Archive | January, 2012

Speech at the Occupy Oakland Rally, 28 January 2012 “This Land!  Don’t you feel it?  Doesn’t it make you want to go out and lift dead Indians tenderly from their graves, to steal from them — as if it must be clinging to their corpses — some authenticity. . .” Those are the words of […]

When I recently went to Alta Bates hospital for surgery, I discovered that legal procedures take precedence over medical ones.  I had to sign intimidating statements about financial counseling, indemnity, patient responsibilities, consent to treatment, use of electronic technologies, and the like. One of these documents committed me to the following: “The hospital pathologist is […]

Laura Oldfield Ford.  Savage Messiah.  Verso, 2011. HAMLET: Alas poor ghost! GHOST: Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearing To what I shall unfold It isn’t just that the alternatives are written over, or out, it is that they return as their own simulacra.     Mark Fisher from the introduction to Savage Messiah In Tom McCarthy’s […]

President Chávez presented his annual report on activities carried out in 2011 and his program for 2012 to the Venezuelan Parliament. After thoroughly carrying out the formalities required by this important activity, he addressed the official state authorities, members of parliament from all parties, and supporters and opposition members who had come to the Assembly […]

a This is the full-text of the introductory remarks made by the author at the Fourth Anuradha Ghandy Memorial Lecture delivered by Arundhati Roy on 20th January 2012 at St Xavier’s College, Mumbai. I woke up this morning to the chirping sounds of the swallows.  Arundhati Roy seems to have brought in those love-birds that […]

CUBA was forced to fight for its existence facing an expansionist power, located a few miles from its coast, and which was proclaiming the annexation of our island, which was destined to fall into its lap like a ripe fruit. We were condemned not to exist as a nation. Within the glorious legions of patriots […]

One state or two?  Boycott of Israeli goods or goods from the settlements?  Is the lobby the genesis of American wrongdoing in Palestine or is it imperialism?  The questions — regarding vision, strategy, and analysis — produce sharp cleavages on the Left.  Indeed, generally ones much deeper than they need to be.  And they remain […]

Sasha Lilley: Protests against Wall Street have inspired many people to move their money from big banks to smaller banks and credit unions and encourage others to do the same.  Why might you be skeptical of this effort? Doug Henwood: There are several reasons.  First of all, I think a lot of the big banks […]

In circles close to the former Zapatero administration, attempts have been made to represent former Prime Minister Zapatero as the politician who “sacrificed himself to save Spain,” comparing him to former German Chancellor Schröder who, though aware that he would antagonize his electoral base with his clearly neoliberal policies, went ahead with them, for he […]

Below is a statement by the UNAC CC on the assassination of Iranian scientists and the growing threat of war against Iran. Also, UNAC members participated in a national conference call on Tuesday with many other antiwar and Iranian groups.  The meeting called for demonstrations on February 4 to protest the threat of war against […]

Americans wonder who will be president next January; Germans are still uncertain who will live in Berlin’s presidential mansion this February.  Its current resident, Christian Wulff, has been under strong pressure to do just the same as his predecessor did — and resign! For weeks the media have attacked Wulff with angry charges of corruption […]

A young veteran was just arrested for murdering homeless people in Los Angeles.  Regardless whether he is actually guilty, a large number of terrible acts have been committed by returning veterans traumatized from the war.  None of the studies of which I’m aware accounts for such costs (including the cost of imprisoning them) in the […]

  Jeremy Salt: I don’t think there’s any doubt at all that a large number of military, of civilians, have been killed by armed gangs and by defectors.  So, what we actually need to do is to disaggregate these (casualty) figures.  How many people have been killed by the Syrian Army?  How many of them […]

Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. | Print

Experience firsthand the change sweeping through Latin America in the areas of food sovereignty, indigenous resistance, climate justice, and human rights through a trip to Bolivia or Venezuela this summer. Delegation to Bolivia: Food Sovereignty, Indigenous Resistance, and Climate Justice (May 29-June 9, 2012) We will be celebrating indigenous resistance and exploring food sovereignty issues […]

At yesterday’s meeting I saw the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, absolutely calm and composed, completely indifferent to Yankee threats, confident in his people’s capacity to confront any aggression and in the efficacy of Iran’s arms, which are in large part produced by Iranians themselves, for the purpose of imposing on aggressors an impossibly high cost. […]

Yesterday I had the satisfaction of having a pleasant conversation with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. I had not seen him since 2006, more than five years ago, when he visited our country to participate in the 14th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement of Countries in Havana. During the summit, Cuba was elected for the second time as […]

The Great Depression of the 1930s saw the outbreak of a multitude of radical social movements on the Left and on the Right — or ones that were simply sui generis like the “Share Our Wealth” campaign launched by the fiery Louisiana populist politician Huey P. Long, Jr.  Long came from a poor pinewoods parish […]

  The International Longshore and Warehouse Union is waging a battle against union-busting.  ILWU Local 21 in Longview, Washington is under attack by a giant consortium, EGT, which has built a $200 million grain terminal and is running it as a scab operation.  This directly violates the port agreement with ILWU which has had jurisdiction […]

With the war in Iraq now officially over and the Occupy Wall Street movement less visible, life in New York was expected to return to normal.  Instead, several recent passersby in Manhattan’s financial district have reported seeing thousands of deceased Iraqi civilians taking up residence at Zuccotti Park.  The park served for two months in […]