thursday, march against MUNI service cuts and fare hikes!

Here are two reasons to not go along with today's sheep-crawl to City Hall, about the austerity measures imposed by Muni management on Muni riders and emplyees. This is the sort of judgement call issue that you can always count on anarchists to fail at:

1. No chickenshit demo on the steps of City Hall is likely to have any effect on the austerity measures on MUNI,

2. And if it does, then what's that saying? It's clearly saying that working with the system is the way to go.

The kind of perspective that can help create a completely different type of revolutionary politics in this country -- anti-market, anti-state, direct action; oriented towards the wage-earning class, and not towards the illusions and emotional needs of leftist apparatchiks and anarchist subculturalists -- isn't about playing footsie with Trots, liberals and social workers -- people in Muni Social Strike and BAAC apparently don't get that.

Kevin Keating

Why is Indymedia allowing this self promoting clown who hasn't done shit since his way overblown self aggrandizing MYEP campaign, to continue to self promote?

Come on Keating get off your feeble pseudo intellectual ass and do some hard work for a change, and instead of just shooting off your mouth and sitting around being contrary about everything and everybody for the sake of contraryness.

How about actually doing some real work with real people that actually has some quantifiable effect, of changing something in the real world and in real peoples lives? How about cutting the incessant "look at me I have the perfect anarchist/communist theory" yammering. Stop resting on your illegimate laurels, acting like a gadfly looking people to buy you free beer.

http://www.keating-is-jerk.com

when's the next social strike meeting?

It doesn't look like there will be another one, brave fellow. That's why a group that ceased public activity some time ago endorsing the sheep-crawl has a bit of an air of fraud about it.

If my politics were anything like yours, I'd cower behind a fake name, too.

Kevin, you /do/ cower behind fake names! Let me see, there's Nester Makhno, Max Anger, Keith Sorel, T. Szamuely, shall I go on?

So, what happened at yesterday's "Rally"? Any news? Photos? Did anyone even show up?

It was pretty small--about fifty people or so.

Keating got his wish. The (counter-revolutionary) action wasn't a grand success. The authentic anti-market, anti-state movement of the exploited for true revolution, whose success was threatened by this egregious diversion, is back on track.

Can't you feel the difference in the air? The workers are victorious.

...He sounds a touch disapointed. I suggest he follow up on the logic of yesterday's event by writing his congressperson to complain. But at least Aaron is enough of an adult to post his failed attempts at irony under his actual name, unlike his fellow underling of Trotskyism "real Makhno at the bottom of a glass" and other cowards.

I've said all I need to say here. The peanut gallery can have the last word. Just cause you little fellows need to respond to me it doesn't mean I have to repay the compliment.

I think it was a mistake to have the march go to City Hall. The Mission District was lively on Thursday night and that's where opposition to the fare hikes and service cuts is the greatest; it would have been better if the organizers had planned the march to stay there. Who wants to hang out in the Civic Center, especially on a chilly fall evening?

Even though the march did end up at City Hall, its intent wasn't to plead to our rulers as Keating lamely says. It was an attempt to demonstrate opposition to the destruction of public transit in San Francisco and reinvigorate the movement against Muni fare increases and service cuts.

Sadly, fighting transit cuts doesn't have a lot of cache among radicals and progressives in the Bay Area.

Note that Keating offers nothing in the way of an alternative tactic. No, he's given up on fighting the transit cuts, yet is more than willing to stand on the sidelines hectoring others for not conforming to, or accepting, his dogmatic worldview.

Firstly, it's fucked that indybay deleted my previous comment here from like three days ago before the Keating arguments (i assume they did so because I was mocking the demonstration). Secondly, I think Keating did offer an alternative idea; writing your congressperson. I mean, Keating sounds like a total douche either way, but sometimes you can make a difference working with the system. Either way, it's good to know the MUNI fare strike stuff flopped hard, as it was destined to. You should have organized carpools, that would have blown away the people at city hall. They're prepared for marches and rhetoric.

" it's fucked that indybay deleted my previous comment here from like three days "

You mean the ones that had a really hateful tone towards people with Down's Syndrome?

