Occupy the NBA

When the NFL threatened their lockout, they said it was the millionaires (players) VS the billionaires (owners).  The NBA is pretty much the same thing.  As far as I can tell (10 minutes on a google search), the owners want a salary cut of 800 million and to split the revenues with the players 50/50.  The players want to keep the current contract where they get 57% and 2.1 billion in benefits/salaries (I'm not sure if 2.1 billion includes the revenue percentage or not).  2.1 billion divided among 450 players (Each NBA team can have 12-15 players, and there are 30 teams, but let's say there are 15 players on every team which divides that 2.1 billion the most) is about 4.7 million each.  800 million divided by 450 is 1.7 million, so players would make 3 million each. Obviously the distribution is not equal, so some make more and some make less, but you get the idea.  Meanwhile, the 800 million cut would presumably go to the owners, and let's say each team has one owner, so that's 800/30 and that's 26.6 million dollars each ON TOP OF whatever they're being paid right now.  This is a lot of money, true, and it is right for the owners and players to have these sorts of discussions, and in theory it is alright for them to not play the season if they can't settle.  It's just like any labor/management dispute.

Except that the NBA creates a lot of cashflow and creates a fair (though not significant) amount of jobs just by existing.  TV ads are bought, and no matter your opinion on ads in general, this counts as an investment in the consumer sector and is good for the economy.  Also, bars may suffer as they cannot advertise "game nights" to get the crowds out - again, in this economy anything that gets consumers spending is a good thing.  Also, in each case, the money earned from the investments may be used to give current workers raises, or to hire new employees.

But most importantly are the jobs at the stadiums, and the restaurant/bars surrounding stadiums.  First, you have ushers and custodians and security and people at ticket booths.  Then you have the vendors, who are not employed by the stadium but buy rental space and then sell their products/memorabilia/food at the stadium, and they make far more money than they would at any other space they could rent.  Then you have police who try to earn overtime by working the detail shifts at the street intersections leading up to the stadium, as well as parking and crowd control.  These are lot of jobs that are simply gone, all because the players and owners are arguing over where $800 million go.  You know what?  Give it to the people I just listed above!

Not really.  That would be wealth distribution in its plainest form.  I agree with their right to disagree about money and know these guys have all earned their life styles and would like to keep making the money needed to support that lifestyle.  That's not selfish.  What bothers me is that these talks can't be held only in the off season.  They are worried so much about these millions of dollars, they are willing to throw so many other people who depend on the NBA under the bus.

So why is the post Occupy the NBA?  Because I feel this is a similar situation the protesters are arguing against.  It's fine to want to support your lifestyle and it's fine to want to be paid what you earn and it's fine to get a bonus for a job well done, but it's not OK to do any of those things at the expense of others.  Maybe you only go to 10 penthouse parties this year instead of 13.  Maybe you only have 6 hookers come to your cocaine extravaganza.  Maybe you keep flying first class but stop buying so many drinks on the plane.  While so many of us are struggling to pay rent and go see a movie once in a while (not to mention student loans!), it is utterly repugnant that you insist on living the highest of the high life.  This is why nobody likes trickle down economics works.  It can work, but it doesn't work when all the money stays at the top.

You don't have to give up your lifestyle, we understand you're used to it and it's unfair for us to order you to give away your money.  But, you know, can you tone it down a bit?  Just a smidgen?  Stop holding the rest of us hostage while you ooze with money.  A million here, a million there, what's the difference to you?  Wasn't there a news story that there aren't enough qualified workers for the jobs that are available?  1 million dollars will put 7 students through 4 years at Harvard.  And what about a more moderately priced school, say UMass Amherst?  11 students.  And trade schools / community colleges?  The number just goes up and up!  See, keeping the money on the top shelf hurts everyone.  Bring it down to our level and invest in some human capital.

There are 20,000 students at Harvard, including graduated and professional schools.  Let's pretend it has 20,000 undergrad students and pretend each class is a quarter of the total population.  That's 5000 seniors.  800 million dollars would pay for 5600 students FOR ALL FOUR YEARS.  So the money the NBA is arguing about is more than enough to put through Harvard's ENTIRE SENIOR CLASS.  And those graduates will save money in the long term by not needing to repay loans.  And then we'll have more qualified applicants for our open jobs,  and soon the economy will maybe stop being a "jobless recovery."

Alas, instead we're forced to watch reruns of network shows while the millionaires and billionaires haggle it out.

Why I hate Poland

I wrote this in 2011.  I think my wry humor got the best of me, as well as just being a little ridiculous.  The facts are accurate, but my feelings about it were intended as a little over the top and weren't meant to be taken literally.  This rant was to be taken with a pinch of salt, and then forgotten about.  Instead, I got hit with a bunch of antisemitic comments, some of which I deleted but now wish I hadn't.  Who, in 2011, read my blog and was antisemetic?  This was long before our current era where "armies of trolls" is a thing online that people need to worry about.

