Late night random ipod shuffle playlist.

1. Sleater-Kinney, "Call The Doctor". I knwo it's a critique of the heteronormative biopolitics of medical knowledge and practice, but this song also remids me that i should, in fact, call the doctor. And then i imagine Corin Tucker shaking her head in disgust, which is really just badly disguised egotism on my part.

2.Madvillan, "Meat Grinder." I swear this song samples the bass line from Rush's "Tom Sawyer." In high school, when i "worked" at this ska label in the east village, i had a friend who was obsessed with Rush. He even put out a zine called "Rudies for Rush."

3.Sonic Youth, "Karen Revisited," from Murray Street, which got talked about as a "comeback album," post NYC Ghosts and Flowers. This song is really long. Even for Sonic Youth.

4. J-Dilla, "One For Ghost."

5.Company Flow, "Last Good Sleep." Also really long.

6.Curtis Mayfield, "Underground." One of his best.

7.Aretha Franklin, "Rock Steady." Desmond Dekker might disagree, or maybe not.

8.M.I.A. "Bingo." Not my favorite track off Arular.

9.The Unicorns, "Tuff Ghost." I still haven't decided whether or not i like this band and its various offshoots. Is the title a Marley reference?

10. Run-D.M.C. "Proud to be Black." Along with "Hard Times," their forray into "conscious rap." Possibly as counterpoint to "My Adidas" following the rescinding of "don't want nobody's name on my behind?"

Generously Endowed

...And cue annual NYT David Swensen panegyric NOW.

Nevertheless, Mr. Swensen, who was an early leader in creating a strategy of investments diversified beyond stocks and bonds, outperformed rivals. He argued in his book “Pioneering Portfolio Management” that depending solely on stocks and bonds would not necessarily provide enough protection to a fund. His approach has led Yale’s endowment into hedge funds, private equity funds and hard assets like timber and oil and gas, and made his performance one that is closely watched by Wall Street.

Sadly, yaleinsider.org and unfarallon.info are no longer available, but readers of this blog will be join me in recognizing the major environmental, labor, geopolitical, and, um, ethical problems involved in Yale's investments in these areas - be they hedge funds, water rights in colorado, forests in Maine, or oil and gas in Alberta and/or the Sudan.

The GM strike looks to be over.

UAW president Ron Gettelfinger won't discuss details with the media, but claims that there's good job security language, in addition ot the VEBA trust that's so controversial among the rank and file.

Specifics of the funding for the trust were not available, but Mr. Gettelfinger said it would “secure the benefits of our retirees” and every G.M. hourly worker now at the company. He said the fund, which would last for 80 years, “would be solvent” throughout that time.A primary concern for U.A.W. leaders, who have seen such funds at other companies run dry, forcing the union to grab concessions so that they could be replenished. Mr. Gettelfinger hinted that if this fund runs low, G.M. would make new investments in it. Asked if there was a “backstop” for it, Mr. Gettelfinger said, “I’m not going into details, but I like that word.”

But the times suggests there may also be a two tier wage system implemented which would sharply differentiate between new employees and those with seniority. Similarly the VEBA language used above says nothing about new hires, only "every G.M. hourly worker now at the company." Is the UAW being forced to mortgage its future in order to save its present?

Because i'm really big on commemorating stuff that happened in 2002-2003 on this blog...

It's actually been five years since this.

The demonstrators left College Street in groups, led by police. Many demonstrators said they were not nervous but proud to be arrested.

"I really am for this 110 percent," Local 35 member Margaret Nelson said. "We need this. We are Yale."

Reports have UAW members at General Motors walking out. The UAW web site is currently down because of heavy traffic. Here's an article from the most recent Labor Notes, a magazine with whom i often disagree, (i.e., do AFSCME officials really have any leg to stand on when they bash SEIU?) on some of the issues that members have had with these negotiations.

