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Today's
Stories
November 29 / 30, 2003
Standard Schaefer
Unions
are the Answer to Supermarkets Woes
November 28, 2003
William S. Lind
Worse Than Crimes
David Vest
Turkey
Potemkin
Robert Jensen / Sam Husseini
New Bush Tape Raises Fears of Attacks
Wayne Madsen
Wag
the Turkey
Harold Gould
Suicide as WMD? Emile Durkheim Revisited
Gabriel Kolko
Vietnam
and Iraq: Has the US Learned Anything?
South Asia Tribune
The Story
of the Most Important Pakistan Army General in His Own Words
Website of the Day
Bush Draft
November 27, 2003
Mitchel Cohen
Why
I Hate Thanksgiving
Jack Wilson
An
Account of One Soldier's War
Stefan Wray
In the Shadows of the School of the Americas
Al Krebs
Food as Corporate WMD
Jim Scharplaz
Going Up Against Big Food: Weeding Out the Small Farmer
Neve Gordon
Gays
Under Occupation: Help Save the Life of Fuad Moussa
November 26, 2003
Paul de Rooij
Amnesty
International: the Case of a Rape Foretold
Bruce Jackson
Media
and War: Bringing It All Back Home
Stew Albert
Perle's
Confession: That's Entertainment
Alexander Cockburn
Miami and London: Cops in Two Cities
David Orr
Miami Heat
Tom Crumpacker
Anarchists
on the Beach
Mokhiber / Weissman
Militarization in Miami
Derek Seidman
Naming the System: an Interview with Michael Yates
Kathy Kelly
Hogtied
and Abused at Ft. Benning
Website of the Day
Iraq Procurement
November 25, 2003
Linda S. Heard
We,
the Besieged: Western Powers Redefine Democracy
Diane Christian
Hocus
Pocus in the White House: Of Warriors and Liberators
Mark Engler
Miami's
Trade Troubles
David Lindorff
Ashcroft's
Cointelpro
Website of the Day
Young McCarthyites of Texas
November 24, 2003
Jeremy Scahill
The
Miami Model
Elaine Cassel
Gulag
Americana: You Can't Come Home Again
Ron Jacobs
Iraq
Now: Oh Good, Then the War's Over?
Alexander Cockburn
Rupert Murdoch: Global Tyrant
November 14 / 23, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
Clintontime:
Was It Really a Golden Age?
Saul Landau
Words
of War
Noam Chomsky
Invasion
as Marketing Problem: Iraq War and Contempt for Democracy
Stan Goff
An Open Letter to GIs in Iraq: Hold on to Your Humanity
Jeffrey St. Clair
Bush Puts Out a Contract on the Spotted Owl
John Holt
Blue Light: Battle for the Sweetgrass Hills
Adam Engel
A DC Lefty in King George's Court: an Interview with Sam Smith
Joanne Mariner
In a Dark Hole: Moussaoui and the Hidden Detainees
Uri Avnery
The General as Pseudo-Dove: Ya'alon's 70 Virgins
M. Shahid Alam
Voiding the Palestinians: an Allegory
Juliana Fredman
Visions of Concrete
Norman Solomon
Media Clash in Brazil
Brian Cloughley
Is Anyone in the Bush Administration Telling the Truth?
William S. Lind
Post-Machine Gun Tactics
Patrick W. Gavin
Imagine
Dave Lindorff
Bush's
Brand of Leadership: Putting Himself First
Tom Crumpacker
Pandering to Anti-Castro Hardliners
Erik Fleming
Howard Dean's Folly
Rick Giombetti
Challenging the Witch Doctors of the New Imperialism: a Review
of Bush in Babylon
Jorge Mariscal
Las Adelitas, 2003: Mexican-American Women in Iraq
Chris Floyd
Logical Conclusions
Mickey Z.
Does William Safire Need Mental Help?
David Vest
Owed to the Confederate Dead
Ron Jacobs
Joe: the Sixties Most Unforgiving Film
Dave Zirin
Foreman and Carlos: a Tale of Two Survivors
Poets' Basement
Guthrie, Albert, Greeder, Ghalib and Alam
November 13, 2003
Jack McCarthy
Veterans
for Peace Booted from Vet Day Parade
Adam Keller
Report
on the Ben Artzi Verdict
Richard Forno
"Threat Matrix:" Homeland Security Goes Prime-Time
Vijay Prashad
Confronting
the Evangelical Imperialists
November 12, 2003
Elaine Cassel
The
Supremes and Guantanamo: a Glimmer of Hope?
