Working Life

You know, one day very soon, this isn’t going to make headlines. It just won’t matter because it will be so accepted as part of the fabric of society. Today, however, it’s still important to cheer for the men and women who come out in the workplace who, because of their relative influence, can move the needle.

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You may have read about the tax deal that the president is threatening to veto. It’s a stinker.

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Admittedly, I have a soft spot for Abdul-Jabbar, having re-entered the world of the NBA just as he and Magic Johnson began their run in the early 1980s (and after they, and Larry Bird, retired, I stopped watching the game because it became unwatchable, “look-at-me” nonsense…but I digress).

More important, with 1.65 million Twitter followers, Jabbar reaches a big audience, part of which I am guessing does not see other political analysis. He stands as a symbol, as well, to all the other athletes who stay silent lest they endanger endorsements, certainly that’s true of athletes still playing but it’s also true for those who have retired (exemplified by Michael Jordan–who, with a single phone call or public statement, probably could have stopped Nike from doing business with child slave labor factories in China).

So, Kareem, you have the stage.

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The problem with Chuck Schumer’s criticism of the focus on health care is that he doesn’t really focus on the main problem. Not surprising because a man who never saw a Wall Street check he didn’t like wouldn’t understand.

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Well, of course, you didn’t–and this is no Nigerian prince scam. Rather, it’s the average income for the top 400 earners in the U.S. This isn’t the top 1 percent. This is the ubber top percenters, the .001 percent.

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Block the borders!!! Those rich people are fleeing state high taxes. Yeah, right–it’s a myth.

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The Federal Reserve Bank of New York is first among equals when it comes to the other 11 regional Fed Banks. That person has a big say on interests rates because s/he sits permanently on the Fed’s Board of Governors. So, should the head of the NY Fed have to be confirmed by the Senate? Senator Jack Reed thinks so.

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Well, duh…

It’s good to see this demand by both Elizabeth Warren and Joe Manchin. But, there’s an important point missing.

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Because what has happened is robbery. Pure and simple. “Stagnation” is too passive. It makes it sound like a natural phenomena, like a sunset.

It makes it sound like there were never active players in the daily robbery of workers–either by outright breaking of the law or by using the so-called “free market” system to take from people the fruits of their labor.

I raise this because of two elite views expressed in the past couple of days that are pretty common repetitions of the myth of “gee, isn’t it terrible this thing just happened”.

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Nobody, in my opinion, knows the Supreme Court better, and writes about its decisions and law in a more user-friendly way, than Linda Greenhouse, former NYTimes Supreme Court reporter who has a regular column on the Times website; I read every one of her columns, even if it’s not a topic I particularly work on or follow.

Today, she blisters the Court in a broadside that essentially says: by agreeing to take up a challenge to the Affordable Care Act, the conservative majority has shown that it is simply a group of “politicians in robes”.

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