Keating was the author of the post which called the organizers of the demonstration Down's Syndrome sufferers. You see, Keating is an aspiring novelist and he just can't resist showing off his wares. Methinks his work will catch fire among the eleven year old asshole demographic.

As to the fare strike: It had its successes but was not a success. Many people resisted fare the first few days after the implementation of the fare hikes. Many Muni operators expressed support and links were made between riders and operators that bode well for future upsurges against public transit austerity. We found that many Muni riders support the idea of radical action, even if we were unable to pull off a fare strike that grew large enough to ensure victory *this time.*

As to the stupid car-pool plan and its planner: Why didn't you organize it foolie? "It" worked NOT AT ALL, while the fare strike shows a lot of promise going forward.

What's a "foolie"? I didn't organize a carpooling action because I support the fare hike. I just recognize that carpooling would have been a great idea for you guys. I even tried to tell the douches at socialstrike [at] riseup.net about that and some other ideas, but they couldn't manage to answer a single question I asked them, or even reply coherently.

No, the comments of mine that indybay deleted were about how the fare strike was doomed from the start, nothing about Down Syndrome.

The fare strike shows promise for moving forward, huh? I suppose there's just a mountain of evidence to support that assertion. It's over, figure out what you could have done better and remember to do it next time, for some other cause.

In the spirit of his anti-Chinese forbearer, Denis Kearney, Kevin Keating wrote the following to attack the Day Laborers who organized the march. In his truly masterful writing style, he managed to kill two birds with one stone--1) A HATEFUL ATTACK ON THE DIABLED; 2) A LIBEL ON MARC NORTON, BEHIND WHICH KEATING TRIED TO HIDE HIS RACIST, ANTI-IMMIGRANT HATRED OF THE DAY LABORERS. Here it is for all to judge:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Down's Syndrome Sufferers March to City Hall -- Nov. 10th
by Marc Norton Saturday, Nov. 05, 2005 at 8:34 PM
xxxxxxxf [at] ix.netcom.com

A petition for moderate reform within the bounds of the law, pertaining to the recent austerity measures around SF's MUNI

Hi there! In a capitalist society, there are politicians who win most of the time, there are politicians who lose most of the time -- and then there's us -- the Down's Syndrome guys!

We are a progressive coalition of people with Down's Syndrome, and our cognitive burden has led us to get together a big march to San Francisco's City Hall. We like voting, we like to be nice to the people that are nice to us -- and we like to go for big walks! Walk, to a nice, pretty building like the big French-looking one, near the wino plaza.

By putting our debility on parade, we hope that we can get the people who hold all the power in our society to be nice to us -- and for this, we say an very nice, enthusiastic please! A big, Dumbo-the-Elephant Jumbo Sized Please! In the immortal words of the Bartles and James wine cooler ad guys, back in the 1980's -- thank you very much!

Your friend, Marc, at
xxxxxxx [at] ix.netcom.com

Kevin Keating should be barred from all radical activities in the Bay Area. He's a clown, an unprincipled actor, and an egomaniac.

Kevin woos newbies with his seeming erudition and witty turns-of-phrase, but EVERYONE who deals with him for ANY duration learns that his erudition is paper thin and really just a form of polished dogmatism and his witticisms are canned and rehearsed bits of self-serving shit-talking.

Kevin would trade in a working class victory for three minutes of media attention if given a chance. For years now he's been telling everyone that he can corner that the Mission Yuppie Eradication Project was the pinnacle of working class activity in San Francisco when in fact it was nothing of the sort. It catalyzed not one effective action against exploiters. It didn't bring people together for any sustained activity. But, it did--and this is what's most important to keating ultimately--gain K.K. a fair amount of attention from the vacuous, two-bit reactionaries at the SF Weekly. Whoopdee-fucking-doo!!

As far as Marc Norton is concerned, he's shown a lot of self-control in not kicking the crap out of keating. It's not like he couldn't if he wanted to.

Yep - I can't think of many articles worth reading in the SF Weekly in the past couple years since they stopped their focus on Nestor Makhno developments.