Col. Dan Smith
Unsolicited
Advice: a Reply to Rumsfeld's Memo
Jonathan Cook
Facility
1391: Israel's Guantanamo
Robert Fisk
Osama Phones Home
Michael Schwartz
The Wal-Mart Distraction and the California Grocery Workers Strike
John Chuckman
Forty
Years of Lies
Doug Giebel
Jessica Lynch and Saving American Decency
Uri Avnery
Wanted: a Sharon of the Left
Website of the Day
Musicians Against Sweatshops
November 11, 2003
David Lindorff
Bush's
War on Veterans
Stan Goff
Honoring
Real Vets; Remembering Real War
Earnest McBride
"His
Feet Were on the Ground": Was Steve McNair's Cousin Lynched?
Derek Seidman
Imperialism
Begins at Home: an Interview with Stan Goff
David Krieger
Mr. President, You Can Run But You Can't Hide
Sen. Ernest Hollings
My Cambodian Moment on the Iraq War
Dan Bacher
The Invisible Man Resigns
Kam Zarrabi
Hypocrisy at the Top
John Eskow
Born on Veteran's Day
Website of the Day
Left Hook
November 10, 2003
Robert Fisk
Looney
Toons in Rummyworld: How We Denied Democracy to the Middle East
Elaine Cassel
Papa's Gotta Brand New Bag (of Tricks): Patriot Act Spawns Similar
Laws Across Globe
James Brooks
Israel's New War Machine Opens the Abyss
Thom Rutledge
The Lost Gospel of Rummy
Stew Albert
Call Him Al
Gary Leupp
"They
Were All Non-Starters": On the Thwarted Peace Proposals
November 8/9, 2003
Kathleen and Bill Christison
Zionism
as Racist Ideology
Gabriel Kolko
Intelligence
for What?
The Vietnam War Reconsidered
Saul Landau
The
Bride Wore Black: the Policy Nuptials of Boykin and Wolfowitz
Brian Cloughley
Speeding Up to Nowhere: Training the New Iraqi Police
William Blum
The Anti-Empire Report:
A Permanent Occupation?
David Lindorff
A New Kind of Dancing in Iraq: from Occupation to Guerrilla War
Elaine Cassel
Bush's War on Non-Citizens
Tim Wise
Persecuting the Truth: Claims of Christian Victimization Ring
Hollow
Toni Solo
Robert Zoellick and "Wise Blood"
Michael Donnelly
Will the Real Ron Wyden Please Stand Up?
Mark Hand
Building a Vanguard Movement: a Review of Stan Goff's Full Spectrum
Disorder
Norman Solomon
War, Social Justice, Media and Democracy
Norman Madarasz
American Neocons and the Jerusalem Post
Adam Engel
Raising JonBenet
Dave Zirin
An Interview with George Foreman
Poets' Basement
Guthrie, Albert and Greeder
November 7, 2003
Nelson Valdes
Latin
America in Crisis and Cuba's Self-Reliance
David Vest
Surely
It Can't Get Any Worse?
Chris Floyd
An Inspector
Calls: The Kay Report as War Crime Indictment
William S. Lind
Indicators:
Where This War is Headed
Elaine Cassel
FBI to Cryptome: "We Are Watching You"
Maria Tomchick
When Public Transit Gets Privatized
Uri Avnery
Israeli
Roulette
November 6, 2003
Ron Jacobs
With
a Peace Like This...
Conn Hallinan
Rumsfeld's
New Model Army
Maher Arar
This
is What They Did to Me
Elaine Cassel
A Bad
Day for Civil Liberties: the Case of Maher Arar
Neve Gordon
Captives
Behind Sharon's Wall
Ralph Nader and Lee Drutman
An Open Letter to John Ashcroft on Corporate Crime
November 5, 2003
Jeffrey St. Clair
Just
a Match Away:
Fire Sale in So Cal
Dave Lindorff
A Draft in the Forecast?
