Blacksmythe

In discussing whether the auto industry deserves a bailout, we talked about the role of the auto industry in creating the middle class. The work protections that we have, the work week that we have, the benefits we have, all come from the “massification” of work and labor organizing. 

As one of my commenters noted “As GM goes, so goes America.”

But what we didn’t talk about the relationship between the automobile and our very conception of the city itself. The conception of urban and suburban space, the development of the freeways we use to drive to work and back, all come from our affair with the car. The ideas we have about whiteness and non-whiteness and the modern mode of segregation that most afflicts blacks are not possible without the widespread use of the automobile. 

The discussions about the Big Three have revolved around whether to save them or not. If we do save them, how will we force them to restructure. But what is perhaps as important is what we want our cities to do in the wake of the change. Key to this discussion is the question of sustainability. 

Even the articles that recognize that the automobile industry has to become greener miss the point. Today for example the New York Times reports that William Clay Ford jr. has been a trailblazer in this area for Ford. But the writers totally ignored his work to make one of the oldest and largest manufacturing plants sustainable. 

David Harvey is one of the world’s foremost geographers. He participated in an interview with Sustainable Cities in August, before the bottom fell out. For him there were six aspects of city life that needed to be reconfigured. 

4. The organization of production systems relates to the organization of social and technical divisions of labour as well as to technologies.This system is driven by a political economic system in which the coercive laws of competition and market valuations hold priority of place. The production of space and the built environment, as well as decisions regarding which goods and services should be produced under which labour processes are fundamental to the transformation of nature into urban life. Experiments with new production and reproduction systems are vital in the search for more sustainable forms of urbanization.

The other five can be found here.

I linked to Subrealism the other day in talking about American illiteracy, or aliteracy. As Craig Nulan wrote in the comments we have the technology, perhaps for the first time, to begin to address this question. And here I’m talking more about the types of discursive networks that both enable you and I to converse with each other in real time, and to amplify our thoughts in a way that leads to policy shifts.

How do we begin to take these tools and make them work for a new project?

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The last few cabinets have been remarkably diverse compared to the ones preceding them. Clinton had the most diverse administration in history, and I believe that Bush followed that up. We’re now getting some sense about Obama’s leaks and already some are asking whether what he’s doing is enough. 

I understand this concern. When government changes hands there are literally thousands of jobs up for grabs. As blacks were the demographic that put him over the top it only makes sense that blacks (and other non-whites given the implicit promise of the campaign) get an equitable portion of those jobs.

But while I appreciate the fact that some Obama supporters are thinking of putting his feet to the fire, at least a little, I am also cognizant of the class biases here. What SHOULD be first and foremost is “stuff.” You don’t elect the candidate of your choice solely because you like him. But that stuff should revolve at some level around policy, and we shouldn’t make the mistake of thinking that a more diverse staff will lead to a more progressive set of policy arrangements. Because it’s very possible to have a diverse staff and a rightward leaning policy apparatus.

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In the wake of what is sure to be the end of the world as we know it–and this doesn’t have to sound as apocalyptic as I make it seem–some are asking whether we are culturally prepared for the oncoming shift. 

There are over 42 million American adults, 20 percent of whom hold high school diplomas, who cannot read, as well as the 50 million who read at a fourth- or fifth-grade level. Nearly a third of the nation’s population is illiterate or barely literate. And their numbers are growing by an estimated 2 million a year. But even those who are supposedly literate retreat in huge numbers into this image-based existence. A third of high school graduates, along with 42 percent of college graduates, never read a book after they finish school. Eighty percent of the families in the United States last year did not buy a book. 

More here. And here. 

We are not a literate society. We are an aliterate society. That is, even people who know how to read don’t want to read. They’d much rather get their stuff from television, or now from the internet. And without the critical skills imparted by literature, these people are going to rely much more on flash, style, and entertainment. Leaving them woefully unable to figure out their place in the new world, much less able to imagine the new possibilities within it. 

But what’s the other side of this coin?

My just turned 4 year old son knows how to navigate the web with savvy. My other children have established strong social networks with people across the country through various web pages. The tendency is to turn back to the old standbys, to wax romantic about how reading requires a type of interaction that is inherently more critical, inherently more engaging. In the article above, the writer turn to Hannah Arendt who argues that with the growing requirement that media “entertain” we are emphasizing the (wrong) needs of the consumer.

There was a moment in the forties and fifties where critics fought back against the massification of society, arguing in effect that we were empty vases open to all types of BS from the “mass media.” And I’m not immune to making this criticism myself. But what people realized is that the consumer isn’t quite as passive as we were led to believe. You can send a leftist pro-free market media until the cows come home. Her attitudes aren’t shifting a bit. We can rail against kids sending text messages of fewer and fewer syllables all we want to…but doing so we ignore the fact that we can convey complex ideas in extremely small packages.

“Me. Whee!”  

The above quote comes from Muhammad Ali. If I weren’t broke I’d bet that none of my readers could come up with a more sophisticated rendering of the ecstasy of being.

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I’m a Ford kid. I graduated from the high school I did because of Ford money. Graduated from undergrad out of Michigan because of Ford money. Went to grad school, got married to the woman i did, and had the children i did, indirectly because of Ford money.

But at the same time I find it more than ironic that the free marketers who railed against universal health care are now flying (in separate planes no less) to DC to ask for help.

Marc Steiner is one of the best talkshow hosts in the business. He had me on a couple of days ago to kick this idea around. Take a listen.

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