1. I have nothing against the Day Laborers. I have a lot against the way the radical potential of the effort around Muni was ripped off by the Trotskyist -- or is it Stalinist, he refuses to 'fess up -- Marc Norton. He was aided in this by some middle-aged slacker slobs I tried and failed to get stuff together with in the past -- and greatly aided as well by the fecklessness and naivete of some of the anarchists involved.

2. As for "Dennis Kearny" and "working class(sic) radical(sic);" This guy is a disgruntled and obsessed former follower of mine. After years and years and years of trying to take him seriously, and repeatedly getting burned for my efforts I told him I wanted nothing more to do with him last July. Since then he's harassed me in various bizarre and tedious ways. This isn't a mutual thing; I want nothing to do with him, I wish this fool no harm, and there is nothing about him that I find interesting. But anybody who knows "Dennis" can tell you this guy is pathologically obssesed with me. Plenty of people around here don't like me -- and more importantly, my politics -- but this guy is the only one who find me so compelling. That might be perversely flatterring, if I needed flattery, but I don't -- especially this sort of creepy pathology-masquerading-as-radical-politics kind of flattery.

Hey "Dennis," next time you're unsuccesfully looking for wit and courage at the bottom of a glass, try to look for where you misplaced your real name.

KEVIN KEATING

that is all.

My getting hassled by this character isn't "slander," it's a substantial political issue.

My getting hassled by this character isn't "slander," it's a substantial political issue.

What I'd like to know is what Keating did for the fare strike other than compose ridiculously text-heavy posters that virtually nobody bothered to read?

Oh--that's right, he also sowed division and ill-will at every turn.

The fact is that Marc Norton did infinitely more to attempt to make the fare strike happen than Keating. While Keating was repeating his catechism in the mirror, Norton, with the help of others, was crafting leaflets in four different languages--English, Spanish, Korean, and Chinese--and distributing them to literally thousands of Muni riders. He made contacts with Muni operators as well as many organizations and individuals across this city. He continues to put out regular bulletins which contain updates and analysis of events. The connections Marc helped to forge can be put into the bank for the future. Keating's efforts rendered no tangible results and leave nothing to build from.

Ultimately, Keating's idea of how effective movements kick off is idealistic. His idea is that long-winded screeds, containing the requisite "anti-market, anti-state" rhetoric, will inspire the masses to rise up. If they don't rise up, well, that's because the masses are idiots for not heeding his words. There's no need, according to Keating, to actually talk, let alone listen, to people he seeks to mobilize. That's prosaic stuff and Keating's got a novel to write and one-liners to perfect (hopefully for media consumption).
############

Notice how Keating never denied writing the Down's Syndrome attack on Marc? Wasn't his reference to "wino plaza" marvelous?

If Keating talked shit about me like he's been talking about Marc (among other things spreading Marc's email address attached to forged comments), I'd beat his ass.

Which is another way of saying I believe Marc is within his rights to give Keating a whipping.

Are you serious? Like, *everyone* can read the details of your infighting. This is why y'all get made fun of. You can't even keep your backyard tidy, passing out nonsense fliers from 9-5 then fighting on the internet 5:30 -10. Nice. It's astounding the city didn't crumble when you all starting making demands. I mean, the solidarity, the organization, wow.

embarassing

until the person who made the posts about Down's Syndrome apologizes

These comments are an embarrassment. Delete!

It isn't too bright to make implied threats of violence over the internet, in your own name, aaron.

You know what, smart guys? The next I see anyone passing out fliers about MUNI fare strike this, service cuts that, I'm going to stand there with them and hand out fliers with these comments on it, plus the idiotic rude emails from the people at socialstrike [at] riseup.net. I'm going to make it one of my goals to let people know that the SF protest scene is run by people who bicker *online* like 14-year-olds arguing about dungeons and dragons. Seriously, just imagine if everyone you tried to reach out to could read this comment thread, if they all knew about the utter disorganization, the infighting, the cluelessness. Beautiful.

SF has absolutely had it with you protest-at-the-drop-of-a-hat types. Especially when there are so many effective ways to get what you want but you just don't want to use them, I can only assume, because they're not fun like protesting. Expect a serious backlash.