Robert Jensen
How I Ended Up on the Professor Watch List
Joanne Mariner
Prisons as Mental Institutions
Patrick Cockburn
Saddam Not Organizing Iraqi Resistance
Simon Helweg-Larsen
Centaurs
from Dusk to Dawn: Remilitarization and the Guatemalan Elections
Josh Frank
Silencing "the Reagans"
Website of the Day
Everything You Wanted to Know About Howard Dean But Were Afraid
to Ask
November 4, 2003
Robert Fisk
Smearing
Said and Ashrawi: When Did "Arab" Become a Dirty Word?
Ray McGovern
Chinook Down: It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Vietnam
Woodruff / Wypijewski
Debating
the New Unity Partnership
Karyn Strickler
When
Opponents of Abortion Dream
Norman Solomon
The
Steady Theft of Our Time
Tariq Ali
Resistance
and Independence in Iraq
November 3, 2003
Patrick Cockburn
The
Bloodiest Day Yet for Americans in Iraq: Report from Fallujah
Dave Lindorff
Philly's
Buggy Election
Janine Pommy Vega
Sarajevo Hands 2003
Bernie Dwyer
An
Interview with Chomsky on Cuba
November 1 / 2,
2003
Saul Landau
Cui
Bono? The Cuba Embargo as Rip Off
Noam Chomsky
Empire of the Men of Best Quality
Bruce Jackson
Midge Decter and the Taxi Driver
Brian Cloughley
"Mow the Whole Place Down"
John Stanton
The Pentagon's Love Affair with Land Mines
William S. Lind
Bush's Bizarre Korean Gambit
Ben Tripp
The Brown Paste on Bush's Shoes
Christopher Brauchli
Divine Hatred
Dave Zirin
An Interview with John Carlos
Agustin Velloso
Oil in Equatorial Guinea: Where Trickle Down Doesn't Trickle
Josh Frank
Howard Dean and Affirmative Action
Ron Jacobs
Standing Up to El Diablo: the 1981 Blockade of Diablo Canyon
Strickler / Hermach
Liar, Liar Forests on Fire
David Vest
Jimmy T99 Nelson, a Blues Legend and the Songs that Made Him
Famous
Adam Engel
America, What It Is
Dr. Susan Block
Christy Canyon, a Life in Porn
Poets' Basement
Greeder, Albert & Guthrie
Congratulations
to CounterPuncher David Vest: Winner of 2 Muddy Awards for Best
Blues Pianist in the Pacific Northwest!
October 31, 2003
Lee Ballinger
Making
a Dollar Out of 15 Cents: The Sweatshops of Sean "P. Diddy"
Combs
Wayne Madsen
The
GOP's Racist Trifecta
Michael Donnelly
Settling for Peanuts: Democrats Trick the Greens, Treat Big Timber
Patrick Cockburn
Baghdad
Diary: Iraqis are Naming Their New Babies "Saddam"
Elaine Cassel
Coming
to a State Near You: The Matrix (Interstate Snoops, Not the Movie)
Linda Heard
An Arab View of Masonry
October 30, 2003
Forrest Hylton
Popular
Insurrection and National Revolution in Bolivia
Eric Ruder
"We Have to Speak Out!": Marching with the Military
Families
Dave Lindorff
Big
Lies and Little Lies: The Meaning of "Mission Accomplished"
Philip Adams
"Everyone is Running Scared": Denigrating Critics of
Israel
Sean Donahue
Howard Dean: a Hawk in a Dove's Cloak
Robert Jensen
Big Houses & Global Justice: A Moral Level of Consumption?