Edit: From the AP report:

Worker Anita Ahrens burst into tears as hundreds of United Auto Workers
streamed out of a GM plant in Janesville, Wis.
"Oh my God, here they come,"
said Ahrens, 39. "This is unreal."
Ahrens has seven years at the plant,
where she works nights installing speakers in sport utility vehicles. She waited
outside the building Monday for her husband, Ron Ahrens, who has worked there
for 21 years.
The couple has three children, including a college freshman,
and Ahrens worried about how they would pay their bills.
"This is horrible,
but we're die-hard union, so we have to," Ahrens said. "We got a mortgage, two
car payments and tons of freaking bills."

Labor Notes.

The clerical workers' strike at the University of Minnesota appears to have ended, but workers don't seem particularly happy about the contract proposal. The IHE article suggests that the union is caving under the threat of health care benefit withdrawal, and has the university bragging as much.

Meanwhile, the U.A.W. is gearing up for a strike at G.M....

Department bar night was at the karaoke bar. This was kind of awesome. Got there late though, because of GSOC "meet your union" event, which had way better turnout than i was expecting given the minimal amount of organizing I did for it. I reprised "Holy Diver," which was fun, "Fuck and Run," which may have pissed some folks off, and Madness's "Our House," which for some reason I mangled - a combination of my getting sick from not sleeping enough/the mouse in my apartment maybe giving me meningitis or something - and just generally being exhausted after a busy day involving a massive load of laundry, a very short haircut, a contentious meeting (making me miss the UOC and that kind of respectful, professional, but loving and supportive organizing environment - that sounds childish) and a fair amount of reading.

I've been thinking about The Silver Jews' "Send in the Clowns," my favorite song off American Water, which the artist formerly known as Sam G. inadvertently sold me on sometime during my first year of college and which retroactively became one of my favorite albums of the late 1990s. (I would have figured this out earlier if i'd listened to pavement prior to 1999 instead of, like, Skavoovie and The Epitones or Jump With Joey...) (Ok, and Charles Mingus and Wes Montgimery and Pat Metheny) There is a line "I'm going to bury my name in you," and I keep thinking about the ways in which gender(ed) violence permeates this phrase and totally shifts the terms of the song and jars the listener. I don't really ahve anything profound to say about this, because again, I'm sick and sniffly, and there are mice in my apartment.

Silly Undergrads, Financial Aid is for Bribery

Recently appointed NYU trustee for life Catherine Reynolds (among the first recipients of whose new $50k fellowship was Bryan Levine, architect of the GAC company union proposal, which ultimately led to the House of Delegates, on which i sit) runs a student loan company which has been charging students extraordinarily inflated interest rates.

A loan company led by NYU trustee Catherine B. Reynolds is being accused of overcharging students and abusing its status as a nonprofit organization, according to the Washington Post.

On NYU's financial aid website, the company was included on a list of financial aid providers until WSN recently asked about the allegations.

The loan company goes by both EduCap and Loan to Learn, and is also closely linked to the foundation. The Internal Revenue Service is examining its business practices, the Post reported, which have made Reynolds rich enough to form the Catherine B. Reynolds Foundation and donate hundreds of millions of dollars to a laundry list of charitable organizations and universities.

But, according to the newspaper, the company was lending money to students with interest rates of up to 18 percent - well above the federal student loan cap of 8.5 percent.

Meanwhile at a "multicultural" forum with freshmen of color, John Sexton brags about how little financial aid NYU students receive.

Sexton responded that because NYU's endowment is only $2 billion, the existence of the university is based on tuition. However, he said that "one in five" get a Pell Grant, a federal loan for students from low-income families, and he praised students for their hard work in order to pay for the tuition.

"Half of our undergraduates work two jobs," Sexton said. "Five hundred undergrads work three jobs. That shows they really wanted an NYU education."

That says it all, doesn't it?

two quick links

Congressional democrats are trying to legislatively overturn the Kentucky River decision...

and

Students at the U of Minnesota have begun a hunger strike to support striking campus workers.

At the close of Guns 'N' Roses' "epic" nine minute, forty second long video for "Estranged," after Axl's suicide attempt has been foiled by samaritan cetaceans and slash has popped out of the turgid waved for one final solo, we cut from Axl's sneaker sinking into the dpeths as Izzy Stradlin pulls him to safety via rope ladder extended from helicopter to Axl chilling with one of his savior dolphins. The dolphin makes clicking noises, as is his wont, and the phrase "Lose Your Illusion" is scribbled across the screen in Axl's handwriting.