"SF has absolutely had it with you protest-at-the-drop-of-a-hat types"

Even if you dont think protests work I dont see how they could offend you enough to use protesting to demonize someone.
I mean there probably are more productive ways to change thing but if so you should propose them and if they are good ideas then people will probably do what you want. If they sound like good ideas but nobody joins on, then there is probably something wrong with the ideas.
The fare strike seems too not have been effective not becasue of any specific fault of the organizers but becasue the risks to those engaging in a fare boycott outweighed the benefits. You can get mad at someone for not being willing to risk a ticket but the risk was worse for the poor (since the price of a fine has more impact and not getting to work on time for poorer workers has a bigger impact than not getting to work on time for wealthier riders).



What can one see on this thread?

Kevin is willing to make statements that sound somewhat biggoted to attack people he used to work with since MUNI protests didnt go the way he hoped they would (so he blame others he disagreed with who worked on the fare stikes).

Some of the Social strike people make machismo sounding statements attacking Kevin that arent exactly threats but dont make whoever is posting them sound like people one would want to work with. Of course one can say Kevin started it with his first comments having such a snide tone, but if he really is such a hard person to work with and always acts like him, the grownup thing to do would be to ignore him.

bad move on my part.

i shouldn't have said that over the internet.

see: i don't work with keating yet i'm forced to hear him slag people off in the most unprincipled ways over and over again.

take a look again at his Down's Syndrome post. here's a guy who's doing nothing to fight the fare hikes yet wants to be viewed as the beacon of resistance to them spending his time writing and posting bigoted, scurrilous attacks on people WHO ARE ACTUALLY DOING SOMETHING. worse yet, he's spreading Norton's email address around hither and yon attached to fraudulant postings that are intended to make him look, literally, retarded.

Marc Norton has weathered months of these cowardly attacks by Keating on his person without firing back. i admire his self-control.

>Even if you dont think protests work I dont see how they could >offend you enough to use protesting to demonize someone.

Huh? Demonize who? Use protesting to demonize someone? I seriously have no idea what you're talking about.

What I'm saying is that no one gives a shit anymore about protests. Their potential to change things in San Francisco is zero. You've ruined it for the rest of the class. I could send out emails and fliers that say "protest" on them and tons of SFSU kids, anarchy kids, and god knows who else would flock to wherever I said and go and "protest". What would they be protesting? Who the fuck knows anymore. It's become a joke. It's become a farce. It's become ironic. Stop contributing to the irony.

>I mean there probably are more productive ways to change thing >but if so you should propose them and if they are good ideas then >people will probably do what you want. If they sound like good >ideas but nobody joins on, then there is probably something wrong >with the ideas.

Homey, we're not on the same team. I think I made that clear in an earlier post. You're trying to change things, not me. I support the fare hike and am against the fare strike, so insulting me for not bringing my anti-fare hike ideas to fruition is not reasonable. My ideas are pretty much limited to "stop protesting for little or no reason."

>The fare strike seems too not have been effective not because of >any specific fault of the organizers but because the risks to those >engaging in a fare boycott outweighed the benefits. You can get >mad at someone for not being willing to risk a ticket but the risk >was worse for the poor (since the price of a fine has more impact >and not getting to work on time for poorer workers has a bigger >impact than not getting to work on time for wealthier riders).

You know, the whole poor vs. rich MUNI debate never made any sense with this fare hike issue because MUNI STARTED GIVING DISCOUNTS TO POORER PASSENGERS IN THE FORM OF THE LIFELINE PASS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So, no, pull your head out of a textbook for two seconds and realize that not every issue in the entire world is best viewed in terms of poor vs. rich, *especially* in a city that is hyper-aware of poverty.

Also "you can get mad at someone for not being willing to risk a ticket." No, fuck you dude, you *can't* get mad at them, which is to say that if for some reason you are internally upset at them you are definitely not allowed to bring it to their attention. The world is not full of people who are just waiting to get yelled at by the likes of you. Some of these people you're mad at have been around the block a few times and know a great deal more than you so blow your anger out your ass. If you feel mad, keep it to yourself. Just bottle it all up and never bother anyone else with it.