Alexander Cockburn
Paul
Krugman: Part of the Problem
October 29, 2003
Chris Floyd
Thieves
Like Us: Cheney's Backdoor to Halliburton
Robert Fisk
Iraq Guerrillas Adopt a New Strategy: Copy the Americans
Rick Giombetti
Let
Them Eat Prozac: an Interview with David Healy
The Intelligence Squad
Dark
Forces? The Military Steps Up Recruiting of Blacks
Elaine Cassel
Prosecutors
as Therapists, Phantoms as Terrorists
Marie Trigona
Argentina's War on the Unemployed Workers Movement
Gary Leupp
Every
Day, One KIA: On the Iraq War Casualty Figures
October 28, 2003
Rich Gibson
The
Politics of an Inferno: Notes on Hellfire 2003
Uri Avnery
Incident
in Gaza
Diane Christian
Wishing
Death
Robert Fisk
Eyewitness
in Iraq: "They're Getting Better"
Toni Solo
Authentic Americans and John Negroponte
Jason Leopold
Halliburton in Iran
Shrireen Parsons
When T-shirts are Verboten
Chris White
9/11
in Context: a Marine Veteran's Perspective
October 27,
2003
William A. Cook
Ministers
of War: Criminals of the Cloth
David Lindorff
The
Times, Dupes and the Pulitzer
Elaine Cassel
Antonin
Scalia's Contemptus Mundi
Robert Fisk
Occupational Schizophrenia
John Chuckman
Banging Your Head into Walls
Seth Sandronsky
Snoops R Us
Bill Kauffman
George
Bush, the Anti-Family President
October 25 / 26,
2003
Robert Pollin
The
US Economy: Another Path is Possible
Jeffrey St. Clair
Outsourcing US Guided Missile Technology to China
James Bunn
Plotting
Pre-emptive Strikes
Saul Landau
Should Limbaugh Do Time?
Ted Honderich
Palestinian Terrorism, Morality & Germany
Thomas Nagy
Saving the Army of Peace
Christopher Brauchli
Between Bush and a Lobotomy: Killing Endangered Species for Profit
Laura Carlsen
Latin America's Archives of Terror
Diane Christian
Evil Acts & Evil Actors
Muqtedar Khan
Lessons from the Imperial Adventure in Iraq
John Feffer
The Tug of War on the Korea Peninsula
Brian Cloughley
Iraq War Memories are Made of Lies
Benjamin Dangl
and Kathryn Ledebur
An Uneasy Peace in Bolivia
Karyn Strickler
Down
with Big Brother's Spying Eyes
Noah Leavitt
Legal Globalization
John Stanton
Hitler's Ghost Haunts America
Mickey Z.
War of the Words
Adam Engel
Tractatus Ridiculous
Poets' Basement
Curtis, Subiet and Albert
Website of the Weekend
Project Last Stand
October 24, 2003
Kurt Nimmo
Ashcroft's
War on Greenpeace
Lenni Brenner
The Demographics of American Jews
Jeffrey St. Clair
Rockets,
Napalm, Torpedoes and Lies: the Attack on the USS Liberty Revisited
Sarah Weir
Cover-up of the Israeli Attack on the US Liberty
David Krieger
WMD Found in DC: Bush is the Button
Mohammed Hakki
It's Palestine, Stupid!: Americans and the Middle East
Harry Browne
Northern
Ireland: the Agreement that Wasn't
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
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Weekend
Edition
November 29 / 30, 2003
The California Grocery
Strike
Unions
are the Answer to Supermarkets Woes
By STANDARD SCHAEFER
To those who believe that unions are nostalgic
relics and that America must support it's massively over indebted
businesses at all cost, consider the curious logic of Wall Street
food and drug analyst Mark Husson for Merrill Lynch Global Securities.
It is his report that was so often quoted in the press as evidence
that there is simply no other way for supermarkets stave off
the Wal-Mart threat than phasing out full-time employment and
shafting workers on benefits. Husson's report is no doubt quoted
for its deft cliché-ridden pithiness: "Wal-Mart
is soon going to be the lowest common denominator in the food
business, and everyone has to move towards that level."
What does Husson believe Wal-Mart's main
competitive advantage is? Is it the computer inventory system
that is so efficient that entire books have been written about
it? No. Is that Wal-Mart has leveraged its market position to
demand the extortionistic, anti-competitive, but completely legal
"vendor allowances"-the kickbacks manufacturers pay
for their products to remain on these shelves? Wal-Mart doesn't
use them. It is their one anti-monopolistic policy. The supermarkets,
on the other hand, received so many of them in 2001 that they
surpassed total profits. The kind of extortion, however, did
not even help the supermarkets' competitiveness. Husson explains
Wal-Mart is the once and future king for one reason: insidiously
low wage costs.
But if this is Wal-Mart's main advantage,
then the solution is self-evident: more unionization.
