What a great post Sofi! It examines a reality which many in this country do not want to face, because if they do they will be forced to some sort of action and isn't it easier to just go along with the status quo? Our backs are against the wall and it is high time we realize it. Unless we do, the future is bleak

Merely using the word 'cooperatives' brings to mind Soviet-style communism.
This op/ed sounds like a call to bring back that system, but to do it right this time around--sans the dictator who wants to run it all, i.e. Fidel Castro.

Next model... the Red Chinese lusting for control of capitalism prevelant in Taiwan?

I agree that people need to assume responsibility for the control of their own welfare, but being sold the line of pap that all opportunities are available to those willing to struggle to achieve it (listen to Hannity sometime and the rest of the gasbags) is great rah rah stuff but hardly reality. They need to get with it and go meet some homeless sometime and see what it's like.

And those in the ivory towers can study it too. It really is another world out there and I do believe in 'to each to his ability' [a great marxism]. We need ALL the achievers doing their best for the benefit of all. Then it will all balance out in the end. The sciences are flourishing, and that's a good thing. Good that new innoventions are being found for useful, less energy consuming purposes. More leisure time was what the greeks came to discover, and philosophy was born.

One thing in order to do this is that everyone should set as many good examples as they can to the young by mentoring and raising children of your own to learn to start conserving because it will be their fate in the balance too. They need ALL the education they can get, from all means available to learn to use their wits (and skills) to their best advantage.

A good example is learning how to farm, and that's what got me thinking of the old soviet co-op farms of the 50-60's and on. Food lines in the city were shown on the nightly news too. The US Midwest sold grain that made the shipping industries rich transporting. The US took a tarrif at Panama, and the farmers saw their harvest go to good use. Is this an example of your co-op?

Don't get me started on the amish!

Good op/ed here, got me thinking. Sorry for having a tangent of my own.

No, I do not believe that a Democracy is the way to go. I believe in what our Founding Fathers believed (I live in the U.S.).

I also believe you are pushing socialism. It doesn't work. We tried it the first year we hit this continent. That was almost our only year!

Everybody has the right to profit any way they want too if is in a clean way, I don't think socialism will work in our nation either.

What I see as a big problem is when the corporations starts buying out our political leaders and then ruling the nation behind them.

Actually...if people knew what Socialism is, it could work. However most people do not even have a clue...

In fact most people assume Socialism allows no private property, etc...

Hmmm. Seems to be a LARGE misunderstanding here about the structure and function of cooperatives. For the record, cooperatives are legal corporations - and already common in the USA. The difference between cooperative and public corporations is that in cooperatives, the profits are shared by members, usually in the form of lower rates or charges.

...My thought is that people who are out of work or who have lost their homes might regroup faster and easier together, than by trying to go it alone.


Here are the first 10 of over 16 million google entries on cooperatives. As you can see, this page contains mainly energy and electricity cooperatives.

Results 1 - 10 of about 16,200,000 for +cooperative +corporation . (0.17 seconds)

Arkansas Electric Cooperative Corporation
Overview on the generation and transmission cooperative. Business information,
locations, and company goals and outlook available.
www.aecc.com/ - 18k - 1 Oct 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

Blue Grass Energy Cooperative Corporation
Kentucky based coop offering services to 23 Kentucky counties. Offers online
payment options and contact details.
www.bgenergy.com/ - 17k - 1 Oct 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

First Electric Cooperative
All contents © 1996-2003 First Electric Cooperative.
www.fecc.com/ - 22k - Cached - Similar pages

Midwest Electric Cooperative Corporation
The Midwest Electric Cooperative Corporation provides high-quality, reliable and
competitively priced electricity to members and customers in west central ...
www.midwestecc.com/ - 12k - 1 Oct 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

Ozarks Electric Cooperative Corporation
Supplies wholesale power to electric distribution cooperatives in Arkansas.
Features member services, products, residential resources, and corporate ...
www.ozarksecc.com/ - 20k - 1 Oct 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

Welcome to WRECC
A non-profit electric cooperative that provides electricity, water, long distance,
and security systems. Includes online billing and payment, description of ...
www.wrecc.com/ - 8k - 1 Oct 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

::: MONDRAGÓN CORPORACIÓN COOPERATIVA :::
Relación de empresas del grupo Mondragón Corporación Cooperativa.
www.mondragon.mcc.es/ - 13k - Cached - Similar pages

Ouachita Electric Cooperative Corporation - Welcome!
Local energy provider member services, history, coop news, and contact information.
www.oecc.com/ - 31k - 1 Oct 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