The fare strike failed because the fare hike just wasn't that bad.

>What can one see on this thread?

Infighting. A reason to not take the SF protest scene seriously. Trotsky-ite this, poor people that, and not one reasonable comment. Not one of you bothered to show up at the meetings ten months ago, the meetings where the lifeline discount pass got thought up because the city listened to the complaints of the people who went and voiced them at the proper time and place. The city ALREADY worked with the citizens who were willing to work with them, and on this website you can see the detritus of a movement that couldn't get out of bed on time on the right day and go have the right conversation to get what they want.

1. I worked like a galley slave to make an Italian-style self-reduction campaign happen in response to the austerity measures on MUNI. Anyone who was involved with Muni Social Strike,

-and many hundreds of Muni operators who I leafletted,

-and anyone who did the leafletting in Chinatown

-and hung posters with me will contradict Aaron's rubbish on this.

His telling a big lie on this is a sign that he hasn't any susbstantial political ground to stand on. He is all kvetching and equivocation. Why don't you punch your pillow or something to let off steam, buddy.

And, anyone can go back and look at the posts under my name. Compare their political substance with the other comments. Disagree with me all you want; my points aren't just flamebait -- they have serious political substance.

I'll write an analysis of the strengths and limits of this, and anyone else can say whatever they want in response.

I use wit and humor to make my points. Leftists tend on the whole to be witless and humorless, so they don't get it -- especially certain beerhall philosophers who are the well-stung targets of my little bon mots.

Tho' cowards flinch and traitors sneer/
we'll keep the red flag flying here

If the protest scene is tedious, then your protest of the protest scene is even more tedious. Go make a music video or something. Really.

http://www.infoshop.org/myep/love_index.html

... is what happens when you let bigots (probably but not necessarily Kevin-even tho his non-denial does raise the ante that it's not cointelpro or someone else trying to stir trouble) and right-wing trolls control your agenda.

Now let's get to the heart fo the question: What went/is going wrong with the social strike/fare strike? I think it didn't click. It never became a social question. A social question is where eveybody including the boureoise media is talking about it. Some of that is the unluckiness of other news stories puushign the stirke aside. On the first day it looked like it was goign to. It should ahve eben followed up by marches areound communites, by clearc and consise announcemens of how to defend those ticketed. Getting people to do things (even if those things are not necessarily revolutionary uprisings) gets people more acitve and less passive. That'as why i support (altho could not make) the march. I also think direct street-wide defense agianst cop and guard harassment would have been in order. The campaign was promoted so much as a long-term thing that it didn't create the momemtum necessary to sustain it.
I also think another tactical error was not asking people to not buy their September fast pass. That would have created the money hole that having indiduals attempt to beat the fare as they alawys do and continue to do did not.
Most of these critiques are in hindsight. I live in the east bay and while i was supportive of the social/fare strike, i did not consider it my primary politicla work. A very small group of people did and they were a lot of times bickering amongst themselves, with Kevin on the side demanding purity according to his "principles". Lessons good and bad were learned and lets figure out what to do next.

you guys

are all

so mean.


no wonder the far left cant hold a crowd, but instead is a perpetual group of ten to twenty disaffected mostly-white-guys with a bunch of different "projects" disguised as grassroots organizations.


as for british culture, lyricize this:
(all quotes from:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1641540,00.html

"A culture of violence in Britain is to blame for an epidemic of school bullying that is devastating the lives of millions of children, according to a devastating attack by one of the country's leading experts on young people."

why should that matter to working class heros like youse?

"But, as Aynsley-Green points out, behaviour that is not curbed in childhood is likely to be replicated in later life, a claim supported by a TUC report last week showing that two million people were bullied at work in the past six months, mostly by managers and supervisors."


now why on earth should someone sign up to submit to bullying in a movement against what's wrong with this society? isnt that what we already get? isnt that what ya might call a sharp contradiction?

or are you guys all really little tin pot dictators in waiting? or what?

in which case, why shouldnt we stick with the current crop of social bullies? at least they're petitionable.

really, what gives?

the crowning irony will be when the indybay editrons come by to send this most revealing thread right down the memory hole.....