The UFCW has lobbied to keep Wal-Mart
out of local municipalities such as Pasadena. Rick Icaza, head
of the UFCW, successfully ran his own candidate for city council
in one case. These efforts have kept Wal-Mart out of some towns
entirely. When they haven't, they've still managed to win concessions.
Why aren't the supermarkets harnessing this energy? Why aren't
they joining the union's efforts to force Wal-Mart to engage
in First World labor practices? Why aren't they attempting to
channel the world-wide anti-Wal-Mart backlash rather than whole-heartedly
embracing their rival's tactics?
As Husson said, "All employers need
a level playing field." At some point, "you have to
make a violent change to get a chance at surviving." He,
of course, was advocating for fewer unions, but the idea of universal
unionization in the retail sector would "level the field"
not just against Wal-Mart, but also the smaller supermarkets
like Trader Joe's and, Super A, and Costco, most of which are
currently "unsullied" by union labor.
The supermarkets won't adopt this course
because they are not really worried about Wal-Mart. On September
3, 2003 at Goldman Sachs Conference, Safeway CEO Burd even admitted
as much:
"For us, it's not the supercenters, it's not the clubs that
are creating the soft sales that we had in 2002 and certainly
in the first part of 2003. It's really predominately the business
slowdown that has affected our top line sales growth and not
either the supercenters or the clubs that we have competed with,
really, for decades."
Corroborating Burd's position are two
recent analyses that suggest that dominant supermarket chains
can actually benefit when Wal-Mart comes in by effectively dividing
up the market. A Bernstein Research analysis of 339 markets found
that, "If a company has a dominant position, even if Wal-Mart
enters, the supermarket gains share in 71% of the cases"
A Deutsche Bank analyst came to a similar conclusion in a report
on February 11 of this year:
"We believe that traditional supermarkets
that focus on convenience and service can coexist with supercenters
that focus on price and assortmentWe believe that over the next
18 months, Safeway should be the conventional operator that is
the least affected by the rollout of the Wal-Mart's supercenters...While
we believe that in the longer term Safeway will inevitably feel
the pressure from Wal-Mart's expansion in California and other
markets, a No. 1 position in California with a 24% market share
should allow the company to better withstand competition from
discounters relative to the other retailers. We are certainly
not implying that Safeway's profitability over the next few years
will not be affected by the growth of discount formats on the
West Coast. We are simply saying that Safeway will be better
able than others to establish duopoly type of situation with
discounters in a large number of markets on the West Coast.
As an example, Safeway holds the No. 1 position in the following
markets in California: San Francisco-Oakland (41% market share),
Santa Barbara-Santa maria (30%) or San Diego (30%). ... Taking
into account that the company's capital spending will be mostly
allocated toward in-market store openings, Safeway's market share
in the above markets could evolve favorably, despite the increase
of discounter penetration."
This report is important for two reasons.
First, it goes to explain tactics supermarkets could use to
remain competitive. Second, it reveals that labor is not the
problem.
So what about the market share losses
that supermarkets have reported recently? Are they lying? No.
The same analysts supply the clue. The Deutsche Bank report
says that the dominant supermarket in each region should be emphasizing
its difference from the Wal-Mart food stores. They suggested
enhanced delis, full-service butchers, more specialty items,
more higher-end products, even better lighting, anything at all
to enhance the shopping experience. None of these will be found
in Wal-Mart. The Wal-Mart customer is simply not the same as
the Safeway customer.
But Safeway failed to remodel their stores
as quickly as their competitors. They have been slow in making
niche-adjustments. In the midst of Safeway's timidity (perhaps
management was simply preoccupied with filing all those insider
stock trades), several smaller chains have stepped-up.
Gelsons, a chain specializing in the
high-end, quickly expanded through Southern California, did so
without acquiring debt, and without compromising its unionized
workers. The slow economy that Steve Burd cites did not stop
this Chardonnay-class retailer.
The supermarkets simply have not transformed
quickly enough. In order to make up for the lost time, the Burd
has focused on the unions with the single-mindedness of thief
blowing a safe. His repeated mantra about rising healthcare
costs is a PR move, chosen because healthcare is complicated,
dull, and frustrating. Everyone knows it is expensive, but knowing
why that is the case in the US and not so much in the civilized
world is even more complicated. The media can't possibly account
properly for these variables on the nightly news or even in a
newspaper article. It's classic sleight-of-hand.
