Tuesday, July 21, 2009

we're not going to take it

Americans are reluctant to buy Chinese toys and food because of the health risks and bad ingredients, and the occasionally sickened American child, or discovery of toxic chemicals in a toy. But we're torn because Chinese products are so cheap and ubiquitous, that it's hard to find something totally made in America anymore (This is all not to mention that America includes NORTH, CENTRAL and SOUTH America. I don't think they have $60/hour union auto laborers in Mexico, my friends)

Well I have always touted that over time our standard of living in this country will fall, and the rest of the world will be lifted up. Somewhere inbetween the golden years of the USA and the terrible payment and labor practices of the Chinese, the future will lay.

This is one story about a Chinese worker who was abused, intimidated and possibly tortured and finally killed himself over the stress of his job in China, making products for rich Americans:

While I totally wanted to buy this product, I was well aware of the fact that Apple hires Chinese companies and keeps the product price low because they make their workers work very long days and pay them, basically, shit. And it was the choice of this employee to kill himself, probably, unless someone "pushed" him out of a window.

See, I bet that Apple's secrecy policy is that there is a potential that FoxConn could lose their contract with Apple if too many of their secrets get out. And it was likely this man who caused the leak of the iPhone case photos online in the USA, which at one point Steve Jobs mentioned in his keynote address revealing the iPhone to the world. FoxConn, operating in an environment where abuse, torture, and intimidation is an accepted practice, would then employ those tactics to keep their workers quieted--China.

All of this for what? So that apple can have secrecy on its next-of-kin portable phone/computer device and an insider can invest heavily before the rollout occurs, and sell after the spike in price....

Another story that shows how neither authoritarian communism not free-market unregulated democratic capitalism work. I'm not a socialist or a communist, but the world has been trending in that direction more and more over the past 5,000 years. It's simply undeniable. More and more the people are in charge. More and more the markets are being regulated and shaped and controlled by the government of the people and not of a monarch, emperor or nepotistically chosen-one.

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

a little argentine limerick that sounds cute

el zapatito me aprieta
la media me da calor
y el muchachito de enfrente
me tiene loco de amor

- My mom said this last night for absolutely no reason and it cracked me up