I should shut up? The whole thread is full of the shrapnel of your organization revealing every little fractured detail of what went wrong and *I* am getting told to shut up. That's funny.

Much respect to the "deanosaur" guy, cuz he gets it. Learn from what went wrong and move on. The fare strike was unbelievably ill-fated to begin with. Take the lessons to the next action and move on. Move on.

Also, it looks like you guys should, in the future, maybe not get suckered into flamewars on indymedia. If guys like Keating come along, talking shit, just ignore it, don't air all your private business for people like me to see it, that's just silly. There's always someone willing to use your shit against you.

Peace

Yes, Carson, the only thing lamer than the slander being puked up on Indymedia is you getting off on it.

Hey, sorry man, some people watch Oprah, some people love cheesy horror movies, I love to watch bullshit pseudo-intellectuals humiliate themselves publicly as their poorly thought out plans fall apart. And who called it? Who called it?! Of course I'm getting off, this is satisfying.

One of you kids wanted to make a fucking BET with me that you'd win and the fares would be rolled back and, for those who don't know, the bet would have been me talking shit on myself publicly in front of all my peoples if I lost (and fares were rolled back). If I called myself a fuckhead in front of all my people you'd be getting off! But I guess fair is fair, and you guys humiliate yourselves publicly after your defeat. Sort of poetic, I think.

It's a guilty pleasure, I know, but I think I can live with that.

This is the opening to an article I'm working on analyzing the recent action around San Francisco's MUNI. It isn't being posted for the entertainment of internet trolls, but for any thinking, potentially rebellious people out there; people who are fully capable of walking on their hind legs...

TRAIN IN VAIN?

The following article analyzes the strenghts -- and there were a few -- and the larger failings of an effort int he summer and fall of 2005 to catalyze an Italian-sytle self-reduction movement against austerity measures on San Francisco's MUNI transit system.


...Most of the anarchists involved in this effort put an admirable amont of time and effort into the social strike -- on an individual basis. But collectively, we, me included, failed to function in any kind of resolute COLLECTIVE anti-capitalist manner, with regard to the pro wage-labor left who attached themselves to this effort; that means people who wanted to see the fare hike and service cuts resisted without any larger opening for an anti-market/anti-state, direct action politics among working people emerging out of the issue.

This effort, and everything that happened city-wide with regard to it, was initiated by people in Muni Social Strike. But the initiative got taken away from the aspiring anti-capitalists by some of the usual crowd of leftist failures. At the end with both the press conference and the ridiculous, empty ritual march to City Hall, the anarchists had become the camp followers of liberals and at least one Leninist. This has happened time and again with anarchists, and it's extremely fucking exasperating to me.

The first pro-wage labor leftist who grafted himself onto the project was able to steer the larger struggle into a statist and completely un-radical direction. He was aided and abetted in this by people in Muni Social Strike not being capable of collectively deciding what we believe in, not as atomized individuals, but as a solid group, and moving forward on that basis against opposition from leftist hustlers in a determined and resolute manner.



From the get-go, it was clear that Muni Social Strike was to be about:

--Drivers and riders taking action together,

--using direct action,

--antagonistic to electoral politics, market relations and the state.

There was no escape clause in any of this, saying, this will be a direct action, anti-statist effort, until someone who is more decisive than us comes along and plays us for suckers, at which point we will turn into work-within-the-system guys. Everybody involved appeared to be clear on the character of the effort and agree on it. There was nothing vague or abstract or equivocating about it.

1. To begin our efforts, we held three town hall meetings to rally public opposition to the austerity measures.

Soon after the second town hall meeting, this other group, Muni Fare Strike, with a name almost identical to Muni Social Strike, sprung up toadstool-like, positioned to the immediate political right of Muni Social Strike. It rapidly became clear that Muni Fare Strike was going to be just like Muni Social Strike, only with all the better aspects shaved off. They wanted this to be exactly the sort of thing that leads to empty gesture demos on the steps of City Hall.