The official line continues to obscure
the issue, citing the soft economy for allegedly prompting customers
to cut back on higher-margin items, from choice steaks to better
bottles of Chardonnay. "Five years ago, it was a bull market,"
said Husson. Now, retailer costs have "shot upward just
as sales have collapsed downward." This is true, sort of.
Healthcare costs continue their moonshot, but these are relatively
small compared to the costs of carrying such an enormous long-term
debt. The nation's three largest chains reported lower same-store
sales for their most recent quarters. But citing weak economic
conditions doesn't explain how it is that these store's competitors
like Gelson's have cleaned the supermarkets' clocks.
The Deutsche Bank report also says (in
the murkiest of terms): "company spendingallocated toward
in-market store openings". The analysts mean that opening
new stores and buying independents within the stronghold regions
like the Bay Area could offset the threat of employment losses
for employees of specific stores closest to the sites of future
supercenters. Why isn't this going on? The Deutsche Bank report
fails to adequately explain that to do so the grocers would have
to take on even more debt. Of course, if the supermarkets take
on more debt the main beneficiaries are the banks.
There is a serious contradiction here.
Wall Street loves to sell debt because it is largely guaranteed
a return whereas their buying stock is a gamble. At the same
time, supermarkets are not seriously courting consumer's dollars.
They are courting Wall Street's. And Wall Street owns the supermarket
debt. It collects fees for structuring it and then collects
interest on the actual loan, so it doesn't want to see either
default or early re-payment. It wants a gradual repayment that
simultaneously improves the company's ability to borrow more
and gives the illusion of austerity so important to stock holders.
In actuality, it simply siphons off money that could go into
direct capital investment-all things these reports cite are necessary
for the supermarkets to compete.
Deutsche Bank is right that the supermarkets
could do more to compete with Wal-Mart, but is its suggestion
to make more acquisitions is self-serving since to do so would
increase supermarket debts. The supermarkets are already highly
in debted. Arthur Levitt, former chairman of the SEC, considers
a debt-to-capital ratio above 20% a warning sign about of an
overleveraged business. Safeway's is 61%. Kroger's is 66%.
Alberton's is 49%. In contrast, the parent company of Gelson's,
the high-end supermarket, is 2%.
Large debts make companies more susceptible
to Wall Street pressure. Take Safeway, for example, they took
on massive debts from a series of bad takeovers. In the meantime,
to please Wall Street, they tried to bolster their share price
with a stock buyback program. It began with the stock around
$43, continued during its slide to the $23 level where it was
temporarily put on hold. In addition to the capital loss, the
stock buy-back was financed on borrowed funds. As result, it
increased their interest expenses during the disastrous drop.
The stock drop itself only adds pressure. And yet the stocks
slide has fairly well stopped since the strike. This confirms
"the Husson problem". The recent action of Safeway's
stock signals that Wall Street approves of management's age-old
anti-union tactics.
Wall Street elite clearly prefer smashing
the union as an intermediate term way of cutting costs across
this whole sector of retailing, rather than seeing the supermarkets
compete properly in a free market for customers. And, of course,
Wall Street likes the idea of the consumer (supermarket worker)
paying their own health expenses, since the consumer-worker would
have no leverage against rising health costs. We cannot forget
that Wall Street's elite also own the stock and the debt of that
other sector that stands to benefit from the supermarket's anti-union
stance.
Wall Street's pressure on the supermarkets
has been relentless. On Oct. 1, 2003 Moody's Investors Service
downgraded Albertson's long-term debt, giving the company its
second-lowest mark. Moody's, a credit-rating service, said it
feared that Albertson's efforts to improve sales and market share
might not yield results anytime soon. This is Wall Street's way
of insisting that Albertson do more to prove it can and will
pay its debts. The reward for doing so is a better credit rating,
an improved ability to borrow without regard to how this affects
the company over the long term. By locking out workers, Albertson's
signals its commitment to Wall Street, not sales growth.