I shouldn't've gotten rid of them.  It just gives them the "you censored me!" card.  Instead I should've allowed it and then pointed a big sign to it saying THIS IS CRAZY, RIGHT???  Oh well.  I did not.  Heads up, read the comments (and my refutation) at your own risk.  They are......... frustrating.  I wonder how they found me.

Anyway, in light of Poland's new law criminalizing speech suggesting Poland's complicity in the holocaust, I am resharing this absurdist but also important post.  Fuck Poland.

I hate Poland.  I do not dislike Poland.  I absolutely hate Poland.  There is no other word for it.

I do not hate Poles.  That should be clear enough.  And clearly if you are Polish but do not live in Poland, I have no qualms with you at all.  I have family from Germany, Czechoslovakia and Russia.  At some point, I probably have an ancestor who was Polish, given my family tree basically surrounds the country.  I don't hate Poles.  I hate how Poland acts and chooses to represent itself.  I don't hate the Polish government.  I hate the country of Poland.  As a Jew, it is my duty.

I'll ignore all the pre-1939 Antisemitism.  There is a lot, but I'll ignore it and be extraordinarily generous.  Let's just review the last 72.

1939:  3 million Jews live in Poland
1940:  Polish diplomat Jan Karski reports to his government-in-exile in London that the Nazi policies against Jews have formed "a sort of narrow bridge where the Germans and a large part of Polish society meet in harmony."
1940-1945:  Nazi records show an incredible amount of willingness on behalf of the Poles to hunt down Jews.  Poles eagerly take over vacant Jewish homes and businesses.  However, many Poles agree to hide Jewish neighbors and friends from the Nazis.
1941:  1,600 Jews are murdered in the town of Jedwabne.  This is even worse than your run-of-the-mill pogrom, as it was planned by the town council and the mayor that on a particular day, all the local Jews would be attacked.  There were no shots fired, they were all beaten or stabbed to death.  Further, some of the fleeing Jews were corralled into a barn, ostensibly for safety, and then the barn was set on fire to kill the remaining Jews.  The Germans rewarded the man who volunteered his barn by building him a new one in return.  Again - this was all planned out.
1943:  During the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, Polish civilians aided the Nazis in finding Jewish survivors.  Girls could be heard chanting as they passed the smoldering ghetto, "Come, look, how cutlets from Jews are frying." (New York Times)
1945:  200,000 Jews are alive in Poland.  Poles who protected Jews during the war beg the Jews not to tell anyone they were the ones who protected them, lest their neighbors call them "Jew lovers," and beat (or kill) them, or break into their homes looking for gold the Jews left behind.  "With the war over, and to tumultuous applause, a thousand delegates of the Polish Peasants Party actually passed a resolution thanking Hitler for annihilating Polish Jewry and urging that those he’d missed be expelled. Indeed, the mopping up soon began. Returning to their villages and towns, Jews were routinely greeted with remarks like “So, ____? You are still alive.” Their efforts to retrieve property were futile — and, sometimes, fatal. Some Jews met their end on trains — not cattle cars this time, but passenger trains, from which they were thrown off. If the trains weren’t moving fast enough, they were beaten to death." (New York Times)
1946:  80 out of 200 Jews in Kielce are murdered in a pogrom when a Christian boy goes missing and the townspeople assume the Jews killed him to make their matzah (Blood libel).  A Jewish tenement is burned to the ground.  The boy later returned unharmed, apparently having been lost in the woods.  Journalists who came to report the story reported seeing Poles eating matzah on the street and, when asked about the accusation this was made with the blood of Christians, the Poles laughed and said such a claim was ridiculous, and really matzah is quite tasty.
1970s and 80s:  Claude Lanzmann interviews Poles for his documentary, Shoah.  Most Poles still live in houses owned by Jews, and speak of the holocaust as an event that happened, just like many others.  Most explain, with a strange sense of pride, how they told Jews they were all going to die, while doing nothing to help them.  While a single Jew from a certain town (the only apparent holocaust survivor from the area) stands in front of a church, a man near him suddenly announces that the holocaust was God's punishment to the Jews for crucifying Jesus Christ.

Such is the recent history of antisemitism in Poland.



You may claim America has its own such bloody history with the Native Americans.  But we, being a 235 year old country, talk about it and are, with varying degrees of guilt, ashamed of it.  Poland doesn't acknowledge any of these atrocities, and when it does it blames the Nazis or the Soviets.  Poland is nearly 1000 years old (with some years of non-existence mixed in), and has had antisemitism throughout its history. They still refuse to talk about it.

I hate Poland.  Not enough to consume me.  I don't wander through life cursing Poland on a regular basis.  Only so much that, whenever the country comes up in discussions, I declare my hatred for it.  And that when I think of the holocaust, I think mostly of Poland, not Germany.  Fuck you, Poland.