The leaflet that became the main tool for MFS's perspective said nothing about joint action with drivers; this was moronic for the possible success of the effort, as well as flat-out politically wrong. An effort like this could never fly if the drivers weren't at least passively going along. And an effort like this should never be mostly about the immediate smaller goal, but always mostly about the bigger goal, which has to be the creation of a larger movement of working people acting around our own needs against capitalist social relations, rooted in the everyday life conditions we face in the main problem country of the world. That means all exploited people together; not just some exploited people balkanized into a sort of sub-identity as an interest group of transit system riders.

The M.F.S. leaflet was bereft of any argument for why Muni riders should engage in an action that doesn't have any precedent in this part of the world. It made no effort to pursuade. Being un-persuasive and un-radical in five languages only compounded the political worthlessness of the Muni Fare Strike leaflet. Working people around here need a convincing argument for why they should try something that might get them ticketed or arrested; this isn't Italy or Argentina, there's no collective culture of resistance right now in the US, here people are generally very timid and mystified. And from beginning to end nothing Muni Fare Strike did or said articulated any larger opposition to the world of wage labor and the market. Check out the weak-assed letter Marc Norton got published in the Examiner, I can find the date later. Why would it -- Marc Norton is a pro-wage labor, pro state leftist. He was and still is the proprietor of that group, with a couple of lager-louts who I've broken things off with tagging along behind him as his golf-caddies...

I was involved in organizing and saw several successes and many ways that the effort, from strategy to political analysis (or lack thereof) and tactics, could have improved. The point of this sort of discussion on Indybay eludes me, however, as it mainly serves to further entrench the few that are participating in their current positions.

There hasn't been a concerted effort to analyze the successes and areas to be improved upon as far as I know. This forum, the internet, is probably one of the worst places for it, were it to take place. Even if that were to happen, I'm skeptical that much would come of it anyway.

In general, a few comments above are less shit talking and more attempts at actual political analysis of conditions the effort faced here in SF, what didn't work, and what might work in the future. I look forward to more of that.

check out:

http://www.midwestunrest.net/fightorwalk/

1. The "hind legs" comment is, obviously, not intended as some sort of able-ist or insensitive-to-disabled people crack...

2. I wasn't talking about "similar efforts" in other parts of the world, including Chicago; I meant the Bay Area. Although, if you check out the doc, "anti-capitalist actions around mass transit..." on the 'Love and Treason' link, posted above, you'll find an account of much smaller and more limited efforts that some of us engaged in in this area a decade and more ago.

*In general, a few comments above are less shit talking...*

Really, did you read it? It seems like the same old tired shit talking.

How much mollycoddling do I have to do to keep guys like you happy? Jesus. Everything in the doc posted above is directly relevant to the question at hand.

Read the article. Comment on the substance of it -- if you actually have anything to say. Please keep the whinning to a minimum. Good luck.

to this one... and vice versa:

maybe more people would be interested in trying to resist with you, if they didnt hafta convert to your religion first.

really, what are these flyers if not leftie versions of jesus pamphlets?

If anything I think the debacle keating is describing shows that just "doing stuff "is pretty pointless, unless you have a lot of time to kill and are looking for a hobby. To have any lasting impact, a group of people have to have a fundamental equally shared understanding of how this society functions; otherwise its just gonna be the usual spinning our wheel anarcho effort. People who don't really have a strong theoretical foundation for political action end up getting snookered by people who do. Law of the jungle, maybe.

it may mean learning to settle for groups of 5-10 people, instead of "masses."

finally the public see that the muni drivers are scapegoats.jus like any other job,u have ur lazy ones.nathaniel ford does not tell u that he has over 250 managers makin six figure salaries.he does not tell that monies for muni is being used elsewhere.he does not tell u that there are over 100 engineers on payroll for muni.he does not tell u that stimulus monies were used to pay his cronies.instead he tells u that drivers are the reason for muni"s woes.open ur minds.drivers do not make or have any say so about anything.that includes schedules,fares,broken equipment,decisions,etc.i seem to think if anyone can fix muni it shold be the drivers,since they are the ones who are one the front lines.wat about sf pd,fire dept,OVERTIME!!!!!!!!!!!!