Throughout contract negotiations with Local 802 of the Musicians union, Cablevision, the managers of the Radio City Christmas Show have made outrageous and provocative demands. Although the union and Cablevision are agreed on all financial matters in the contract negotiations, management will not let the union return until…well, it’s not really clear why they won’t sign the contract and let the musicians return.
“We have told the musicians in no uncertain terms that until there is an agreement and there is no possibility of them walking out on future performances, they remain on strike and cannot return to the Music Hall,” doth decreed the pinheads at Cablevision. Again, it’s a minor point, but I am a stickler for such things, it’s only a strike if the union decides not to work. If the union workers unconditionally offer to work, and the boss refuses to let them, it’s a lock out.
Call the Radio City box office at 212-307-1000 and tell them to bring live music back to the Christmas show. Sign the damn contract.
What a disappointing decade and a half it’s been for fans of Paul Westerberg. The mercurial former lead singer for the mighty Replacements moved from glossy pop rock to over-produced singer-songwriter navelgazing to under-produced home recording reclusiveness, from major label “next big thing” to indie label “has been,” from sober to drinking again.
Westerberg’s cult status is consecrated, to an extent, by the Rhino collection, “BESTerberg: The Best of Paul Westerberg,” a curious 20 song collection culled from six of his nine albums, plus assorted extras, that feels like a condensed version of what should have been a three record set. B-sides and soundtrack contributions, like his anemic cover of “Nowhere Man” and the AIDS-themed rocker “Stain Yer Blood” (finally available without the “witty banter” from the tv show “Friends”) properly belong on a fuller collection of odds and sods (call it “RESTerberg”), along with some good stuff that didn’t make the cut, like his covers of “Make Your Own Kind of Music” and “Sunshine,” as well as the Danish bonus track, “33rd of July.” Ponderous clunkers like “A Star is Bored” and “Man Without Ties,” however, are more properly classified as “WORSTerberg.”
What’s good on here are mostly some mid-tempo ballads filled with regret and ennui, like “Things” and “Once Around the Weekend” (presented here in a too-busy alternate mix). The wistful “Love Untold” manages to overcome not only a slightly saccharine flavor, but makes a line about wearing clean underwear “just in case” sound charming and romantic. “It’s a Wonderful Lie” sounds like the sadly resigned flip side to the old Mats’ song, “Talent Show,” while “Lookin’ Out Forever” still sounds ragged and desperate, if a bit too much like Tom Petty.
Paul Westerberg stands now on the precipice of the peculiar variety of following his own muse that Alex Chilton rode to artistic oblivion. The next 15 years could be fascinating, or they could be a ridiculous train wreck.