What I wonder now, having watched the video for the first time in a long many years is, is this supposed to be a translation from the dolphin?

What might the implications of this be? Does this fundamentally reshape how we understand Use Your Illusion? Or at least Use Your Illusion II? Does the dolphin signify something other than the problematically gendered redemptive nature, the maternal ocean? Is this a self conscious critique of GNR as a cultural form and as a political project? Or is the dolphin just telling Axl Rose to lose the stupid Charles Manson T-shirt?

Ah, cutting, incisive, student journalism. How could the university function without thee?

If the delicious fare synonymous with NYU's events wasn't enough, students and community had plenty of food for thought at the "NYU Plans 2031" open house last night.

Tonight's karaoke setlist.

I started out with a rendition of Holy Diver. The crowd enjoyed it. i think.

My next song was a duet of Liz Phair's "Fuck and Run" with Stefanie's friend Isabel.

Then Stefanie and I did a ridiculously awesome version of "You Could Be Mine." Ostensibly as an ironic comment on the song's profound sexism. We were awesome, but i wish they had "Estranged."

My last song was a duet with Rana on the Stevie Nicks/Tom Petty song "Stop Dragging My Heart Around."

omg.

Proud of his Jewish heritage, Green delivered the decisive blow on the first night of Rosh Hashana, the high holiday that marks the Jewish New Year.

"It's really nice to contribute any game, but I guess if you put it in that perspective it adds a little bit to it," said Green, undecided about whether he'll sit out next weekend on Yom Kippur, which he's done twice before.

I taught my first two sections yesterday, (World Cultures: Contemporary Latino Cultures) at 8:00 and 9:30 in the morning on opposite sides of campus (houston and mercer and then 11th and university.) The first one went well. I was completely exhausted and barely coherent by the end of the second section. It was exciting nonetheless. And a little surreal. And sort of fun.

I then went home to get out of the rain, started grading (which is a pretty horrible, harrowing, and nerve-wracking exercise if you've never done it,) and promptly fell asleep around 2 PM. I woke up and the clock said 5:30 and i thought it was five thirty in the morning and i freaked out and then i realized it might be afternoon, but i was sure i'd slept twenty-seven hours instead of three and a half. It was pretty disorienting

The class is going well. The professor i teach for has been pretty good about critiquing the marginalized position the World Cultures curriculum occupies in relation the "Conversations of The West," as well as the problems in excluding latino cultures from the west, the problems that come with failing to understand colonialism and conquest as fundamental to the formaion and articulation of western modernity as performed by our more 'universal' counterparts in the MAP.

But i am boring myself, and I am way too overburdened between teaching, coursework, and my looming first exam to be blogging.

The New York City Taxi Workers Alliance is on strike for the first time since the Giuliani administration. The issue is the installation of GPS monitoring devices into the cabs, which drivers rightly see as taylorism on steroids. This "e-leaflet" is making the rounds on the internet:

STOP GPS SPYWARE IN TAXIS!
SUPPORT DRIVERS' AND PASSENGERS RIGHTS!
The Taxi & Limousine Commission wants to force cab drivers to install
GPS technology in all taxis. GPS is a bad deal for riders and for drivers:

~ GPS WILL NOT give drivers navigation software or online maps
~ GPS lets private companies track drivers' AND passengers' every move
~ GPS violates all our civil liberties and right to privacy
~ GPS will subject you to annoying broadcast ads during your ride
~ GPS will cause the meter to shut down if the technology fails
~ GPS failure will force you to interrupt your ride and hail another cab
~ Drivers will lose days of income while waiting for GPS repairs
~ Drivers' income will be hurt by higher lease rates because of GPS

JOIN DRIVERS AND PASSENGER FIGHTING FOR FAIRNESS!
PROTECT YOUR PRIVACY & DRIVERS'

You can help by:
Calling the Taxi Workers Alliance - 212-627-5248 and volunteering to help!