C & L Electric Cooperative Corporation
Not-for-profit corporation providing electric services to the areas of Bradley,
Cleveland, Dallas, Desha, Drew, Grant, Jefferson and Lincoln counties in ...
www.clelectric.com/ - 5k - Cached - Similar pages

Inter-County Energy Cooperative Corporation
Danville based cooperative serving more than 22973 consumers in twelve counties
of Kentucky. Information on products and services, safety and conservation, ...
www.intercountyenergy.net/ - 6k - 1 Oct 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

Good posting- (in other words I agree with you) Some scare -mongering is necessary to get a poster to at least read the substance IMHO. If it gets the ire of the corporate slaves- all the better. (I'm calling the kettle black- since I am a corporate slave myself!) Cooperatives may be the direction we need to take to get out of the oil dependency trap. What we really need to do is start some small manufacturing in our local communities. (biodiesel is a good start!) Big business and corporate welfare have had their decade of glory- it is time for some accountability. Boycotting is a good start- You see that less taxes for education (no child left behind and religious vouchers) and health-care are having an effect on the local workers. Self-policing in environmental concerns are a whole 'nuther can of worms. Less taxes from the local GM plant for example can have an extremely demoralizing effect on the local school in that district, for example. Then there is the electricity, water, and sewer discounts (internet acess, and phone discounts). This is what we call corporate 'welfare'.

If populism is the shoe that fits- so be it. i call it more like local economies and socialism- IMHO

Other countries are taking the lead in coops- they may not succeed because of global warming though


Just remember- coops need hard work too! Somebody's got to stock those durn shelves. Can you lift 30 lbs repeatedly? (Frito-Lay Warehouse requirements.)

First off,
I am surprised that Val, and Sofi are at such odds here...

I see Vals point regarding scaremongering... but it is true, that a touch of it is needed to get response... (i.e. every major media headline for the last century)

And I know Val well enough to know that she is not "defending" anything... if anything, she seems to have a problem with the way to approach it, not the result...

personally: The situation we find ourselves in as a country today, is not as much a legacy of rich controlling poor, BUT
rich corporations dicovering that it is much easier to buy a few politicians than earn their customers...
which results in legislation and financing controls that hold the little guy down, (prevent competition) and benefit the original corporations (favorable tax structure, deductions, no bid contracts)

spell it however you want it... but it aint capitalism, and it aint democracy...

TC - You know I would love to see the U.S. go back to something like our original form of government, but we both know that is not going to happen. The federal republic died during the civil war and the aggregation of power by the federal government has continued unabated, in fact it has probably accelerated, since then.

Originally posted by LazarusTheLong
... I know Val well enough to know that she is not "defending" anything... if anything, she seems to have a problem with the way to approach it, not the result...

Not sure - seems the sticking point is that Val is against big government, but for big business. ...I am against big business, or "corporatocracy."

personally: The situation we find ourselves in as a country today, is not as much a legacy of rich controlling poor, BUT
rich corporations dicovering that it is much easier to buy a few politicians than earn their customers...
which results in legislation and financing controls that hold the little guy down, (prevent competition) and benefit the original corporations (favorable tax structure, deductions, no bid contracts)

It's bigger and deeper than that Laz - review the "evolution" of corporate law. National and international corporate laws "protect" corporations, give them "personhood" and individuals rights, the rights of nationhood without the responsibilities...

spell it however you want it... but it aint capitalism, and it aint democracy...

Nope. It ain't. It's corporate feudalism. Corporations instead of monarchies; CEO's instead of kings.


.

The problem is guys, Capitalism would always end up in this situation. Eventually one company will own every aspect of each area [or a super majority at least] and then you'll see groups like Walmart and Microsoft begin to work together and so on and so fourth...until we are...#ed to say the least. It'll end up as a system where a few rich people [in the low thousands] will control every Nation on other...that is what the spread of capitalism and democracy in the Middle East and China is about, they are the last areas which are hard to get into for big buisness...

Originally posted by Odium
The problem is guys, Capitalism would always end up in this situation. ...that is what the spread of capitalism and democracy in the Middle East and China is about, they are the last areas which are hard to get into for big buisness...

FYI Odium - cooperatives can be capitalistic for-profit ventures. And IMO - the corporate epidemic has NOTHING to do with democracy.


.

soficrow, it has a lot to do with removing Government's that control the whole economy and take a portion of the profit. If they remove the profit the Government takes would then go back to the company and democracy is the easist way to openly abuse this.

Look at the destruction of Islamic Socialism in the last 8years...

Let's back up, okay? Some great ideas and tangents - BUT - I really just want to look at co-op businesses as a way:

1 - for people who are displaced and homeless from catastrophe to get new homes; and

2 - for people who are out of work, again because of catastrophe, to find decent jobs at decent pay.

...?