Wall Street is famously short-sighted,
but it has to be pointed out that Wall Street analysts widely
considered Safeway CEO Steve Burd a brilliant manager while the
stock went up 52% in bubble of 2000. Since the slide, the same
analysts have been largely silent about his increasing debt load
and interest expenses during the economic slowdown. Why? They
knew that a sluggish economy could be used as a cover story to
squeeze the workers, to cast them as greedy children, and to
win concessions that would insure Safeway paid its debts back.
Burd is now blaming the economy for his lost market share only
to divert attention from his mismanagement. Placing the blame
on something he cannot control allows him to argue that he should
have a chance to steer the company during the expected rebound,
cashing in his options all the way.
The "slow economy" myth that
the supermarkets are using has one legitimate angle. What we're
seeing here is the bubble's hangover. Safeway's failed takeover
of Dominick's occurred during bubble-era asset pricing. Among
a number of missteps, they began by paying too much.
The supermarket battle must be seen in
terms of the debt bubble that continues to this day thanks to
Greenspan's engineering and Bush's dividend tax cut. Since the
supermarkets cannot afford to pay much of a dividend, they cannot
compete as well for Wall Street dollars. If they were not so
indebted and could pay dividends, then the insiders who have
been selling their Safeway stock would gladly hold on to it,
enjoy the fact Uncle Sam would be taking little of their dividend
income, and they would not be as inclined to short-term thinking.
America is just now dealing with the
lower living standards that are inevitable after a bubble. The
question is should workers' living standards drop or should CEOs,
particularly flailing ones such as the case here, accept a lower
standard of living?
Recent revelations that the supermarkets
have colluded to share revenue during the labor stoppages confirms
their fear of losing Wall Street's favor. It is not labor's fault
that the supermarkets are failing. It is Wall Street's and the
speculative mindset it perpetuates. This mindset has come even
to the allegedly sober-minded corporate managers. What we are
witnessing is the increasing ability of the finance sector to
gain control over the real economy. To support the unions, to
support improved working standards across the board is the stand
up against financialization of America and the slavery of unproductive
debts.
One thing is clear: the unions are not
the problem. They are the solution to a world where high finance,
stock market speculation, and monopolistic business practices
scapegoat the diminishing middleclass and only increase the wrong
kinds of competition, the wrong kinds of cooperation-the bright,
wide-open collusions that are impoverishing us all.
Standard Schaefer is an independent financial journalist, an editor
of The New Review of Literature, a poet, essayist, and an instructor
at Otis College of Art and Design. He can be reached at ssschaefer@earthlink.net.
Weekend
Edition Features for Nov. 14 / 23, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
Clintontime:
Was It Really a Golden Age?
Saul Landau
Words
of War
Noam Chomsky
Invasion
as Marketing Problem: Iraq War and Contempt for Democracy
Stan Goff
An Open Letter to GIs in Iraq: Hold on to Your Humanity
Jeffrey St. Clair
Bush Puts Out a Contract on the Spotted Owl
John Holt
Blue Light: Battle for the Sweetgrass Hills
Adam Engel
A DC Lefty in King George's Court: an Interview with Sam Smith
Joanne Mariner
In a Dark Hole: Moussaoui and the Hidden Detainees
Uri Avnery
The General as Pseudo-Dove: Ya'alon's 70 Virgins
M. Shahid Alam
Voiding the Palestinians: an Allegory
Juliana Fredman
Visions of Concrete
Norman Solomon
Media Clash in Brazil
Brian Cloughley
Is Anyone in the Bush Administration Telling the Truth?
William S. Lind
Post-Machine Gun Tactics
Patrick W. Gavin
Imagine
Dave Lindorff
Bush's
Brand of Leadership: Putting Himself First
Tom Crumpacker
Pandering to Anti-Castro Hardliners
Erik Fleming
Howard Dean's Folly
Rick Giombetti
Challenging the Witch Doctors of the New Imperialism: a Review
of Bush in Babylon
Jorge Mariscal
Las Adelitas, 2003: Mexican-American Women in Iraq
Chris Floyd
Logical Conclusions
Mickey Z.
Does William Safire Need Mental Help?
David Vest
Owed to the Confederate Dead
Ron Jacobs
Joe: the Sixties Most Unforgiving Film
Dave Zirin
Foreman and Carlos: a Tale of Two Survivors
Poets' Basement
Guthrie, Albert, Greeder, Ghalib and Alam
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